Hmm. Just checked the last check-in date for some of the related AI classes, and they're all from pre-release. I suppose it's possible another change elsewhere in the AI is affecting this, but I don't seem to remember messing with the broadside AI since then. I do recall making some AI bugfixes, but iirc they weren't broadside-related. But not 100% sure.
Is this definitely a "typical" battle you're seeing? I can just about see this happen as a rare worst-case scenario where everything goes badly. For example, at 1:00, it's *trying* to turn towards a broadside, but given the enemy's motion, it looks like it's turning to face it instead - you can see that when the relative motion changes, it's finally able to turn to broadside, although much too late to do any good.
Having a hard time figuring out what it's doing at 1:30 or 2:00, though, and not seeing anything at all like that on my end. Which is confounding, because the code involved should be the same for us both.
What I'm seeing on my end is probably closer to spending two-thirds of the time or more on-target, depending on how you count switching sides/time spent just out of range/etc. In a more generous interpretation of those, it spends probably 75% of the time lined up correctly.
For a somewhat more objective measurement, it beats that Dominator maybe 4 our of 5 times, usually with about half the hull left. When it does lose, it's very close, like in the video - but it's not due to broadside maneuvering being poor in that particular fight, it seems more due whether it's ever able to get breathing room to vent/dissipate or not. That stream of rockets applies a lot of pressure.
I'd also note that this Dominator, despite being the "worst" in terms of, ah, "apparent quality" I guess, is by far the toughest of the 3 simulator loadouts. The flux-free rocket pressure is hard to deal with for any AI ship. Running a few tests, the "Elite" Attrition beats both other loadouts without taking a single point of hull damage.
So - I'm not exactly sure what's going on here. Having run maybe 20-30 fights total, I haven't seen a single one that's like the one in the video, especially not the moments at 1:30 and 2:00, though I did see 1:00 a couple of times.
Did also find a bug! It seems like it decides to turn face-on towards an enemy once they're overloaded. Made a note to fix that up.
My best guess is that the AI on my side of things is somehow different, though I'm not entirely comfortable with that assessment, as, again, I did look at everything that seems to be involved and it dates to pre-release. All I can say right now is I'll definitely keep an eye on it.
And finally I noticed that the non PD medium and large weapons kept tracking the missiles while not firing on the enemy ship while in range! It wasn't a weapon grouping problem as you can see in the video, and I don't think that's the desired behavior when you made them follow the target while not in auto-fire.
That happens when it turns off autofire on those weapons due to flux, and they start tracking the "mouse" of the AI ship.
Probably not related, but I just noticed something funny about the autopilot in the video: Why is it flickering autofire on the non-missile weapon groups (often including the PD one) on and off, simultaneously, at seemingly random occasions?
Probably due to flux level changing. The logic there could use some work so it doesn't "flicker" when it repeatedly crosses a specific flux level threshold.
