@mootzville Yeah, that's what I discovered.
https://docs.nodebb.org/en/latest/themes/create.html Seems to be a bit out of date.
templates: (Optional) A system path (relative to your plugin’s root directory) to the folder containing template files. If not specified, NodeBB will search for the “templates” directory, and then simply fall back to using vanilla’s template files.
Normal learning curve stuff for me, Bump into all the oddly/un/badly documented assumptions that make perfectly good sense when you've been working with it for a while.