I know you from the CoD threads and understand your complaints.
I felt the same way playing Bad Company2 coming from CoD4, but trust me BF3 is far and away much improved from BC2. You can at least strafe run now!
The biggest difference between cod and bf games weapon wise is that bf is a bit more realistic in the fact that all the weapons arent lasers. There is bullet drop and random spread to contend with whereas in cod the bullet hits wherever your crosshairs are no matter if its 10m or 1,000m. LOL
When sniping you will also have to hold over and lead moving targets at longer ranges. With practice this becomes second nature, but remember that each rifle has its own bullet drop characteristics.
For me the red dot sight is must to have on anything other than a sniper rifle. It has faster target acquisition and the dot is small enough for accurate fire at longer ranges. The heavy barrel will increase your accuracy and range but also increases recoil. The foregrip has been rendered virtually useless now with patches, I prefer using the flash hider as it helps with vertical recoil. Remember to fire in short controlled bursts with full auto weapons with maybe an exception being belt fed LMG's. They tend to settle in after several rounds especially if using the bipod. Personally the bipod doesnt work well with my run and gun play style so I usually avoid it.
And no the beginner weapons are actually pretty good, other than the snipers. I prefer bolt action snipers and use the straight pull bolt unlock.
Try playing TDM on Noshar Canals and if you find it takes to many hits to kill someone try hardcore. You can usually find me on this server a few times during the day:
http://battlelog.battlefield.com/bf...9358-653762bef88d/RUF-Hardcore-TDM-400-Ticks/