Random selection

[EMarburg]

I am taking a class and I am having trouble with one line of script. I have my List as follows:

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pirates = [     'Captain William Kidd',     'Pierre Le Grand',     'Red Leg Grieves',     'Edward Low',     'Calico Jack Rackham',     'Anne Bonny',     'Captain Henry Morgan',     'Black Sam Bellamy',     'Black Bart Roberts',     'Edward Blackbeard Teach']

Then I have

1 2	player = random.choice(pirates) opponent = random.choice(pirates)

what script do I use to print the player and opponent?
I have tried print player
?????

[boring_accountant]

I would assume your class is using python 3.x, where the proper syntax is:

1 2	print(player) print(opponent)

If using python 2.x, then:

1 2	print player print opponent

[EMarburg]

I am using 2.x and print player does not work. I just gives me a random letter

[boring_accountant]

I can run your code just fine using 3.x. I don't have a working installation of 2.x at hand. Can you post your full code, just to make sure the issue doesn't lie elsewhere ?

[EMarburg]

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#Import the random Module import random   # Here are your list of Pirates pirates = [     'Captain William Kidd',     'Pierre Le Grand',     'Red Leg Grieves',     'Edward Low',     'Calico Jack Rackham',     'Anne Bonny',     'Captain Henry Morgan',     'Black Sam Bellamy',     'Black Bart Roberts',     'Edward Blackbeard Teach']   # PRINT THE CONTENT OF THE PIRATES LIST TO THE SCREEN HERE print '''Your List of Pirates are:   ''' for pirates in pirates:     print pirates #  Attacks List attack = ['Dodge', 'Parry', 'Thrust'] print'''     ''' # PRINT THE CONTENTS OF THE ATTACK LIST TO THE SCREEN HERE print '''Your Available Attacks are:   ''' for attack in attack:     print attack # Choosing the Characters for the fight player = random.choice(pirates) opponent = random.choice(pirates)           # ############################################################################# # Change the line below to correctly concatenate PLAYER and OPPONENT with # the variables above so that when the statement prints to screen, the chosen # character names are shown. # #############################################################################   print "Ahoy ye swabs! Prepare for battle!" print "PLAYER has challenged OPPONENT in one on one combat!"   # Choosing the attack pattack = random.choice(attack) oattack = random.choice(attack)   # CREATE A CORRECTLY CONCATENATED STRING THAT CONTAINS PLAYER, OPPONENT, PATTACK & OATTACK

[boring_accountant]

Ah ! Here is the error:

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for pirates in pirates: # <-- This line is the bad guy     print pirates     # Attacks List     attack = ['Dodge', 'Parry', 'Thrust']     print'''

What this does is it cycles through values in the list named pirates and puts the result in a string called pirates. This effectively replaces the initial list with a string. When you call random.choice(), it is correctly applied on a string, which will return a random letter from the last word in the initial pirates list.

Here is a short example that should demonstrate what I mean:

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test = ['abc', 'def'] for test in test:     print(test) print(test) print(random.choice(test))

Output:
abc
def
def
e

If rename my initial variable from test to tests, here is the resulting code and output:

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tests = ['abc', 'def'] for test in tests:     print(test) print(tests) print(random.choice(tests))

Output:
abc
def
['abc', 'def']
def

Hope this helps.

[ichabod801]

I believe the problem is line 21: for pirates in pirates:. You use the plural form for both the looping variable and the thing looped over. So at the end, pirates is equal to the last pirate: 'Edward Blackbeard Teach'. So you should switch that loop to:

1 2	for pirate in pirates:     print pirates

You should also switch to Python 3. At the end of the year support for 2.7 will stop.