asking about an out of play object

Okay, I’ve got another one. How can the player ask for something that they know about but is currently out of play? Here’s what I mean.

[code]Place is a room. “On one side of the room, you can see a couch. On the opposite side of the room, you can see a book.”

James is a person in Place.

A book is in Place. The description of the book is "You open the book and see on the inside cover a message: ‘If you ask the right person, they might just give you the toy.’ "

A couch is a fixed in place enterable scenery supporter in Place.

A toy is a thing.

Persuasion rule for asking James about something: the rule succeeds.

Instead of asking James about something:
if the noun is the toy:
say “With a wave of James’s hand, the toy magically appears in the room.”;
now the toy is in Place;
continue the action;
else:
continue the action.[/code]

The result I get when asking James about the toy is “There is no reply.”

I have also tried a different variation which gives me “You can’t see any such thing.” which I’m guessing is due to the fact that the object is out of play.

This looks like it ought to be easy, but is actually more involved than you’d think.

The easiest way to do what you want is to use the Conversation Framework extension (which is available via the Public Library). That would redefine the “ask” command to include asking about actual things in the game world (as opposed to just asking about text). Since the Framework uses Epistemology, it also allows you to ask about concepts that are out of sight of the player. Finally, you have to mark the toy as actually known to the player, or the player won’t be able to ask questions about it.

[code]Include Conversation Framework by Eric Eve.

Place is a room. “On one side of the room, you can see a couch. On the opposite side of the room, you can see a book.”

James is a person in Place.

A book is in Place. The description of the book is "You open the book and see on the inside cover a message: ‘If you ask the right person, they might just give you the toy.’ "

A couch is a fixed in place enterable scenery supporter in Place.

A toy is a familiar thing.

Persuasion rule for asking James about something: the rule succeeds.

Instead of quizzing James about the toy when the toy is off-stage:
say “With a wave of James’s hand, the toy magically appears in the room.”;
now the toy is in Place.

Instead of quizzing James about the toy, say “‘You only get the one. They don’t grow on trees, you know.’”[/code]