Glossary

Words highlighted bold have a definition within this page, letting you search for it here.

A - E

 * AA : Initialism of Ancient Apparition.
 * AC : Initialism of Assault Cuirass.
 * AM : Initialism of Anti-Mage.
 * AW : Initialism of Arc Warden.
 * Aggro : Abbreviation for aggression. The programmed aggression of AI controlled towers and creeps. Refers to getting the attention of a particular hostile unit, e.g. "I have aggro" means a hostile unit is focusing on attacking you.
 * AoE : Initialism for Area of Effect. It refers to a spell, attack, or effect that affects an area around a point (for example, Dragon Slave is an "AoE spell"). Also used to refer to the range or size of one such spell/attack/effect, for example Reverse Polarity affects enemies in a 410 radius, therefore it has an AoE of 410, or it has "410 AoE".


 * B : Initialism for "Back" or "Get Back". Used to call for a retreat. A player saying "b" is usually suggesting that everyone back up or run away.
 * BAT : Abbreviation for Base Attack Time, which determines how long an unbuffed unit with 0 agility and 0% bonus attack speed has to wait to attack again. Lower BAT units are able to attack more frequently. Most heroes have a BAT of 1.70. It is considered better to have a lower BAT and worse to have a higher BAT.
 * Backdoor : The act of attacking enemy structures while a player's own lane creeps have not reached the structure yet. Usually ineffective due to backdoor protection.
 * Barracks: Structures found in each lane that when destroyed permanently grant super creeps to the team that destroyed it.
 * BB : Initialism of Bristleback or Buyback. If a teammate asks "do you have bb?" they are asking "do you have buyback?".
 * BD : Initialism for backdooring.
 * BF : Initialism for Battle Fury.
 * BH : Initialism for either Bounty Hunter, or Enigma's ultimate, Black Hole.
 * BKB : Initialism for Black King Bar, an item that grants spell immunity.
 * Bot : Refers to either the bottom lane of the map, or an AI-controlled Hero.
 * BoT, BoTs: Initialism for Boots of Travel.
 * Bottle Crow : Giving the bottle to the courier, then sending it on a round trip back to base to refill the bottle and give it back to the owner. This keeps the player's HP/MP healthy, and they do not have to miss any exp/gold from lane refilling it themselves. Note that any bottle that is not full will slow the courier by 30%, and the act of bottle crowing may hamper player's allies as they will find it harder to deliver their own items while the courier is making trips.
 * BRB : Initialism of "be right back".
 * Break : Refers to either the effect of disabling the effects of a Hero's passive abilities or the other passive ability of Tranquil Boots.
 * Buff : A beneficial spell or effect placed on a unit. Refers to the opposite of a Debuff.
 * Burst or Burst Damage : Refers to a high amount of damage dealt over a short period of time. Usually involves Nukes.
 * BS : Initialism for Bloodseeker or Bloodstone.


 * Carry : A type of hero which can overpower the enemy team in the late game. These Heroes tend to scale very well with gold and experience, and thus require large sums of it in order to be successful.
 * Caster : Refers to a person who commentates on an ongoing game.
 * CC : Initialism for Crowd Control. See Disable.
 * CD : Initialism for Cooldown or Captain's Draft.
 * Chicken or Chick : Refers to Animal Courier.
 * CK : Initialism for Chaos Knight.
 * CM : Initialism for Crystal Maiden or Captain's Mode.
 * Crow : Refers to Flying Courier, which upgrades a walking courier. A player asking to "please crow it" is asking for someone to upgrade the courier.
 * CS : Initialism of Creep Score, the amount of last hits a player has, or the amount of last hits and denies a player has. In DotA 1, typing -cs would show the player' last hits and denies count. May also refer to "creep steal", the act of stealing last hits from an allied player.
 * CW : Initialism of Clockwerk.
 * DD : Initialism for Rune of Double Damage.
 * Debuff : A detrimental spell of effect placed on a unit. Refers to the opposite of a Buff.
 * Deny : Killing your allied unit, hero or building, in order to prevent an enemy from gaining the gold and experience it gives. You can manually attack your own creeps if their health is below 50%, your own towers below if they are below 10%, and heroes affected by certain DoTs.
 * Deward : The act of removing enemy wards, usually mostly pertaining to Observer Wards.
 * DGU : Initialism for "Don't give up"
 * Dieback : When a player dies after using their buyback, resulting in a much longer respawn time and unable to use it once more as it will most definitely be on cooldown.
 * Disable : A catch-all term referring to any spell, ability, or effect that otherwise prevents an enemy hero from moving, casting, and/or attacking, leaving them helpless for a short period of time or in general impeding their ability to act. See the main article for more information.
 * DK : Initialism for Dragon Knight.
 * DoT : Damage over Time, an applied effect that repeatedly inflicts damage at a regular interval for a specific duration. A classic example would be Venomancer's Poison Nova.
 * DP : Initialism for Death Prophet.
 * DPS : Initialism for damage per second, a measure of the damage dealt by a hero or unit over one second. Usually refers to heroes with consistent damage output over a period rather than heroes with high burst damage periodically.
 * Dunk : Refers to either Axe's ultimate, Culling Blade, or Earthshaker's ultimate, Echo Slam.
 * Dust : Dust of Appearance.
 * Easy lane: See Safe Lane.
 * Egg : Refers to Phoenix' ultimate, Supernova.
 * Epi : Refers to Sand King's ultimate, Epicenter.
 * ES : Initialism of Earthshaker, Earth Spirit, or Ember Spirit.
 * ET : Initialism for Elder Titan.
 * Exp or XP : Experience, the resource used by heroes to gain levels, level skills, and otherwise increase in power over the course of a game.
 * ez : "Easy", typically said to mock the enemy team's lesser power.

F - J

 * Fade Time: The amount of time it takes for a unit to become completely invisible following the activating of an invisibility effect.
 * Farm or Farming : The process of steadily earning gold and experience by killing lane creeps and/or neutral creeps. This tactic is often slow and tedious, but is usually necessary for Carries to reach their full potential.
 * FB : Initialism for First Blood, the first kill of the game. The first blood kill grants 150g more than usual, which always comes out to be at least 359g.
 * Feeder : A player who "feeds" the enemy team gold and experience by getting killed frequently. Can be intentional or unintentional.
 * Flash Farming : A style of farming when you farm your lane creeps until the enemy tower and then proceed to clear neutral creep camps in quick and efficient rotations. This is often the fastest method of farming, but it also allows the enemy to farm your creeps freely by their tower and can be risky, as being near the enemy tower is often an easy gank, or the enemy might know exactly where you are clearing the camp closest to the lane tanking creeps and losing health, etc.
 * Flash Farming Skill/Ability: An AoE ability that facilitates flash farming by allowing a hero to quickly clear lane creeps or groups of neutrals. The classic flash farming ability is Shadow Fiend's Shadowraze which allows him to mow down wave after wave of creeps with ease. It is common to hit lane creeps below threshold and then clear them all in one shot with the flash farming ability, and then go off to check rune, kill neutrals, etc.
 * FF : According to DotA history, "ff" appeared on DotA-League.com (at this time it was for DotA 1), and it means "forfeit". You had to type "-ff" in the game so it can detected and recorded by the dota-league plugin and save the data to your dota-league profile. If all 5 members of one team type it the game would end.
 * Fog of War : Refers to the portion of the map that is dark and unseen. If you cannot see an area, then it is said to be "fogged". Most of the map is "fogged" by default, such as Roshan's lair, and the enemy base.
 * Fortification/Fortify : The Glyph of Fortification is the button in the bottom right hand of the screen that renders all allied buildings invulnerable for 5 seconds on a 5 minute cooldown. If a player says "don't fort", they are telling the team to save the glyph for later. Towers are "fortified" for the 5 seconds that the glyph is active.
 * FoW : Initialism for Fog of War.
 * Furion : Nature's Prophet's name in WC3 DotA. Still referenced in the game's files for the Hero.


 * Gank : Abbreviation for Gang Kill, but over time the term has come to refer to any time a hero or group of heroes attempts to pick off an enemy hero (or enemy heroes) by surprise, but usually with superior forces (such as 2v1).
 * gg : "Good game". Said by either team when they are winning or losing and the match is close to ending, or when a team or a player gives up or claims victory. For example, both teams might say "gg" to congratulate each other after a hard fought match, or a team might call out "gg" after their ally abandons in an assumption that they can no longer win.
 * ggwp : "Good game, well played". Used in a similar fashion as "gg", but also congratulates the enemy for skillful play.
 * glhf : "Good luck have fun". Usually said at the start of a game to encourage other players, or just to be courteous.
 * Golem : Refers to Mud Golems, Ancient Golems, or Warlock's ultimate summon through Chaotic Offering.
 * Guinsoo : A reference to Scythe of Vyse's full name in WC3 DotA, which in turn references one of the developers of the original DotA maps.


 * Hard Carry : A type of carry hero which scales incredibly well with items and requires a substantial amount of farm to be effective. Examples of this are Anti-Mage and Spectre. Hard carries are usually weaker than other semi-carry or non-carry heroes at the early-mid stages of the game, when they do not yet have their core items.
 * Hard Lane : The lane of either faction where the creep wave meets up furthest from the tower, making those who lane in it more susceptible to ganks (top lane for Radiant, bottom lane for Dire). See Lane.
 * HH : Initialism for the item Heaven's Halberd.
 * HP : Health/hit points, referring to the health a unit has.


 * Initiation : The act of starting (initiating) a teamfight. A good initiation will catch the enemy team off-guard, and possibly lose quickly to the attacking team. A Hero adept at performing this is called an initiator.


 * Juking : Running and weaving around trees, fog and other obstacles in such a manner to avoid being attacked by an enemy.
 * Jungling : The process of killing the neutral creeps in the woods between the lanes. Killing ancient creeps also counts as jungling, but is more often referred to as ancienting or "clearing ancients".
 * Jungler : A hero adept at clearing jungle camps from lvl 1, usually by some combination of: having some way to avoid or reduce damage to their hero, having some way to sustain their health, or having some AoE ability that clears the creeps faster than the creeps can clear them.

K - O

 * Kite or Kiting : See pulling. A technique where a hero gets the attention of a hostile unit to draw them away or force them to follow. Can also be used to refer to a period of repeated hit-and-run attacks where the target is kept out of range.
 * KotL : Initialism of Ezalor, the Keeper of the Light.
 * KS : Either means "kill steal" or, usually jokingly, "kill secure". Firstly, it refers to the act of one Hero stealing the kill of another Hero who could have easily taken themselves. Secondly, it refers to when another Hero "secures" the kill if the carry or another Hero could not do so themselves. The latter meaning is also sometimes interchangeably used with the former meaning in a satirical or comedic way.


 * LC : Initialism for Legion Commander.
 * Leoric : Wraith King's name in WC3 Dota.
 * Long lane : See Hard Lane.
 * Lothars or Lothars Edge : Shadow Blade's name in WC3 DotA.


 * Micro : Micromanagement. Refers to (effective) control and usage of multiple units, items, and abilities in quick succession. Bad micromanagement can result in the many units becoming a hindrance or a liability rather than an asset or ability combos being wasted and/or used in the wrong situations, while a good one can easily overpower an enemy in seconds. Meepo, Invoker, and Chen are good examples of Heroes who require good "micro".
 * Mid/Middle : The middle of the three lanes in the map.
 * Miss or MIA : Mentions that a particular Hero has gone missing and is probably setting up for a Gank, e.g. "Earthshaker mia" or "Earthshaker miss" means that Earthshaker isn't visible to the team. "MIA" is an acronym for "Missing In Action".
 * MKB : Initialism for Monkey King Bar.
 * MP : Mana points, referring to the amount of mana a unit has.
 * MS : Initialism for Movement Speed, or sometimes "missing".
 * Mute : Refers either to the effect that prevents item usage, or blocking any means of communication from a player in the game to avoid harassment.


 * Necro : May refer to Necrophos or the Necronomicon. Rarely used to refer to Visage, the Bound Form of Necro'lic.
 * NP : Initialism for Nature's Prophet or "no problem".
 * Nuke : A spell whose purpose is to deal a large amount of damage immediately or in a very short span of time.
 * OC : Initialism of Octarine Core.
 * OD : Initialism for Outworld Devourer.
 * Offlane : See Hard Lane.
 * Offlaner : A Hero sent down to the offlane/hard lane, usually on their own. These Heroes usually have good escape abilities or are naturally durable to withstand being alone and facing usually two enemy Heroes (and being more vulnerable to ganks).
 * Omni : Refers to Omniknight or Juggernaut's ultimate, Omnislash.
 * OOM : Out of mana.
 * OoV : Initialism for Orb of Venom.
 * Orb Walk : Using your Orb i.e. Frost Arrows, Searing Arrows, to harass the enemy while moving forward to gain distance on the target, also eliminating enemy creep aggro.

P - T

 * P : Abbreviation for Push or Pause. Players saying "p" means they are either suggesting the team to push an enemy lane or asking for a pause.
 * PP : Initialism for "Pause please".
 * PA : Initialism for Phantom Assassin.
 * Pet : A creature that a Hero can summon or convert to their side. For example, the Eidolons are Enigma's pets.
 * PL : Initialism for Phantom Lancer.
 * PotM : Initialism for Mirana, the Princess of the Moon.
 * Proc : Short for "Programmed Random Occurence". It refers to the triggering of effects, whether the occurence is random (such as Wraith King's critical strikes on  attack) or regular (such as Bristleback's quill spray every 250 damage he takes). When these effects trigger or "process", they are said to "proc". The rate of occurence for random effects is termed the "Proc rate".
 * Pull or Pulling: A technique where a hero gets the attention of a hostile unit to draw them away or force them to follow.


 * QoP : Initialism for Queen of Pain.


 * Rat : A strategy in which heroes avoid 5-man teamfights, and focus on pushing other lanes instead.
 * Rax : Abbreviation for Barracks.
 * Recrow : To reuse the courier after it has finished performing one of its deliveries/tasks. Since the courier can only perform one task for one player at a time, this is mentioned to remind/alert other players that the courier is now free to use.
 * Reuse : See Recrow, usually mentioned by Southeast Asian players.
 * Ricer : Hardcore farmer whose main goal is to be extremely strengthened by the time they come out of their farming.
 * RNG : Random Number Generator, referring to the proc chance of abilities and items such as Bash or Evasion.
 * Ro3 : See Roshan, usually mentioned by Chinese players.
 * Roamer : A hero who jumps between lanes, especially in the early game, in order to gank enemy Heroes or defend allies.
 * Roshan or Rosh : Roshan is a difficult-to-kill neutral creep that drops the Aegis of the Immortal when killed (or Cheese on its third death and afterward). Spawns at the beginning of the game, respawns 8-11 minutes after it is killed.
 * RP : Reverse Polarity, Magnus' ultimate.


 * Safe lane : The lane of either faction, where the creep wave meets closest to the tower, making farming easier and less risky for those in the lane (bottom lane for Radiant, top lane for Dire). See Lane.
 * SB : Initialism for Spirit Breaker or Shadow Blade.
 * Scepter : Mostly refers to Aghanim's Scepter, although can also refer to Eul's Scepter of Divinity.
 * SD : Initialism for Shadow Demon.
 * SF : Initialism for Shadow Fiend.
 * Silence : An ability that prevents the target from casting spells, but can still allows item usage.
 * Sheepstick : Refers to the Scythe of Vyse, since in DotA it turned the target actually into a sheep.
 * Short lane: See Safe Lane.
 * SK : Initialism for Sand King. May also refer to Wraith King in reference to his former title, Skeleton King, or Terrorblade in reference to this former title Soul Keeper.
 * Skillshot : An ability that requires proper aim and timing to hit an enemy. Some examples would be Sacred Arrow and Powershot.
 * Smoke : Refers to either Smoke of Deceit, or Riki's ability [Riki#Smoke Screen|Smoke Screen]].
 * SnY : Initialism of Sange and Yasha.
 * Solo : Being the only hero on the lane. A player may call for "solo" to prevent other players from interrupting their lane and splitting experience and gold.
 * Soul Keeper : Terrorblade's former title in WC3 DotA.
 * Squishy : A Hero that can only take relatively little damage or abuse before dying.
 * SS : See miss. Mentions that a particular Hero has gone missing and is probably setting up for a Gank, e.g. "Earthshaker ss" means that Earthshaker isn't visible to the team. Also refers to the ultimate of a Hero ("special/super skill"), usually mentioned by Southeast Asian players. May also refer to Storm Spirit and Shadow Shaman
 * Stacking : A technique which allows several groups of neutral creeps to spawn at once.
 * Static Farming : A sub-type of farming where you aim to only kill enemy lane creeps when they have low hitpoints and deny the allied lane creeps whenever possible, with the goal of maintaining an equilibrium of the lane creeps in a safe position. This is often a slower method of farming, but allows you to farm safely with little risk of dying to a gank.
 * Suicide : The act of killing oneself to deny the enemy of gold and experience. May also directly refer to Techies' ability Suicide Squad, Attack!
 * Suicide lane : See Hard Lane.
 * Summoner : A Hero whose primary function is summoning or controlling Pets.
 * Support : A Hero whose primary function is to help their own team through heals, buffs, and detection, or sabotaging the enemy team through disables, slows, or debuffs.


 * TA : Initialism of Templar Assassin.
 * Tank : A Hero that can take a lot of damage and abuse before dying. See also Durable.
 * TB : Initialism of Terrorblade.
 * Throw : The act of giving a supreme advantage to the supposedly losing team, letting them win the match instead. This can be accidental or intentional.
 * Throne : See Ancient. Remnant of WC3 DOTA in which the Scourge's (Dire) Ancient is using the Frozen Throne model.
 * Top : Refers to the top lane of the map. For the Radiant, this is the lane to the North. For the Dire, this is the lane to the West.
 * TP : Teleport, can also be used as an initialism for Scroll of Town Portal.
 * True Sight: Anything invisible caught in the radius of True Sight will be revealed. Towers, a Gem of True Sight, Sentry Wards, Dust of Appearance, and some abilities of certain Heroes (like Slardar's Amplify Damage and Zeus' Lightning Bolt) all provide True Sight.
 * Turnaround : The act of a team facing the enemy in a situation where they might be expected to run, such as when a team initiates on the other. Instead of running away, they try to turn the battle around and fight back, possibly even winning the battle themselves.

U - Z

 * Ulti: Abbreviation for Ultimate.


 * Veno : Abbreviation for Venomancer. Rarely used to refer to Orb of Venom.
 * VS : Initialism for Vengeful Spirit. Less commonly used to mean "versus".


 * Wards: Items that can be placed almost anywhere on the map and provide vision around the location for 7 minutes. May also refer to Mass Serpent Ward, Plague Ward or Death Ward.
 * WD : Initialism for Witch Doctor.
 * Well : The fountain from either team. Derived from its name in WC3 DotA: "Well of Eternity".
 * Wipe : The act of an entire team dying at once. Also known as a teamwipe.
 * WK : Initialism for Wraith King.
 * wp : "Well Played". Usually said by either teams when they are winning or losing and the match is either about to end or when a player did something skillful. Usually paired up with "gg".
 * WR : Initialism for Windranger.
 * WW : Initialism for Wind Walk (From WC3 DotA), which are abilities that grant mobile invisibility, and is sometimes generalized for enemies who gained invisibility overall (through runes, items, or buffs). Also an initialism of Winter Wyvern.


 * Zoning: The act of harassing an enemy hero away from the creep zone in order to prevent them from gaining experience.