Question keeps looping endlessly / Action without rule

Authoring Inform 7
#1

Hello again,

thought I’d be fine, but here I run into another problem. :confused:

I guess to answer this question one will need a bit experience with the Extension “Questions by Michael Callaghan”.

I am trying to establish a conversation and have been fairly successful. Basically it is just one person talking and asking the player a number of questions. The conversation begins when entering a specific room.

Sounds simple. Most likely it is. I chose a complicated path, most likely. This is what I did in a simplified example:

[code]
Include Questions by Michael Callaghan

The Bedroom is a room. “It is ridiculously boring.”

A question is a kind.
A question is either answered or unanswered.
A question is usually unanswered.

Question1 is a question.
Question2 is a question.

Every turn:
If player is in the Bedroom:
If Question1 is unanswered:
Now the current question is “How much is 1 x 12?”;
Now current question menu is { “1”, “12”, “24” };
Ask a closed question, in menu mode;
Otherwise if Question2 is unanswered:
Now the current question is “How much is 2 x 12?”;
Ask a closed question, in text mode.

A menu question rule:
if the current question is “How much is 1 x 12?”:
If the number understood is 2:
Increase Score by 5;
Say “You are a math genius!”;
Now Question1 is answered.

A text question rule:
if the current question is “How much is 2 x 12?”:
If the current answer is “24”:
Increase Score by 5;
Say “You are unbeatably brilliant!!!”;
Now Question2 is answered.[/code]

My problem here is that I cannot get past the text question. The line “You are unbeatably brilliant!!!” is shown, but then the game gives me the prompt for answering the question again.

How can I exit the loop?

Also: Is there a more elegant way to trigger the conversation? At the moment I use the “Every turn” rule, but what if I want to do that later and there is no action I could bind a rule (like “after”, “before” or “instead”) to?

This also applies if I want to “Say” something, but have no rule I could put the “If” clause in. What can be done?

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance for your input.

BiB

#2

Have you considered using Simple Chat by Mark Tilford?

It has recently been updated to fix a conflict with the latest I7 library. The update is here:

http://pastebin.com/4ycjZJ52

#3

This is actually a good idea. The downside of this is extension is that it only allows for a menu based chat.

Every now and then I need an answer in open text. I could change all answers to multiple choice, but I’d rather not.

I will use it if nothing else comes up…

Thanks for the tip! :slight_smile:

BiB

#4

BigBonsai, the problem with asking questions about extensions on the forum is that folks don’t necessarily have much experience with a particular extension. So, you might try contacting the author of Questions directly. If his email address isn’t listed in the extension, I can PM you his email address.

–Erik

#5

Yes, I figured that.

Sure, PM me. Then I can send the author a link to this thread. See what happens. :wink: Thanks.

BiB

#6

The author was very kind and has replied.

His (working!) solution is to add “Exit;” to the respective rules. This will end the question.

I also had the problem that when asking a number of questions consecutively, the score count would not be increased, since time did not advance. To solve this, the lines

Follow the notify score changes rule; Follow the advance time rule;
must be added as well.

So this is what the code will look like corrected:

A text question rule: if the current question is "How much is 2 x 12?": If the current answer is "24": Increase Score by 5; Say "You are unbeatably brilliant!!!"; Follow the advance time rule; Follow the notify score changes rule; Exit; Now Question2 is answered.

Thanks to the author! :sunglasses:

BiB