Added 7 minutes later
whoa, I missed a step in the FBX creation phase... it says that the MODEL also needs to be linked to the GLOBAL!!!
I honestly don't understand this... it seems to be a quirk of Heroes 5...
Added 1 minute later
why link a model that has a SKIN to the root bone of the skeleton to which the skin is tied... this is terrible...
and I think when I extracted models FROM the game, there was no linking of the model to the bone... maybe the editor fixes this somehow?