While the VCA faders are really helpful for this functionality, they are more useful for controlling groups. To use them for controlling the relative volume of each track makes for too many faders. The relative automation lane is very helpful, but I don’t believe it quite has maximized the expected behavior user experience.
Here’s what I would expect. Feel free to disagree. The default volume lane is where people are going to set their rough mix levels and begin writing their automation. Once they are happy with that automation, they are going to want to “lock it in” and control/audition the overall volume without committing to additional written automation. When I am in “read” mode and click the “relative” option from the automation modes, I expect the relative lane to open up, locking the first lanes automation greyed out behind it - the way it does in relative latch mode, for example. From here, still in read mode, I would expect to be able to control the fader without drawing automation in the same way that the default volume fader works in read mode when no automation is written.
This would create a more cohesive user experience across the different methods of automation and intentions for adjusting track volume.
Lately I’ve been using the trim window to accomplish this, but their isn’t a way for me to grab that from my hardware controller.