Unexpected surge in patrol flights

[mats0916@rogers.com]

Just started playing the Debt of Honor scenario from the Steam workshop
I set up two BARCAP patrol zones with 4 x F-14 for each zone. Seemed to work out ok
I also set up a CAP patrol zone for my F/A-18 assigning the mission to keep 8 A/C at any given time out of 48.
Turned out the majority of my F/A-18 took off for this mission except 10. Something definitely amiss here.

Attached is a screen shot of the debacle, saved scenario in the next comment:

[mats0916@rogers.com]

Save file attached

[TyphoonFr]

Hello,
The problem is between your chair and your keyboard I think [:D]

9 of your planes are not armed and "VFA-15 Valions # 6" does not take off so much a second plane is available since you request flights of 2 planes,you want 8 aircraft in flight, and you have 19 flights of 2 planes, or 38 planes.

[TyphoonFr]

Since your backup, I recalled all the F18s that took off, I designated all the F18 of your CAP mission.
1:30, later, when all the F-18 was available again, I all assigned to your mission CAP and all is pass as in the plan only 8 planes took off.
I have also replayed the scenario since the beginning and only 8 planes took to the air.

The only way to reproduce what happened to you is to disable the "1 / 3rd rule" and leave "0" in the number of units you want to keep in the air (Try to keep 0 units of each class on-station). In this case all the available planes take off respecting the size of the flight.

[mats0916@rogers.com]

Thanks C. for taking your time to test play my save file.

ORIGINAL: TyphoonFr
Since your backup, I recalled all the F18s that took off, I designated all the F18 of your CAP mission.
1:30, later, when all the F-18 was available again, I all assigned to your mission CAP and all is pass as in the plan only 8 planes took off.
I have also replayed the scenario since the beginning and only 8 planes took to the air.

The only way to reproduce what happened to you is to disable the "1 / 3rd rule" and leave "0" in the number of units you want to keep in the air (Try to keep 0 units of each class on-station). In this case all the available planes take off respecting the size of the flight.

This is just exactly it. In my screenshot you can see that the 1/3rd rule was unchecked and I had 8 in the box for Try to keep... units of each class on station. Still all my assets took off (not expected) except the Unavailable ones and the lone trailer (per design and expected).

I don't remember if I changed the above settings before or after designating the F/A-18s to the mission or not. And should that matter?

Anyhoo. I will try to replay from a previous autosave if I can find one and see if it happens again.

Thanks

Edit: clarification