I agree completely and support

/signed

Empire Tree, Group Jumps and the awful fleet formation.  Fix them, I dare you. 

I usually solve this by changing my camera angle, i dunno if its superstition or some kind of weird programming deal but it seems like changing my camera angle often opens up paths on the screen and suddenly the ships go, 'Oh, now I see where to go!'. I've always wondered about it, I notice if I sit in one angle indefinitely at that angle there are ships on top of one another and nothing moves, so the moment I change the angle and as the camera pans it reveals the gaps in 3d space and the AI responds as if it's seeing what I'm seeing. 

EDIT: Also, I usually group warp my fleet and then when roughly the bulk of them get lined up I change to single warp.

EDIT 2: As far as caps turning 180 I've noticed it during groups but not on individuals unless an enemy cap has disabled its abilities or maybe taunted it? I'm not really sure, sometimes spamming orders keeps them on the level, but I generally get frustrated with giving orders and having them disobeyed (like telling a colonizing cap to colonize a planet and having it leave for the edge of the gravity well because there's not enough anti-matter or hostile culture or bombardment) especially late in the game with lag, I've seen some really weird things happen and I feel certain I never issued orders for some of the craziest things, like half of an assault force warping off to another planet....ok, I could see if I accidentally forgot I was still selected my fleet and clicking on another gravity well but why did only half of them go? <(0_o)>

It is not taunt or a disable, I assure you....while this problem affects human players, it is most profound for the AI, which is really dumb and doesn't retreat in a timely manner...as such, it's not uncommon to see AI cap ships flee after their entire fleet is gone, and so many times I see them do the double 180 and get killed...

I used to think it was just the AI, but it happens to humans too, a handful of my LAN games with a close friend were decided solely because a high level cap was retarded and wouldn't jump out like it should, and lag was definitely not the issue there...have had it happen on ICO too, last night my eradica would go to the edge, do a quarter turn away from the phase lane, and just sit there indefinitely...had it happen three gravity wells in a row and if it weren't for repulse and some friendly repair bays I would have lost my titan...all because of pathfinding issues...

Devs, this is a serious issue that affects human and AI, SP and MP...please fix....

Unfortunately it isn't just group jumping, even individual jumps can have this problem (though group jumping certainly makes it more prone to happen)....

I also find that Advent ships are the worse, but maybe that's just a skewed perception since I play them the most....

Its incredibly frustrating to watch... they have ALL that space (in the broadest sense of the word) and jumping caps/titans behave like they're crammed in and are confused as to which way would be best to jump out BUT OH WAIT it wants to do a 180 degree twirl first! nvm those 150 bombers pounding at it....

turn speed on caps also needs to be increased

I've been adjusting some of this internally for a future update. It's not going to be a miracle fix, but it should be a little better.