Jamba - new feature - Focus / Target Management - DESIGN feedback requested.

[Jafula]

Hi,

I am working on Jamba ('http://www.dual-boxing.com/forums/index.php?page=Thread&threadID=12887') - 0.2 and Zub requested a feature where Jamba could set focus to the current master. This is fine and I'll implement it the best I can by programatically updating a /focus macro and then requiring the user to press a key. (Wow API FocusUnit is protected and I cannot use it).

I personally don't use focus for my master, I use targettarget in my macros ( no focus manifesto ('http://www.dual-boxing.com/forums/index.php?page=Thread&threadID=8052') ); so I wanted to set up a system where I could manage focus simply.

My idea is below; could you critique it for me? (I'm developing it anyway; but its great to get ideas / potential problem feedback early.)

New: Jamba-Me
A list of nicknames that this character responds to when receiving jamba slash commands. Jamba slash commands have an optional parameter <pushnickname>. If <pushnickname> is set only characters that have that nickname will run the command. If <pushnickname> is not set, Jamba only runs the command on the character that the script was run on. Essentially every time certain Jamba slash commands are received and <pushnickname> is not blank, the command is sent to all enabled Jamba members and they look at the <pushnickname> parameter and decide whether or not to execute the command. Example nickname set based on my 5 box group: Yaswar (warrior): all, main Yasmage (mage): all, slave, sheep Yasprie (priest): all, slave, shackle, mainheal Yasham (shaman): all, slave, hex1*, backupheal1 Yashan (shaman): all, slave, hex2*, backupheal2 So if I wanted my tank to be the focus on all my slaves, I use the slash command (one just one of my characters, my main say): /jamba setfocus Yaswar slave (and then I press the jamba set focus key on my keyboard) /jamba setfocus party1 slave (and then I press the jamba set focus key on my keyboard) Or, if I use the targettarget macro system (and focus is for sheeping) and I want to assign a target to sheep, I use: /jamba setfocus targettarget sheep (and then I press the jamba set focus key on my keyboard) To get everyone to dance (from the main).. /jamba dance all (when I implement the dance command) I have focus on my priest set to my mage (aggro magnet) so I can easily heal her. /jamba setfocus Yasmage mainheal (and then I press the jamba set focus key on my keyboard)Jamba
Focus management - new slash commands:
/jamba setfocusmaster <pushnickname> /jamba setfocus <unittarget> <pushnickname> (where unittarget is party1, party2, target, targettarget, player, focustarget, etc) /jamba clearfocus <pushnickname>
Once this system is in place; it should be easy to extend it to other out of combat commands; like dance or configuring spells, etc.

Did I explain myself well enough? What do you think? Will this work? Would you use it? Can you see any potential problems with it?

Thanks in advance.

EDIT: This is turning into a target management feature as well.

[warbringer]

If this can do what I think it does it sounds awesome!
For my current 5-group shammy I'm no so dependant on CC since I don't have any but I'm also planning on a 1 Paladin/4Mage group which gives me plenty of sheeps to manage.
Something like this could be used to easily sort your focus in instances and have each mage sheep something and keep it sheeped while burning down something else.

I'd definitely use this for instancing/CC-heavy fights.

[Gaffy]

Sounds like a great idea.

[bugilt]

A pally powers/grid type interface would be pretty slick with this. When a option for a unfriendly target is selected a grid type UI creates a new box with an indication of what is being done to that target appears. Buttons to clear options per target or all could be useful.

[SilverSlice]

some entertainment out of combat options would be great
so that if you target a player in the game so all my char would
do some /dance with the player that is targetet, the way i do it now
i got a macro on all my chars
/assist silvetachi "my main
/dance


but not all my slaves wanna dance with my target sometimes they are dancing with me.
i am sure my macro can easly be improved, but having some entermainment options within
this addon makes the whole ting easier :)
is allways fun to see a horde doing K E K at me and they trow him a funny emote x5 in at him like /kiss /flirt.

anyway great work so far i am looking forward to see the next update to this addon as i am sure we all are :)

Silver

[Jafula]

A pally powers/grid type interface would be pretty slick with this. When a option for a unfriendly target is selected a grid type UI creates a new box with an indication of what is being done to that target appears. Buttons to clear options per target or all could be useful.Google comes up with this ('http://wow.curse.com/downloads/details/3738/') for pally powers. Looks pretty sweet. From your description do you mean that a box appears for each unfriendly target; and in the box you see some information - like a sheep icon if you had a mage focus on the target? Or something slightly different to that?

[Jafula]

some entertainment out of combat options would be great
so that if you target a player in the game so all my char would
do some /dance with the player that is targetet, the way i do it now
i got a macro on all my chars
/assist silvetachi "my main
/dance


but not all my slaves wanna dance with my target sometimes they are dancing with me.
i am sure my macro can easly be improved, but having some entermainment options within
this addon makes the whole ting easier :)
is allways fun to see a horde doing K E K at me and they trow him a funny emote x5 in at him like /kiss /flirt.

anyway great work so far i am looking forward to see the next update to this addon as i am sure we all are :)

SilverSsssh, you're spoiling my secret plans. :whistling: I've got some ideas for role-playing aspects of the game I'd like to do as well. I'd like to be able to tell my toons to do a funny emote, but they all do a different one- like my warrior is gruff and rude so always /rude, my priest is friendly, so always /cheer, my mage is flirty, so always /flirt, my shamans are .. well they're shamans, meh. But it is tedious to set up macros. I want something I can change easily (like you want).

Anyway, back on track, I've done the development for the nicknames and all the focus scripts except clear focus. It works really well. I just am trying to design a nice gui (bugilt had a suggestion) so that each toon can have a button and assigning a focus is just a mouse click on main, a key press and the slaves update. Perhaps a small dropdown for each toon with options listed such as target, targettarget, focustarget, party1, player, Yasmage, Yasprie, etc.

Anyway, I'll think about it more over my morning coffee. :D

[lacitpo]

So this is purely for focus management. Seems like a great system. Have you thought about a /jamba settarget command also?

[Simulacra]

So this is purely for focus management. Seems like a great system. Have you thought about a /jamba settarget command also?
I second that, a lot of us use target instead of focus

[Jafula]

So this is purely for focus management. Seems like a great system. Have you thought about a /jamba settarget command also?I have now. Because of wow api restrictions, Jamba target changes could only happen out of combat. So on the fly in combat target changing is out. BUT, what if you could set up 3 target commands, each with its own key bind.
Before combat, you set up mob1 as target1, mob2 as target2 and mob3 as target3. At the start of combat, you press key1 which targets mob1. Nuke mob1 out of existance while tanking the rest. When mob1 is dead; press key2 which targets mob2. Nuke mob2 out of existance while tanking the rest. When mob2 is dead; press key3 which targets mob3. Nuke mob3 out of existance and give your tank a rest.So a couple of new commands:

/jamba settarget <#> <target> <nickname>

/jamba settargetresolve <#> <target> <nickname>

The command settargetresolve gets the actual name of the mob from the <target> and places that in the internal macro instead of <target>. E.g., if my slaves were targetting my main, and my main was targeting mob1 then

/jamba settarget 1 targettarget slave => /target targettarget

/jamba settargetresolve 1 targettarget slave => /target mob1

I'd throw in a raid icon option as well somewhere. And a gui, because I don't want to type all those slash commands the whole time. Although shouldn't be too hard to bind the commands to a key using Trinity (or similar). Maybe allow up to 5 targets. Is that enough?

EDIT:

And if while in combat you got an add / mob that wasn't Jamba targetted, you could fall back to (in my case) a keypress that causes slaves to target the master (my spells are all the "/cast [target=targettarget, harm] [] Lightning Bolt" style macros)

[lacitpo]

I see problems with mobs with the same name.

I generally use the same targeting structure as you use it seems with all my spells targets as [target=targettarget][] so they target my main's target.

I could see some real use for the ability for the target passing and focus passing being able to default to your brain's target.

[Jafula]

I see problems with mobs with the same name.

I generally use the same targeting structure as you use it seems with all my spells targets as [target=targettarget][] so they target my main's target.

I could see some real use for the ability for the target passing and focus passing being able to default to your brain's target.Mobs with same names: yes agreed, I have noticed with slaves targettarget that occassionally half my slaves pick on one and half on another. Hence the raid icon integration (optional). A visual indicator of what your slave is targetting. Going to look into the mob unique identifers to see if I can use that somehow...

I think the out-of-box experience is leaning towards your suggestion (working on master):

Keypress to get all slaves to target master. ["/jamba settargetmaster slave" bound to key]
Target mob1 with master.
Click jambatarget1 button (has star raid icon). [Jamba marks mob with star icon; and all slaves update target1 macros to mob1.]
Keypress of jambatarget1key. [All slaves should now target mob1 that has star icon; if not spam key until they do]
Repeat for additional mobs.
Nuke.

[Xzin]

I had the idea of a similar system about two years ago with regards to sheeping / CC.

It was somewhat killed off by the fact that 1) I never bothered to code it up and 2) because they introduced 2.0 code.

But what about some kind of system that can track targets? Say you have 4 CC sources (sheep, hex, etc). You could select 4 targets, push them to the 4 clients and then press one button and presto - 4 sheeps on 4 different targets. You only need to push /target NAME to the clients.

This would be great for arenas, to say the least.

[Ken]

It looks nice, but how will this work in PvP where you constantly get other people attacking you and your priorities of attacking shift? Would I constantly have to smash a button to make the slaves target the right target before they can cast?
[edit] Also I wonder how much you can make use of the RPC library before Blizzard says "this is automation".

[Otlecs]

This is one of those times when I'm sure I'm missing something, but I've thought it through as far as I can bring myself to, and... I don't see the benefit.

Like you, I use a "no focus leader" system and use focus for cc / specific-target healing. To set focus, I just use keybinds.

In my case, I have a G15 so I use esoteric keybinds but it's basically G1-G5 to focus each of my characters, and I can change focus mid-battle too - really important when I'm holding two sheep and want to actually kill one of them whilst re-sheeping the other.

Likewise for killing different targets (in PvE, one guy nukes the pet while the others nuke the NPC Warlock for example) - just different "/assist" keybinds.

This is how a simple pull usually pans out when I play my mage/mage/hunter/priest/pally team, where I hands-on play the pally:

- Select sheep1 target, hit G1 (first sheep target set), orange circle appears over his head, mage1 has it as his focus target.

- Select sheep2 target, hit G2 (second sheep target set), blue square appears over his head, mage2 has it as his focus target.

- Select kill target. Hit assist. All drones have my kill target as their target. Skull appears over his head for target confirmation.

- Pull with avenger's shield, hit generic "sheep focus" button shortly after I start casting. Hit it again if one got resisted.

- Tank, DPS, heal, re-sheep as needed.

- Target sheep1, hit G1 and G2 - both mages now have the same sheep target.

- Target sheep2, hit assist. All characters now have sheep2 as the kill target.

- Hit generic "sheep focus" button again. Sheep1 goes bah, sheep2 breaks, is mad and either runs to me (avenger's shield aggro) or goes for the mages. Either way I grab him on the way past.

- Repeat untill all mobs are dead.

There are variations for LoS pulls, pet off-tanking, shackling, etc, but they all rely on the same basic mechanism - dynamically shifting focus for CC and /assist for killing.

The only benefit I see of this proposed enhancement to Jamba is that I'll be able to manage targeting through slash commands instead of with keybinds. So long as I'm not in battle.

See? I just know I'm missing something here. What is it ? :S

[lacitpo]

Ok, your target/focus project has been on my mind a lot so I'm going to do a sort of brain dump here on my thoughts and hope that some of it helps.

I think any system you design needs to be able to handle both character, mob, and NPC names, along with having a token based system. Token based system being that each character in your squad can be assigned one or more tags. Here are all the possibilities for tokens that i can see.

brain (character with a person in control)
healer (primary healer)
backup healer (backup healer)
cc (crowd control)
dps (primary dps)
dps lead (character that other toons use to aquire their dps targets)
slave (any slave character)
tank (tank)

First thoughts on token based focus and target passing. The token based system would be beneficial for pre-combat setups. I can see it as a great tool to simplify alt-tabbing between instances of wow and being able to focus more on a single window. I think that the tags should be able to be numbered so that you have dps1, dps2, cc1, cc2 so that you can distinguish between toons. Also some of this stuff could begin to be worked into a status window allowing you to reference which toons are marked with which tags.

It seems to me that this system would be the first step towards a system spoken of earlier (referenced as the perfect addon but i don't feel like digging up the link). Since Jamba can't pass targets or focus during combat, those options have to be hard coded into a macro before combat begins. I'm not sure what approach you have thought of for the system but here is my vision of it. I am not sure if all of this is doable from a coding standpoint but again, this is just a brain dump.

Jamba provides a completely seperate macro interface. All of your macros can be written and are stored inside of jamba. Macros can be written with token tags in place of targeting information. For example.

Your current party has a paladin named Tankadin who has been given the tag "Tank1"

/cast [target=tank1-target]

would be rewritten automatically to

/cast [target=Tankadin-target

I may have wandered a bit off subject but I needed to dump these ideas somewhere.

[Motgib]

In my case, I have a G15 so I use esoteric keybinds but it's basically G1-G5 to focus each of my characters, and I can change focus mid-battle too - really important when I'm holding two sheep and want to actually kill one of them whilst re-sheeping the other.

What is Esoteric keybinds, exactly?

I have a G11 keyboard and I was using the G Keys set as CTRL+Alt+Shift+# but recently I have been having problems with the G Keys just pressing the "1" Key instead of the "Ctrl+Shift+Alt+1" Key. So I've stopped using them for now until I can figure out WTF is wrong with them. Also they are keeping the old keybinds regardless of the new profile and settings that I have saved. I even removed and re-downloaded the software and it kept all of the same keybinds.

[Duane]

In my case, I have a G15 so I use esoteric keybinds but it's basically G1-G5 to focus each of my characters, and I can change focus mid-battle too - really important when I'm holding two sheep and want to actually kill one of them whilst re-sheeping the other.

What is Esoteric keybinds, exactly?

I have a G11 keyboard and I was using the G Keys set as CTRL+Alt+Shift+# but recently I have been having problems with the G Keys just pressing the "1" Key instead of the "Ctrl+Shift+Alt+1" Key. So I've stopped using them for now until I can figure out WTF is wrong with them. Also they are keeping the old keybinds regardless of the new profile and settings that I have saved. I even removed and re-downloaded the software and it kept all of the same keybinds.

I had that same problem and had to either use the WoW default and configure it or do something different. I'll try and remember to check it out when I get back home this evening.

[Jafula]

I had the idea of a similar system about two years ago with regards to sheeping / CC.

It was somewhat killed off by the fact that 1) I never bothered to code it up and 2) because they introduced 2.0 code.

But what about some kind of system that can track targets? Say you have 4 CC sources (sheep, hex, etc). You could select 4 targets, push them to the 4 clients and then press one button and presto - 4 sheeps on 4 different targets. You only need to push /target NAME to the clients.

This would be great for arenas, to say the least.If I understand you correctly ...



GUI at start:

----------------------------------
Player Name | CC Target
----------------------------------
Mage 1 | -- [CLICK TO SET PLAYER1 TARGET]
Mage 2 | -- [CLICK TO SET PLAYER2 TARGET]
Mage 3 | -- [CLICK TO SET PLAYER3 TARGET]
Mage 4 | -- [CLICK TO SET PLAYER4 TARGET]
----------------------------------
[CLICK TO UPDATE SLAVE CC TARGET]

Then master does:

1. Master, target "Arena Enemy 4", click [CLICK TO SET PLAYER1 TARGET].
2. Master, target "Arena Enemy 2", click [CLICK TO SET PLAYER2 TARGET].
3. Master, target "Arena Enemy 5", click [CLICK TO SET PLAYER4 TARGET].

and the GUI would look like:

----------------------------------
Player Name | CC Target
----------------------------------
Mage 1 | Arena Enemy 4 [CLICK TO SET PLAYER1 TARGET]
Mage 2 | Arena Enemy 2 [CLICK TO SET PLAYER2 TARGET]
Mage 3 | -- [CLICK TO SET PLAYER3 TARGET]
Mage 4 | Arena Enemy 5 [CLICK TO SET PLAYER4 TARGET]
----------------------------------
[CLICK TO UPDATE SLAVE CC TARGET]

4. then press [CLICK TO UPDATE SLAVE CC TARGET] - jamba will update internal button macro to

/target Arena Enemy 4
/cast Polymorph
/targetlasttarget

on Mage 1, etc for Mage 2 and Mage 4

5. Press button to sheep and you have 3 sheeps.

You are stuck with this macro until combat ends.
Mage 1 couldn't sheep an additional target in combat.
And mage 3 is just plain lazy.
Of course, you can use traditional keybinding for setting focus, sheeping once you are in combat.



I don't PVP much; but for Arenas aren't the CC spells nerfed compared to the PVE equivalent?

see: http://forums.wow-europe.com/thread.html?topicId=43835277&sid=1&pageNo=1

So, its definitely doable - but is it worth doing?
As a multi-boxer arena player will this be enough?
Would you actually benefit from this system?
Is it that timing is king in arenas and having a pre-targetted macro beats focus keybinding?
Or focus needs to be free for something else? I assume you are in combat for the duration of the match?
Could you give me an example of play where this would be useful?
Aside: This doesn't mean I don't want to code it up, I just want to make sure if I do code something, that it'll get used.

[Jafula]

I think any system you design needs to be able to handle both character, mob, and NPC names, along with having a token based system. Token based system being that each character in your squad can be assigned one or more tags. Here are all the possibilities for tokens that i can see.

<snip>

Also some of this stuff could begin to be worked into a status window allowing you to reference which toons are marked with which tags.
Great ideas! Its what I was trying to explain in my first post about nicknames. Its done (but not released) except for the status window. I call tokens 'nicknames' and they are per character.

http://wow.jafula.com/images/extforums/jambanicknamepreview.jpg
Example mage nicknames.
Jamba provides a completely seperate macro interface. All of your macros can be written and are stored inside of jamba. Macros can be written with token tags in place of targeting information. For example.

Your current party has a paladin named Tankadin who has been given the tag "Tank1"

/cast [target=tank1-target]

would be rewritten automatically to

/cast [target=Tankadin-target]

I may have wandered a bit off subject but I needed to dump these ideas somewhere.Sweet, I hadn't got as far as your thinking of embedding the token tags into macros. I'm really glad you brain-dumped in this thread! The post you referred to is probably this one ('http://www.dual-boxing.com/forums/index.php?page=Thread&postID=115607#post115607') .

The /jamba setfocus system currently in place uses macros stored inside of Jamba. I don't see why I couldn't extend this to take your existing macro with token-tags, replace the tokens and store it as a new macro. To use the new macro you would use the command /click JambaMacroOriginalMacroNameButton or something similar; which you could embed into a button (Trinity, Bongos, etc) or Jamba could provide a key bind interface directly to the macro for you. A little configuring and tweaking but it would work...

EDIT: Done, but not released.

EDIT 2: Was smoking something when I wrote that! Key bind out of combat setup focus is done...

[Jafula]

It looks nice, but how will this work in PvP where you constantly get other people attacking you and your priorities of attacking shift? Would I constantly have to smash a button to make the slaves target the right target before they can cast?
[edit] Also I wonder how much you can make use of the RPC library before Blizzard says "this is automation".It wouldn't work in PVP. You can only set up targets, out of combat. I can only see it being useful for PVE situations; the exception being perhaps Xzin's Arena crowd control target idea above...

Disclaimer: The below is all IMHO...

I wouldn't wonder too much; enjoy the multi-boxing while you can! Everything Jamba uses is legtimate wow api commands that addons are allowed to use. I'm sure Blizzard thought long and hard about what was protected (addons cannot use) and what wasn't.

For instance, Zub's request to automatically set focus to the master is not allowed in an addon; the FocusUnit method is protected. But Blizzard specifically allow out of combat internal macro configuration. So Zub has to press a key (hardware event) to get the focus automatically set to the master. Hope Zub doesn't mind.

Lots of addons use this idea, like, healbot, assistfu to name two off the top of my head. Its limiting as nothing can change in combat; which is what Blizzard's "no automation" intention was.

P.S. Love your avatar image. I've got my d10 out and I'm rolling now; I've generated at least 2 whines! Oh wait... multi-boxing isn't paper and dice, doh!

[lacitpo]

Cool cool

Tonight is my multiboxing night so I'm going to give this all a whirl and see how all these features work out. Promise to provide feedback.

[Jafula]

This is one of those times when I'm sure I'm missing something, but I've thought it through as far as I can bring myself to, and... I don't see the benefit.

<snip>

The only benefit I see of this proposed enhancement to Jamba is that I'll be able to manage targeting through slash commands instead of with keybinds. So long as I'm not in battle.

See? I just know I'm missing something here. What is it ? :S
First of all, thank you for writing out an example play; its great to have one to help one think. And thanks for the criticism, the last thing I need to do is go off track and code up some monster that no one will use...



Having said that, imagine this hypothetical situation:

Let's forget focus for the moment and imagine a 1 warrior and 4 shaman group (no cc). Master is party leader. Pretend, I'm not so good a tank and prefer to click target rather than tab target. I also don't shaman shock to interrupt mob spell casting; because its not macroed up yet. And my AOE totems are not talented and I forget about them on this occasion.


I go to BRD with my 1 warrior and 4 shamans. I get up to the Black Vault. The mobs in this area are real social and always pull in groups of 6 (2 elite, 4 normal). The mobs are DangerousRangedHighDps1, DangerousRangedHighDps2, MeleeEasyMob1 MeleeEasyMob2, Elite1, Elite2. Enter combat with the warrior; say by charging Elite1. :whistling: My shamans have stopped following and are some distance back after my charge (still in dps/heal range). Shaman now begin to dps down first /assist mob (DangerousRangedHighDps1). Warrior thunderclapping, sundering away, etc, getting agro. Warriors back is to the shamans. Now when 6 mobs all hit my tank hard; I'm going to need to heal my tank asap; so I do just that with my resto shaman. Resto shaman crits on the heal and gets aggro from two mobs (MeleeEasyMob1 and MeleeEasyMob2), so I'm spinning around, running back to my group trying to click target those mobs that aggroed my healer so I can taunt, sunder, etc them off the healer. But I leave a mob behind (DangerousRangedHighDps2) that also aggros my healer (but I fail to notice). Meanwhile the dps shamans have finished nuking down the DangerousRangedHighDps1 mob and are beginning to get a little titchy. In the heat of the battle, I now /assist my current target (MeleeEasyMob1 or MeleeEasyMob2) that I'm trying to get off my healer and the dps shaman begin to nuke that one down. BUT I really should have had my dps group targetting the DangerousRangedHighDps2 mob; because that one is now nuking my healer to death. Wipe.


Enter Jamba-Target (or whatever).

In this situation I know (caused I wiped here), that I need to kill DangerousRangedHighDps1 and DangerousRangedHighDps2 as fast as possible. But how to target DangerousRangedHighDps2 for /assist dps when I'm busy trying to save the healer? (Remember the tank is not facing towards DangerousRangedHighDps2 and is concentrating hard on saving the healer.)

Jamba-Target provides me with 6 key binds for 6 targets (on each character). On all my characters I bind a key to each of these targets (to keep it simple, NumPad 1-6 map to jamba-target-keybind 1-6).

I get to the step 2 above (the 6 mob stage). On my master, Jamba-Target provides me with 6 "set target" gui clickable buttons (say 1=Star, 2=Circle, 3=Diamond, 4=Triangle, 5=Moon, 6=Square). This buttons use "/jamba settarget" slash commands so you don't have to.

I have a key already bound to a macro on my slaves that says /target master. So I press that key, and all slaves target me.

On my master I now target DangerousRangedHighDps1. I then click the Jamba-Target 1=Star button. Jamba sets raid icon star on DangerousRangedHighDps1. Jamba then goes and bakes into internal target macro 1 "/target DangerousRangedHighDps1"; on all the slave dps characters. Remember this macro is bound to NumPad1.

On my master I now target DangerousRangedHighDps2. I then click the Jamba-Target 2=Circle button. Jamba sets raid icon circle on DangerousRangedHighDps2. Jamba then goes and bakes into internal target macro 2 "/target DangerousRangedHighDps2"; on all the slave dps characters. Remember this macro is bound to NumPad2.

Etc for targets 3 - 6. This is quick to do, as I'm clicking on target1, clicking JambaSetTarget1 button, clicking on target2, clicking JambaSetTarget2, etc.

Before I start combat I press NumPad1 whichs targets DangerousRangedHighDps1 on my slave dps characters. I charge wth my warrior to start combat; etc. When I get to step 6 above, instead of /assist the wrong target, I press NumPad2 which causes my dps slaves to target DangerousRangedHighDps2 and I burn it down. I press Numpad3-6 as I burn through all my targets and need new ones.

Now at any time, if I get a spawn or add in that fight, I can still use the usual target with master and /assist key that you describe in your post. When the add is dealt with; I've got my NumPad4 key to target the Triangle mob; etc.

When combat ends; Jamba automatically clears down the internal target macros ready for next combat.

Does that make sense?
Is this hypothetical situation realistic?
Would this that be useful?

Errrr, focus, oh well... :P

[Tasty]

I was just gonna ask about automation etc etc but as you pointed out if Blizzard didn't want you doing it they'd protect it (imho) Anyways gonna try out your awesome lookin addons when I get home :D

[Otlecs]

Does that make sense?
Is this hypothetical situation realistic?
Would this that be useful?
Yes, yes and yes.

Now I understand exactly what you're doing. This is all about having an immutable, pre-defined kill sequence, nothing to do with crowd control which is where I went off track (for some inadequately explored reason).

That would indeed be useful, though obviously I never accidentally target the wrong thing with MY team in the heat of battle.... :whistling:

See, I knew I was missing something. Thanks for the very thorough explanation.

[Ken]

It looks nice, but how will this work in PvP where you constantly get other people attacking you and your priorities of attacking shift? Would I constantly have to smash a button to make the slaves target the right target before they can cast?
[edit] Also I wonder how much you can make use of the RPC library before Blizzard says "this is automation".It wouldn't work in PVP. You can only set up targets, out of combat. I can only see it being useful for PVE situations; the exception being perhaps Xzin's Arena crowd control target idea above...

Disclaimer: The below is all IMHO...

I wouldn't wonder too much; enjoy the multi-boxing while you can! Everything Jamba uses is legtimate wow api commands that addons are allowed to use. I'm sure Blizzard thought long and hard about what was protected (addons cannot use) and what wasn't.

For instance, Zub's request to automatically set focus to the master is not allowed in an addon; the FocusUnit method is protected. But Blizzard specifically allow out of combat internal macro configuration. So Zub has to press a key (hardware event) to get the focus automatically set to the master. Hope Zub doesn't mind.

Lots of addons use this idea, like, healbot, assistfu to name two off the top of my head. Its limiting as nothing can change in combat; which is what Blizzard's "no automation" intention was.

Thanks a lot for the detailed explanation.


P.S. Love your avatar image. I've got my d10 out and I'm rolling now; I've generated at least 2 whines! Oh wait... multi-boxing isn't paper and dice, doh!
Ahahaha thanks! :D

[Griznah]

yes yes yes!
I love that option for the Jamba-Target.
BUT! I have question, would the Jamba-Targest be for DPS'ing, or just switching target? And how would it work with Multiple mobs with same name?

[Jafula]

yes yes yes!
I love that option for the Jamba-Target.
BUT! I have question, would the Jamba-Targest be for DPS'ing, or just switching target? And how would it work with Multiple mobs with same name?Just switching target. Like to keep it simple. So to dps mob1, press JambaTarget1 key, then press your dps button.

My dps button is macro'ed up like:
/cast [target=targettarget,harm][] Lightning Bolt (no focus manifesto)
so the [] fall through clause is what makes this work.

Does that answer you question?

Multiple mobs with the same name are an issue. Its the same issue as manually /target mobname. I'm not 100% sure if I can help this, going to research mob unique identifiers and /targetexact. But as others have said in other threads about this issue, just mash the key until the slaves are all showing the same target.

[Jafula]

Now I understand exactly what you're doing. This is all about having an immutable, pre-defined kill sequence, nothing to do with crowd control which is where I went off track (for some inadequately explored reason).

That would indeed be useful, though obviously I never accidentally target the wrong thing with MY team in the heat of battle.... :whistling:

See, I knew I was missing something. Thanks for the very thorough explanation."immutable, pre-defined kill sequence" - such eloquence :love:

TBH, you weren't missing anything as the OP was all about crowd control / focus. Plus your post got me thinking and I've got a nice implementation plan now. As I see it, there are three distinct topics in this thread.
Focus (not so useful as you so rightly put); Target (kill sequence - useful for the clickers); Pre-baking macros so you don't have to (for ease of character swapping).
Anyway, this thread has been great and I have a got a lot from it; so thank you all.

[bornmx]

Total <3 for you Jafula, because of the time and effort of setting up addons again i didn't want to give this a try. Last night spent a few hours setting up this along with a few new addons and updated versions of previously installed addons. Im very impressed now im running about 13mb/s for my addons, and thats running questhelper aswell.
Looking forward to updates to come and recommend this to everyone!