How to show instance variables in the inspector

Questions & Answers
1

I am trying to use a system of base and derived classes in Unity for the first time.

What I can’t figure out is how I can show instance variables in the inspector, if that is possible at all. Possibly I’m doing this completely wrong from the start. My intention was to set up a system where I can have spells derive from the base class and build on them, and then use a script on the player to instantiate these attacks. So I don’t need an entire, almost duplicate, script for each attack.

I need them in the inspector so that I can assign prefabs for, for example, particle systems that are specific to each attack.

This is the beginning that I’ve made:

using UnityEngine;
using System.Collections;


public class AttacksHandler : MonoBehaviour
{
    GameObject playerGO;

    public class Spell
    {
        public bool needsTarget;
        public float movementSpeed;
        public int damage;
        public GameObject attackVisual; //HOW TO SHOW THIS THING IN INSPECTOR FOR EACH INSTANCE?

        public Spell(bool _needsTarget, float _movementSpeed, int _damage)
        {
            needsTarget = _needsTarget;
            movementSpeed = _movementSpeed;
            damage = _damage;
        }
    }

    public class Fireball : Spell
    {
        public ParticleSystem explosionEffect; //HOW TO SHOW THIS THING IN INSPECTOR FOR EACH INSTANCE?
        GameObject target;

        public Fireball(bool _needsTarget, float _movementSpeed, int _damage) :
            base(_needsTarget, _movementSpeed, _damage)
        {
        }
    }

    public Fireball redFireball = new Fireball(true, 50f, 25);
    public Fireball greenFireball = new Fireball(false, 20f, 200);

    void Start()
    {
        playerGO = GameObject.FindGameObjectWithTag("Player");
    }
}

Again, I may be doing this completely wrong alltogether but this was my idea to use OOP.

2

Firstly you would need to put [System.Serializable] above each class that doesn’t inherit from MonoBehaviour (or classes that do not have Object as their base class). Secondly, instances of your classes will only show up as their base class, Spell, in the inspector.

What you’ll want to do is look into ScriptableObjects. You can inherit your spell class from it and still inherit other spells from that spell class.