Jargon

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# A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

When you are playing Empires, you may come across some jargon you don't understand. Here is a list of the most commonly used bits of Empires jargon.

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3 Phase - Refers to the (3 Phase Electric) engine upgrade.

8 mine - Refers to detonating 8 mines remotely by placing a 9th mine somewhere else, causing the previous mines to detonate to avoid going over the limit.

9 mine - Refers to when a grenadier places down a 9th mine on top of a stack of 8 previously laid mines, relying on the explosion of the first mine to detonate all of the other mines. This can be used to deal large amounts of damage to static structures at once, or to throw some vehicles into the air.

#slot - Refers to how many slots a vehicle has for a certain weapon type, or how many slots a weapon uses. "HE is a 2slot cannon" "Brenodi APCs have 3slot MGs"

A

Ammoz - Running joke referring to a frequently asked question by new players, usage: "How to get ammoz?!" the subject may be changed, or a specific ammunition type may be referenced: "How to get aircraft?!", "How to get fist ammoz?!".

APC rush - Building a Vehicle Factory at the beginning of the game, constructing a cheap (armourless, weaponless) APC from it, getting all players inside it, and then driving off to the enemy base to quickly destroy their barracks and CV before they have defense.

Arty - Artillery Vehicle. Plural: 'Arties'.

Aura - Refers to the Squad Leader's power-up aura that gives nearby units improved abilities. Uncommonly used.

B

BE - Refers to the "Brenodi Empire" Team.

BEAR - The standard assault rifle of the Brenodi Empire's Rifleman. Not the carnivorous mammal, BEAR no longer exists.

BECAR - The Brenodi Rifleman's long range burst fire rifle.

BEHR - The heavier variety of the assault rifle available for the Brenodi Empire's Rifleman.

Bio - Short for Biological, can be used to refer to either Biological Machine Guns or Biological Missile Launchers.

BioMG - Biological Machine Guns.

BioML - Biological Missile Launcher.

Bio Engine(s) - BioDiesel Engine.

Blimp - Running joke in Empires. To date Aircraft have had a protracted development history over a number of years and the Blimp was casually spec-chatted about as a fast-track of getting some aerial thing in Empires. It would be later much later that the community map "emp_tropicvendetta" would include two airbourne but stationary Blimps housing the CVs.

Boomtank - The Command Vehicle. Originates from before the Commander voting system was implemented, when new players would rush to the Command Vehicle and proceed to drive it around the map as if it were some kind of uber-tank, oblivious to its true purpose. It is ironic that some skilled players do use the Command Vehicle to destroy weak tanks or stop/slow bigger tanks allowing others to get a shot in without worrying about the target running. (For further satire, see: Noob's Guide to Empires). Rarely used nowadays.

C

Calculator/Calc - Engineers tool which can be used to heal/repair/build structures or units.

CDR - A prefix to the name of a map, which indicates it is a 'commanderless' version of an existing map. This prefix is not currently in common usage.

Chem - The 'Chemistry' research tree.

Chokepoint - Any point on a map that forces a team into a small geographic area--for example, a bridge, a narrow canyon, an elevator, or a gate. It is these spots in a map that are most often camped, and where battles most often take place, because both teams know that the other team must pass this particular area. These also are the routes that are most easily defendable against assault, as the assaulter is vulnerable when forced into tight quarters.

Comm – Commander.

Comvee - Command Vehicle. Rarely used.

Comm Suicide - A usually malicious act of intentionally destroying one's own Command Vehicle by driving it into an unrecoverable situation (e.g. off a high cliff or into deep water). More commonly referred to as griefing, or something along the lines of: "The ****ing comm just sank himself."

Coolant - Refers to the (Advanced Coolant) engine upgrade.

Crash Dumps - Files generated by the game whenever it crashes. These files contain debugging information used by developers to track down bugs responsible for the crash.

CV - Command Vehicle.

D

Decon - Short for "Deconstruct"; an Engineer's ability to un-build and destroy enemy structures with the engineer tool.

E

E-Build - Whilst an Engineer with a calculator can rapidly build various un-built items, other classes can simply press the 'E' key (by default) in front of the structure. Just like multiple Engineers building one item, multiple E-builder's efforts will stack.

Engy - The Engineer class.

Engy Tool - Engineers tool which can be used to heal/repair/build/deconstruct structures or units.

ER - The Extended Range cannon.

ETA - Estimated Time of Arrival (e.g. "ETA armor?!" = When will armor be done)

F

Flip - (Verb) In reference to when a vehicle is somehow turned upside down by any number of means; poor driving, collision, explosion, etc. Usually in reference to the command vehicle, when a grenadier uses the ninth mine trick. Flipped vehicles self-destruct over a short period of time to simplify game mechanics and prevent the server from being bogged down with vehicles. As in "to Flip," or "has been Flipped."

Freeball It - Empires In-Joke. Something Headshotmaster said when he was Com and his entire team abandoned him. He mean to say "... you guys are no help anymore, i'm just gonna Free*style* it"

G

GG - Abbreviation of Good Game, not genera. Generally NOT used for a good game but, to signify that the end of the round is near, here, or completely fucked(new guy or hobbs as the commander).

Gren - The Grenadier class.

Griefer - Someone who intends to ruin the game. See 'Comm Suicide'.

H

HE - The High Explosive cannon.

HEMG - The High Explosive Machine Gun.

Heavies - Heavy tank.

HMG - The Heavy Machine Gun, a weapon of the Rifleman.

Hobbed - As in "we got hobbed!" Happens when Hobbs is the commander and gets stuck on the map environment or caught by the enemy due to his constant boomtanking(happens 50% of the times he commands but, its still entertaining).

K

Killspawn - Suicide by typically typing "kill" in the console (or binding to a button) so that you can re-spawn at another spawn point elsewhere on the map. Useful emergency measure if immediate reinforcements are required.

L

Lane - A distinct, linear combat area that teams can attempt to push through or defend. Some maps have lanes that open automatically after reaching a sufficiently high playercount.

Lights - The Northern Faction Light tank.

LT - The Northern Faction Light Tank.

Lvl/Level - In reference to turrets. Usually described in-game as a "lvl3", this being the third and most powerful variety of turret.

M

Main - The main base, usually where the VF radar and main barracks are placed. Can be the starting base, but that sometimes changes. If the original base is not the main base, it is referred to as "Old Main".

Meds - Medium tanks.

MG - Machine Gun Turret.

ML - Missile Launcher Turret.

Mowtar - Alternate spelling of the Grenadier's Mortar weapon.

N

Nade - Grenade.

Nader - Another term for a person spamming grenades.

Nadespam - The act of constantly throwing grenades into some vital area, while simultaneously restocking from an ammo box, often used by engineers with seismic grenades to take down structures and Scouts with Smoke grenades to visibly obscure a large area. Also seen on district402.

NE - Northeast corner of map / Upper-right corner of map

NF - Refers to the Northern Faction.

NFAR - The standard assault rifle of the Northern Faction's Rifleman.

NFHR - The heavy rifle of the Northern Faction's Rifleman.

Ninja - The attempt of a player (especially Scout w/Hide upgrade) to sneak into the enemy base and destroy key structures or the CV without the enemy noticing before it is too late(Update: potential for destroying via scout sabotage has been drastically reduced to unlikely odds). Another way to ninja is to sneak past enemy lines and place a barracks next to enemy main without them knowing.

Nukes - HIT Missiles, veterans call it a Nuke as that was the original term and the missile is still effectively a nuke, as it is researched under the Fission item.

NW - Northwest corner of map / Upper-right corner of map, most commonly used on Cyclopean, since that corner of the map has no distinct landmark to name it.

O

OP - Overpowered, unfair in that it suits one side or another.

P

Paper Tank/Arty/Armor - A vehicle armored with the basic (weak) armor. Also applies to tanks that have one plate of armor on all sides, regardless of armor type.

Partybus - An APC with spawns, usually refers to an APC loaded with infantry heading to the enemy base in a rush.

Permakill - binding a key to 'force_kill'. When used, team players can no longer revive your body, interrupting your probable attempt to save a base or the commander(who is probably hobbs stuck in the enemy main).

Pixerduduh - Vocalisation of PXR-DDH (Portable X-Ray Detection Device for Humanoids), a.k.a. an engineer-placed camera. Rarely used.

PUG - Acronym of 'Pick-Up Game', a community organized match frequented by veterans of Empires. A good place to show off your skills to the best of the rest in the Empires community, or, at the very least, meet some of the regulars.

R

Rax - Abbreviation for Barracks. Rarely but asking the Comm 'I need a Barracks, Obama'

Ref - Refinery.

Regen - Usually in reference to Regenerative Vehicle Armor. Sometimes refers to the Regenerate skill upgrade.

Res - Resources, the "money" for Empires and therefore required to build anything.

Rev - The act of reviving a dead player by use of the Engineer skill.

Rez - Derived from "resurrect". See 'Rev'. Not often used due to it's ambiguity.

RTFM - 'Read The F*cking Manual'. Rarely used acronym, uttered when a new player asks an obvious question.

!RTV - A plugin-provided chat command to initiate an immediate vote for a new map, ending the current match prematurely. Often invoked when the current player count is no longer high enough for the current map. Sometimes invoked to voice one's own dislike of the current map.

Running - Used to indicate that the enemy command vehicle is attempting to flee from his base while being attacked, usually a last ditch effort to relocate and set up a new base elsewhere. As in, "Heads up, the comm's running!"

Rush - Usually meaning to get nearly the whole team to attack one place on the map, usually the command vehicle or enemy main base, either as infantry or in vehicles.

S

Sab - Sabotage. When a Scout used their 'E' key (default) on an enemy's structure (Buildings & Turrets, not Vehicles). The primary benefit of sabotaging a structure varies from type to type. Vehicle Factory - all vehicles spawned will have half hull HP and armor. Barracks - All soldiers who spawn will have half HP. Turrets - Will be disabled. Refineries - Will have half resource flow rate(still true?). The Secondary benefit to sabotaging, the structures HP is immediately halved and will steadily decline over time by 1hp. Purple smoke emanates from a sabotaged building

SE - Southeast corner of map / Bottom-right corner of map

Seeding - To seed is to play when few players are on the server, with the intent to ensure that new players arriving are able to play and therefore stick around. It is also used for messaging people asking them to play when there are none or few online.

Shotty - The Northern Faction Shotgun pistol.

Skill Stack - Also 'Stacked', When one team has an advantage of more players with high skill.

SL - Squad Leader, the first person to join/create a squad.

Sploit - From "exploit": abusing a bug to gain an unfair advantage over the enemy. Examples include clipping into geometry, falling under the world, getting to places inaccessible by design, etc.

Spawn Kill - Getting killed the moment you spawn before you can do anything. Happens often when you are revived during a battle.

Spotting - Use of radio command or scout binoculars to mark enemy units/buildings for the sight of infantry, tanks, and artillery vehicles.

Squad Rev - Referring to the use of the squad leader Squad Revive ability.

!sr - A plugin-provided chat command to initiate a surrender vote. Sometimes used sarcastically at the beginning of a match to indicate a lack of faith in one's own team.

Stack/Stacked - Referring to when the teams are uneven and there are more players on one team than the other.

Stalingrad - When one team has almost defeated the other team, but ends up losing because they run out of tickets before the other team, and soon get outnumbered. It rarely occurs and is rarely referred to as Stalingrad.

Sticky - Also, 'to have been stickied,' and 'to stick,' this refers to the various sticky grenades used by riflemen and scouts.

Straight Tech - (Verb) The action of researching a higher tier upgrade, such as heavy tanks or nuclear missiles, before completing any other research in the match. As in: "the commander straight teched heavies before getting us armor or engines,". No longer in current usage.

Stun - (Verb) Being overheated due to a scouts Stun Sticky, usually used in the context of "That little faggot stunned me" or "Hit the Heavy tank, he's stunned!"

Suicide - Often the last resort to getting "unstuck," or used to get somewhere else in a hurry; pulling down the console with the tilde (~) key, typing "kill" (without quotes) and pressing enter.

SW - Southwest corner of map / Bottom-left corner of map

T

Teams - Abbreviation of "The teams are imbalanced" or "Even the teams". Ingame usage "Teams!"

Tickets - How many more "lives" the team has to spare.

Turret Climbing - Rapidly building and trashing turrets as an engineer in means to build a "ladder" in order to get on top of high places. Often considered exploiting. Walls are also used.

Turret Farming - Act of creating multiple turrets in a localized area. HE or artillery is usually the reply to such a farm.

Turrent - Common misspelling of "turret". Also an In-joke due the in-game voice clearly announcing "Our Turrents under attack"

Turtling - Variant of 'Turret Farming', where a team relies on walls, turrets and other defensive measures to protect a small area, instead of advancing across the map. Also used as a final resort when a team is pushed back to their final barracks. Very hard to break out of, since the other team usually has all refineries.

U

Unstuck - As in the command "emp_unstuck" used to remove your avatar if it is clipped into part of the map and can't move.

V

VF - A Vehicle Factory.

W

W - West side of map / Left side of map

Wall - (Verb) To rush an enemy vehicle, usually the Command Vehicle, and build walls around it, thereby trapping it. As in "to wall the tank", or "I got walled in, there was nothing I could do!".

WallClimb - Using walls to gain height by utilizing their "growing" behavior as they are constructed.