Is this something that you can reproduce in vanilla? I have a feeling it might be mod-related in some way. The one way I can think it might happen is if fighters are the only thing *deployed* (not just visible), but that's an unlikely/fringe scenario.
Yeah they aren't the only things deployed they are part of most ships cruiser and above, anything else you can think of that could cause this? It was mostly during the simulator tests that I see this. It is also more prevalent on station load outs, so maybe targeting works differently for modules.
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As far as Vanilla related experiences, this wasn't really a Vanilla suggestion.
It was more of a mod support suggestion so sorry if I did not get that across I'll put something in the title indicating it as such. (Not sure where those would go other than here so sorry if this is the inappropriate place for such things).
I'm sure the current AI works great for Vanilla in the majority of scenarios, but its pretty terrible for my mod and if there is anything I can do about it I want to try. Hence the suggestion for a new tag that would perform that function and provide that kind of behavior for Vanilla if it ever proved necessary. I'm not suggesting changing the current tag though, especially if it works well as is. However, part of the reason this would impact more than my mod is that super weapons which operate off of long cooldowns are currently pretty impossible to properly implement with this behavior in place. Even in Vanilla, wasting a minute cooldown weapon on a fighter would be frustrating.
Most strike weapons in my mod are the primary sources of flux, other than damage, so its like using 10% of your shields and a large portion of your potential damage impulse pre-battle to overkill something that will be completely replaced in ~10 seconds.
Strike weapons in Vanilla are far less limiting and can play a more dual-oriented role against fighters, so it makes sense for them to default to fighters when nothing else is present- especially since fighters are also much stronger in Vanilla and I'm guessing for larger groups pd would not be enough on its own.
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Bombers never used Atropos against enemy fighters in my playthrough.
It hit fighters and debris sometimes, but the target was always a ship.
I meant ships equipped with those weapons not bombers, bombers I don't seem to notice having that behavior as far as I can tell.