wow, thank you, i have been on this site for over 18 years, i should of just asked for help sooner
i feel a bit stupid for searching multiple times these past two decades
i thought myself to be very good with tech, working in web dev since the 90s, familiar with many of the cms platforms and past 5 years with magento 2
and it never occurred to me (as a user), to use a wildcard in a keyword search on a website, +requiredwords and "specific combinations" sure, and wildcards in code/terminal/filebrowser etc fine, but not in a search field on a website.
oh well, clearly this was my problem for not reading the docs (or asking the question), though i have definitely met another speedo fan (in the flesh) and we were talking about where we go for porn, he knew this site (which alone was something i rarely come across) and commented on the same issue.
genuine question, is there a reason it is not "on by default"? server load or something?