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[Alex]

Thank you for the savefile, I really appreciate it! It's really about the only way to be able to have a good look at an AI issue - video is better than screenshots, but very often still not enough to get a good idea.

Haven't seen the "crossing line of fire" issue yet, but I'm definitely seeing the "hanging back seemingly without a good reason" behavior - investigating!

[huggs]

Not saying that the maneuvering logic can't be improved, but this is kind of an edge case here when the frigates' available options are limited by other frigates in close proximity and constrained by the short weapon range.

No, that's really not the case. Well, it will definitely happen sometime, but it is not the issue I am talking about.

There are plenty of cases where there are no ships next to the ship that starts blocking. E.g. it may be moving to avoid incoming fire, but it could have done so away from line of fire instead of into line of fire.

I'm also taking about the case where the blocking ship is not actually firing on anything.

I'm also talking about the case where the blocking ship is blocking, and moving parallel to your line of fire, when it could instead have been off to either side by one ship width and then move parallel to your line of fire towards or away from the target.

I'm talking about the case where 1-2 ships are engaging  the same capital ship, but they place themselves to block your line of fire instead of being off to either side or behind the target.

And yes, I am also talking about the case where 6 Brawlers are actually engaging your target, and are filling up all the space around the target. So there's nowhere else for the Brawlers to go you might claim. My point is that for the 1-2 ships that are in your line of fire, never engaging in the first place, and/or disengaging and going anywhere else on the entire battle area would be an improvement, because replacing 2 Brawlers shooting at the target with 1 Paragon shooting at the target is a big improvement.

[huggs]

Haven't seen the "crossing line of fire" issue yet, but I'm definitely seeing the "hanging back seemingly without a good reason" behavior - investigating!

By the way, I frequently lower Paragon shields and hit X to stop shooting in order to get double ship speed until I get a bit closer than maximum range. I am not saying that the Brawlers move into position to block only when my weapons are on hold. I just mention this because perhaps the AI are sampling such information infrequently or that toggling weapon hold from time to time will mask their understanding that I am actually firing at other times.

[NikoTheGuyDude]

Haven't seen the "crossing line of fire" issue yet, but I'm definitely seeing the "hanging back seemingly without a good reason" behavior - investigating!

By the way, I frequently lower Paragon shields and hit X to stop shooting in order to get double ship speed until I get a bit closer than maximum range. I am not saying that the Brawlers move into position to block only when my weapons are on hold. I just mention this because perhaps the AI are sampling such information infrequently or that toggling weapon hold from time to time will mask their understanding that I am actually firing at other times.

As a side note, the AI should really learn when to drop shields and get the 0-flux boost to get closer one of these days. I get it's probably hard as hell to hit the fine balance where they're not suicidally greedy but also not too timid, but it'd be really nice.

[Alex]

Took me a while to figure out what was happening here, but: finally did. The issue was - in broad strokes - that among other things, the AI wants to meet certain criteria in terms of how many friendly/enemy ships are in front of or behind it. In practical terms, this helps with the formation of something resembling battle lines - a sort of equilibrium where the AI on at least one side feels like it's not a great idea to get out in front of its allies.

This is what was happening here; thank you again for uploading the savefile, by the way - extremely useful! The fix is to make ships with an eliminate order - or a reckless personality - disregard this particular consideration, the same way they disregard concerns about being flanked, since it's just a different expression of the same concern. In general, it's not necessarily a bad decision to keep these ships back - even these short-range LP Brawlers; they suffer a lot of attrition if they *do* rush forward - so it feels like giving the decision to the player (via the eliminate command, and "full assault") is the right call.

(... and, still not seeing the "crossing in front of line of fire" issue. Possibly some other in-dev AI changes factoring in?)

[huggs]

You're welcome. I'm glad I could help. And thank you for looking into the issue!

[vok3]

(... and, still not seeing the "crossing in front of line of fire" issue. Possibly some other in-dev AI changes factoring in?)

I don't understand how this is possible.  I see it in at least half of all the battles I fight, with pretty much the whole possible spread of tactics and officer personalities / fleet doctrines.  I've seen it with frigates assigned to escort cruisers, with frigates / destroyers set to have specific kill orders, with frigates / destroyers responding to engage or concentrate fire orders, with frigates / destroyers just flying on their own, frigates with officers, frigates without officers, frigates under full assault, frigates under no orders at all, default fleet doctrine, fleet doctrine shifted towards "aggressive", with my flagship being anything and everything from a Hammerhead to laser cruiser to a modded broadsider battleship to an Onslaught, whether I'm using ballistics or pulse energy or rocket volleys or lasers - I've seen friendly frigates fly deliberately into my lasers that I was manually firing at a target and sit there, blocking the beam, taking the damage (no I did NOT stop firing), until they blew up. 

Ok, one correction, I haven't seen it with Timid or Cautious doctrine or officers.  Because I don't use those. 

I just really wonder how you go about playing this game that results in not producing this behavior.

[Helldiver]

Same here. Any battle that involves more than half a dozen ships and ships of different sizes ends up as a circus of smaller ships blocking larger ships from firing guns, even when trying to use orders to move them aside and regardless of officers. When controlling a capital ship I spend more time waiting for my own ships to move out of the way to shoot at targets or having to try to "snipe" through gaps between them than actually doing damage. AI in control of larger ships or ballistic close support ships deals no damage for most of a battle because it just waits unable to shoot due to friendly fire risk.

[Not a Pirate]

It is for this reason that I almost never buy frigates, and salvage them instead.   I find a couple of them, with near suicidal officers, set to escort my larger ship will have them realizing their expendability if they do "cross the streams" so to speak.

A strangely enjoyable part of the game...

A quick shot of Tequila and a good laugh later and the officer and I are back in the salvage rig selecting what new or different ship he or she wants and joking about launch tubes, exhausts, and things going right up 'em.

Arrrhhhhh.....Friendly fire....not just a terrestrial thing then.