The idea is really quite simple: Allow queueing of research to be done automatically in a given order.
Quite often you already know the next three or four researches you're going to pick. Right now you need to remember those until the next research is done (which happens almost exclusively while you're in the midst of battle and really don't have time for this right now).
Similar to how you have a crafting queue you should be able to just add a research to the queue, instead of replacing the current one. If you want to abort you have to do it manually by clicking on the icon at the top right (or somewhere else).
Interesting question would be whether it should be possible to queue research that isn't actually available just yet, but will be once some other research in the queue in front of it has been finished.
Pros (+) and cons (-) as far as I see them:
+ Efficient, does away with a minor annoyance
+ in the spirit of ”automate all the things”, even though it's not technically automated via some in-game entity
+ Probably doable without adding much to the UI. Basically you'd just need a line of queued research icons, for example at the bottom of the science window
- Kind of ”removes game play”, as in, keeping in mind your research plans is sort of a minor side challenge. With this you could more or less forget about research for a while as long as it keeps running.
- May still be complicated for some people
Let me know what you think!
