Resource UI order is illogical, Silicon and Chemicals should be swapped

Currently the resources are listed on the left of the screen as:

Power
Water
Food
O2
Fuel
Aluminium
Iron
Steel
Carbon
Chem
Silicon
Glass
Electronics

In many respects this order is very well thought out. Power at the top as it is somewhat unique and fundamental, grouped with all the life/colony support resources like Water which leads to Food, O2, and Fuel. Then the metal mines Aluminium and Iron, which leads to Steel.

What should happen next is the two elemental mine resources Carbon and Silicon should be next to each other, leading to the final 3 advanced resources Glass, Chemicals, and Electronics.

Given the care taken for the rest of the ordering, it seems like Silicon and Chemicals should be swapped, to group the elemental mines, and advances resources. The only cost to this is a short adjustment of muscle memory for players, and the earlier in development the smaller and issue this is.

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Carbon is used for Chemicals. Silicon is used for glass. That's the order they're currently in. The current system seems more consistent to me.

I guess I could see an argument to swap the silicon/glass group with carbon/chem, but its not critical.

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While I do like that carbon is right above chemicals because carbon is used for chemicals, I don't think it's essential to have them next to each other. The main thing you need to see when looking at chemicals is fuel, because fuel is the primary input. Since fuel is so distant from chemicals, I think it's okay to have carbon slightly distant from chemicals as well.

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Fuel is mainly used for chemicals, so grouping chemicals and carbon for that reason is weak. Grouping in harvesters and complex processors makes more sense, such as:

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I would guess that the developers wanted to keep things like iron near steel, so it would be easier for you to see how the prices related, since that might be critical to whether you decide to shutdown a processor.

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Fuel is with the life support because its auto purchased to run your colony. Every blimp requires fuel, whether you have it or not. Putting it with the life support makes sense so you can look at the resource panel and see all of the debt accumulating resources at the top.

The current grouping makes alot of sense. It's far more useful to have the resource groupings together than the primary resources together since you can see the gain/drain next to each other, with the life support broken out and up top since those have such a strong effect, and all draw from water anyway.

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I don't think that they should be totally reordered, just Silicon and Chemicals are awkward.

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Not really. Silicon is used for glass, and is right above it. If you are making glass, you do want to know how much its consuming/how many you have without looking all over the resource panel. Same for carbon and chemicals. Switching them separates the secondary resources from the major primary. By that reasoning steel is in the wrong place too.

It was roughly how you suggest during the prototype phase and it was just awkward. It's way more functional this way since the secondary resource goes with the major primary.

Perhaps the developers can add a way to customize resources in the options at some point.

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Quoting indczn1,

reply 7

Perhaps the developers can add a way to customize resources in the options at some point.

Woah. Customized resource order. MIND=BLOWN. Good suggestion.

Bonus points to the developer that makes the location draggable in game.

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Customized resource order is something that should be do-able. I'll add it to the list.

I don't feel like it should be available in-game because players might get super confused if they accidentally move one resource elsewhere.

The first implementation will probably be something hand-modified in an ini file then we'll work on a visual editor if people like it.

NOT THAT I'M PROMISING ANYTHING! I'M NOT!!

-Scott-

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