How to Organize It All

[Spiff]

The above spreadsheets are the most important. But if you'd like to keep more information at hand, you may also find it useful to make a spreadsheet for

• homeworld production
  
• planet resources
  
• fleet locations
  
• research priorities
  

The first is extremely helpful in maximizing your Industrial Capacity (for details on what this means, see the second post in Your First Three Turns), like this:




Planet Resources I record on a sheet for each star system, with one page for each planet to record the GEO & CSV results for each. Here's info from a planet I just surveyed, with Max Installations (5 x Yield) calculated. While this is handy, it's also optional. You could reduce record-keeping by just noting any planets you'd like to colonize and what resources you want there.




A sheet of Fleet locations, orders, and future plans can also be helpful:


Again, it isn't essential - you could spare yourself the recording and just check the Fleet Report each turn - but I find this sheet very useful when planning my turn.

Finally, a spreadsheet is ideal for keeping Research Plans. I actually keep mine as part of my Turn Plans, on a separate 'sheet' (page). That way, when I note the order for Set Research Priority, I don't write out everything I'm researching. Instead, I use Sheet 2 to record my 25 slots, so when I enter my orders, I can just glance at it and update anything new (usually Slot 1, plus anything else just completed):

All of this I organize in three folders

• Rules
  
• Empire Info
  
• Turns (holding Turn 01, Turn 02, etc)
  

Each turn folder has an alias link to the first two, so I can access the rules and update spreadsheets for Exploration, Fleets, and each star system. The only new document is my Turn Plans, where I draft the orders for each turn.

I also like recording my Ship Designs and putting system information into a map. In case you do, too, there are examples in the post below.