I just started playing this game a few weeks ago, but there are some weird behavior with the Gryphon when loading it with any ballistic weapons the Ai will favor going into the range of the ballistic weapons even if there are only vulcans. I specifically loaded a Gryphon with max range missiles (squall MLRS, medium and small harpoons), but the AI would always charge into the range of its ballistic weapons even though its main weapons severely out ranged the enemy. When I removed all of the ballistic weapons and only used the missiles the AI then maintained optimal range.
I do understand that some players use pd weapons as main weapons so that would be the reason for AI to get into range, but in this case or maybe this is the case with all missile focused ships is that the AI heavily favors maintaining energy and ballistic weapon range over missile range. I do not know if the AI considers which weapons are intended to be used as main weapons, if it does then this can be adjusted for missile based main weapon ships.