Not really. It will sometimes stay in 5th and lock/unlock the torque converter.
Since you are buying a 2011, it will have the tranny temp gauge. Keep an eye on the gauge, if it climbs, pull it down a gear. Don't worry though, the Titan revs just fine and can run all day at the higher RPM.
I THINK and don't know for sure because I'm no expert you want to manually put the trans in 4th gear on the highway towing. This will give you the 3.36 ratio and more power going up hills and dealing with gradual inclines. The misleading part of Nissan website is saying it is like 4.10 gears when that is totally not true in 4th gear.
That is a loaded question. I love my T and wouldn't trade it for the world. Maybe some of the Titan owners that tow a lot can give you more insight and feedback of the Titan towing.
I went from a Ford Ranger 2wd w/4.0L v-6 which towed my 3500 lb set-up quite nice, but I still had to manually drop it down to 4th gear for the hills....Can you leave it in "D" and let the trans do it's own thing?...of course...BUT the the trans behaves very much like the trans in your present Ford, that is it will not downshift to 4th right away as the hills get steeper, it unlocks the converter first giving you that extra 3-4 hundred rpm...which in many cases is enough to clear the hill/grade.
The real issue is that most of the trans heat comes from the converter slipping, so if you manually downshift to 4th gear, the converter has a much easier time locking up and keeping the trans temps down.
My Ranger also had a 5 speed trans and I did the very same thing, manually dropping to 4th gear...in reality, I might have only saved myself 10-15 degs of trans temp rize, but since the trans is the most complicated/expensive part on almost any truck now-days many guys towing get a little "anal" about their temps and will gladly go that little extra effort...
How did my the Titan tow my old set-up compared to the Ranger(which I thought towed dang good) Awesome!
No on both accounts.....I had a custom install of a set of 3.73 gears installed, since I'm only 2wd I don't need to worry about matching gear ratios for a front diff...There are NO front diff custom gear ratio installs....
Trying and think of the 4.10 and 3.73 as what the final drive ratio is in 4th gear. The Titan has a tall overdrive gear and was not designed to tow in 5th, most because the fluid does not recirculate as quickly.
I tow 4000 to 6000 pound trailers through the mountains all the time without the lower gears no problem. I have towed a tandem axle trailer filled with green firewood up a steep gravel mountain road in low lock at 25 mph. I would not attempt it in your truck because I would be afraid of getting hurt or killed, not to mention breaking the truck. Yes it's an upgrade but we don't have duel rear wheels or anything with modern diesel power.
I think any brand of half ton will meet your towing requirements. What I would look at it the toque curve of the engines. The Titan makes it's power down low which is nice for towing. I think the tundra makes some decent power down low. the new Ford Ecoboost makes gobs of torque down low but there base NA V6 makes all it's power up high. I'm sure about the other engines out there. My truck is paid for and I have no plans for a new truck.