Arrays, Objects and Setter Links (Sugarcube 2)

olympusmons

This is a partial continuation of my previous struggles with arrays in Harlowe, but I've created a new thread as this is me trying out Sugarcube 2 per expert advice. Apologies if a new thread for a new format and a new question isn't proper etiquette.

So what I have is this: $characters, a database of character arrays. For experimental purposes, it's set up thus:

<<set $sam to {name: "Sam ", health: 2}>>
<<set $frodo to {name: "Frodo ", health: 1}>>
<<set $characters = [$sam, $frodo]>>

Then, $activeCharacter is used to store the variables of the character we're using at the moment. This seems to work fine; for example, here where i is 0, Sam's variables get put into $activeCharacter:

<<set $activeCharacter to $characters[$i]>>

At a main passage I include a link of each character's name. All these links go to an "affect" passage, where the player can affect the stats of the character whose link was selected.

<<for $i to 0; $i lt $characters.length; $i++>>
<<link affect][set $activeCharacter to $characters[$i]>>
<</for>>

This all seems to work, including the links. However, the "set $activeCharacter to $characters[$i]" which worked fine outside the link setter does not seem to work inside it, and throws a SyntaxError: Unexpected Token message.

Thoughts?

greyelf

You don't use the set keyword in Setter Links, you also don't need to use the <<link>> macro:

<<for $i to 0; $i lt $characters.length; $i++>>
[[$characters[$i].name|affect][$activeCharacter to $characters[$i]]]
<</for>>

WARNING: Each time you move from one passage to another in SugarCube the History sub-system stores the current value of all $variables with the previous passage and creates a new snap-shot of all the $variables (and their values) available to the new passage.
In the case of $variables containing objects this means that those $variables will now contain a copy of the original object, not the original object itself.

olympusmons

Thanks, I evidently misapplied the documentation.

greyelf wrote: »

In the case of $variables containing objects this means that those $variables will now contain a copy of the original object, not the original object itself.

So I understand. My intent is to use $activeCharacter to work with in loadout selection, combat etc. and then write short bit of code that dumps $activeCharacter back into the slot in $characters whose $name matches $activeCharacter.name when that character is no longer being used by the player.

olympusmons

greyelf wrote: »

<<for $i to 0; $i lt $characters.length; $i++>>
[[$characters[$i].name|affect][$activeCharacter to $characters[$i]]]
<</for>>

This does not in fact work. After some playing around, it appears that the $i in [$activeCharacter to $characters[$i]] is applied when the user selects a link, not when the for loop creates the link. Therefore, the for loop having by then completed, $i will be length of array plus one when applied, and $activeCharacter will not be filled from $characters. For example, both setter links generated by the example code run with $i = 2 because there are 2 items in $characters.

I tried a few junky ideas to get the setter links to remember the right value of $i, but no luck; and I cannot seem to find an obvious reference in documentation, which doesn't mention setter links that use variables changed by loops.

TheMadExile

The setter components of links are evaluated when the link is clicked. In this case, you need to force the $i within the setter component to be evaluated when the link is created instead, to catch its current value.

For example:

<<for $i to 0; $i lt $characters.length; $i++>>
<<print "[[$characters[$i].name|affect][$activeCharacter to $characters[" + $i + "]]]">>
<</for>>