Specific dice to reroll in C - c

Question

I am working on a game of Yahtzee and one part of the game is the user can choose which dice out of 5 they wish to re-roll. I don't really know how to approach this besides writing a ton of if if-else statements, but there has to be a more efficient way to re-roll the specific die/ dice. I wrote out a snippet of what I am trying to accomplish, its not exactly like this in my actual code, but hopefully it is enough to answer the question :)
#include<stdio.h>
int main(void)
{
int die1 = 0, die2 = 0, die3 = 0, die4 = 0, die5 = 0;
int *ptr_die1 = &die1, *ptr_die2 = &die2, *ptr_die3 = &die3, *ptr_die4 = &die4, *ptr_die5 = &die5;
int choice = 0;
int die[5] = { 0 };
for (int i = 0; i < 5; i++)
{
die[i] = rand() % 6 + 1;
}
printf("Die[1] = %d\n", die[0]);
printf("Die[2] = %d\n", die[1]);
printf("Die[3] = %d\n", die[2]);
printf("Die[4] = %d\n", die[3]);
printf("Die[5] = %d\n", die[4]);
choice = printf("Please select which die to reroll\n");
scanf("%d", &choice);
printf("%d\n", choice);
for (int i = 0; i < 5; i++)
{
die[choice-1] = rand() % 6 + 1;
}
printf("Die[1] = %d\n", die[0]);
printf("Die[2] = %d\n", die[1]);
printf("Die[3] = %d\n", die[2]);
printf("Die[4] = %d\n", die[3]);
printf("Die[5] = %d\n", die[4]);
return 0;
}
after this I am really lost on how to change the die because the user could want to change just 1, or all 5 or any combination in between...

Answer 1

You have way too many variables that are not really needed.
int main(int argc, char **argv)
{
int i;
int choice;
int dices[5];
srand(time(NULL));
while(1){
for (i = 0; i < 5; i++)
dices[i] = rand() % 6 + 1;
choice = printf("Please select which die to reroll (or enter 0 to quit)");
scanf("%d", &choice);
if (choice == 0) // end the game
break;
if (choice < 1 || choice > 5 ){ // make sure that input is valid
fprintf(stderr, "error, input should be between 1 to 5 (inclusive)\n");
return -1;
}
printf("dice shows: %d", dices[choice-1]);
}
return 0;
}
You need to ask the user for the ending it, e.g. "Enter 0 to end the game". Otherwise it would be an infinite loop.

Answer 2

You could have the user input a comma-separatd list of die, instead of a single integer, which it looks like you're doing now. Then just parse the input, check that you have between 1 and 5 valid integers less than 6, and index into each die.
Or you could do like kaylum suggested and loop until the user inputs a special string indicating they're done, or prompt for 1, 2, ... 5 and ask for a yes or no answer to each.

Answer 3

Just use an array of int values to represent the set of dice:
#define DICE_COUNT 6
void rollDice(int* diceArray, size_t diceIndex) {
assert( 0 <= diceIndex && diceIndex < DICE_COUNT );
diceArray[ diceIndex ] = rand() % 6 + 1;
}
int main(int argc, char* argv[]) {
// Seed the RNG:
srand( (unsigned)time(&t) );
int dice[DICE_COUNT];
for(size_t i = 0; i < DICE_COUNT; i++) {
rollDice( dice, i );
}
while( true ) {
printf("Please select which die to reroll. Enter -2 to quit. (%d to %d inclusive)", 1, DICE_COUNT);
int selection = -1;
scanf("%d", &selection);
if( selection == -2 ) break;
if( 1 <= selection && selection <= DICE_COUNT ) {
selection--; // convert from 1-6 to 0-5.
rollDice( dice, selection );
}
}
return EXIT_SUCCESS;
}

Answer 4

I don't see any if..else statements in your code above. I will say, in this chunk of code:
for (int i = 0; i < 5; i++)
{
die[choice-1] = rand() % 6 + 1;
}
You don't need the for loop. You are not using the index, and rand() should work the first time through. I know rand() isn't the best written function, but if you seed it first, it should give you a pseudo-random number.
#include <time.h>
...
/* initialize random seed: */
srand ( time(NULL) );
...
die[choice-1] = rand() % 6 + 1;
Hope this was helpful, if you are still even working on that project!