RE: Looping phrases (training error)

My guess is that your default response was setting an exclusive "topic", and was the only default response for that topic.

If they is an active topic, then the default response with a matching topic will be used.

If a topic is set to be "exclusive" then only response that have that topic will be used. So if your default response sets an exclusive topic, and is the only response with that topic, then it will always be return after the topic is active.