Skipper Items 

sure! that would be great. I am not familiar with cubase's function. I like the "item paradigm" because it is readily visible, and fits in with everything neatly, and that it may be simpler to implement and easy to comprehend. but, since you mention it, in addition to omitting a phrase, a specialized item's properties could include parameters indicating the number of times to repeat a time area as well. thanks

check out the 'marker actions' in sws extension - does a certain amount of what you want.