ok, i figured out some of that in between checking this post. I made a dummy unit with bloodlust and a trigger to make it cast automatically every time a unit attacks, but i need a bunch of them because the delay keeps one from casting 50 bloodlusts simultaneously.
BUT
i put them on the map IN THE MAP EDITOR, i didn't make a trigger to spawn them. So i have something like 50 of them stacked and looking at 40 units engaged in combat is like watching a slideshow of screenshots taken every 10 seconds of the game...
I was looking for tutorials on dummy units but they were all super long, and people were talking about how they had memory leaks and whatnot. I'm going to try to do what you guys are saying, but i'm not sure that i possess enough technical knowledge about triggers to do it correctly. If you know of a simple tutorial or if you could throw a line or two of triggers that'll make the game not lag then that'd be great! mostly i need to know how to give a unit an expiration timer
And thank you a TON for the help! I thought i was going to have to scrap the system because of the lag =/ (even if the triggers work, i still worry that i may have to scrap the system because the game could potentially be spawning 200 dummy units at once...)
EDIT: Thank you so much! I'd completely forgotten about the slow poison ability. You're a life-saver a thousand times over!
EDIT TWO: Ok i've everything's good, the lag has cut down to nothing since i finished the triggerwork- and it's stupendous guys! Really, thanks a thousand times over for the help! This was one of the most important features of my map, and you guys helped make it work! woohoo! i'm super-excited, you have no idea. Now the only time the game lags is when i have the camera over where all the spawning and expiring is taking place (expiration timer is set for 1 second) i have about 50-100 explosions per second going off in the same exact place and it makes the game freeze up a bit. I can think of two solutions:
1. You guys know some way of making this go away (i removed the 'art - special' value from the building, but i couldn't figure out how to make the unit not have a model, so i'm using the human scout tower model)
2. i just create a location (then get some help figuring out how to make it not leak) that's either off of the camera bounds or so obscure no one will ever see it
either way is a 100% acceptable method of completeing this mechanic for me, the important part is done. Thank you guys so much for all the help!