[Suicide Junkie]

Shields as one big single number go first.
Then armor gets damaged, in order of placement.
Then Outer hull slots get hit. Directionally.
Once all outer hull slots are dead, then Inner hull slots get hit. Directionally.

Outer before inner is highest priority. Directional then decides between all the ties.

Example;
Getting roasted alive from the back. Outer hull components get vaped one by one... the bottom row goes first, then row by row up to the top. Now all outer hull components are dead and all inner hull components are intact.
Then the damage destroys inner hull components on the bottom row. Then row by row to the top. Then all components are dead and your ship explodes.


SO, when designing ships in GGmod, you put all your armor on the edge-most slots, and squeeze your real components into a small cluster in the middle.
Since the armor is packed onto the top row, the bottom row, the left column and the right column, one of those four will get hit first by a weapon.

Now, if you are hit from the left, all of your leftmost armor will be hit first. But the rightmost armor will be hit last. The internals aren't too happy about the latter.

Now, if you put the armor in the upper left corner, it will be both above and left of your internals! This provides protection from both directions.
The downside is that GG layouts are round, so there aren't corners to put armor into. You can fit some in that general area, but it makes for a very small safe-zone since the armor will be halfway to the middle from both sides.