A Gamer's Lexicon - Entry 4

Screenshot from Everquest

A Gamer's Lexicon series touches upon terms players use in video games. The terms here mostly come from my experiences in the MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game) Everquest. This series will hopefully help the non-gamers understand some of the terms gamers use. And gamers may find it humorous as well! If you have any gaming terms (from any type of video game or table top gaming) you would like me to address in the future, or if you think I should add something to already defined terms, please post in the comments--I may ask you to define a term though, if it isn't one I've come across before. Happy hunting!

The previous terms in A Gamer's Lexicon series can be found here:

Entry 1: RNG, RNG Gods, mob, loot, wipe
Entry 2: Newb/Newbie, Noob, Aggro, Train, KoS
Entry 3: EQ, Evercrack, Lesson of the Devoted, DOOM, Rat Killer, Everquest Expansion Abbreviations through RoF

It's been a while since I've had a new post for A Gamer's Lexicon! To put it in perspective, Everquest has released two more expansions (up to 21 now). I think it's high time I added more terms.

camp - NOUN: A specific area a group sets up to kill surrounding mobs. When people call for a Camp Check (sometimes simply abbreviated CC) in a certain area, they are asking where groups already there are killing mobs, so they know not to encroach on their territory. VERB: To target a specific mob or mobs to kill. "I'm camping this mob until I can get the loot I need from it."

spawn or pop - After a mob is killed, you have to wait for the next spawn or pop, in other words for it to show up again. There is usually a timer, different for each area, that determines how long it takes for mobs to re-spawn or re-pop. The average time in Everquest for more recent expansions is 15-20 minutes. That can be a long time to wait if you're only killing one mob and waiting for it to re-spawn!

Named - A special and rare kind of mob that takes time to spawn. Named mobs usually drop better loot, including armor. Most Named have capital letters at the beginning of each word in its name, hence the term Named. However, there are some Named with all lowercase letters because the developers like to be sneaky.

PH - PH is an abbreviation for placeholder. This refers to the specific kind of mob that has a chance to re-spawn as a Named. It's a normal mob, but not all normal mobs that are killed can re-spawn as a named. Usually PHes are in specific locations or have a particular name, to allow players to figure out what mobs to target if they want to spawn a Named.

grinding - One of the main goals of a game is to level. If you sit in one spot for hours on end, only killing mobs to gain experience in hopes to level, this is called grinding. "I hate grinding - I'd rather be questing!" True statement. ;)

Can you figure out this paragraph that uses all the terms above?: Last weekend I camped a Named mob. But it kept spawning as the PH! There are 20 minutes between pops, and I had to have killed at least a dozen PHs. How monotonous and mind-numbing! But that's the life of a gamer. I guess I could have been grinding instead.

Did you get all that? It's like learning a new language. Well, I hope you at least found the post fun. Now I'm looking forward to some Named hunting this weekend, and I hope we don't get PH after PH!

NEXT UP: What Am I Writing?