Table formatting automation that affects only specific aspects of formatting (not via a macro)?

You can create a custom table style in Word, but there is a learning curve. The setup tool is anything but intuitive.

Create a blank table in Word. The Table Tools tab appears. Click on Design, then on the Table Style Gallery opener (it has a horizontal line over a down-pointing arrowhead). At the bottom of the dropdown, choose New Table Style.

The key to using this is to format different parts of the table style by changing the Apply formatting to: dropdown. Start with the default Whole Table and set the background characteristics that will apply to all cells. Tip: don't expect anything from font formatting here, it's broken. Use the Format button in the lower left corner to set margins for the table as well as most other properties.

Then change the Apply formatting to: dropdown to Header row and set the properties for just that row. Color banding is done by formatting the Odd banded rows and Even banded rows.

It will take many tries to format your first custom style. After creating the first one, use the Modify Custom Style choice from the Table Styles Gallery dropdown to revise your style. The above is just a rough outline, here is a tutorial with more detail: Custom Table Styles

Table Styles only cover the formatting of the cells, you still have to apply text styles to the final table to get the font formatting correct.

I suggest taking a slow methodical approach. Start with formatting everything you can with Whole table, Save, Test, then do the Header row, etc. I know it can be done, I create table styles for customer templates on a weekly basis.

You can create a custom table style in Word, but there is a learning curve. The setup tool is anything but intuitive.

Create a blank table in Word. The Table Tools tab appears. Click on Design, then on the Table Style Gallery opener (it has a horizontal line over a down-pointing arrowhead). At the bottom of the dropdown, choose New Table Style.

The key to using this is to format different parts of the table style by changing the Apply formatting to: dropdown. Start with the default Whole Table and set the background characteristics that will apply to all cells. Tip: don't expect anything from font formatting here, it's broken. Use the Format button in the lower left corner to set margins for the table as well as most other properties.

Then change the Apply formatting to: dropdown to Header row and set the properties for just that row. Color banding is done by formatting the Odd banded rows and Even banded rows.

It will take many tries to format your first custom style. After creating the first one, use the Modify Custom Style choice from the Table Styles Gallery dropdown to revise your style. The above is just a rough outline, here is a tutorial with more detail: Custom Table Styles

Oh, John, just saw your reply.  Thank you so much for putting it in the exact words I would have used if I were good at writing things succinctly and efficiently (1656, Blaise Pascal:  "I apologize that this letter is so long -- I lacked the time to make it short.")  This feature is, indeed, not intuitive at all.  Actually, all that is needed is a change in approach, something simple like maybe tick boxes to enable or disable attributes at will, for goodness' sake!  So easy rather than trying to guess how to use this darn thing!

The steps above are so familiar and I've done them so many times!  It sure makes me worry about folks who are regular folks and not power users such as myself (like we are called, that sounds so grand doesn't it ... "power users" ... <sigh>).  But you've given me hope.  I'm going to print this out and I'll try one more time before giving up once and for all.  If all I walked away with is alternate banded rows that I then could apply to any table, I'd be happy.

The worrying thing is your line that font formatting is broken (that sure explains so much!!).  If that is true in the way I think you mean, then that will be a complete deal-breaker.

But I'll report back.  I suspected that Tables Styles was too good to be true but since I'd never cracked this nut, I never gave up on it <sigh>.  We'll see how it goes.

Actually, that is not the case.  Not once where I have tried to create or even just edit a table style has it ever worked!  Not once.  Every single attempt and approach over the years has always failed.  It doesn't even seem to matter what I have ticked.  Right now only Banded Rows are supposedly enabled, but if I apply a table style from the gallery that either I created from scratch or that is available, the table always gets changed drastically and goes out all of whack.  And believe me when I tell you that I have done this many times and many times with always the same outcome!

Like other aspects of MS Word, one has to be an expert to do this, I'm guessing.  Believe me, as a power user I know this.  Folks come to me to help them with their Word issues and not the other way around.  But this is one of those features that has something we need to be doing that is not intuitive or straightforward; that's the only explanation to me for the failures.  It.Just. Doesn't. Work!  And so far I've found no way to even begin to figure out what I'm doing wrong.  Every single video I've looked at online covers other things or just the basics.  I've not found one yet that covers how to get into the nitty gritty where you are targeting just very specific attributes.

That's what I finally gave up trying to do this time around myself and why I came here for help.  A very comprehensive step-by-step guide is obviously needed here as I'm not a dummy when it comes to using MS programs at this level, even with MS Word that is the most difficult of the Office applications (VBA ... that's something else entirely, however!  I can't say that about my abilities in VBA as I don't do well without help with new code - then I take it from there <g>).

So if someone could point me in the right direction on affecting _just_ banded row colouring and disabling all other changes Word wants to do to tables when using Tables Styles, I'd be very grateful.

Thanks for any help!

Table styles allow shading of alternate rows and/or columns. However, for each table, you can choose to 'apply' the setting for alternate rows or not. This setting (along with others for first row, first column etc) can be found when your cursor is in a table and you go to Table Tools > Design > Table Style Options > Banded Rows.

For this setting to be obviously active, you need to have applied a table style that has a difference in the odd or even row settings for that style.

Turning the Banded Rows setting on or off will not change the indentation or other table attributes that have already been applied as part of the table style or overridden by local table property settings.