UI annoyances/problems v3.2 and future suggestions

1. First of the settings button on the start-up screen is looking in the wrong directory for the .ini file, I think.

1. In the main options menu of the game there is no reset to default button, I had to manually delete the .ini file to reset everything. The same goes for the galaxy setup menu where such a button is also missing, I think it's always nice to have a good idea for what settings a game is balanced/designed. 

1. Maybe some buttons on the galaxy creation screen to deactivate mercenaries and determine the amount of precursor worlds. Due to hardware restrictions I usually only play on medium maps, sometimes large both with fewer habitable worlds. Because of this the bonusses that those provide are significantly stronger. This could also be balanced but this is a far easier solution.

1. Icons for black holes, elerium, antimatter and nebulae to be visible for people who turn off particles. They are invisible unless you zoom out if you want to play with particles off for whatever reason. I tried to change the distance for the icons to appear but I couldn't get the icons for nebula, black holes, etc. to appear zoomed in.

1. Tooltip for special planets like desert planet could be a bit more easier to open because you need to hold your cursor slightly below the word.
2. I would want some thing similar hear. If you can't colonise an extreme planet change the icon to red, or add one. They did this in two.

1. Support modules for increased fire and damage for the entire fleet don't tell with what value they increase it.

1. The tooltip or description of a tech not showing everything it gives. I'm not completely sure but I always have a celebrity after I research the first entertainment tech while this is not listed in the description.

1. Some specializations might be wrongly described in the trade screen. In a trade I was offered a logistics specialization, the first one you get in the engineering tech tree. I was sure I already had that specialization because I never really picked another one at that point. After I accepted the trade I looked in the tech tree and I had high capacity hulls and the logistics one. I'm not completely sure because I don't know how to check that before I made the trade.
2. I would like to see a path of techs, not just one specialisation techs.

1. Corrosive world has the desciption of a frozen world.

1. The stat or report tab in the civilization menu, I can't remember which one but the one that ranks your civilization on a buch of statistics. On the left the tab gives the different statistics and on the right it shows how your civ is ranked compared to the other ones. It would be far easier to read if every other line was coloured or if there were lines between them.
2. This should be against known civilizations, not all the ones on the game.

1. In the diplomacy screen it would be nice to have an overview of where all your diplomats are. The ones dispatched and the ones working for your government, without having to look for them.

1. All the tabs on the top could be redone to represent different branches of your government. Keeping track of what ships you have, how many, where they are, how to upgrade them (at once) was a lot easier in gal civ II from what I remember.
2. I have to disagree about some of this being easier in two the ship list was hidden hear where you couldn't just use it to take your turn. Where in three you can move this way where in two you had to go into a screen. My gripe in three is when I colonise a planet, build a starbases, build a shipyard, or create a trade route. I have to start at the beginning of the list instead the previous ship.

1. The repeat button for missions for the shipyard doesn't work, it is greyed out when the shipyard is preparing a mission. I remember those being repeatable automatically.
2. They used to be with no option to shut it off. This caused a lot of Mico management. I was glad when they shut this off. It would be nice to have this as an option.

1. An auto upgrade button on the planet screen so I can turn off auto upgrades. The manual stated that there was one in the colony tab of the civilization menu but I couldn't find it there either.

And now last but not least some things I noticed in the ship designer:

Hi

1. Two buttons that allow you to go through the last few changes you made in the ship designer.

1. The ability to take a part from the design and move it to another hard point. I believe this could be done in gal civ II.

1. An option to copy a part with the exact same dimentions would be nice. From what I remember from gal civ II once you set a part how wanted it you could keep adding it until you selected a new part.

1. The gizmos showing the correct dimensions, sometimes the colouring is wrong. This might be because I've moved some parts in strange ways, gal civ II had this sometimes as well.

1. Let the yellow block of the gizmos scale with the size of the part because the smaller parts often dissapear completely in it. If that happens you have to make the changes you want to, deselect the part to see if you like it, and then reselect and adjust it if you need to.

1. Some way to navigate through all the parts. There are a lot more of them than in II, maybe a list of favourite parts could help to find the ones you use the most for a given set of ships. Also it would be helpfull if it was easier and more straightforward to create and store your own parts.

1. Lastly, this isn't really a UI thing but I found the shipdesigner to be very dark and one side of the ship you're designing is always in shadows. I think it would really help to see what you are doing if your design was brightly lit on both sides.

I would like to hear other peoples idea's about the UI. I've lurked here for quite some time, I decided to post here after I read the post about the goals for the game in 2019. I would really like his game to be the best game it can be. It certainly is a lot more engaging then when it first came out, but there still are many bugs and things missing like some of the UI elements mentioned here. At first I wanted to make a thread about the strenghts and weaknesses of gal civ III compared to it's competition like Stellaris and Endless Space 2. I still may do that in the near future, I thought it would be best to start simple since I've never posted here before.

I believe endless space 2 has a notification above the turn button to go through all ships that have movement points left.

The Tech progress bar is broken. The only way to truly know how many turns remain to complete a tech is to go to the Tech Tree. This is especially true if you happen upon an anomaly that gives a percentage tech bonus. I've seen it say "1 Turn Remaining", then change that value upwards on the next turn!

The Planet list no longer updates when values (morale, for example) change. It used to work in previous versions. Go to a planet, rush an Entertainment Center, and the Planet list will not have changed. The only way to know the current status is to click another tab, then go back to the Planets list for it to update properly. The same error exists with the Current Build progress bar.

I noticed some irregularities about these two but I forgot to take a note of it at the time.

A designated Designer button. I don't design ships that often but when I do, I don't want to have to travel through a Shipyard to get there. I'm sure those of you who use the Designer a lot are frustrated by all this extra, unnecessary  clicking.

Couldn't agree more. You have to go to the designer so many times that this would definitely save a lot of time.

Get the Citizen actions all put under the Citizens tab. As it stands now, managing citizens is split between the Civilizations screen and the Citizens screen. Why? They are not Leaders, they are Citizens with a focus (eg, Social or Research). Maybe I'm missing something here.

This is a tough one because citizens are represented in a wide range of mechanics, you can already see what all of them do in this tab.

Someone on this forum mentioned that it would be nice if SD fixed things instead of adding more broken stuff and I couldn't agree more. (Microsoft needs to learn this lesson, as well.)

My list could get very long but I'll leave it at that for now.

ok right now I can't fix it I added two things to the quote. A couple of other interface ideas I added was.

1. I really don't like repeating projects that caused so much micro management, but as an option it is acceptable. 

This could be solved for the shipyard if the repeat button would also work for the missions.

2. Ive been suggesting main menu, and planet governor's since before the alpha was out. With a default main override. Allowing planets being able to override the main menu governors. 

For playing bigger galaxies this would be nice but I never play anything bigger than medium or large. I don't have the hardware to play any bigger but also the game remains the same, only the time it would take to mop up after you've already won just increases. I like the approach in stellaris better albeit the execution isn't that great. In stellaris the focus of the new planetary screen is to leave the bigger long term and more meaningful decisions to the player and let the planets grow on their own.

3. It wasn't nice when they allowed you to double click a tech to return to the main screen, but not the tech tree, because I only use the tech tree. Allow a double click on the tech tree to return to the main screen when you are picking a tech in the research screen to. 

This could be helpful. I only use the tech tree too, the tech screen is rather pointless because it doesn't provide an overview on  how a tech is related to other techs. 

4. If I want to remove an item from the planetary build list I have to click on the item in the list then delete, or cancel it. Just let me double click it. Same thing in the shipyard.

Agreed. I would also like it if you could expand the build list so you can drag and drop in a larger list of things you want to build. Also some indicator as to where you will drop a construction would be really nice.