Guild Wars/Gaming slang words (please help me!)

Zephyrulk

Zephyrulk

New Member
Hey guys,

At the moment, one of my college classes that I'm taking is called "Dialects of Contemporary English" and I have an assignment that I'd like all of your input on. My general assignment is to gather slang from a certain dialect or type of language that a group of people use; I'd like to use the Guild Wars (or Gamer-) language for this assignment... and yes I already got the professor's approval =P. So what I need from you folks, which I think this will be a fun activity anyways, is to post here the following (if you please):

1. Any slang or informal terms that are used in MMO's, or Guild Wars, that wouldn't be traditionally accepted in an academic paper for school. (can be class/profession specific or just general gamer lingo - abbreviations work as well)

2. For the terms that you list, please also give the meaning of the word as you understand it and at least one sample sentence using the term.

3. Feel free, also, to comment on each others' entries - make this fun! =D

Thanks in advance, I really appreciate it.
 
Build: a specific set of skills. "Hey, check out this new build I'm using"

Tank: Someone designated to take the brunt of the damage. "We totally need another tank for this."
 
What, nobody's mentioned "noob" yet?

Noob: Generally bad player. Distinct from "newbie". Newbies are still learning and can be taught to become good players. Noobs are hopeless.
My friend here is a newbie. He just bought the game yesterday. Everyone welcome him and show him the ropes. That ele/War is a noob. He's wielding a sword with 12 points in Hammer Mastery, 2 in fire, 2 in air, 2 in water and 2 earth.
 
TheRaven said:
What, nobody's mentioned "noob" yet?

Noob: Generally bad player. Distinct from "newbie". Newbies are still learning and can be taught to become good players. Noobs are hopeless.
My friend here is a newbie. He just bought the game yesterday. Everyone welcome him and show him the ropes. That ele/War is a noob. He's wielding a sword with 12 points in Hammer Mastery, 2 in fire, 2 in air, 2 in water and 2 earth.
Click to expand...

I tend to think of noob as derrogatory and rude.
 
And if Raven is freaking out about noob ;), I think now is a good time to bring up Leet. Variants: 1337; l33t, slang for "Elite": Means good quality/value; very good; amazing
 
I like the newbie/noob distinction. I'm hearing both in a lot of places off line.
 
FTW - "for the win" - either a death dealing blow or a win sealing move - "In relationships try Romans 12:18 - FTW."
 
A couple I use from Guild Wars are:

Farming - going out looking for wealth or special items as opposed to sowing and reaping. "I think I'll go up to Walmart and do a little farming."

Spiking - massive damage from numerous skills or players. "Wow - they are really spiking the congressman aren't they."
 
Pub - Public room or server. "Let's go Pubbing tonight!"

LFG = Looking for Group as in "Lvl 20 War LFG! Mission and Bonus!"

Lvl - Short hand for Level meaning what level your character has achieved.
 
Piggybacking on eskimo's lvl - is the verbal use of leveling up - "We need to level up the quality of the worship service a bit."
 
PUG: Pick-Up Group; Finding strangers to assist in various objectives; Often not effective; "Hey we need a few more players, lets get a PUG so we can go."
 
This is a good selection, please keep them coming. Are there any "role-playing" words/terms that you can think of? Any job-specific words? (such as those that involve a necromancer, paladin, warrior, mage, priest, etc?)
 
MM=minion master
55=55hp monk farm build
600/smite=a farming build involving a 600 tank and a smite monk
permasin=An assassin maintaining Shodow Form
SF=Searing Flames a fire magic elite
 
"Nuking" used to be what I did with a cup of water or bag of popcorn in the microwave - now it is what I do at work when I want to really bash a task. My primary is Fire Elementalist.
 
Here's a few that haven't been mentioned.

Grind: To perform a repetative (sp?) task over and over to gain rank or status in a game.
Ex: Hey, are you going to buy that new game? Nah, I hear it's too much grind to compete.

Squishie: A character class that's easily killed. Usually because of low armor.

And there are the roles that gamers assume:
Farmer: A player that does a task over and over outside of the normal gameplay just to earn gold or some other reward. You can farm gold, farm faction, farm experience, farm titles, etc.

Runner: A player that helps others advance thru the game without effort on their part, usually for a fee.

Griefer: A player that either sabotages other players fun ingame. Either by causing his team to fail or simply by hanging out in town and harassing others with hate speech or blocking their means of progress ingame.

Leecher: A player on the team that doesn't pull his weight. Usually meant to describe someone that deliberately goes AFK or refuses to participate with the team goals. Distinct from a bad player (noob) or a player deliberately sabotaging the team (griefer).

Power Trader: A player that is an expert with the game economy and has used this knowledge to become wealthy.

Botter: Generally means a player that uses macros or automated programs to play the game for him. In most games, botting is a bannable offense, but some like Second Life actively encourage it.

I'm not sure how useful the job-specific words will be. Is your paper focusing just on GW or are you trying to find words that apply to many games. I've never played any online RPG's other than GW, so I don't know if MM, Nuker, etc have meanings in other games or not. You should talk to some WoW gamers and throw these terms at them to see if they apply there as well or if they mean something completely different in another game.
 
ZONE - Verb or Noun depending on usage. Verb; action of moving from one game area to another that requires loading. Nound; generic term for and entire area in which one can move around without loading to a new area. usage "I'm gonna zone are you guys ready?" or "Hey what zone are you in?" -I used this verbage much more in EQ than GW

MOB(S) - An NPC (non player character) that you could engage in combat.

TRAIN - This doesn't really happen in GW because everything is instace but it was a huge deal in EQ and some other MMOs. It's something you shout to let people know there is a train of mobs after you and you don't want them to get totally pwn'd as a bystander. "TRAIN to NW zone!"

FTL - For the Loss opposite of FTW see above.

AGGRO - short for aggrivation I suppose. This term refers to the moment when a MOB realizes you exist and begins to attack you. "Stay out of aggro range of that dragon! we don't want it coming down on us like a... dragon!"

DPS - Damage Per Second reffered to by many MMO's when calculating what the damage impact of your character can do. "hey, we need a heavy hitter, who's got the best DPS"

NUKER - A spell based character, player or non, that is focused on damage spells. "hey this group needs a nuker, lets get a mage"

LOOT - items and moneys received from mobs after killing them. "You see the sweet loot that just dropped!"


Sounds like a fun paper good luck!
 
@above
Aggro isn't actually gamer slang, it's British slang and isn't commonly used in America, and it is short for agression and agrivation.

Anyhow:
gl hf=Good luck, have fun, don't see it used commonly in GW, but it is used occasionally in PvP moreso in RTS games though.
QQ=crying, since it looks like eyes crying.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top