The Security Guard — A Really Simple NPC

Back in Chapter 7 we arranged for the ID card to be confiscated by a security guard if the player character attempts to pass through the metal detector carrying the card, unless the metal detector is switched off. We therefore clearly need an NPC to represent the security guard, although the implementation can be very simple, since confiscating the card is about the only role he will be called to play in the game. He's therefore a good choice for our first NPC.

The object that represents the actual physical presence of the NPC (as opposed to various aspects of its behaviour) is defined much like any other Thing, except that we define it to be of class Actor. The Actor object representing the security guard might look like this:

guard: Actor 'security guard; burly flab; man; him' @securityGate
    "He's a burly-looking fellow, though it's probably as much flab as muscle. "
    
    actorSpecialDesc = "A security guard stands by the metal detector, eyeing
        you suspiciously. "
    
    checkAttackMsg = 'With your training you could probably overpower him
        easily enough, although he\'s armed and you\'re not, but that would
        probably result in all the other airport security staff coming after you,
        which is a complication you could do without right now. '
;

You can place this code right at the start of your npcs.t file, and then recompile and run the game to ensure that the security guard is now present by the security gate.

There are a few points to note about this definition:

1. Since we're defining the security guard in a separate file, we can't use the + notation to define his initial location. Instead we use the @ notation as the second element in the template to define where the security guard starts out, hence @securityGate. This is a technique you'll often use when defining NPCs.
2. Note that we use all four sections of the vocab property, ending it with 'him' after the third and final semicolon. This defines the NPC as being male (rather than female or neuter), so that he can be referred to with the pronoun 'him', and so that any library-generated messages will use the right pronoun to refer to him.
3. Note that we've used actorSpecialDesc to provide a separate paragraph about the security guard in the room listing. This works much like specialDesc, and indeed in this particular case we could have used specialDesc just as well, but with a more complex actor this would have broken part of the ActorState mechanism, so using actorSpecialDesc with Actors is a good habit to get into. The reason for this will become more apparent when we come to implement the flight attendant.
4. We've also defined a checkAttackMsg to provide a customized (refusal) response to HIT GUARD, ATTACK GUARD and the like, an action which the player might well try. If this property is defined it actually stops the ATTACK action at the check stage (typically as here with a message explaining why the player character isn't going to carry out this action).

For now, this really is all there is to defining the security guard. For sure, as implemented he seems hardly more than another Decoration object, but we'll make him a bit more responsive in Chapter 11, when we implement some NPC conversation.

For the full story on defining the basic Actor Object, consult the adv3Lite Library Manual.