I can initiate combat all the time, but that's because I use sneak, and then when I get into a good position I press enter and I can start combat how I like. If you walk in range of the enemy, then yeah all of your enemies will attack first.
Another thing you might do is wait around the corner, start combat, and then walk around and shoot and I guess you won't need sneak, but it would be difficult in some cases, and the other problem is you lose "focus" so your aim will likely be bad. So I recommend putting some points into sneak.
But otherwise maybe it would be a good idea to add something like sequence, so players with higher agility get to fire/move first.
Also I hope the repair issue is modified too, I think a lot of other people are voicing their concerns about it so something will probably be modified in upcoming patches, since the whole reason they were implemented (to prevent players from amassing too much wealth) apparently isn't even working as intended according to Styg's patch notes. I hope he doesn't decide to increase the durability loss, because that would suck the fun out of the game by making ranged combat virtually impossible or extraordinarily irritating!