What's going on with the "Explore _____" contracts?

[zarakon]

Before 1.0, I would reliably get the 4-part contracts to explore each world (orbit, science from space, land, science from surface).

But in my 1.0 career only about half of them have shown up so far. I got them for Duna, Ike, and Gilly, but not for Mun, Minmus, or Eve. There are also none available for anywhere else.

I've gotten "Fly by ____" for everything. I got "Orbit ___" contracts for Mun and Minmus but nowhere else. I got a "Land on ___" contract for the Mun, but nowhere else.

[Superfluous J]

Did you go to Mun and Minmus quickly? I vaguely recall a bug in earlier versions (that may not have been fixed, or even seen as a bug) where once you either land on or enter the sphere of influence of a world, its "explore" contract gets somehow marked to never appear.

[zzz_side]

I can confirm that I also don't get the 4-part contracts for Mün and Minimus playing career mode on 1.02. They were definitely available when I was playing 0.90 couple of months ago.

Maybe it's not a bug at all.

[zarakon]

Did you go to Mun and Minmus quickly? I vaguely recall a bug in earlier versions (that may not have been fixed, or even seen as a bug) where once you either land on or enter the sphere of influence of a world, its "explore" contract gets somehow marked to never appear.

I feel like I've been going at a pretty careful pace

[Streetwind]

Contracts appear randomly. It's always been the case that in some cases they just don't show up because you're unlucky. A forum search would probably dredge up dozens upon dozens of threads like this one

I've only recently posted a suggestion here which would circumvent that issue (among other things).

[gom jabbarwocky]

Huh, okay, so I'm not the only one who has seen this. I thought maybe it was a bug I had caused due to incompetence on my part, but, nope, just a regular bug/weird quirk.

[Claw]

I think that this was done on purpose, but I'm not certain. The four part Explore contracts do not always show up, and which ones do show depend on your progress. The reason being that there are also now "World Firsts" contracts that appear that are similar, so I think some of the explore ones don't show up to prevent too many repetative contracts. If you notice a World Firsts contract, keep your eye out for follow up ones. Often, when you complete one of those contracts, another related one will show up.

Personally, I also miss having all of the Explore contracts. Those ones feel like some sort of a collection to me.

Cheers,

-Claw

[HyperbolicKerbonaut]

The Explore contracts definitely feel like a collection, like a preamble or gateway to future missions on a given body.

Does anyone know how they're triggered? I'm pretty sure I've gotten "land base on Eve" missions before I got an Explore Eve contract. It seems like the exploration contract should come first, and its completion unlocks the other random contracts.

[Aragosnat]

The Explore contracts definitely feel like a collection, like a preamble or gateway to future missions on a given body.

Does anyone know how they're triggered? I'm pretty sure I've gotten "land base on Eve" missions before I got an Explore Eve contract. It seems like the exploration contract should come first, and its completion unlocks the other random contracts.

Sorry for the long reply. IT is a combination of reputation and completing x plane/moon to get it. Used to be in 0.90 Doing Mun got you Minmus (doing a fly-by basicly an encounter then exit), Ike (landing or orbit on Mun) and Duna (landing or orbit on Mun). Eve landing on Minmus. Gilly you had to do Duna and Ike expolre contracts completely. Eve and Gilly You got Jool and its moons. After Jool is Dres then Eeloo then Moho.

Yeah. I do agree it would make more sense if when we finish or do parts of the contract that other contracts pop up. In 1.0.2.. Duna and Ike still pop up after doing the Mun Explore. Just have not gotten the Minmus one to pop up yet on my current play though.

[RocketPropelledGiraffe]

It seems to me that for each body you can either get the "Explore" contract or the series of World First contracts "Fly by"->"Orbit"->"Land/Splash Down". So far I have not seen a combination of these for the same body.

I hope the World First contracts will eventually become automatic, like the altitude records in 1.0.

[G'th]

I don't know if this was actually the case or not, but I always thought that it took into account how long and how many tries it took for you to do the initial roll of contracts (IE, orbit, escape atmosphere, launch new vessel, Kerbin science) that would determine at least what initial explore contracts you get.

This seemed to be the case for me even in 1.02 where if I played around a bit, taking a couple launches to complete the initial contracts, I'd get a Mun, then Minmus, then Duna/Ike, and so on. But then if I went and did the contracts all in one launch, it'd skip over the Mun (and sometimes even Minmus) entirely no matter how many contracts I cancelled.

[MartGonzo]

I'd like to see them made automatic like the speed and altitude records, I don't care about the upfront money you get but it bugs my OCD that in my career I had to give up on some of the explore contracts never showing up.

[KerbMav]

I'd like to see them made automatic like the speed and altitude records, I don't care about the upfront money you get but it bugs my OCD that in my career I had to give up on some of the explore contracts never showing up.

This. They might be always active when appropriate like the altitude and speed ones, without upfront money and simply offering rewards for going places the first time, to keep the player going aside from doing random contracts all the way, giving directions as to what to pursue next.

[Alshain]

I'd like to see them made automatic like the speed and altitude records, I don't care about the upfront money you get but it bugs my OCD that in my career I had to give up on some of the explore contracts never showing up.

Agree, as for the up front money, they can just tack that on to the final reward. Fly By missions too. Anything that can't be done after a certain condition has been met IMO should be automatic.