macro VS spell

First post, a hearty hello.

Been browsing the site and Wiki for months, trying out new things, following other peopls suggestions, but I have a question that I just can't seem to answer myself, or browsing through the wiki/forums. I am 4-boxing ele shamans, with a 5th at 70 waiting to join the mix, and currently i have the "big" button, that I hit and it follows the focus, targets the focus, assits the focus and has a stop cast written into it. Would it be better to replace all the dragged out spells on my tool bar with a macro that simply said;

• /target focus
• /assist
• /cast [harm, nodead] Spell/ability

If that is a viable option, is there a way to get rid of the whole /target focus then /assist, sometimes I have to double tap to get it from no target, to me and then onto the mob, like would "/assist focus" work?

In advance, I would like to thank everyone for their input and assistance, and say thank you to the entire community for having such an easy to read/use database.

Use

/assist focus
/cast Spell/ability

or

/cast [target=focustarget] Spell/ability

I use the former so I can see when they have acquired my target.The second one sucks (imo). Why? If your main dies or you want to attack something with a character who is not in range of the main, it will NEVER attack because it must have that target to attack. It's annoying.

I don't use nodead or harm modifier because it won't cast the spell if it can't cast it anyway. All it does is prevent error message spam which doesn't really matter anyway.

Keep in mind no matter what you do there will be targeting delay. Your latency times two is the delay between when you target something and your followers can pick it up.

Additionally, you may find this macro useful for target acquisition:

/assist focus
/startattack
/follow focus
/cast !Shoot

That will automatically acquire a target on your main and everyone else if don't have one (it will pick the closest enemy in range). Generally this is helpful as it avoids the /assist delay. There is a chance your followers will target a different mob than you do at first, but after the latency delay will pick your target if you press it again. I generally use it as my normal /follow button to spam and to make sure everyone has the target acquired. Melee will autoswing, hunters will autoshoot, and casters will wand if standing still.

you don't want to imbed an /assist into your cast macros because there will be times when you want your main attackign something, while your alts continue to burn down the target you started with. Now what you can do is this:

Code:

---

/cast [harm,nodead] Lighting bolt
/stopmacro
/cast [target=focustarget] lighting bolt

---

Assuming you set your main as your focus for all your alts, this macro will continue to spam lighting bolt on whatever target you initially told them to assist, and then automatically switch to your new target once it is dead.

Thank you for the responses. Just the opinions and feedback I was looking for.