While this is going completely off-topic, a video is usually very useful when talking about AI issues. I'm not sure there's a problem here, though - I just tired the stock "Strike" Wolf variant, and it uses the AM blaster it has well.
If you're talking about a loadout that's got several blasters where firing them requires almost all of the flux capacity, that's just not going to work well in the hands of the AI, because it requires a radically different tactical approach. If they're in an alternating group, though, that should still work reasonably well (see the stock Afflictor), as long as you don't expect it to make long-term plans of the "I'm going to save up flux, close in, and let 'em have it" variety. Since it doesn't do that.
All in all, I think it's a question what your expectations of the AI are. Regardless of how much it's tweaked, some loadouts will always work better than others in AI hands, and some won't work well. Discovering what does and doesn't work and then using that knowledge is part of the game.
(You could take that line of thinking way too far, of course. If the AI had trouble using autocannons, that'd be a problem. The AI failing somewhat with loadouts requiring special tactics, on the other hand, is to be expected. It almost literally can't
not; it's designed to work best with more balanced variants.)
On the topic of orders in general, is there any option to have ships just follow others. I try and use the escort commands and ships rigidly lock to my flanks and seem to be really.... fidgety... Constantly moving back and forth in the general area of just behind my ship to either side of me. It's really weird to watch.
Yeah, I hear that. It bugs me, too - not so much the overall behavior and the effectiveness of the escorting ship, but just the way it moves to do it. That fidgeting just doesn't look good. I'll probably end up taking another look at that behavior at some point.
Suggestion:
When an objective is flagged with 'Defend', at least one of the ships tasked with defending should actually SIT ON the objective to prevent it being captured.
Preferably this station keeping task would be issued to the largest/toughest/least manoeuvrable ship out of the group assigned to defend.
Yes, the least maneuverable ship of my frigate-only fleet should ignore it's ability to dodge incoming fire and instead take it like a capship.
That's just leading to more and more rules (Point: make it only apply to ships bigger than a certain size. Counter: but then what about frigate fleets?).
Personally I'm happy that the AI puts survival above objectives, to some degree.
But Alex mentioned that there will be some change with the upcoming .60 release, so let's wait how that turns out, hmm?
This is an interesting idea. I think it comes back to the overall theme that failing at trying something clever makes the AI look dumb instead. There are far too many scenarios where dedicating a ship to sit on the objective is tactically a bad idea, and being able to detect all of them reliably is impossible.
I think you could maybe make an argument for a "hold position" assignment, though. There's also the possibility for having officer character traits that govern how far from an assignment they stray. For example, if you put an officer that's a stickler for orders into a cruiser and assign them to a "defend", they might stick to it. Hmm.
