I encountered a flight of approx six Nupe 11s in a mission last night. They were all right on the deck and providing a spectacular display of diving and looping aerobatics. I got two of them, they made no attempt to defend themselves or fight back. The AI Halbs, at the same altitude, behaved far better.
I have noticed this, that when I select auto-level in my Halb at too low a throttle-setting, it will porpoise indefinitely. Auto-level is, effectively, the AI taking control of my plane.
So, it tries to maintain a specific altitude setting and will hunt for it. When auto-level is selected the nose usually drops. The AI then tries to regain the correct altitude with a heavy nose-up maneouver, but low-throttle and too much nose-up causes a stall and the plane falls back below the required altitude. So it noses up again. Repeat ad-infinitum.
Low-powered planes like the Nupe 11, when going to zero altitude, are, I believe, experiencing this loop issue. As soon as they hit the trigger-altitude the AI responds with a heavy nose-up, loses speed, drops below the trigger-point again and repeats, ad-infinitum.
Is there no way to code a solution for this specific behaviour? Eg:
"If plane attains altitude-X plane goes into level flight until speed-X is attainted then begins very very shallow climb until extra altitude-X is attained then normal AI combat mode is reactivated"
They might become sitting ducks for a short time under such parameters, but they're sitting ducks already plus they look incredibly stupid.