How to return multiple values (from table)

[Spellwastaken (Spell)]

I have a piece of code that will return a number of animations. I want to return them at once, using this method:

local number1 = 4
local number2 = 29
local number3 = 9
return number1, number2, number3

However, I have a table that contains those items. I want to return every single one of them. Each table might have a different length, so I can’t just do

local tbl = {4,21,9}
return tbl[1], tbl[2], tbl[3] -- works

local tbl = {4,21,9,10}
return tbl[1], tbl[2], tbl[3] -- the last one doesn't return unless I manually add in "tbl[4]"

How can I change the number of returned items based on the length of the table?

Edit: I know I can just return the entire table, but what if I don’t want to? Is there another wa?

[MRBOGO_YT (Bogo)]

This should work but I typed it right here and not in a code editor so It might need a bit of tweaking.

local tbl = {4,21,9,10}

for i, Value in tbl do
    print(tbl[i])
end

[Spellwastaken (Spell)]

I want to return it, not print it. i can’t do:

for i, v in tbl do
    return v
end

because return will just stop the function

[vxsqi]

None of above are answering his wanted method.

When returning multiple variables you can aquire them two ways

local function x()
local a=1
local b=2
local c=3
return a,b,c
end

local one,two,three = x()
print(one,two,three) -- 1, 2, 3

or

local t = {1,2,3}
local a,b,c = unpack(t) 
print(a,b,c) -- 1, 2, 3

[MRBOGO_YT (Bogo)]

You could do this although it would just put the values you wanted into a new table:

local tbl = {4,21,9,10}
local wantedValues = {}


for i, Value in tbl do
	table.insert(wantedValues, tbl[i])
end

print(wantedValues)

Also, you can get the number of values in a table by doing: #tbl - In this case, this would be equal to 4. Idk if that’ll be helpful or not. I’m stuck too now, as If you want to return them it makes things a whole lot more complicated because as you said, return stops the function.

@vxsqi

None of above are answering his wanted method.

When returning multiple variables you can aquire them two ways

local function x()
local a=1
local b=2
local c=3
return a,b,c
end

local one,two,three = x()
print(one,two,three) -- 1, 2, 3

or

local t = {1,2,3}
local a,b,c = unpack(t) 
print(a,b,c) -- 1, 2, 3

This isn’t scaleable? Idk how unpack() works though so I could be mistaken.

[Kitsomia (Mia)]

Here’s some variety:

-- // a way
local t = {4, 21, 9, 10}

return table.unpack(t, #t)

-- // another way
local t = {4, 21, 9, 10}

local function unpackAll(t, prev)
    local index, value = next(t, prev)
    if not (index and value ~= nil) then 
        return
    end
    return value, unpackAll(t, index)
end

return unpackAll(t)

-- // another way
local t = {4, 21, 9, 10}

local function unpackSelected(t, index, ...)
    if (index == nil) then
        return 
    end

    local value = t[index]
    if (value == nil) then 
        return
    end

    return value, unpackSelected(t, ...)
end

return unpackSelected(t, 1, 2, 4) -- returning indices 1, 2 and 4

[vxsqi]

@MRBOGO_YT

local tbl = {4,21,9,10}
local wantedValues = {}


for i, Value in tbl do
	table.insert(wantedValues, tbl[i])
end

print(wantedValues)

My bad I didn’t explain. Unpack returns a number of arguments from the table you pass with. For example you can easily clone tables using unpack like this.

local t={1,2,3,4,5}
print(t) -- [1] = 1, [2] = 2... and so on until 5
local t2 = {unpack(t)}
print(t2) -- [1] = 1, [2] = 2... and so on until 5

If you wanted it to be scaleable and assign variables. Just have a table and assign indexes.