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[Sarissofoi]

Like in title. AI ships getting to close to enemy ships and blocking line of fire for allies. Sometimes bumping or pushing each other.

Spoiler

[close]

The small ships also consistently getting to close to enemy for their own good.
Anyone else noticed this?

[Drazan]

They especially love to do this while fighting a station. I have some Dominators intentionally specked to do long range damage. But they always burn drive closer to the station, just to block others (including onslaughts) from firing.

[Draba]

Yes, that's been a bugbear of mine for a while.
Even a steady officer beam only ship likes to get into knife fighting range against overloaded enemies.

[Daynen]

That was actually a fairly tame example.  I seem to constantly have my entire fleet circling in front of me when I'm trying to shoot something.  Escorts INSIST on being closer to the enemy than I am, no matter what extreme ranged artillery I give them and station battles are a horse race to kill the station before my whole fleet drifts up into coitus range and tries to get a front row seat to the impending splash damage from the explosion.  Sometimes I swear they actively protect enemies from me, even when they're loading with only point defense and pilums and I'm rocking large ballistics with ammo feeders.

[Nick XR]

I've had real issues with a Radiant and Paragon both trying to attack a target, both have their shields up. The Radiant could get shots off with its main 5 large weapons but instead turns into the Paragon and sort of pushes it. 

It might be pathological in nature with a Paragon and Radiant (both BIG boys when their shields are up), but it does happen often. 

[Sutopia]

I prefer it remain this way so my flagship monitor can drag 120DP worth of enemy attention.

[WeiTuLo]

I find that the monitors like to block my ships at times. Helps preserve the other ships at times, but also gets in the way.

[Lucky33]

Dual Flaks have 400 range. Arbalests 700. There is no way for Hounds to not get between destroyers and their target. They are doing their best to not get stuck. Do not assign ships with so much difference in range to the same target. Including Escort order if weapon range of the larger ship doesn't prevent possibility for the smaller ships to engage directly.

[Gennadios]

Dual Flaks have 400 range. Arbalests 700. There is no way for Hounds to not get between destroyers and their target. They are doing their best to not get stuck. Do not assign ships with so much difference in range to the same target. Including Escort order if weapon range of the larger ship doesn't prevent possibility for the smaller ships to engage directly.

Granted I hadn't played SS in over six months until the current release, but I don't remember it being this bad in the previous version. My playstyle keeps me from investing too many points into pure combat skills, so the past few versions I've mostly been autopiloting carriers while giving orders, I've spent alot of time watching how the AI behaves.

Larger ships were much better at spacing out when focusing fire on a single target in the previous versions. I've seen really stupid collisions between two ships when there was nothing else in the vicinity. It's almost as if both ships are simultaneously not aware that the other exists and are trying to fit into the same space, probably trying to reach the optimal follow vector.

Smaller ships would previously stay out of the other ship's firing lines because they seemed to be better at maneuvering behind larger ships to hit the engines or sneak behind shields, which doesn't seem to be happening much. It's mostly just hover at safe point and make the occasional probing attack until somebody's flux starts going up.

New updates always break the AI in some way, but it's particularly regressive with this update.

[Lucky33]

AI logic was reworked compared to 0.91. It is more opportunistic now. And, in some cases, just buggy. However it is still impossible for AI to comprehend complex tactical ideas like: "I want my Hounds to stay back and move forward only when there are fighters/missiles incoming". Under escort order they act more like the station drones by with a bit more leeway.

[Sarissofoi]

I think the problem with them going to close is because they aim at the center of enemy ship. So it become clearly visible problem in case of bigger ships that have plenty of ship between their centre and attacking ship guns(and God forbid the centre of the attacked ship is put in some other point that middle of it). Also a reason why they often sometimes(still) get caught in explosion.

[Lucky33]

That was always the case.

[Low Settings]

On the bright side, when this happens it usually ends up as a death for the surrounded ship. Unless ofcourse it's a radiant and it teleports away..

[Helldiver]

Do not assign ships with so much difference in range to the same target.

This happens regardless of orders. It has been happening for ages and every time people bring up the same fake excuses for this horrid AI behaviour (orders when none are given, officer personality when there's no officer involved).
AI ships blocking not only each other's lines of fire but the player's too is one of these infuriating issues that makes using anything except long range AI ships in your fleet a frustrating nightmare, especially in a solo game where all you fight with and against is this AI. That's if your ships don't randomly decide to move ahead and block your shooting for no reason even when armed with long range guns and already being in range.

It's an issue that is omnipresent and yet never becomes any more acceptable with time. It happens to some degree in any battle where more than one ship fights a common target (or even separate targets that are near each other) and I frequently see capitals and cruisers in my fleet not getting to shoot anything during much of a battle because some ally or other is blocking them from shooting at all times.

[Thaago]

Its definitely not ideal that smaller ships are blocking larger ones. On the other hand, its not all bad: if a smaller ship goes in front of me, then I can safely vent my half full flux without fear of being tach lanced in the face. And if I can vent while the enemy can't, then I win.

I agree that it can be difficult to get the AI to do exactly what we want. But its not impossible to tell small ships to go for the flanks and leave the center clear for larger ones: what I was doing during my cap + wolfpack high tech playthrough was that I had half my frigates assigned to group 1, half to group 2. Cap goes up the middle. Press 1, right click to put a rally up and far left. Press 2, right click to put rally up and far right. After contact with the enemy move or remove the points as needed (once the enemy is roughly between the frigates forces is ideal, if the enemy goes down the center). When the enemy is in position removing the rallies by clicking full assault is my usual go to.

Adjust strategy as needed: if an enemy scouting frigate/destroyer wanders into sight range by itself, pounce on it with a triple eliminate from a group.