Does the AI get bonus to emergency FTL escape chance and cooltime?

[Kryndude]

Why do I always get the feeling that the AI gets to escape faster and more reliably? Like right now, I just attacked an AI fleet with triple its fleet power and better equipment (I did give them 16% boost to every combat stats so that evens things out) and somehow it managed to escape with 8 corvette losses while I lost 12 corvettes and 2 battleships. Okay, maybe 1% increase to combat stats per 10 years is a bit too much, but even without it I remember quite a few times when I was sure the AI escaped before 30 days into the battle.

 

[Kryndude]

Any ship that takes hull damage and is already below 50% health has a chance to disengange. If that did happen to all ships in a fleet an emergency retreat happens to that fleet. That can of course happen at any time.

So just reduce your fire power to not always reduce the health of all the enemy ships so fast and the ai will not retreat that fast.

That should solve your issue ;-).

I didn't know such mechanic existed. Thank you for telling. I have an additional question tho; by 'a chance to disengage' do you mean each ship gets a single shot at escape, or does it rolls the dice every tick of game calculation?

 

[beckermt]

I didn't know such mechanic existed. Thank you for telling. I have an additional question tho; by 'a chance to disengage' do you mean each ship gets a single shot at escape, or does it rolls the dice every tick of game calculation?

Every time a ship is hit by an attack below 50% hull (if that is the right number) it has a chance to disengage. This is why very high damage hits can be nice, because they will give ships less chances to escape before being destroyed.
On the other hand, lots of small hits will "force" a ship to disengage earlier, potentially taking it out of the battle faster.

All ships have a huge bonus to disengage in their own territory. Usually, the player is on the attack, so it can feel like the AI has a big advantage to disengage chance (because it does). But not because it's an AI.
Also, don't forget to avoid the No Retreat War Doctrine, if you don't want to lose ships.