How to store data with lots of subdata but keep easy and simple access in python

Question

Making an open world choose-your-own-adventure text based game in python. Sorta new to python so I'm not sure what the best way to do this is. I want to store information about lots of different items such as armor, weapons, etc. I also want to store information about different towns and the NPCs in them. How can I store this info, all with their own subdata such as a swords damage, in a easy to use, sorted manner?

My first thought was to use classes. This was so I could do something like

class goblin:
    health = 10

class items:
    class weapons:
        class ironSword:
            damage = 1
            
goblin.health -= items.weapons.ironSword

But i figured this wouldn't work because I need the items to be accessible, like a variable. This is because I am using a class for the player, which has a list for their inventory. I want to be able to store these items in said list, Which I am not sure how to do with classes.

Answer 1

Your approach of organizing the data in classes is good. But you're defining the classes in a rather complex way. A better option would be to use inheritence. If you are unfamiliar with the concepts of inheritence or subclasses, you can check out this excellent video by Corey Schafer.

You may want to do something like this:

class Item:
    def __init__(self, name, description):
        self.name = name
        self.description = description

class Weapon(Item):
    def __init__(self, name, description, damage):
        super().__init__(name, description)
        self.damage = damage

class Armor(Item):
    def __init__(self, name, description, defense):
        super().__init__(name, description)
        self.defense = defense

Then you can create as many objects (your items) you want from these classes like this:

iron_sword = Weapon("Iron Sword", "A basic iron sword.", damage=10)
machine_gun = Weapon("Machine Gun", "An automatic assault rifle.", damage=90)
leather_armor = Armor("Leather Armor", "Light armor made of leather.", defense=5)