>> I need to specify a priority of match without regard to position.

Try look-ahead search. May this sketch give some help:
$line =~ s/^
   (
      (?= .*? $regex_1 ) .*? $regex_1     #FIRST PRIORITY
      |
      (?= .*? $regex_2 ) .*? $regex_2     #SECOND PRIORITY
   )
   /something/gmx;

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Edit: removed text that caret is obsolete.
Upd.: I think my example (now striked-thourgh) simply reduces to the same but without look-ahead; see comment by Lanx.

In reply to Re: How to enforce match priority irrespective of string position by rsFalse
in thread How to enforce match priority irrespective of string position by Polyglot

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