Is it intentional or a bug that "Explore" contracts seem out of order?

[Chaos_Evolved]

Hello,

I was hoping to get confirmation, from people who have looked into this or perhaps even the devs themselves, as to whether or not it is intentional that "Explore" contracts seem out of order. I had this issue around July, and now again that I've restarted the game. I get the usual world firsts like "orbit kerbin", then I get "fly by mun" then "rendezvous 2 ships in orbit" and then Explore Duna. Shouldn't this be explore mun, or minmus? In the summer I would get Explore Mun, then it would go to Explore Duna, skipping minmus.

And before anyone says it's because I left Kerbin SOI or something like that, I made a mock career save, turned cheats on, and quickly repeated all the world first contracts only. It STILL skipped Mun and Minmus and went to Duna after "rendezvous 2 ships in orbit"

Googling around I have been finding posts where some people claim contracts are related to reputation. Even if this is true, why would Duna require less rep than Mun?

Thanks

Edited January 4, 2016 by Chaos_Evolved

[Temstar]

In my career save I get Minmum, Mun, Duna and Ike contracts open all about the same time.

Makes sense too. From hardware perspective, if you can make it to Mun then you probably can make it to Duna too. The delta-V difference between the two are not actually all that different. It's only the flight time and the actual piloting that makes Duna harder.

[322997am]

5 minutes ago, Temstar said:

In my career save I get Minmum, Mun, Duna and Ike contracts open all about the same time.

Makes sense too. From hardware perspective, if you can make it to Mun then you probably can make it to Duna too. The delta-V difference between the two are not actually all that different. It's only the flight time and the actual piloting that makes Duna harder.

Really? I though that duna was way more than mun. This is why I haven't planned a mission to duna yet. I'm going to minmus but thx for the info.

Edited January 4, 2016 by 322997am
Duna is way more than duna

[Ringkeeper]

Landing at Mun: 5150

Landing at Duna: 6540

so not that much difference. And on Duna you can even use parachute, but don't know if amount of parachutes outweights the delta-v saving.

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/index.php?/topic/87463-105-swashs-delta-v-map-continued-22-nov-17th-opm-update/

[Temstar]

In souposphere days you could easily use Duna's atmosphere to perform an aerocapture, thus saving some further 600m/s on arrival. Is that still possible?

[Deadpangod3]

1 hour ago, Temstar said:

In souposphere days you could easily use Duna's atmosphere to perform an aerocapture, thus saving some further 600m/s on arrival. Is that still possible?

i did it to just barely capture into an eliptical orbit with a probe (was fun with remotetech) and reduced the apo with further passes (after deorbiting on the first brake several times acidentally) so it is possible, just hard.

[rdwulfe]

I suggest you check out the Trajectories mod. It makes life with aerocapture so much easier.

[problemecium]

I think "Explore Mun/Minmus" don't exist in the predefined contracts. In my experience there have only ever been "Explore X" contracts for planets.

You'll also in all likelihood be getting plenty of "land on Mun," "Science data from surface of Minmus," etc. contracts as you go along, so the initial "Explore" contract isn't really necessary.

[KerikBalm]

I got expore mun/minmus before... so they were there at one time... I also have explore laythe, bop, poll... so the contracts appear for moons and planets.

It is still very possibe to aerocapture at duna, and land using parachutes an only a little dV to soften the landing. I competed the explore contract for duna with a QBE and a m16 parachute + oxstats and some science stuff.

Landing on duna with appropriate use of aerocapture, transfer windows, and parachutes takes less dV than landing on Mun... getting back is another issue, but for a 1 way probe, its actually "easier" (where easier is eine as a ower V requirement for the rocket).

[Geschosskopf]

13 hours ago, Chaos_Evolved said:

.....

Thanks

In answer to the actual question posed by the title of this thread, the answer is "both":.  The game is hard-wired to prod you in certain directions, and it's a bug that the "explore" contracts fail to take launch windows into account at all.  The 1st one should be Minmus because of its inclination, seeing as you can go to Mun any day of the week.  Next should be Eeloo, then Jool.

[r_rolo1]

Well, I have to go devil's advocate here and ask: There has to be a order?  IMHO the science tree and the building tier system are the ones that actually were made to constrain your ability to send stuff to places ( not completely because you can do a lot with the basic resources on tier 1 ), so why would the contracts offering system also do that? Why don't simply propose all "explore X" contracts at game beginning and let the player pick the ones they think they can do?

Edited January 5, 2016 by r_rolo1

[m_sporkboy]

On 1/4/2016 at 4:42 AM, Temstar said:

In souposphere days you could easily use Duna's atmosphere to perform an aerocapture, thus saving some further 600m/s on arrival. Is that still possible?

I find a 20km periapsis will capture you with an orbit less than 400km apoapsis.  A second pass through the atmo will put you on the ground.

My duna guide (in the tutorials section) does this.

Edited January 5, 2016 by m_sporkboy

[m_sporkboy]

On 1/4/2016 at 3:50 AM, 322997am said:

Really? I though that duna was way more than mun. This is why I haven't planned a mission to duna yet. I'm going to minmus but thx for the info.

If your ship can land on mun, it can orbit duna.

 

[322997am]

3 hours ago, m_sporkboy said:

If your ship can land on mun, it can orbit duna.

 

And come back?

[tranenturm]

35 minutes ago, 322997am said:

And come back?

You're so demanding. 

[r_rolo1]

For that you need a little more...but not much more, maybe some extra 500-800 m/s

[RocketSquid]

My mun rocket almost got into a solar orbit, and would've had enough DV to probably get to Duna or Eve.

[m_sporkboy]

1 hour ago, 322997am said:

And come back?

Without trying it, I'd say it's about the same; for sure if you aerobrake at Duna.

But if you want a full mission plan with landing and everything, it doesn't take too much ship: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/index.php?/topic/126536-sporkboys-guide-to-going-to-duna-without-docking/

Edited January 5, 2016 by m_sporkboy