When I parent or group several objects together then try to smooth only one object appears to be smoothed, is there a work around for this?
Parented objects: Regardless of how i try to select i can only ever smooth one object within the group
As a group: with a group if i select all objects together in the outliner and not the by using the group icon then all objetcs smooth, if i select the group icon then only one object appears to smooth.
thanks if any one can help 
maybe insted of grouping you could use the polys booleans to combine the objects but im not shure how possible it is to seperate them afterwards. but if you dont need to then yey
if anyone knows that then please let us know.
Parenting and grouping is the same thing in maya. Groups are dag noeds parented to empty transform node.
QUOTE
with a group if i select all objects together in the outliner and not the by using the group icon then all objetcs smooth
Where's the problem then?
Yes just select the objects you want to smooth by clicking them and making sure you are on object mode not hierarchical. 
Even in object mode I still cant select a object in the center of a parent chain without selecting everything that follows that, I can only select the last object on the chain.
Yes you can! You might not realize it because you get at first no sane feedback but you can select many of them at a time. This does not mean you cant select them. Infact what you se highlighted IS NOT WHAT YOU HAVE SELECTED.
It takes a bit of time to become used to this behaivour, but the reason it works like this is that form mayas point of view theres no difference between a group, a object, or a parentting linkage. infact if i mark out T for transform and s for shape youd have a unlimitted combo of cases
CODE
T-+-S Normal parent
|
+-T-S
T-+-S Normal multi parent
|
+-T-S
|
+-T-S
T-+-T-S What most call a Group
|
+-T-S
|
+-T-S
T-+-S Well what do you know a ???? structure
| Should we call this a group by teh way
+-S because it acts like you clearly want here
T-+-S oh yeah and this then
|
+-S
|
+-T-+-T-+-T
| |
| +-T
|
+-T-S
I think ive found another solution and that is to select 'choose shapes' in outliner it seems that you can then select each individual obect in the chain in the outliner without selecting its child. You can also then select display/sort order/alphabetical within type (for easier selection). Select the group of objects in outliner and smooth all at the same time... probably a long way to do this and Im sure there is an easier way but it seems to work.
thanks for the help as always