As I work my way through building more useful macros, I figured it couldn’t hurt to do a quick overview of the various commands and scripts I am using. While I get most of my information from the WoWWiki, I’ve found that it sometimes it’s easier to keep my own notes on how (and sometimes why) macro and script commands work. These posts will be broken down into ‘like kind’ groupings, or into individual posts depending on how I’m using the information.

Target

A target is the PC or NPC that is currently has been selected by the player. Spells and attacks are used on your current target, so using the command /target in a macro allows you to select a specific PC or NPC.

Target can also be strung together to target the thing your target is targeting (targettarget) or the thing your target’s target’s target is targeting (targettargettarget) and so on. I haven’t been able to find anything that says just how many targets you can string together, but I can’t think of a situation where you’d ever need to go further than three hops.

As an example:

/target Stringtheory

Would set my current target to Stringtheory so that I could heal or buff her.

/target targettarget

Would set my current target to whatever Stringtheory is targeting (assuming that I had first targeted Stringtheory), allowing me to attack or buff the NPC or PC.

/target targettargettarget

Would set my current target to whatever is being attacked by the mob Stringtheory is targeting. Which could be good if I want to buff or bandage the party member that the mob is currently beating on (which would hopefully be the tank!)

/target targettargettargettarget

Would just set my target back on the mob that Stringtheory was attacking… unless the other character in the group was attacking something else. This is the point where I just don’t think it’s a very useful to chain this far.

TargetParty

A good way to target party members for buffing is to use /targetparty, which starts with the first member of the party and every time the macro is pressed, targets the next party member. You can also select specific party members by using /target party1 (or party2, party3, party4– which are similar to the F1 through F5 keys, except the numbering starts with F2).

Assist

This set’s your target to the target of the person or UnitID you have listed.

/assist Stringtheory

Would set Overdraft’s target to whatever Stringtheory has targeted.

/assist focus

Would set Overdraft’s target to her Focus’s target (who may or may not be Stringtheory)

/target Stringtheory
/target targettarget

Would do the same thing, but with a lot more characters. Since there is a 250 character limit, we want to use whatever we can to cut down on the length!

Focus

Focus is a way to ‘remember’ a target. While you can’t affect a focus directly, you can target your focus or use “focus” as an identifier in scripts.

/focus Stringtheory

Would set my focus to Stringtheory, but would not target her.

/focus Stringtheory
/target focus

Would set my focus to Stringtheory and then target her. Once the focus is set, it will remain the same until you /focus something else or use /clearfocus to set it back to null.