Experimenting with weapon conflagrations, I made a really cool beam weapon that creates a long line of laser blasts that only last for a split second in front of the weapon, so there's instantly a line reaching about halfway across the screen (or as long as you want, really). I managed to get the AI to use it by setting its speed so high that its instantly off radar by the time you see it, but I coordinated its starting position so that you always see the first blast appearing right in front of the ship.
The bad news is that it doesn't actually damage anything. Oh well.
