Can I use GetChildren() & math.random to select a random number of children in a folder?

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#1

I’m making a survival game, and I want to know if there is a way to use GetChildren() and math.random to select a random number of children inside of a folder. If not, can you show me an api article to where I can?

#2 
local obj = yourobj:GetChildren() 
local Rand = math.random(1, #obj) 
print(Rand)
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#3

heres a code snippet that should do it! i havent tested it so it might have a typo or 2

local function getRandomChildren(folder)
  local children = folder:GetChildren()
  local num = math.random(1, #children) -- choose a random number of children

  local selected = {} -- children that will be selected

  for i = 1, num do -- loop from 1 to num
    local index = math.random(1, #children) -- get the index of the random child to take

    table.insert(selected, children[index]) -- add that to the selected children
    table.remove(children, index) -- remove that index from the children table so it wont be chosen again
  end

  return selected
end
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#4

Thanks, I’ll edit this script and I’ll try it out. I’ll let you guys know if I have an error or something.

1 Like
#5

Im not fully understanding your question but here is what I think you want.

A random number of random children to be selected from a folder and put in a table.

To accomplish this it should look something like this:

local folder = workspace.folder -- your folder here
local total = math.random(0, #folder:GetChildren())

local children = {}

for i=0,total,1 do
    local randChild = folder:GetChildren()[math.random(1, #folder:GetChildren())]

    local pass = true
    for i,v in pairs(children) do
        if v == randChild then
            pass = false
        end
    end

    if pass then
        table.insert(children, randChild)
    else
        i -= 1
    end
end

thisis kind of a brute force approach, but it still should get the job done :slight_smile:

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#6

I’d probably shuffle the table first and then select a random number of elements to create a new table out of. Here’s an implementation in Lua:

local function shuffle(t)
    for i = #t, 2, -1 do
        local j = math.random(i)
        t[i], t[j] = t[j], t[i]
    end
    return t
end

local function getRandomSelection(t)
    return table.pack(table.unpack(shuffle(t), 1, math.random(1, #t)))
end

local selected = getRandomSelection(folder:GetChildren())