Just add filters to the backpack opened with the ` key. There would be filters to sort by food, potions, tools (including weapons/fstyles/magics), meals, reagents/catalysts, and gemstones. There would still be an “all” filter.
Details/background on your proposal
Adding this feature would make navigating the backpack much faster and easier- you would be able to use a handful of clicks instead of needing to type in the searchbar every time you need to pull something out of your inventory.
Personally, I don’t like my hotbar full, so I have to do this all the time. It also helps de-clutter the inventory. The game would also remember what filter you were on last, with the exception of defaulting to the tools filter if you were previously on the “all” filter.
Reason to add/change
This suggestion kills two birds with one stone; not only does it massively reduce inventory clutter and make it easier to find what you need in a flash but if the filters are remembered when closing and reopening your backpack it also provides a fix for the lag that happens to some people for a second whenever you open your backpack, since you’re not rendering nearly as many objects at once. That lag is why the game defaults back to tools when you were previously on the all filter, so that you don’t subject players to that lag more than necessary.
Minor side note, this is the first suggestion I’ve made in a while so forgive me if it would do better with some rewording or clarifications
the search bar already works for the backpack, you can search up “fish” for all fish (it adds meals with “fish” in it too tho), “shells” for stuff like clams to colossal clams, “mushroom” brings up all mushrooms (also mushroom meals), “gem” or “jewel” work for their respective things, and you can search up specific reagent effects for their reagent (I.e. you search up “revealing”, you get clear stone and tree sap, along with any potions with “revealing” in their name)
the save filter to decrease lag tho is good yes, I just don’t see the point in not using the search bar to find stuff when it’s still relatively quick
“catalyst” doesn’t work though (one specific example ik).
I think this idea is fine if it’s even possible, but I think the backpack just needs a good “default sort”.
There’s some semblance of sorting, in that stuff like meals, charts, jewels, and reagents are usually around the same place. However a few things scramble whenever you open your inventory again (e.g. charts move up and down but craftables usually stay in the same place) and everything moves when you rejoin.
If the items in your backpack were always in the same general area with a consistent order for sorting (like high-low rarity within a subsection, subsections being those search terms in @DespicablBanana’s comment) then it would be mostly good enough imo.
Also make the default sort for the inventory actually good.
i dont really have an issue with the suggestion but i doubt itll ever happen as the search bar exists
and anyway the real issue with the backpack is the fact that it closes and resets as soon as you click out of it. it prevents using items with the backpack open, so eating a bunch of different small meals is a pain.
its not really something that filters would fix, or specifically its something that could easily be fixed probably in a minute without having to go through adding filters