Well, since none of the answers I can find seem to explain this in the level of detail I require, I'll make a new thread.
I want to take a slightly more realistic approach to exploration of the planets in my system.
First, I designed a sensor buoy, then I designed a missile with enough range to explore much of the system with the buoy as the second stage.
When I use the 'Launch Missiles at' command, I discovered the ship just goes to Luna and dumps a missile, which then self-destructs as it has no sensors and no target.
Here's what I'm trying to accomplish: the design and use of a 'base' that can launch missiles which travel to distant targets and then separate, leaving the buoy in orbit.
I tried using waypoints, but that doesn't allow me to fire things into the orbits of other planets.
Am I stuck sending a ship to every planet I wish to survey? Or is there a way to use missiles to remotely survey planets? Is that what drones are for? They don't seem to do anything.
Yes, this is what drones are for but alas there is an issue with drones atm because Steve lost his work on them due to a database corruption and it wasn't fully redone for v4.8. Drones are scheduled to be fully implemented in v4.9 and they are designed to have the extended range that you are looking for.
There is another active thread that has a discussion on this topic too, if I come across it again I will try to remember and link to it.
The other thread details the way to apply a WP to an orbital body that is moving, so the WP moves with it and when you launch the missile at the WP it will track correctly. I can not remember specifics though.