WoWGlossary

This page contains a glossary of more or less common WoW (World of Warcraft) terms and acronyms. Some entries are in German because I play on a German realm. Each list is sorted alphabetically.

Terms

Add

Additional mob

Aggro

Probably short for "aggression" or some related word, it refers to who a mob is attacking - that player is said to "have aggro" or have "pulled aggro"

Alt

An "alternate" character - not your main (character)

Bubblehearth

A term referring to the Paladin escape method of casting their Divine Shield (an invulnerability spell) followed by activating their Hearthstone, in an attempt to teleport to their home town without being killed.

Classic/Vanilla

Refers to the original World of Warcraft content, before Burning Crusade

Clothie

A character of a class that is restricted to wear cloth armor.

Grind

To grind refers to doing a repetitive task in order to achieve a goal, e.g. gain reputation with a faction.

Imba

Short for "Imbalanced", e.g. if a character is geared incredibly well. May also refer to an ability or class that is perceived to be overpowered.

Main

The main character, i.e. the most played, highest level, or first created character. Not one of your "alts".

Mine, Farm

To stay in one place, killing the same mob over and over and over again, for loot or XP. May also refer to gathering a resource.

Mob

A term from older text based MMOs, standing for "Mobile Object," ie, an NPC that moves around on it own

Nerf

A change to the game that makes a given class/spec weaker

Pat

Patrol

Proc

Short for "Process", "Procedure", or some similar term (see WoWWiki). What it refers to is things that have a chance to go off when some event happens.

Rez

To rez means to resurrect a dead player. Various classes have different rez abilities, which can usually be cast only out of combat. Druids are the only class that have the ability to battle rez, i.e. to rez while a battle is still in progress.

Sheep

Sheeping refers to the Mage ability to polymorph a target into a sheep for a limited time, thus rendering an enemy mob harmless. Sheeping is a form of crowd control (CC).

Spawn

A place where an NPC or mob appears in the game world

Squishy

A character of a class that is restricted to wear cloth armor, thus is an easy, "squishy" target for enemies. Basically the same as the term "clothie".

Tankadin

A Paladin character that has the tank role

Toon

Short for cartoon, a character.

Trash

Monsters that are not bosses are often referred to as the trash of the instance

Twink

An alt character, often one that has unusually high quality gear & enchants

Acronyms

WoWWiki has an entire category with articles that explain acronyms.

AoE

Area of Effect

AH

Auction House

AFK

Away From Keyboard. Your character gets this status after a certain time elapses without keyboard or mouse activity. The character can be explicitly put into this state by issuing the command "/afk".

AK

Archavons Kammer, or Vault of Archavon. A raid dungeon.

AP

Attack Power, a stat in the game.

AQ

Ahn'Qiraj. General name for the region where several raid dungeons are located.

AQ20/RAQ

Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj. A raid dungeon.

AQ40/TAQ

Temple of Ahn'Qiraj. A raid dungeon.

BB

Booty Bay

BC

Burning Crusade

BFD

Blackfathom Depths

BG

Battleground

BoA

Bind on account

BoE

Bind on equip

BoK/Kings

Blessing of Kings. A Paladin buff.

BoL/Light

Blessing of Light. A Paladin buff.

BoM/Might

Blessing of Might. A Paladin buff.

BoP

Bind on Pick-up. Also: Blessing of Protection, a Paladin buff.

BoS/Salv

Blessing of Salvation. A Paladin buff.

BoW/Wis

Blessing of Wisdom. A Paladin buff.

BRD

Blackrock Depths

[U|L]BRS

[Upper|Lower] Blackrock Spire

BWL

Blackwing Lair. A raid dungeon.

CC

Crowd control

CD

Cooldown

DC

Disconnect

DD

Damage Dealer

DE

Disenchant

DF

Dungeon Finder. An in-game tool that helps players to find others to team up to play an instance.

DK

Death Knight

DKP

Dragon kill points, a cover term for a number of systems guilds use to distribute loot (see [http://www.wowwiki.com/Dragon_kill_points WoWWiki)

DM

Dire Maul, or Deadmines. To prevent confusion, Deadmines is sometimes also abbreviated to VC, after the end boss Van Cleef.

DND

Do Not Disturb. Your character gets this status after issuing the command "/dnd".

DoT

Damage over time

DPS

Damage per second

FFF

Faerie Fire (Feral), a Druid ability.

FP

Flight point, flight path

GM

Game master

GS

GearScore, an addon for evaluating a player's gear. (In)famous and controversial because raid leaders looking for group members often require players to have a minimum "gear score", thus ignoring a player's skill.

HoT

Heal over time

IF

Ironforge

LF

Looking For ("LF tank," etc.)

LFG

Looking For Group. If used by a player on a global channel that player is literally looking for a group that she may join. An older in-game mechanism to team up with other players was also called "Looking For Group", nowadays the tool is called the Dungeon Finder.

LoS

Line of Sight

MA

Main Assist

MC

Mind Control. Also: Molten Core, a raid dungeon.

MMO

Massively multiplayer online game, e.g. World of Warcraft.

MP5

Mana per five seconds

MT

Main Tank

NPC

Non-player character

OH

Off-hand

OOM

Out of mana

OT

Off tank

PDK

Prüfung des Kreuzfahrers, or Trial of the Crusader. An epic 10- and 25-player raid dungeon.

PDoK

Prüfung des obersten Kreuzfahrers, or Trial of the Grand Crusader. A heroic mode 10- and 25-player raid dungeon.

PUG

Pickup group, i.e. a group of random players that are grouped together via the matchmaking system, usually to do an instance or quest. Not necessarily limited to a 5-man group, randomly assembled raids are also PUGs.

PvE

Player vs. Environment

PvP

Player vs. Player

PW

F : Power Word: Fortitude

PW

S : Power Word: Shield

Re

?; used in chat to announce that one is no longer AFK.

RL

Real life

RNG

Random Number Generator, may refer to any situation where a random element is involved

STV

Stranglethorn Vale

SW

Stormwind City

TPS

Threat per second

TS

Teamspeak

Vent

Ventrilo

WB

Welcome Back; used as greeting after someone has returned from being AFK

WC

Wailing Caverns

WotLK

Wrath of the Lich King

WoW

World of Warcraft

XP

Experience points

ZF

Zul Farrak

Abbreviations

WoWWiki has an entire category with articles that explain abbreviations.

Naxx

Naxxramas

Ony

Onyxia's Lair

Kara

Karazhan

Scholo

Scholomance

Shatt

Shattrath City

Strat

Stratholme