Hiya!
In an effort not to distract the player too much, could I restrict table entries to showing only those relevant to the player’s current situation?
for example, if the player has not yet obtained the blaster, all the info regarding the device, such as how to set it to kill, or stun, or aim for the danglies, would only be a distraction to the player - or worse! look like a bug. What if he starts thinking he should have a blaster, but just hasn’t acquired it yet?
What are you using the table for? If it’s a table of hints, have you looked at Adaptive Hints by Eric Eve? My impression is that it’s set up to enforce exactly this kind of limitation.
You can either put the stats of the blaster in its description (therefore requiring the player to possess and examine it,) or if you want the stats somewhere like in inventory or the status line, use a when statement.
After taking inventory when the blaster is carried by the player:
say [blasterstats].
Or see 18.23 for constructing the status line.
Rule for constructing the status line when the player carries the blaster:
say "[the players surroundings] : Blaster-[blasterstats]"