About getting repeating drum patterns to playback. What you need to do is
repeatedly paste  the pattern into the repeating bars, transfer it into
voice 2 and hide the notes. You can then create the repeat bar rests . This
looks correct, and the pattern will play without being seen.

1. Select the bars containing the original pattern (e.g. bars 1-4).
2. Press Ctrl+C to copy them.
3. Go to the start of bar 5 and press Ctrl+V to paste them.
4. Bars 5-8 will now be selected.
5. Press Alt+2 to put all of the pattern into voice 2.
6. From the main menus choose Edit > Hide or Show > Hide.
7. The selected items will now be hidden and will not print.
8. Select bars 5-8 again.
9. Press Ctrl+Alt+Shift+1 to select the voice 1 items. 
10. You should only have selected four bar rests.
11. You can check what's in the selection by choosing Plug-ins > Access >
Selection List.
12. Go to the combo box in the bars panel and choose option 2.
13. This should turn the bar rests into repeat bar rests.
14. Now select bars 5-8 again, making sure that this is a passage selection
containing everything in all voices.
15. Press R to repeat the pattern as many times as you need.

What you should end up with is repeat bar rests in voice 1 of each repeating
bar, and the pattern itself, hidden in voice 2.

Don't forget that bars 1-4 should be written in the normal way, in voice 1,
not hidden, and with no clever bar rests In sight.