So I’m doing the DPD w/ the 3 Doombot minions as first wave.
The Doombot is never using “Temporal Wave”, even though he has 30 Black AP.
So what’s the deal? Does he only have a 5%(?) chance to fire it off if he has the AP?
I’ve seen this happen, and also wondered what causes it.
One thing that will cause a goon ability not to fire is having no basic tiles of the right color available, but I think I’ve seen the exact decision you describe without that being the case.
This happened to me during yesterday’s ddq. I made sure to keep the doombot around for last and to leave black tiles on the board. Eventually it started dropping black countdowns, but it still had 12 or so AP banked by the time the wave ended. The same thing can happen with Maggia Dons. Frustrating if you accidentally cascade into the next round and get creamed by a strong ability.
Interesting. Weird, but interesting. I’ve often wondered why Maggia Dons were such theoretically dangerous pushovers. I wonder if this is intended design.
Well this minion, only has 2 powers. Green Shock ___, and Black Temporal ???.
Of course, by the time you nuke the 1st wave, it’s banked 30 Black AP for the 2nd wave.
3** HT then gets off 1-2 Infernos before I can kill him, so there’s 6-10 Inferno tiles on the board, while I nuke the rest of wave 2 and then wave 3.
Certain enemy goons seem to be coded to only use their abilities in certain fashions- I.E. as soon as possible, only if other abilities can’t be used, or only every so many turns, etc. The doombot does appear to have weird instructions to follow, but I expect it is working as intended. Basically, the waves are indeed set up to bank AP for the characters to use against you. 
You can combat this with AP stealing from characters like OBW, and you can focus them first of course. You can also spend the wave banking your own AP to nuke them before he can Inferno multiple times, or have a character ready to stun him.