"/assist party1" not working

[Epotus]

So, I'm trying to continue using my /assist party1 for a 5box system based on any toon being the leader at any given time.

however, since 3.0.2 patch, when the leader types /target party1 it targets someone else in the group (not "self" or "player").

the same is true for /assist party1

anyone else having this issue? or am I just crazy and doing something different/wrong than I used to?

[Bot]

im not having that issue that i know of but ill test it out a little and see if i can replicate it.

[Epotus]

yeah, I've been testing again. still not working...


if the Party leader types
/assist party1
/follow party1
/target party1

they end up targeting different group member (instead of themselves or nothing)

all other party members seem to be using the command just fine.

[Ualaa]

I was getting this issue prior to the new patch.

The solution for me was to have hotkey bar 1, as the /assist [target=party1]... /cast Whatever macro.
And bar 2, being the same abilities, but without any form of assist.
In the default Blizzard UI, you have bars 1, 3, 4, 5, 6 visible (1 is default bar, 3 is lower left, 4 is lower right, 5 and 6 are right vertical bars).
Bar #2 is not visible (access via Shift 2 or the up/down arrows on the hotbar).

Then, all your slaves are on bar 1, which has them assist the party leader.
Your master is on bar 2, which is the exact same spells, but without assisting since they are the leader.
So every toon has all the assist macro's on Bar 1, and the same spells without assist on bar 2.

There is a macro, which you can put in to the Leader Change key, which will change your hotbar to bar 1, when you're no longer the leader.
There is also a macro which will put the toon onto bar 2, when they become the leader.

I'm using Jamba for the follow function (plus Flightpath's, Quests and tons of goodies), but if you're not using Jamba you could ignore this section of my macro.

Each of my five toons has five leader change macro's.
Four of these leader change macro's are to make a different character the leader.
One of the leader macro's is for the toon I am on to assume the leadership.

Example:
Toon 1: Macro 1 (Leader Macro), Macro 2 (Promote Toon 2), Macro 3 (Promote Toon 3), Macro 4 (Promote Toon 4), Macro 5 (Promote Toon 5)
Toon 2: Macro 1 (Promote Toon 1), Macro 2 (Leader Macro), Macro 3 (Promote Toon 3), Macro 4 (Promote Toon 4), Macro 5 (Promote Toon 5)

These warcraft macro's are hotkeyed to the same Keyclone PiP command to bring that screen to the front.
Thus, if I have toon 2 become the new leader, one key brings Toon 2 to the front and executes the promote toon 2 to leader on Toons 1, 3, 4, 5 and executes the Toon 2 is now leader macro on Toon 2.
The current leader promotes the new leader, while the other characters receive the message, "You are not the party leader". A small price to pay.

The leader's macro is this:
/changeactionbar 2
/jamba Setmeasmaster all (Ignore this if you don't have Jamba)

The slaves macro's are this:
/script if GetPartyLeaderIndex() == 0 then if GetActionBarPage() == 1 then ChangeActionBarPage(2) else ChangeActionBarPage(1) end end
/script PromoteToLeader("New Leader's Name");

Naturally each of your toons will have the leader macro once (on their PiP keybind) and the PromoteToLeader macro four times, once each for the other four toon names.

In practice, whenever I switch leaders (I'll sometimes have to spam the key a few times for the game to recognize the new leader), the new leader goes to hotbar 2.
The previous leader goes to hotbar 1, which means they are assisting the leader.
The new leader is just casting the spell and is not assisting anyone.

My focus key is free to focus an opponent, either for a focus fire macro... or in PvE for a crowd control or an interrupt.
I don't believe this is as effective as a leader free, focus free set up, but its a lot simpler then the keymaps thread which quickly lost me.
This system works fairly well, and is easy to set up and use.

[Epotus]

Ualaa,
Thanks for the info. after much fussing about with macros and hotkeys I found a solution (although I'm still annoyed that a simple /assist party1 is not working...)
I do something similar to what you recommend, although instead of changing hotkey bars from 1 to 2, I swap weapons. Allow me to explain:
I can make ToonC leader for example and have him equip a 1 hander and a sheidl while all other toons put on a 2 hander. this is easy to keep standard since all my chars have the same gear from quests (or from drops). I can then use the logic check on [equipped:shield] to decide who to assist, follow, etc...
/assist [noequipped:shield] party1 <-- strangly this works. since the leader will HAVE a shield, this will result in false, and the leader will not try to assist 'party1'
or
/cast [equipped:shield] Lightning Bolt.
Esentially the true / false, of "is your shield equipped" is what I eneded up basing everything off of for the time being. Not a perfect system but it seems to be working for now. Plus you get the added 'bonus' of your leader being able to take hits a little better with a shield, and the others can use a 2hander staff for more DPS.
However, if anyone has any answers to why when the party leader type /assist party1, it doesnt assist him/her self, please let us know.

[Hachoo]

Sounds like a good time to set up a more useful leaderless system instead of using party1 so you don't have to use crazy hacks to get it to work :)

Ie: I use focus and I never really use assist, just /cast [target=focustarget,harm][] Spell - F8-F12 pick which partymember I want to be my leader, pressing F9 will activate my second WoW window as the master, change all my other characters focus to that party member, promote that party member to leader, and follow that character. Then, none of my characters will really have a target ever (except in special situations like seduce or spell lock when I actually do use assist so I can "save" the target). They just attack whatever the current character I'm controlling attacks by using focustarget.

Anyway, there are definitely going to be times when you want every to either have a shield or not have a shield so I wouldn't stick with that method.

[Motgib]

Can't you use:

/cast [target=party1target] spell ?



I only dual box but with my priest I can use a macro like this:

/cast [target=party1target, harm] smite; renew


So to dps I just target the enemy with my pally and use this macro, to heal I just target the friendly target. Saves me space and is very simple to swap from dpsing to healing. (I'm at work so the macros might be a little off since I don't have them in front of me 8| )

[Ualaa]

I don't want the leader to be my focus, because I want the focus reserved for either: a) My PvE crowd control targets; b) My PvP burn target.

The shield equipped or not equipped is ingenious; I personally won't use it, as all my toons enjoy the high armor of a shield, but its very neat what you came up with.
This community is very creative in finding solutions, and likes to share with each other which really rocks.

In response to Motgib...
We cannot just use /cast [target=party1target] Spell.... because while this works very well for the slaves, the current master attempts to assist Slave #1 (F2 on their screen, not being themself).
The /assist [target=party1].. /cast Spellname could as easily be /cast [target=party1target] on the slaves. Your suggestion is actually fewer characters, if the 255 characters per macro is ever an issue. Functionally they're the same.
The leader needs special treatment.

I looked at the leaderless / focus-free / target-free system, and think its a great solution, once you get it working.
For me, I found the thread a little hard to follow. I understand the idea of hotstrings, and having a slightly different macro per toon according to where they are in the macro sequence.
The example showed a macro (or might have been a keybind) bound to " i " on each client; this kind of lost me... why bind to a key that is not something you click for your spell.
Once its set up, and assuming you don't change your spells too often, the system would rock.
My system is simple to set up, and allows for 12 keypresses which so far is enough for me.
If I had not got my system to work, when I was looking for a focusfree / leaderfree system, this would have been my next option.

[Epotus]

Sounds like a good time to set up a more useful leaderless system instead of using party1 so you don't have to use crazy hacks to get it to work :)


Ie: I use focus and I never really use assist,
I used to use focus for probably the first 15 levels, but after reading up on the forums realized it may have its limited, esp in PvP since you could have different focuses for different players your fighting. the idea behind a leader assist is simply builidng your macros in a way that on any given day at any given time (like during collection quests) you can play from ANY character as if it was the "main".
what I have now is a macro / hotkey combination that allows me to push 'G' on the open window, all other windows equip a 2 hander, the active window equips a mace/shield, and the guy with the shield gets made leader.

But you are correct about later on wanting all characters to have the same gear... so my set up is really a patch more than a fix.

Thanks motgib for:
/cast [target=party1target] spell ?


I'll have to test that out.
Thanks for all the great feedback guys!

[viper408]

Hi,

I am new to multi-boxing in WoW and was reading this thread to get my setup. I was wondering if something like this will work?


/script if GetPartyLeaderIndex() == 0 then /assist party1 else end end

[Hachoo]

All of you guys saying focus removes the ability to pvp, etc, need to read the rest of my post.

focus, and target, work the exact same way pretty much. If you DON'T use target for anything (I don't) you can use it as a focus instead of using focus as a focus. This works the exact same as using focus for pvp, except you're using your alts target frame instead. its really no different.

Anyway, I have my "leader" set to focus, and my alts use /target or /assist (instead of /focus) for CC. I wish people would read a bit more or try to understand something before jumping to conclusions.

[Souca]

I didn't see it mentioned in the thread, so I'll point it out here.

For every character BUT the leader, party1 is the leader. For the leader, party1 is the first character in list of party members on the screen. This is not a 3.0.2 change. I think you can get around this with a little lua script, but I can't remember it off the top of my head. You basically fall through the macro if the player is the leader which I believe is checked with IsPartyLeader( "player" ).

Hope this helps.

- Souca -

[Jheusse]

There are also some addons that change how the party is displayed which then causes the leader to still see himself as party1, but that's a crude solution.