A (hopefully) simple assist macro request.

Post by PaleKing

Hi, I am aware that variations of this question have been asked in the past but the ones I found seemed a little more complicated than that which I'm after. Could anyone please help with a macro for the following:

I'm DPS so at the beginning of a dungeon I select the tank and "set focus". What I'd like is a macro that targets whatever he (my focus) is targeting. I need a macro that helps me to be sure I'm targeting the right thing when everything gets too messy to see what's going on.

Is it as simple as manually setting the tank as focus at the start of the run (using right-click) and then using "/target focustarget" as the macro?

I've seen versions that included a"no dead"command but I want sure what that was or if it was over-engineering things

Cheers for any help.

Post by Wanderingfox

yep. /tar focustarget will get you the target of your current focus. If your focus is the tank, it will get the tank's target.

There are a few minor issues with this kind of macro, however. Specifically, your focus can be randomly reset due to distance / death (I believe... it's been a while since I've tested it). You can get around it with a macro re-writing addon if it bothers you (look at mtarget).

The nodead prevents you from picking up the focus target if it's dead. In other words, your tank is targeting a dead mob, the nodead will prevent the macro from swapping targets in that case. It essentially ensures that when you hit the button, you'll always get a living mob.

Post by PaleKing

Cheers for the help. What syntax would integrate the nodead aspect into the macro please? Would you suggest it is worth doing so for the rare occasions it would cause a problem?

Post by 1069282

This post was from a user who has deleted their account.

Post by Wanderingfox

Cheers for the help. What syntax would integrate the nodead aspect into the macro please? Would you suggest it is worth doing so for the rare occasions it would cause a problem?

should be something like /target focustarget

I gave up of using that kind or macros. Couse every time I got new focus target one of my addons started to yell that I cant take focus target while using it. Or should I say 4-6 addons? Everytime I disabled addon which couses me to relog other addon starts to say the same... And pll in my group didnt have time to wait and thats why I always got kicked from raid,lfr and dungelns. So I gave up of it and now I am just doing classic clicking.

Use mtarget. It doesn't use focus, but rather uses macro rewriting to achieve a similar effect.

For example, you make a macro that looks like this:

/target $tank

Then you tell mtarget to use it as a template.

Then you make a second macro with:

/mtarget set tank
/mtarget write

Now, whenever you use the second macro, it sets a variable called tank to be whatever you're targeting. It then updates all macros that mtarget has a template for, and replaces all instances of $tank with the value you stored.

For example,

I target a player named Bob, and hit the set macro. $tank is now set to Bob. It then takes the first macro, and rewrites it to /target Bob. If I were to then target Fred and hit the second macro, the first macro would update to /target Fred.

It only works out of combat, but that's all you need for this kind of thing.

Post by ce0122

The easiest thing I've found to make a two-line macro with an attack command:
/target focus
/assist
/startattack

Hope that helps.

Edit: Did not think about adding the nodead part...

Post by PaleKing

The easiest thing I've found to make a two-line macro with an attack command:
/target focus
/assist
/startattack

Does this mean that as long as I have the tank set as a focus, the command "/assist" does the same thing as "/target focustarget". Is there a reason to use one in preference to the other?

Post by Neffi

You should simply be able to do:

/assist focus

or

/assist

As for your question,

/tar focustarget

will usually do the same thing as /assist, except that assist will respect the option "Attack on assisst" in the interface options (start auto-attack when you /assist). But that can also be achieved with /startattack

If you're looking to mix in nodead logic:

/tar

Which will target your focus's target IF it (your focus's target) is harmful, alive and exists; otherwise it will do nothing. Mix in a /startattack line to replicate the auto-attack on assist feature (or don't).

---

As for your focus changing when the tank dies, it will only drop your focus. That is, if the tank dies you will lose your current focus but it will not set it to anything else by accident (unless other macros of yours set focus). As long as you remain in a party though, you won't drop focus if your tank goes out of range (that only happens for units which are not in your party). That will only happen if your tank leaves the dungeon (thus disappears).

Edit: Actually, now that I think about it, I don't believe your focus will drop if the tank dies. Since he is in your party, he should remain focused even when he dies. I'm almost certain of this, because I also use focus for keeping track of tanks in instances, and friends/flag-carriers in BGs. I'm 95% sure that your focus will stick if it dies. No need to use an addon.

Post by PaleKing

ok, so would you suggest :

/assist
/tar [@focustarget,harm,nodead)
/startattack

Would I need any other command at the start or end?

Cheers.

Post by ce0122

If your focus dies they'll still be there as your focus.

For the /startattack thing: I whoopsied a long time ago as a hunter and switched targets with tab and had autoattack left on and pulled a rather large group of mobs so I've disabled it across the board on my folks which is why I throw in the /startattack; it works to start your autoattacks if you're like me and switch targets and have the autoattack setting off.

Neffi hit it with the /target ...whoever is your focus you'll switch to their target straight away, if you want to limit it to targets you can kill and that aren't dead PaleKing had it with /tar .

Personally, I like the idea of the nodead switch (no sense in attacking a dead thing) so I'm going to borrow that one! :)

Post by Wanderingfox

Edit: Actually, now that I think about it, I don't believe your focus will drop if the tank dies. Since he is in your party, he should remain focused even when he dies. I'm almost certain of this, because I also use focus for keeping track of tanks in instances, and friends/flag-carriers in BGs. I'm 95% sure that your focus will stick if it dies. No need to use an addon.

It's probably been fixed. I know this was an issue at one point way back when as it's what drove me to mtarget originally XD

A (hopefully) simple assist macro request.

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