Abbreviations

This page provides a quick, single page guide to abbreviations used in chat and other places in Guild Wars. It's meant to be a practical guide for users who are new to the game and need some help understanding the lingo.

Rules for adding content:

• The page does not aim to be all encompassing, but rather to cover:
  • Terms that are likely to be encountered (i.e. if you haven't seen it used commonly in chat, then don't add it).
  • Terms that are not commonly known, and are not obvious. (e.g. don't add "lol" means) or explain that "u" == "you".)
    • However, there's some space for semi-commonly known terms at the end under Chat (Generic).
• If the abbreviated and non-abbreviated terms are both common, list both.
• If the term varies in capitalization, just list the most common abbreviation. (e.g. AB instead of Ab.)

Guild tags

Guild tags are the 2-4 letter tags appended to the name of players that belong to guild. e.g. if a player named Budweiser belongs to a guild "King of the Beers" with tag KotB, then their name in-game will look like "Budweiser [KotB]".

Guild tags are not necessarily abbreviations, and are not necessarily unique. e.g. all guilds that belong to the NiTe alliance use the tag "NiTe" and are all named something like "Dragons of winter [NiTe]", so that the appended guild tag is actually part of the name.

Guild tags are also commonly used to complete a phrase started with the guild name, e.g. "We Are Afraid Of The [Dark]".

Guild Wars specific terms

Abbrev.	Expansion	Details
15^50	+15% over 50%
40/40	40/40 set
55 or 55 monk	55 Monk
AB	Alliance Battle
AC	Alliance Chat	Chat channel accessible only to alliance members
ae	America English	America English district
AoE	Area of effect
arms or a	Armbrace of Truth	Often used as a form of currency for more expensive items
assa	Assassin
BDS	Bone Dragon Staff
BiP	Blood is Power
BU	Essence of Celerity	Originated as "Back Up" as it's considered the most important component of a consumable set (see cons or conset)
CoF	Cathedral of Flames
cons or conset	Consumable set
derv	Dervish
dis or d	District	Used to specify which district to meet in e.g. "dis 1 is full; come to dis 2".
DoA	Domain of Anguish
DSR	Dhuum's Soul Reaper
DShot	Distracting Shot
EBSoH	Ebon Battle Standard of Honor
ecto or e	Glob of Ectoplasm	Often used as a form of currency
ee	Ebon Escape
eee	Embark Beach Europe English district	A common meeting place for Underworld and Fissure of Woe speed clear teams
EL	Everlasting tonic
ele	Elementalist
emo	Elementalist/Monk
ench	enchantment
EoE	Edge of Extinction
EotN	Eye of the North	Can refer to either the outpost or the expansion.
EVAS	Ebon Vanguard Assassin Support
FA	Fort Aspenwood
FoW	Fissure of Woe
GC	Guild Chat	Chat channel accessible only to guild members
GH	Guild Hall
GLF	Group Looking For
GotH	Gift of the Huntsman
GotT or Nick gift	Gift of the Traveler
GToB	Great Temple of Balthazar
GvG	Guild versus Guild
GWAMM	God Walking Amongst Mere Mortals	The final rank in the Kind of a Big Deal title
HA	Heroes' Ascent
HCT	Halves casting time
HM	Hard Mode
HoM	Hall of Monuments
HR	Heroic Refrain
HSR	Halves skill recharge
IAU	"I Am Unstoppable!"
imba	Imbagon
Int	International	Refers to International District
JQ	Jade Quarry
k	platinum	1000 gold
Kama	Kamadan, Jewel of Istan	A popular town for trading
KD	Knock down
KoaBD	Kind of a Big Deal
LA	Lion's Arch
LDoA	Legendary Defender of Ascalon
LFG	Looking for Group	Someone looking for a group to join for some purpose. e.g. "LFG Charr Hunting.'
lp or pick	Lockpick
Me, mes, or mez	Mesmer
MM	Minion Master
Mo	Monk
necro	Necromancer
NF	Guild Wars Nightfall
NM	Normal Mode
obby	Obsidian Armor	Terms such as "obby shard" and "obby edge" refer to other obsidian items.
OP	Over-powered	Usually refers to skills or builds that are significantly more effective than average
OS	old school	uninscribable weapons
para	Paragon
PBAoE	Point blank area of effect
PC	Price Check	Someone asking for the going price on a given item. This is asked in a guild, alliance, or Kamadan, prior to sale/purchase.
pcons	Personal consumables	Any items which provide a buff to only the user in an explorable area
Perfect	Perfect
perma	Permanent	Maintaining a particular effect; most commonly Shadow Form
Perma pre or perma-pre	Permanent pre-Searing character
PI	Pain Inverter
PM	Private Message	I.e. a whisper, so "pm me" means "whisper me". "psst" is also occasionally used.
Pre	Pre-searing
Proph	Guild Wars Prophecies
Post	Post-Searing	Usually only used in pre-Searing and just after leaving pre.
PvE	Player versus Environment
PvP	Player versus Player
RA	Random Arenas
req or q	Requirement
rit or Rt	Ritualist
rupt	interrupt
SC	Speed clear	Often prefaced with an abbreviation of what is being speed cleared e.g. SoOSC = Shards of Orr Speed Clear
sin	Assassin
SoGM	Signet of Ghostly Might
SoO	Shards of Orr
SoS	Signet of Spirits
SF	Shadow Form	Very rarely used for Searing Flames.
ST	Soul Twisting	Often used to refer to a build including Shelter as well as Soul Twisting
UA	Unyielding Aura	Often refers to a player using this skill
UW	Underworld
VoS	Vow of Strength	Often refers to a player using this skill. Occasionally used for Vow of Silence
VQ or vanq	Vanquish
VSF	Voltaic Spear Farm
war or warr	Warrior
Wammo	Warrior/Monk
WiK	War in Kryta
WoC	Winds of Change
WTB	Want to Buy	e.g. WTB Black Dye.
WTS	Want to Sell	e.g. WTS White Dye.
WTT	Want to Trade	e.g. WTT Voltaic Spear for Globs of Ectoplasm
YMLaD	"You Move Like a Dwarf!"
Zkey	Zaishen Key	A chest key that, because of its rarity and price, is often used as currency.
ZM	Zaishen Mission

Generic chat

Chat terms that you may see anywhere, not just in Guild Wars. For much longer list, see Webopedia.

Abbrev.	Expansion	Details
afk	Away From Keyboard	To indicate that player has stepped away from keyboard. When used as an emote (/afk) triggers the sitting animation. Sitting is an informal way to indicate that you're not around, but is only useful for players who can see you. A more useful action is to set your player status to "Away" in the Friends List window.
bbl	Be Back Later
bbiab	Be Back In A Bit
brb	Be Right Back or BathRoom Break
brt	Be Right There
ftw	For The Win	A common expression among players to say something is good.
ftl	For the loss
fr	Full run
gg	Good Game/Good Going
gj	Good Job
gl	Good Luck
gn	Good Night
grats, gratz or gz	Congratulations
hf	Have Fun
ign	In Game Name
irl	In Real Life	carry over from online chat rooms
k/kk	Okay
nn	Night Night
np	No Problem
nvm	Never Mind
ty	Thank You
tyt	Take your time
tyvm	Thank you very much
yw	You're welcome
Wc or w/c	Wrong chat
whoru	Who Are You
omw	On My Way

See also

• Category:Glossary
• Category:Abbreviations
• Abbreviations at Webopedia
• Guild, by Tag