Hi
I have to say with better experience of pypilot that i use very low gain settings and I almost NEVER change them, and i think it adapt itself automatically very well ! When heading change quickly in hard back seas for example, pypilot corrects quickly too, even with low gains, but if heading is stable, he is just reacting very calmly.
On a long trip I used the same gains settings during weeks, from 8knots upwind to 40knots downwind with the seas states who belongs to, and pypilot was steering very (very !) well. I use higher gains only in very light winds when the boat is almost not manoeuvrable and needs big steering action to react. Most of the time, the power consumption is shown on the plugin between 2 and 6watts !