bugger me i got it working! (Kinda) - hey thanx amykhar! - it was my hook location, i had the admin plugin using 'global_start' which in turn was reseting my forum id... the code was ok, i just needed to alter the hook location... i can now get both counters working, but i have a weird behaviour in the updating of the counter from admin...
i have to click update twice?? weird... it works, but why twice? my hook location for the admin plugin is : admin_options_processing
yep, definatly have to click save twice for this to work.... bum!
-b6