It changed as I saw what could be done. I don't want a spoonfed answer, I want to understand the how, what, when and where. Nor do I wish to be seen as another "you-must-help-give-me-answers-now" type of poster as I have seen elsewhere on the interweb. This is why I have asked limited questions, so I can plug all the smaller parts together myself.

At this time I would like(subject to awareness):
a button in a document when pressed that will:
save the current document (for the bookmarks) and then select multiple .dotx and open them and update the links, modify the file name and the properties and save each of them to a specified common folder (that changes on each macro run) as pdf's with as minimal user interaction as possible and a small polite "no error" notification at the end

So far I have 80% (mostly thanks to you). Missing is:
Silently SaveAs pdf unless file exists (unlikely but one never knows)
SaveAs into the specified folder (I can see what is wrong, but clueless how to resolve it)

I am sure I'll have further assembly issues, but I am prepared to try to fix them myself before asking for help.
I intend to post the entire project 'withcomments back to this forum once it works, because I feel it is a worthwhile project with some good examples of practical macro code (observer bias aside) I didn't expect to have a fully automated workflow when I started, I just wanted to populate many document templates from a single doc.
One might be so bold to suggest it is all your fault for showing me the power and the depth of what a Word VBA macro can do, thus absolving myself of any responsiblity to behave appropriately in a forum...

Regards from Queensland