Sort Order

Sorting order for planets, ships, etc.

from GalCiv2 Forums

Does anyone know what criteria the game uses to sort planets, ships, etc.?

E.g. :

1) While using the 'x' key on the main map to select the next planet

2) On the planetary window, when using the 'Next' or 'Previous' buttons to select the next/previous colony

3) Using the 'tab' key to select the next ship with moves available

Further, is it possible (for end users/modders) to change the sort criteria?

 

Thanks.

9,461 views 5 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I dont know. I use the colony management screen, where you can sort your planets by a bunch of different ways. I find doing a lot of things from that screen to be very convenient.

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Reply #2 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I dont know. I use the colony management screen, where you can sort your planets by a bunch of different ways. I find doing a lot of things from that screen to be very convenient.
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I find the colony management screen to be very sluggish. Plus, it tends to re-sort itself every time I make an action. It's actually a great screen early on when I only have a handful of planets, but as the number of planets goes up the sluggishness and auto re-sorting of the lists make it such that it's actually faster to use the 'x' key on the main map to do my tasks.

I wish it wasn't this way, I'd rather use the colony management screen if it were faster and auto-re-sorting could be turned off. I find the side bar to suffer the same problems as the colony management screen.
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Reply #3 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Plus, it tends to re-sort itself every time I make an action.
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IIRC, people used to complain that the list didn't update to reflect changes so the devs added the behavior. On my old, sub-spec machine I found the list did take many seconds to load in late game (50-200 worlds). On the Vista box I began suffering last August, things are pretty sweet and I like the fact that it updates when I do something like add an improvment to a world that had been building nothing.

But your question reminds me of a very longstanding UI wish of mine: that the "next whatever" keys in all contexts would use the last relevant sort choice you'd made, whether it was in the Colonies list or the mini-list.

My best guess for how the order works now is that the game goes by some sort of GUID that's invisible to players.
Reply #4 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
My best guess for how the order works now is that the game goes by some sort of GUID that's invisible to players.
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That's my best guess. In games with hundreds of colonies, I've even been tempted to rename all my planets as 001, 002, 003... etc. lol
Reply #5 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
That's my best guess. In games with hundreds of colonies, I've even been tempted to rename all my planets as 001, 002, 003... etc. lol
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I used to do this as I colonized planets, but it got where it just slowed me more on a game that was going to take me two months to play anyway. I also use the z/x keys to navigate mass buying on large maps, though I see no rhyme or reason in what is next as it just jumps randomly around the map.

On my older machine it can take the Colony list a minute and a half just to come up and then the 15 to 20 second delay after I hit accept along side the reset to the top thing on a buy makes it unusable.