May I suggest to move the slider so that when it is popped out, the knob/slider portion is just below the mouse cursor (provided there is space).

I will try to add this.

May I suggest to move the slider so that when it is popped out, the knob/slider portion is just below the mouse cursor (provided there is space). That might be a decent enough compromise that increases usability of those knobs. VS already does something like this with other controls in that area such as the dropdowns:

Affinity:

VS:

Stroke dropdown:

Edit: The slider bar is on the long side, but I can see why with the level of precision available there (and that has been a good thing in my experience when working in inches)... another observation as for what slows things down is when using the slider, it's very precise... but because I can't use scroll wheel at all, it's very difficult to work in increments. It almost always requires I use direct input. So I think that's the reason it feels like that function would feel missing.

Corner property in the Contextual Toolbar doesn't respond to the scroll wheel either. Could

All scroll wheel use in the contextual panel is disabled, to avoid modifying these inadvertently (has been requested long ago).

I will check the other things.