[help] "Selecting" duplicated movieclips

I'm having some problems making a real-time strategy game. So far I've made a map and placed the player's units on it.

But now I need to select the units. I've tried a couple of things to get a variable (_root.selected) to hold the instance name instead of the source MC name.

I've failed each time. I know for a fact that the instances exist, but for some reason the code in them isn't working.

Is it even possible to have duplicated MCs interact with eachother, or on their own? I've used them in games before but that was also with just 1 MC for the user, and duplicated ones as enemies.

In this case the duplicated MCs will be for both the user and the computer... Is it possible for them to interact or am I aiming way above flash's capabilities?

It should work. Duplicated mc's act same way as normal mc's.

Explain what exactly are you trying to do and how have you built the movie.

sorry for taking so long to reply, i took a break from programming to get my head straight.

I've attached a .FLA of the scene I'm working on. The placement of units and the map construction is done on Frame 1, Layer 5.

The "selection" of the carrier unit is in _root.carrier to the top right of the screen

I use flash 5. The code thats currently there is wayyyy off because I was getting frustrated and trying anything to make it work.

I hope this helps you help me, because I REALLY want to finish this game!

You forgot to attach the fla.

i'll try again

This should work:

code:

---

onClipEvent (mouseDown) {

    if (this.hitTest(_root._xmouse, _root._ymouse,true)) {

        _root.selected = this._name;

    }

}

---

You dont need to make another variable "name", you can use movie clips instance name as it is.

To check which ship is clicked, you can use _xmouse/_ymouse.

it works when you click on the source movieclip "carrier", but when you click on "car1" or "car2" (the duplicated MCs of "Carrier") _root.selected becomes null.

any idea why?

It works on all duplicated mc's too when I test it. Maybe you forgot to delete the old code from other ships?

that doesn't seem to be it...

i'm using flash 5.

Change the code Tonypa gave you to "onClipEvent(mouseUp)", and you can also get rid of your "onClipEvent (load)" code also. I was having the same problem as you until I changed that.. seems to be giving the correct names now.

I changed onClipEvent(mousedown) to onClipEvent(mouseup) and it works!

thanks for all the help! (including help getting the .fla posted)
:D