StarCraft Brood War Dictionary

[TrongaMonga]

StarCraft Brood War Dictionary

Learn all you ever wanted to know about StarCraft and Brood War terminology, slang, and abbreviations.

Table of contents[Click on letter]:

(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)-==-(#)

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(A)​

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• AC - Ally chat. To do this, you click on the Messenging button above the minimap during a game and select the option Send to allies.
  
• Acad - Terran Academy.
  
• AE - Ally End. Everyone in game allies at the end of the game. Usually said when someone on a team has made the game unfair by leaving.
  
• Ally Lurkers - Burrow some Zerg Lurkers somewhere and ally your enemy. When he walks across your lurkers you un-ally again, starting to kill off what he has got. (Also see Hold Unit Trick)
  
• Ally Mines - To lay a lot of Terran Spider Mines somewhere; then ally your enemy. Unally once enemy troops are standing above the Terran Spider Mines. All mines popup right under the feet killing all troops instantly.
  The other way is to lay two rows of Terran Spider Mines and then unally your ally when a unit is between them, making them chase him into an enemy base. It is very hard to pull this off. (Also see Ally Lurkers)
  
• Arb - Protoss Arbiter.
  
• Archive - Protoss Templar Archive.
  
• Assim - Protoss Assimilator.

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• Babo - Baboon, another way of saying someone is dumb. (Mainly used by Koreans)
  
• Backstab - Attacking your allies without notice.
  
• Backstabber - A person that Backstab.
  
• Bat - Terran Firebat.
  
• BC - Terran Battlecruiser.
  
• Beacon - Protoss Fleet Beacon.
  
• BG - Bad Game.
  
• BGH - Big Game Hunters. A melee scenario.
  
• Block often Tank Block or Lurk Block. See Containment.
  
• BM - Bad Manner.
  
• BO - Build Order. A recipe for reaching a certain technology, or a certain amount of units. (See Build Orders)
  
• Bot - A Chat-Room Robot, a semi-smart program that performs some chat-room functions, like spamming messages. Some have a few useful commands. Many clans use bots, to keep control over their clan-channel.
  
• Broodling - Zerg Queen's Spawn Broodling.
  
• Bunk - Terran Bunker.
  
• Bunkerless Defense - A build formation popularised by Heartcutter, it involves sealing a Siege Tank and Missile Turret into a confined area.
  This area becomes so tightly packed that it is impossible to drop units inside, and melee units cannot reach the Siege Tank within. Bunkerless Defenses are most commonly found protecting the mineral line. The purpose of Bunkerless Defense is to provide a more efficient all purpose defence than a standard Bunker would provide, while making good use of Terran Supply Depots.
  
• Build Orders - Will typically be shown using the current supply meter as a vague time gauge for when events along the build order timeline should happen (Depot on 9 would mean build a Terran Supply Depot when your supply meter reaches 9)
  
• BS - Backstab or Bull****. More commonly used as Backstab in a game.

 

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(C)​

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• Carr - Protoss Carrier.
  
• Cannon Rush - See Offensive Cannon.
  
• CC - Terran Command Center.
  
• Cheese - Any super effective yet overused strategy, usually something that's easy to set up but tough to stop.
  
• Chobo - A Korean word standing in reference to StarCraft as a poor or new player. (See Noob)
  
• Choke - A narrow passage usually at your main base. (Also see Wall In)
  
• Citadel - Protoss Citadel of Adun.
  
• Clan - A group of players, who are playing under a Clan-Name. The Clan Name is often added to the players nicknames in brackets. A clan can contain from two to hundreds of players. Many clans have a set of rules that must be followed by its members.
  
• Cliff or Cliffing - In general, it's to place ranged units on a hill overlooking a strategic important location, like an expansion. Thereby hindering the enemy from expanding. (See Turbo newbie)
  
• Cloning - The ability to select a group of one type of spell caster, cast the desired spell on a target, deselect one caster, target the spell on a different target, and repeat until all casters have separate targets. It is an effective alternative to excessive hot-keying. This requires some distance between the casters and the targets to prevent redundant castings. Often done with lockdown. Another type is Peon-Cloning which is similar to standard spell caster cloning, but uses the four opening workers you are given at the start of a map. Use identical cloning techniques to separate workers onto different mineral patches, increasing opening economy by a substantial amount over a player who does not clone his peons.
  
• Comp - Computer Player.
  
• Comp Stomp - Any game where the amount of players versing computer players is considerably larger(6v2. 7v1. 5v3). These games usually contain a lot of backstabbing.
  
• Containment - To surround your enemys base and prevent him from leaving his base, while you expand throughout the map. Usually executed with Terran Siege Tanks or Zerg Lurkers.
  
• Control Group - You can assign a building, building add-on, or a group of up to 12 units to a single key. To do this, select what you want to assign, then hold down Control and select a number on the keyboard between 0-9. Then, when you want to select what you assigned, simply press the number of the group that you want. Pressing a group number twice will center the screen on the group.
  
• Cor or Sair - Protoss Corsair.
  
• Crackling - Zergling with the Adrenal Glands and Metabolic Boost upgrades. It looks like they are on crack when they move/attack.
  
• CTF - Capture the flag. A type of game, like UMS or melee are other types. Where you have to capture the enemy's flag from their beacon and bring it to yours in order to win the match.
  
• Cyber Core or Core - Protoss Cybernetics Core.

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• DA - Protoss Dark Archon.
  
• DD - Don’t Die.
  
• Dance - Is to move damaged units backwards, saving them before they die, and spreading damage equally on your units. This also makes enemy units follow, which in turn gives your other units free hits on the following enemy unit.
  
• Def - Zerg Defiler.
  
• Def or D - Defense.
  
• Def Mound or Mound - Zerg Defiler Mound.
  
• Depot - Terran Supply Depot.
  
• Deep6 - A controversial strategy developed by Heartcutter that involves widespread use of infantry units vs. Protoss enemies.
  The theory and practice behind Deep6 is that Protoss units are almost all mechanical and susceptible to Lockdown. Lots of fast micro is required to achieve success with Deep6, which centers around 3/3 Marines and Medics, Ghosts with all upgrades, and tactical Nukes.
  
• Dev - Zerg Devourer.
  
• Dire - Dire Straits, the most played air scenario.
  
• Disc or DC or Diss - Disconnect from a game or battle.net.
  
• Dmatrix or Matrix - Terran Science Vessel's Defensive Matrix.
  
• Doom Drop - A drop designed to outright kill the enemy. It involves massing an army and dropping them strategically in the enemy's base and annihilating it from the inside.
  
• Drone Rush - See Worker Rush.
  
• Drop - The action of dropping units at your enemy with shuttles, dropships or overlords. It can also refer to when someone is dropped out of a game, due to a disconnect from the game.
  
• DS or Swarm - Zerg Defiler's Dark Swarm.
  
• Dship - Terran Dropship.
  
• DT or DTemp - Protoss Dark Templar.
  
• Dweb or Web - Protoss Corsair's Disruption Web.

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• Ebay - Terran Engineering Bay.
  
• EMP - Teran Science Vessel's EMP Shockwave.
  
• Exp or Expo or Xpan - An expansion base from your main base.
  
• Extract - Zerg Extractor.
  
• Extractor Trick or ET - See 10/9.

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• F4 - Some morons still believe that pressing the F4-key speeds up the downloading of maps in the game lobby. This is plain wrong. Pressing F4 does nothing.
  
• Fast Map - See Money Map.
  
• Fac - Terran Factory.
  
• Fb or Bat - Terran Firebat.
  
• FFA - Free For All. A type of game where the allying option is disabled, so it's every-man-for-himself.
  
• FL - Friends list. See the Commands section of this guide for a more complex definition.
  
• Flare - Terran Medic's Optical Flare.
  
• Finger of God - The Carrier/Corsair/Arbiter combo. It's called The Finger of God because supposedly you can't stop it.

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• Gate - Protoss Gateway.
  
• Ghost Drone - A bug that makes it possible to make drone fly by it self or hover the water. Often used to fast-expand on an island in secret. This bug was supposedly fixed in patch 1.10.
  
• GJ - Good Job. A nice way to boost the morale of your teammate.
  
• GL - Good Luck. Heh, alot of us need it
  
• GM - Good Manner.
  
• Gol - Terran Goliath.
  
• Gosu - The Korean (Or Japanese) word for skilled. When used in StarCraft, it usually means uber-skilled.
  
• GG - Good Game.
  
• Goon - Protoss Dragoon.
  
• Grunt - Any ground attacking unit.
  
• Guard - Zerg Guardian.
  
• GW - Good Work.

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• Hacker - Someone who uses an illegal program like Maphack within a game.(See MH)
  
• Hatch - Zerg Hatchery.
  
• Hax - Hacks.
  
• Hasu - An average gamer.
  
• Heavy Metal or Metal - Creating an army based solely around Terran Factory units.
  
• HF - Have fun.
  
• Hold Unit Trick - Most units have the ability to be ordered on hold, by hitting the H key. Some units lack this ability, lurkers and workers for example, but there is a way around this. By grouping such a unit together with a hold-able unit, and then press hold, both units will be on hold. Sometimes you would want a SCV under a tree in the middle of a map. You don't want it to wander, so, select it with a marine, and hit the H key. This keeps the SCV from wandering. After that, you can move the Marine around or command it to attack. Since you don't have the SCV selected with the Marine, the SCV will still stay held in place. The same goes for lurkers.
  Now the lurker won’t attack anything until it is ordered to attack again. This means that you can wait until a horde of marines are exactly on top of the lurker, and then press attack.
  
• H/O - Hold on.
  
• Hot Key - Every unit command has a hot key, or keyboard shortcut, associated with it. Holding the cursor over any unit command button will display the name of the command. Note that one of the letters appears in Yellow. This is the hot key for that command. Using hot keys for special abilities, attacking, and construction can save a lot of time.
  
• Hot Keying - See Control Groups.
  
• HT or Temp or Templar - Protoss High Templar.
  
• Huh Puh - Saying someone sucks in Korean.
  
• Hydra - Zerg Hydralisk.

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• Irr - Terran Science Vessel's Irradiate.
  
• Irradiate Raid or Irr Raid - The process of taking two Terran Science Vessels, casting Irradiate on both of them, and hovering them above the enemy mineral line causing massive splash damage. This is more typically used against Zerg opponents and its effectiveness is close to that of a Psi Raid.
  
• Inter - Protoss Interceptor.

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• JJang - Korean word for king.

 

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(K)​

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• KA - Kick ass.
  
• Kekeke - Korean laugh.
  
• Kek - The Korean equivalent of heh, or a slight snicker.

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• Lag hack - A hack that makes the game lag so horrible you have to leave the game or suffer hours of slow-motion gaming.
  
• Late Game - The portion of the game where players have access to all units and technologies at the end of a race's technology tree.
  
• Lock - Terran Ghost's Lockdown.
  
• Lol - Laughing out loud. Can be used both friendly and sarcastically.
  
• Lord or Ol or Ovie - Zerg Overlord.
  
• Ling - Zerg Zergling.
  
• LT - The map called The Lost Temple. (Also see Temple)
  
• Lurk - Zerg Lurker.
  
• Lurk hold - To group Lurkers together with another unit that cand be held. This way the lurker wont attack until told to. (See Hold Unit Trick for more information)
  
• Lurk Aspect or Aspect - Zerg Lurker Aspect. The technology that allows a Hydralisk to morph into a Lurker.

 

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(M)​

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• Macro - Macromanagement. It refers to game play in terms of the entire game. It is a very broad term that can refer to build orders, strategy, expanding or anything that affects the outcome of the entire game. Knowledge of good Macromanagement is essential to playing the game well. When talking about Macro and skill, it would be ability to pump out huge facility quantities of units fast, and attack with all of them at the same time. (Also see Micro)
  
  Mass Attack - An attack containing large quantities of units.
  
• Maynard Transfer - To build way more workers than is needed in one base. When the construction of an expansion is finished you transfer a huge bunch of workers to it, in effect doubling your mineral income at once. Although Maynard didn't invent this he was widely known for using it. Today basically all good players use it.
  
• MC - Protoss Dark Archon's Mind Control.
  
• MCNT - Mass Carrier Newbie Tactics. People still say it when they mass BC’s, without changing the abbreviation.
  
• Map - Koreans often use this as short for Map Hack.
  
• Map - StarCraft or Brood War Scenario.
  
• Med - Terran Medic.
  
• Metal - See Heavy Metal.
  
• MH - Map Hack. A hack that reveals all the map.
  
• Mineral Only - An expansion without Vespene Geysers.
  
• Micro - Micromanagement. It refers to control of individual units during a battle. Usage of Micromanagement can easily affect the outcome of a battle, and can include directing fire, unit placement, dancing, and other forms of controlling units beyond their normal AI.
  Good use of micromanagement often divides the expert players from the average players. (Also see Macro)
  
• Mid Game - The portion of the game where middle technology units start to make their appearance. This includes medium strength ground units, light air units, and drop capabilities. This is typically the longest part of the game.
  
• Mineral Line - The part of the base where the mineral deposits are located. It is a prime spot for enemy attacks, since without workers to mine minerals, a player's economy will suffer greatly, leading to that player being overwhelmed easily.
  
• M&M or M and M - Terran Marine and Medic.
  
• Mod - An altered version of StarCraft. In a mod there can be new sounds, graphics, and spells(A Terran Marine may fire missles like a Terran Missle Turret and look like a Goliath). Requires that you patch StarCraft.
  
• Money Map - A Scenario where players can accumulate minerals and gas very quick by having mineral fields placed right next or very close to their base. Mass Attacks and Backstabbers are common in this type of scenario.
  
• MPQ - Mike O'Brian Pack. Compressed archive format used by Blizzard. All scm/scx files are really this format.
  
• MU - Match up.
  
• MU? - When you ask your opponent, or vice versa, of what you would like the MU to be.
  
• Multi's - Expansions in Korean. (See Exp)
  
• Muta - Zerg Mutalisk.
  
• Muta/Ling - A popular ZvZ strategy where you use a combo of Mutalisks & Zerglings as your main attack force.

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• Natural or Nat - Natural Expansion. It is the most likely expansion position for a given start position.
  
• Nest - Zerg Queen's Nest.
  
• Non Covert Nuking - To nuke the enemy without cloaking your Terran Ghosts. Instead, you use a large support team to protect the Ghost. The goal is to either do a successful nuke, or just force your enemy to sacrifice a lot of units trying to kill your well guarded Terran Ghost.
  
• Noob or Newb or Newbie or N00b - A new player typically with poor skill.
  
• NR - No rush. (See Rush and NR##)
  
• NR## - An agreement at the start of a game to wait a certain amount of time before attacking. (NR10 = No rush for 10 minutes)
  
• No RE? - No Rematch? Asked after a game.
  
• No Rules - An agreement between people in the game that any and all strategies are permitted. This often goes without saying.
  
• Nydus - Zerg Nydus Canal.

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• Ob - Protoss Observer.
  
• Ogas - A strategy called Offensive Refinery/Assimilator/Extractor.
  
• Ol or Ovie or Lord- Zerg Overlord.
  
• Offensive Bunkering - The act of building bunkers close to your enemy's base really early in the game so you can attack their buildings with defensive structures. A dicey move, considering it can be stopped pretty easily if noticed in time.
  
• Offensive Canon - The act of building Protoss Photon Cannons just outside sight range in your enemies base. Then build more cannons closer and closer towards his base. If he scouts to late, it can be very hard to stop. Best way to stop this is to kill his Probe, which builds the cannons.
  
• Offensive Nydus - To build a Zerg Nydus Canal secretly in your enemy's base. Then use it as a backdoor to launch an attack into his base.
  
• Offensive Refinery/Assimilator/Extractor - To run into enemy base in the beginning, build a Refinery/Assimilator/Extractor, and take their gas to prevent them from getting any kind of gas technology units.
  
• Overlord Hunting - The process of taking an early air unit, usually Terran Wraiths or a small pack of Protoss Corsairs, and finding Overlords to destroy with a goal of setting back the Zerg player's supply count and halting his unit production briefly.

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• P - Protoss race.
  
• Peon - Terran SCV, Protoss Probe, Zerg Drone.
  
• Player 12 - The player that owns all neutral units, and the units that are left when a player leaves the game.
  
• Plz - Please.
  
• Pool - Zerg Spawning Pool.
  
• Port - Terran Starport.
  
• POY - Poo on you. While under attack, instead of saying rape, use POY.
  
• Pro Gamer - Professional player who competes in worldwide tournaments.
  
• Proxy Rax or Gate - When the user builds a Terran Barracks or Protoss Gateway close to the enemy base to get more units faster to the enemy base.
  
• Psi Storm or Storm - Protoss High Templar's Psionic Storm.
  
• Psi Raid - The process of dropping Protoss High Templar near the enemy mineral line, casting several Psionic Storms thereby catching the enemy off guard and destroying many workers in the process, then lifting and retreating.

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• Q Trick - In a game, tell someone to press Alt+QQQ. By pressing Alt+QQ, you exit the game.(Also see X Trick)
  
• Queuing Command - Assigning waypoints and queuing commands are effectively the same thing. To queue commands, hold down the shift button, and issue commands to the unit, clicking on the mini-map or on the main screen. When you have issued all your commands, release the shift key. Each unit is capable of queuing several commands at once singly or when group selected. You can queue most commands such as left-clicking, right-clicking, Stop, Attack, Hold Position, Repair, Move, Patrol, and Load/Unload. There is a limited number of commands that can be queued. You will receive a message indicating when you have reached that Queue limit. (Also see Waypoint)

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• R - The option random when choosing race.
  
• Ran or Tran - Terran race.
  
• Rax - Terran Barracks.
  
• Rax - Terran Barracks are secretly flown into your enemies base. Then they are used to produce marines from the inside of enemy base. It can also be doen with a Terran Factory.
  
• RC or R/C - Recreate the game.
  
• RE - Rematch.
  
• Rep or Replay - Prerecorded game that can be viewed by one or more players. Its primary purpose is to assist in strategy so players know what they did wrong in a game they lost or what the experts do right in order to win. You can watch a replay in the replays folder. A replay can also be used to show off how much you pounded a guy in a game.
  
• Reav - Protoss Reaver.
  
• Restore - Terran Medic's Restoration.
  
• Rine - Terran Marine.
  
• RM - Remake the game.
  
• Robo Fac - Protoss Robotics Facility.
  
• Robo Bay - Protoss Robotics Support Bay.
  
• Rush - An attack really early in the game usually by getting Zerg Zerglings, Terran Marines or Protoss Zealots as fast as possible and attacking the enemy to catch them unprepared. This, however, sacrafices Mid Game economy.

 

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[StarCraft Brood War Dictionary Thread]​

• Sair or Cor - Protoss Corsair.
  
• Sal sal - Saying someone/something sucks in Korean.
  
• SCC - StarCraft Compendium. The consolidated source for official StarCraft news, strategies, Maps, updates, FAQs.
  
• Scenario - Another word for Map.
  
• .SCM - The name extension for StarCraft maps. (Scenario.scm)
  
• .SCX - The name extension for Brood War maps. (Scenario.scx)
  
• SCXE - StarCraft X-tra Editor. The StarCraft X-tra Editor is a set of StarEdit-Mods. These mods are made to make map making easier and give StarEdit more options.
  
• Sci Facil - Terran Science Facility.
  
• Server Split - Server Split occurs when one or more Battle.net servers become so overloaded that they either crash and restart or sever themselves from the network. This results in server instability and massive user disconnection and makes it difficult to keep in contact with the rest of Battle.net for the purposes of starting a game. Server splits do not affect games in progress.
  
• Sair Whoring - Process of using a substantial amount of Protoss Corsairs for the purpose of large scale Overlord Hunting, air superiority, or massive use of Disruption Web.
  
• Shift Queue - See Queuing Command.
  
• Sieging - Process of switching a Siege Tank from Tank Mode to Siege Mode.
  
• Silo - Terran Nuclear Silo.
  
• Single File - When you walk your units a long distance and they start to walk in a single file line. It is very bad to attack this way, since your units reach the enemy one at a time.
  
• Smurfing - When using a temporary nickname without telling anyone who you really are. A smurfing person is called a Smurf.
  
• Speed - The Zerg Overlord or Protoss Zealot speed enhancing upgrade.
  
• Speedlings - Zerg Zergling with the Metabolic Boost upgrade.
  
• Speed Vult - Terran Vulture with Ion Thrusters. They are the fastest unit in StarCraft.
  
• Spore - Zerg Spore Colony.
  
• Splash - Splash damage. An attack that damages more than 1 unit at once. (Example: Terran Nuke)
  
• Split - See Worker Split.
  
• Spoofer Hack - Allows a user to appear with a different name in games. It is most easily recognisable when the user has spaces or other invalid characters in their name, or if it appears in color. But the spoofer does not actually change their account name, so they can still be detected using /whereis.
  
• SS - Screenshot.
  
• Sunken or Sunk - Zerg Sunken Colony.
  
• StarEdit - Starcraft Campaign Editor, used to create and edit maps.
  
• SV - Terran Science Vessel.
  
• Swarm or DS - Zerg Defiler's Dark Swarm.