Casting
/cast <spell>: the workhorse. Casts a spell, remembering rank inside the name if you want an older rank./cast [@mouseover,help,nodead] Purify/castsequence <a>, <b>, <c>: steps through the list, one entry per press, resetting on your chosen condition./castsequence reset=target Shadow Word: Pain, Vampiric Touch/castrandom <a>, <b>: casts a random entry. Mostly used for cosmetic lines (random mount, random emote). Rare in serious macro writing for a reason: randomness is rarely what a rotation wants.
Targeting
/targetenemy: targets the nearest enemy; press again to cycle to the next one up. The foundation of tab-free play./targetlasttarget: returns to your previous target. The healer's friend: damage, heal, damage./focus: sets your focus target (your second, persistent "marked" target)./clearfocusdrops it./assist: targets whatever your target is targeting. The classic raid-leader assist bind./startattack//stopattack: starts or stops auto-attack without touching anything else. The "include in every damage macro" command, so your auto-attack keeps swinging even when a spell fails.
Full targeting patterns (focus fans, mouseover, last-target weaving) live on thetargeting macros page.
Pets
The pet commands, for hunters and warlocks:
/petattack: sends your pet at your target (or your focus). The backbone of the pet macros on this site./petfollow//petstay: the leash commands. Bring the pet along, or park it./petpassive//petdefensive: the two pet stances. Passive pets never initiate; defensive pets attack whatever you attack. (The old aggressive stance, and its command, are gone.)/petdismiss: dismisses the pet. The feign-death-friendly eject key.- Summoning is a spell, not a command. /petsummon does not exist: hunters raise the pet with
/cast Call Pet, warlocks with their demon summon. Battle pets use /summonpet.
Items and equipment
/use: uses a trinket, potion, racial, or any item on a target. Takes conditionals like /cast./use [harm] Goblin Rocket Pack/equip <item>: equips an item by name and remembers the slot./equip [button:2] Shield of the Lost; [button:1] Worldcarver/equipset <set name>: swaps an entire equipment-manager set. One button, full gear swap.
Action bars
/changeactionbar <n>//swapactionbar <n>: swap which bar is active. Powershift bar tricks, druid forms, and stance pages live here./click <frame>: clicks any visible button, including addon-created frames. The hidden engine behind many "one button does everything" macros.
Control
/stopcasting: interrupts your current cast. The interrupt-enabler on every interrupt macro on this site./stopmacro: stops the macro right there, used inside conditionals./stopmacro [combat]is the classic "never do this in combat" guard./cancelaura <name>: drops a buff or channel by name. Dance-to-kill-swing macros, old-style heroic presence cleanses./cancelform: drops a druid form or shaman ghost wolf./dismount: dismounts you. Bind it to a key, always.
Macro editor and scripting
/macro: opens the macro window./macroiconsets the macro's icon from the chat line. Names like/macrotextthat show up in old guides are addon attributes, not client commands./run//script: executes Lua. The everything-command in old guides, now combat-restricted for security. See the FAQ./reload: reloads the UI. Not a macro command per se, but it rescues more broken bars than any spell.
How to use this page
Bookmark it, then build a macro from the guide. When a technique page mentions a command in passing, this is the page it links to. The list is stable client infrastructure: if you learned it in warlords, it still works today.