An alternative to the 'switch' is using a dispatch array. I'm assuming for the following that $some_obj->get_status returns an integer number, otherwise this number has to be extracted from the return value:

# choice number  0       1       2     3    4     5     6
my @choices = ([0,6], [0..2], [2..5], [3], [4], [2,5], [6]);

my $num = $some_obj->get_status;
my @newlist = @list[ @{ $choices[$num] } ];

local $"=', ';

print "Result: status = $num; list=@newlist";
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-- Hofmator