Type

entity.Type

A template shared by entities of the same group. An entity's Type corresponds to the name of its Lua file in the entity folder, for example cat.lua.

On the serverside, it is used as a parameter for entity creation.

It is referenced heavily in clientside SDKs for the spawning, despawning, and management of entities.

Type	Initialised Value (default)	Description
string	eg. cat	String name of an entity.lua file. Read-only.

Example:

Get nearby entities with a specific type, then create more, if there are less than expected.

-- entity.lua
local function update(self, dt)
    if api.util.Time() % 5 == 0 then
    
        local nearby_entities = self:GetNearbyEntities(64)
        local type_count = 0
        
        for index, entity in pairs(nearby_entities) do
            if entity.Type == "cat" then
                type_count = type_count + 1
            end
        end
        
        local x,y,z = self:GetPosition()
        if type_count < 5 then
            api.entity.Create("cat", x, y, z, {})
            print("Created a new cat. Now there are "..(type_count+1).." nearby.")
        end
        
    end
end

-- Every five seconds, find each entity within 64 units distance.
-- Count how many have the Type "cat".
-- If there are less than 5 cats nearby, create a new cat.

-- Prints (starting with no cats nearby):
-- Created a new cat. Now there are 1 nearby.
-- Created a new cat. Now there are 2 nearby.
-- Created a new cat. Now there are 3 nearby.
-- Created a new cat. Now there are 4 nearby.
-- Created a new cat. Now there are 5 nearby.