Oolite Bulletins

Last night I completed the Constrictor hunt for the first time in 1.80 [1] and found it disappointingly easy compared to in 1.77.1. I even went back and repeated the fight [2] with the same result (didn't even overheat my mil laser)

Thinking about this:
is it that I have got much better at combat? - Not likely
or
is it that it took me so much longer to rack up the required kills, given the new AI behaviour, that the mission now triggers much later and thus I'm in a much better ship (which I was) than previously [3].

I was therefore wondering what experiences others have had with this in 1.80 and if it is something else that could do with tweaking a bit.

[1] started from new Jameson; in Adder, worked up through CobraMkI, Moray, to an Asp; core ships only. Started it when I had the message.
[2] after removing cim's combat balance test mod in case it had affected the fight - it hadn't.
[3] mission was triggered just after I had defeated 7 Thargiods in witch-space (now that was a fight ).

I had my chance at 1.77.x version of constrictor, and I can say I wouldn't want "that" kind of fight for the first "official" mission of the game. I was quite baffled by its AI.
This might've been discussed elsewhere already, but I guess the best way to deal with this would be to choose a difficulty level "once" with the new commander start, and have it "stamped" on the savegames after (something a la "Piece of cake" up to "Damn, I'm good!" , or "Just a wanderer" to "You asked for it"). And to make it easier for the developers, it shouldn't change during the lifetime of a specific (set of) savegame(s), that is, it shouldn't be available after loading a saved game. Changing difficulty during one's career should definitely translate as a cheat.