The Aurora is far bigger than the Sunbeam was, so I guess the Sunbeam got only acknowledge when it already got very close. Aurora perhaps was estimated to be a bigger potential threat?

Also it was the mission of Aurora to search for the guys from Degasi, if I'm not mistaken.

Originally posted by =AJSA= Big Mad Wolf:

The Aurora is far bigger than the Sunbeam was, so I guess the Sunbeam got only acknowledge when it already got very close. Aurora perhaps was estimated to be a bigger potential threat?

Well, that's where the whole thing becomes a little fuzzy again.. The Quarantine Enforcement Platform was designed to keep things from entering and leaving the planet, yes? Now the Sunbeam clearly broke atmosphere and intended to land when it was blown up. Same thing can be suspected to happen to the Degasi a decade ago..

But the Aurora was only in orbit around the planet when it was hit, which means it wouldn't have been a threat to security protocol at the time. So shooting at a ship as big as the Aurora would be like sending up a flare to tell the world 'here we are' as it is bound to leave survivors and broadcast a distress signal before being destroyed. (one might speculate that the Aurora was only 'winged', hence why it's still so intact)

Originally posted by =AJSA= Big Mad Wolf:

Also it was the mission of Aurora to search for the guys from Degasi, if I'm not mistaken.

Searching for signs of the Degasi was only a secondary mission for the Aurora that they acquired after picking up an mongolian emissary, which the audiologs reveal they had no real intend to make an effort off.

So while doing their slingshot maneuver around the planet and scanning for signs of the Degasi, they suddenly pick up a signal just moments before they're hit. Which I assume is the QEP powering up to take a potshot, as the Degasi left no functional transmitter on the planet.

So bottom line, why was the Aurora even targeted? Unless it's some AI glitch I can't see any reason what so ever as to why it was shot down.

It probably got too close to the planet while doing the slingshot maneuver. The Aurora is much larger than the Sunbeam, so it might be that the defense system picks up on it earlier/starts shooting it earlier to allow for enough firing time to ensure a crash.

You'll also notice that the G.U.N. starts its activation process while the Sunbeam is in high orbit, and is only ready to fire after it has completed approach. The Aurora, being much less agile, would have gived the Platform enough time to destroy it in orbit.

in game i remember that it said that it wil target any ship inside the atmosfere
so maybe the aurora entered the most distant part of the atmosfere for enohgt time to be shot down

The answer may be this simple:

The sunbeam was shot down a good deal after breaking the atmosphere becaue it was a smaller target and confused the QEP's computers while the Aurora was a larger target to begin with and so could be targetted more easily. Ya' never know. Even though the precursors were masters of energy generating, they might've had trash computers.

Or, y'know, the scanning set it off. No signal to not fire, so from the QEP's point of a view it was a ship moving towards orbit while scanning.
Like it was looking for a place to land.
As for the Sunbeam, there was a bunch of junk in orbit so QEP was making sure of a clear hit.

The sunbeam was in direct course to the planets surface, the aurora was flying along the orbit.

So assuming that the QEP targets anything within a certain range and takes some time to charge would mean that the Sunbeam travelled those ~10 seconds towards the QEP while the Aurora kept the same distance to the surface of the planet (since it travelled along the orbit).

=> Sunbeam gets shot much closer to the surface, Aurora gets shot in Orbit

Well.....why not?

Aurora will be shot even when NOT landing because of drones/probes they send to bring clues about degassi!

They have secondary mission to find degassi who had missing/lost contact decade ago on the planet!

They been shot after aurora sending drones( scanning from aurora doesn't trigger planet defense system to act) to investigate planet and this drones that return to aurora can easily Carry "infected material" on board(spreading infection outside the planet). They(planet defense system?) Saw this and consider this as an attempt to spreading infection and decided to shot it far from orbit(with more powerful guns, missiles or stealth mines or laser satelites?).

Shooting every drones/probes is NOT posibble (because too small or numerous?) So they shot aurora(the sender and receiver ship)

Playing KSP I'd say, the Aurora was orbiting as it was not a "landing ship" and therefor shot down in Orbit.
Sunbeam didnt apply an orbital burn but came down for landing directly when entering the planets sphere of infuelnce.

Well it was clear that the alians did not want the infection on planet 4546B to spread to other planets so maybe the alians will shoot at everything that gets to the planet just to keep it away from the planet and thus the infection

The pda-entry of the energy core states that 'it is functioning without any parameters, suggesting it will shoot any ship in range.'

Originally posted by =AJSA= Big Mad Wolf:

The Aurora is far bigger than the Sunbeam was, so I guess the Sunbeam got only acknowledge when it already got very close. Aurora perhaps was estimated to be a bigger potential threat?

Also it was the mission of Aurora to search for the guys from Degasi, if I'm not mistaken.

Captain just wanted to do long range scans and "pretend" that Alterra is helping Mongol states. You know, politics. Once scans picked up something the captain cut the recorder.

It could be that once they picked up something on the radars they parked in orbit in preparation for survey of the planet.

Originally posted by Dogmatius:

Originally posted by =AJSA= Big Mad Wolf:

The Aurora is far bigger than the Sunbeam was, so I guess the Sunbeam got only acknowledge when it already got very close. Aurora perhaps was estimated to be a bigger potential threat?

Well, that's where the whole thing becomes a little fuzzy again.. The Quarantine Enforcement Platform was designed to keep things from entering and leaving the planet, yes? Now the Sunbeam clearly broke atmosphere and intended to land when it was blown up. Same thing can be suspected to happen to the Degasi a decade ago..

But the Aurora was only in orbit around the planet when it was hit, which means it wouldn't have been a threat to security protocol at the time. So shooting at a ship as big as the Aurora would be like sending up a flare to tell the world 'here we are' as it is bound to leave survivors and broadcast a distress signal before being destroyed. (one might speculate that the Aurora was only 'winged', hence why it's still so intact)

Originally posted by =AJSA= Big Mad Wolf:

Also it was the mission of Aurora to search for the guys from Degasi, if I'm not mistaken.

Searching for signs of the Degasi was only a secondary mission for the Aurora that they acquired after picking up an mongolian emissary, which the audiologs reveal they had no real intend to make an effort off.

So while doing their slingshot maneuver around the planet and scanning for signs of the Degasi, they suddenly pick up a signal just moments before they're hit. Which I assume is the QEP powering up to take a potshot, as the Degasi left no functional transmitter on the planet.

So bottom line, why was the Aurora even targeted? Unless it's some AI glitch I can't see any reason what so ever as to why it was shot down.

Maybe the active scanning triggered the cannon.