Make planetary exploration contracts "automatic" like the speed and distance records

[Patrick Kerbivan]

I just started up a new career game on 1.0 this afternoon and accepted a contract for a Mun flyby. I overengineered a bit and wound up having enough fuel to not only fly by but also orbit and land, forgetting that in doing so I cheat myself out of the rewards for the standard exploration contract (orbit, science from orbit, land, science from surface). In .90 those exploration contracts for the Mun and Minmus were the low-hanging fruit that really got my space program off the ground, especially when I was playing on higher difficulties. Now that we have the precedent of those automatic rewards for more generic accomplishments, could we get the planetary exploration milestones included?

[Armchair Rocket Scientist]

I just started up a new career game on 1.0 this afternoon and accepted a contract for a Mun flyby. I overengineered a bit and wound up having enough fuel to not only fly by but also orbit and land, forgetting that in doing so I cheat myself out of the rewards for the standard exploration contract (orbit, science from orbit, land, science from surface). In .90 those exploration contracts for the Mun and Minmus were the low-hanging fruit that really got my space program off the ground, especially when I was playing on higher difficulties. Now that we have the precedent of those automatic rewards for more generic accomplishments, could we get the planetary exploration milestones included?

Hmm... In real life, something like this would generally be considered an extended mission, which would be a separate contract.

Is there anything preventing you from, once you realize you can perform an extended mission on Minmus, going back to KSC and accepting the "explore Minmus" contract?

[Patrick Kerbivan]

I'm not absolutely certain, but I had discarded a few contracts when the flyby contract appeared without the explore, and if memory serves the explore contracts would usually show up right away if they were available at all. I don't know what all the tweaks made to contracts in 1.0 are, but it seems like the exploration contract just wasn't available yet. Perhaps the flyby is now a sort of prerequisite, but if that's the case it seems like it's punishing the efficient to not allow you to take them both on in one flight.

[Tw1]

This is a flaw I've seen in many computer games- where the player takes the initative, and does something themselves, the game does not recognise it, and later instructs the player to do the exact same thing.

Squad walked straight into this one, with the way they've used the contract system.

[TothAval]

could be handled by being able to manually request the specific contract on a certain celestial body via the infoscreen in map view or via an additional option in mission control.

i also added this suggestion in the QoL list i am currently making

[Mr. Scruffy]

I agree with the OP - these contracts should be auto-active.