====== Commonly Used Shorthands ======

~~NOTOC~~

===== A =====
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AN</WRAP>
**Armor Negating** -  __Armor Negating__ is a damage modifier that ignores 100% of enemy [[protection]] when dealing damage. For example, a spell that deals 20 AN damage that hits a target with 20 protection will ignore 20 of that protection, dealing on average 20 damage. 

AN damage is often capable of being resisted in other ways, such as requiring a [[Magic Resistance]] check. Shock damage is notable in that it is always AN, and is resisted by Shock Resist (SR). Spells or effects that deal AN damage without any resist are both rare and powerful.</WRAP>

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AOE</WRAP>
**Area of Effect** of an attack or spell. The number after aoe refers to how many squares are targeted. For example, aoe 2 spell would target two adjacent squares on the battlefield.</WRAP></WRAP>

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AP</WRAP>
**Armor Piercing** -  __Armor Piercing__ is a damage modifier that ignores 50% of enemy protection when dealing damage. For example, a spell that deals 20 AP damage hits a target with 20 protection. That spell will ignore 10 of that protection, dealing on average 10 damage. 

This effect can stack with other forms of armor penetration, notably __Piercing Damage__. __Piercing Damage__ ignores 20% of protection, and a damage source that is both Piercing and AP will ignore 60% of enemy protection. This is achieved by first reducing the protection by 50%, then the remaining prot by another 20%. Or for the mathematically inclined Effective protection = Nominal protection * (1 - 0.5) * (1 - 0.2).

Fire damage is the most common form of AP magical damage, and crossbows are the most common form of AP damage available to generic units. </WRAP>
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Arco</WRAP>

**Arcoscephale** -  A common nickname or shorthand used when discussing the nation [[Arcoscephale]]. </WRAP>

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Army of Foo</WRAP>

This refers to either **??Army of Lead??** or **??Army of Gold??**. These are Alteration 9 Earth spells (Earth 5 and 3 earth gems to cast in battle) that are some of the best late game buffs available. They share a shorthand because both are battlefield wide buffs that provide ??Ironskin?? to the caster's entire army, the primary reason for casting one of these spells. They differ in that __Army of Lead__ also gives +4 Magic Resist, while __Army of Gold__ will give all friendly units +5 Fire Resist. </WRAP></WRAP></WRAP>

===== B =====
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BF</WRAP>
**Battlefield** - Often used when describing spells which target all units on the battlefield (aoe bf, bf wide, bf clear and so on).</WRAP></WRAP>

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Boosters</WRAP>
**Items** which increase the paths of mages who carry them, e.g. the ??Water Bracelet?? that increases a mage's Water path by one, as long as it has at least one already.</WRAP></WRAP>


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Buffing</WRAP>
**Buffing** Casting spells that improve the combat capabilities of units and mages, either through increased defence like ??Wooden Warriors??, offence like ??Strength of Giants?? or utility like ??Flight??</WRAP></WRAP>
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Brand</WRAP>
**Fire/Frost/Shadow Brand** - One-handed weapons valued for being cost effective gear capable of killing large numbers of chaff quickly by applying AOE damage on attack. 

**??Frost Brand??s** provide +5 Cold Resist, and deal 12 AOE cold damage to the entire square every swing.  Forging requires 5 Water gems, making for an extremely efficient top tier thug weapon. Does not clear undead swarms. </WRAP>
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Brand cont.</WRAP>
**??Fire Brand??s** provide +5 Fire Resist, are __Armor Piercing__, and deal 14 __Armor Piercing__ AOE fire damage to the entire square every swing.  Forging requires 5 Earth and 5 Fire gems, making for a reasonably efficient top tier thug weapon, notable in that the fire damage AOE will clear undead chaff such as skeletons that are immune to the effects of the other two brands.
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Brand cont.</WRAP>
**??Shadow Brand??s** are __Armor Piercing__, and deal 5 __Armor Negating__ but __MR Resisted__ AOE damage to five squares every swing. If this AOE damage is applied, there is a chance for the unit so damaged to have their strength reduced. This large AOE is not limited to enemy troops, and can hit the wielder of the Shadow Brand. The AOE does not affect lifeless troops such as longdead skeletons. Forging requires 10 Death Gems and 5 Earth Gems, making it an inefficient thug weapon. 
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===== C =====
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Cap</WRAP>
**Capital** of a nation. </WRAP>
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Cap Only</WRAP>

Units/Mages that can only be recruited from the capital. </WRAP></WRAP>

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Chaff</WRAP>
Weak units which are easy to mass and usually easy to kill. Examples of chaff are units like militia and wolves.</WRAP></WRAP>

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CR</WRAP>
**Cold Resistance** </WRAP></WRAP><WRAP>

===== D =====

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DE</WRAP>**[[Dominions Enhanced]]** - A large and prevalent mod that adds a large number of national spells, generic spells, nations, summons, items, and heroes. The most common mod outside of [[Worthy Heroes]] and [[Enhanced Pretenders]] (which DE includes). </WRAP></WRAP>

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Domkill</WRAP>
**Meaning 1:

To kill another player by extinguishing their dominion** 

This is the result of having more, stronger [[temple check]]s than your opponent, whether by simple temple count, or supplemented by the use of heretics, [[stealthy]] preachers, [[blood sacrifice]], and dominion conflict bonuses either as an innate national property, or due to possessing certain [[Thrones]] or the ??Gigantomachia?? global enchantment.

**Meaning 2: (also known as [[#Popkill]])

Factions whose dominion kills population**

Refers to nations whose dominion kills population, derived from the modding command #domkill. [[EA Therodos]], [[MA Ermor]], [[MA Asphodel]], [[LA Lemuria]], [[LA R'lyeh]] fit into this category.</WRAP></WRAP>

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DRN</WRAP>

**Dominions Random Number** - The DRN, or [[random-number-generator|Dominions Random Number]], is the core randomization mechanic of Dominions. It is 2d6 exploding. That means two normal six-sided dice are rolled and summed, and any time a die comes up as a 6, the six is kept and the die is rolled again. However, for each successive roll, 1 is subtracted. See [[random-number-generator]] for more information.

The randomizer in the DRN is not truly random, and distribution is not truly even, but the details of this are not clear.</WRAP></WRAP></WRAP>

===== E ===== 
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EA</WRAP>
**[[Early Age]]** - Comes before a nation name and is used to distinguish between nations that exist in multiple eras. for example, [[EA Ulm]], [[MA Ulm]], [[LA Ulm]].</WRAP></WRAP>

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Ele</WRAP>
**Elemental** - Often used when speaking about different types of elementals. For example, water ele or wele is water elemental.</WRAP></WRAP>

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Elf</WRAP>

Refers to units with the __Glamour__ ability. Units with Glamour do not show up on the strategic map and has a ??Mirror Image??-like effect in combat. Can also refer to nations with such units.</WRAP></WRAP></WRAP>

===== F =====
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FR</WRAP>
**Fire Resistance** </WRAP>

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F&SR</WRAP>
**Fire and Shock Resistance** - A common bless accessible by taking Earth 5 on your pretender </WRAP></WRAP>

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Fluffing</WRAP>
Buffing your Thug or Super-combatant with a mage set to retreat after casting all scripted buffs, such as ??Luck??, ??Mossbody??, ??Gift of Flight?? etc.
</WRAP></WRAP>

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FV</WRAP>
**??Foul Vapors??** - A particularly effective poison-based battlefield wide spell capable of single-handedly winning battles. Particularly associated with [[ctis-ma|MA C'tis]]. </WRAP></WRAP></WRAP>

===== G =====
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Gem gen</WRAP>
**gem generator** - item which generate gems. Two types of gem gens exist, those which generate temporary gems for battles, and those which generate permanent gems every month. Permanent gem gens are rarer than temporary ones and are usually only available as unique items at __Construction 8__.

This term may also refer to the various global enchantments which grant their controller some number of gems every turn.
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GfH</WRAP>

**??Gifts from Heaven??** - A particularly effective Earth/Astral evocation that drops boulders from the heavens onto the battlefield. The accuracy is abysmal, but the spell has massive damage output. 
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GoH</WRAP>

**??Gift of Health??** - A nature global that provides bonus HP and healing to friendly troops while inside your dominion. The total HP gained for combat and the chance to heal an affliction are based on the total number of friendly candles in the province where the unit resides. 

This is one of the few ways to heal non-living units such as Tartarians. </WRAP></WRAP></WRAP>

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===== I =====
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Indies</WRAP>
**Independents** - Any unit or mage that is not a national recruit, but is unaffiliated with players at large. This could refer to troops attacking due to an event, a mage tied to a province you want to recruit (such as a Crystal Sorceress), or provinces you are trying to expand into during the early game that are not owned by anyone yet. 

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===== L =====
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LA</WRAP>

**Late Age** - Comes before a nation name and is used to distinguish between nations that exist in multiple eras. for example, EA Ulm, MA Ulm, LA Ulm. 

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LoS</WRAP>

**Legions of Steel** -  A common acronym of the battlefield buff spell __Legions of Steel__. This spell requires Earth 3 to cast, and with an AOE of 25 will buff a large number of troops with +3 protection on each piece of their armor for the remainder of the battle. __Legions of Steel__ is an early research target for earth nations, and is found at __Construction 3__. </WRAP></WRAP></WRAP></WRAP>

===== M =====
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MA</WRAP>
**Middle Age** - Comes before a nation name and is used to distinguish between nations that exist in multiple eras. for example, EA Ulm, MA Ulm, LA Ulm. 
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Mari</WRAP>

**Marignon** -  A common nickname or shorthand used when discussing the nation Marignon. 
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Monkeys</WRAP>

Refers to nations whose base units are simian in nature. Kailasa, Bandar Log, Patala. Technically Lanka is also in this category, however the playstyle is sufficiently distinct from the other monkey nations that they are rarely included. 
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MR</WRAP>

**Magic Resist** 

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MW</WRAP>

**Magic Weapons** - A [[bless]] that makes sacred units deal magic damage.
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===== N =====
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NAP</WRAP>
**Non-Aggression Pact** - A temporary peace treaty between two nations. It is highly recommended that players be very careful when forming NAPs to ensure that no miscommunication has occurred. It is important to spell out all the terms and conditions of your agreement, and be aware that not all games have binding diplomacy.

There are two common forms of NAPs: 
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The first is a NAP that exists indefinitely until one player informs the other that they would like to break the NAP, at which point the NAP will continue to exist for a period of time specified at the creation of the NAP before breaking. The most common amount of time is three turns, and would be written as NAP 3. 

//For example, Ulm and Abysia agree to a NAP 3 on turn 10. On turn 20, Abysia informs Ulm that they are ending the NAP. Usually this counts as the first turn, so Ulm has turns 20, 21, and 22 to prepare for Abysia’s invasion. Abysia’s invasion can begin on turn 23 without violating the NAP.// 
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The second is a NAP that lasts for a specific period of time and then automatically expires. A NAP for 15 turns would still be written as NAP 15, however usually the length of time specified makes it clear which NAP variant is being proposed. 

//For example, Ulm and Abysia agree to a NAP 15 beginning on turn 10. On turn 25 the NAP automatically expires, and the nations can either negotiate to extend the NAP or let it expire.// 
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===== P =====
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PD</WRAP>
**Province Defence** is the static defence that can be put onto a province through the "d" hotkey and will fight any invaders. For more information see [[Province Defence]]
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Point Buffing</WRAP>

Casting aoe 1 buffing spells on a low numbers of stronger units to make them much harder to deal with. A common example would be ??Body Ethereal?? and ??Ironskin?? on a couple of elephants. It is important to take into consideration the battlefield position of both the mages casting and the troops that you want to receive the buffs, ensuring that they are in range and targeted appropriately.</WRAP></WRAP>
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Popkill</WRAP>

**Factions whose dominion kills population**

Refers to nations whose dominion kills population. EA Therodos, MA Ermor, MA Asphodel, LA Lemuria, LA R'lyeh fit into this category.
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PR</WRAP>

**Poison Resistance** </WRAP></WRAP></WRAP>

===== Rec-Anywhere =====
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Rec-Anywhere</WRAP>
**Recruit Anywhere** - Either when a unit can literally be recruited anywhere (like Marignon's Flagellants) or when a sacred unit or mage is not limited to the capital and can be recruited out of any fort.  
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Rigor</WRAP>

Short for the spell **Rigor Mortis**, enchantment 6, generally troublesome to deal with. 
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Romans</WRAP>

Refers to nations that draw inspiration from Roman history. Ermor, Pythium, Sceleria, Lemuria. 
</WRAP></WRAP></WRAP>

===== S =====
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SC</WRAP>
** Super Combatant ** - A supercombatant, or SC, is a heavily equipped unit that is powerful to start with and can cast some or all of the most powerful self-buffs in the game, such as __??Soul Vortex??__ and __??Phoenix Pyre??__. These guys are traditionally capable of taking on armies. 

An SC is built on a limited and exclusive collection of Commander chassis. SCs are often given 50+ gems worth of equipment and should be able to take out entire armies with that equipment. An SC Chassis often, if not always, has more than 60 HP and 3 or more inherent forms of damage mitigation from abilities or magic paths. SCs are commonly used alongside armies because many anti-SC strategies will fail if the opponent is unable to isolate the SC, and the tactics for killing an SC may be different from optimal tactics against an army.
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Shin</WRAP>

**Shinuyama** - A common nickname or shorthand used when discussing the nation Shinuyama. 

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SoG</WRAP>

**Strength of Giants** -  A common acronym of the battlefield buff spell __Strength of Giants__. This spell requires Earth 3 to cast, and with an AOE of 25 will buff a large number of troops with +4 strength for the remainder of the battle. __Strength of Giants__ is an early research target for earth nations, and is found at __Enchantment 3__. 
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SR</WRAP>

**Shock Resistance** 
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STR</WRAP>

**Slow to Recruit** - A mage or unit that takes multiple fort turns to recruit because it has a Command Point requirement of 4 or greater. </WRAP></WRAP></WRAP>

===== T =====
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Thugs</WRAP>
**Thugs** - Mages with good stats who are given gear to efficiently raid lightly defended enemy lands for economic disruption and gain. The term **Counter-thug** can also be applied to thugs specifically geared to counter other thugs or super combatants. An example of a thug is a ??Sidhe Lord?? with a __??Frost Brand??__ and a __??Vine Shield??__ who self buffs with __Bless__, __??Barkskin??__, and __??Mistform??__ before attacking. 

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Tstrike</WRAP>

**??Thunder Strike??** - A particularly effective shock-based Air evocation that has extremely high AN damage on target square and a low damage stun chance in surrounding squares. Extremely long range. 
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TNN</WRAP>

**Tir na n'Og** - A common nickname or shorthand used when discussing the nation Tir na n'Og
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===== U =====
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UW</WRAP>
**Underwater.** Provinces are divided basically between land and **UW** provinces, with varied terrains types that provide more diversification (forests, deep sea, etc). Unless a unit has a amphibian or aquatic trait it generally will not be able of moving to underwater provinces. Amphibian units can go to both types of provinces and aquatic units are restricted to UW provinces. This can be remedied with items

Note that you can teleport a commander to a province that is not able to support it. It will simply next turn when it arrives there.</WRAP></WRAP>
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===== X =====
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Xib</WRAP>

**Xibalba** - A common nickname or shorthand used when discussing the nation Xibalba. 
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X power</WRAP>

**Summon Earthpower / Summon Water Power / Summon Storm Power / Phoenix Power** - A collection of spells that buff an elemental spell path. The specific version is often unspecified and obvious from context.
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===== W =====
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WoS</WRAP>
**Weapons of Sharpness** - A high level Earth buff that grants a large number of troops the modifier Armor Piercing, dramatically increasing damage output. </WRAP></WRAP></WRAP>