Doom community jargon

As with any other long-running community, the Doom community has a long list of technical jargon, memes, slang terms, idioms, and catchphrases. Without knowledge of most terms, a lot of Doom community discussion may be indecipherable for new members or new mappers. An example sentence would be as follows:

"The borders in your map have waggle problems, but you can only see them if you're bottlenecking the stairs. Maybe replace them with slopes or widen that area out? Also, remove the number of hitscanners in those hallways because it's almost impossible on UV MAX unless I spam plasma from the map before. This would be impossible on pistol start."

This list is by no means exhaustive, but should help a newbie in understanding the gist of old and new Doom community discussion.

A

 * ACS - A byte code script from Hexen. Usually short for Extended ACS, an extension of the ACS Format supported by ZDoom and Eternity Engine.


 * Agitating skeleton - A nickname for the revenant. Popularized by 4chan /vr/ group.


 * Alignment - Specifically texture alignment.


 * Attacking the ZDoom - The act of designing a mod to push the limits of ZDoom, or to exploit a bug in a ZDoom feature to obtain a desired effect. A catchphrase from ZDoom Forums. Searching for it online brings up only joke posts and tweets about the original term, suggesting that the phrase was posted on a forum post that has since been deleted.

B

 * Ball shit snakes - Ancient Doomworld forums meme from a disgruntled member with a questionable grasp of English.


 * BFG whore - Competitive Doom trash-talk for a player who consistently abuses the BFG, especially in areas where avoiding the tracer cone is impossible.


 * Boom compatible - A map designed in the Boom map format. Boom compatible maps usually run in every popular source port, with a few exceptions.


 * Borders - Small sector of floor that outlines the main floor with a wall, analogous to moulding in a house. Borders were a bit of a mapper fad in the mid-2000s.


 * Bottlenecking - The act of leading monsters into a small area or opening to make them easier to take out. Some in the scene have viewed this tactic as "cheap" and have designed their maps to discourage bottlenecking or eliminate it entirely.


 * Bump - To obtain an item by exploiting the collision code. The most famous bump is the "Plasma bump" in MAP01 Deathmatch, where the Plasma Gun can be picked up by running into the raised platform.

C

 * Caco - A cacodemon.


 * Cardboard - An optimized software renderer by Stephen McGranahan (SoM).


 * Copypasta - A term for the action of a mapper directly copy/pasting sections of a map solely for the sake of breaking up perceived monotony.


 * Cybie - A cyberdemon.

D

 * DECORATE - Script format defining actors and weapons in ZDoom. Comes in two flavours, with the original format largely unsupported. Intended as a temporary stopgap in the never-ending wait for DoomScript, it became an instant hit with Doom modders and is arguably the primary reason for ZDoom's current dominance.


 * DeePsea patches - Tall patches.


 * DeHackEd - A patch format (DEH) for modifying various code pointers in Doom. Most source ports have DEH support.


 * DEHSUPP - A lump for ZDoom that extends DeHackEd capabilities. It has since been deprecated in favour of DECORATE, but still used and extended in ZDaemon. DEHSUPP was the subject of controversy among some who protested its removal with no suitable replacement ready to fill the gap.


 * Delted - Slang for "deleted". Comes from a joke page touting a site-wide hacking of Doomworld.

E

 * EDF - A DECORATE-style modding format for Eternity Engine. Unlike DECORATE, EDF aims to make the entire port moddable.

F

 * Flat detailing - The use of additional sectors on floors to give a sense of an uneven or damaged floor. Used primarily on hexagon tiles, and was a fad in the mid-2000s.


 * Frad - A deliberate misspelling of "fraud".

G

 * git - The "Development" version of a source port. The term is from, a content control system for software. Usually used in sentences like "Use the latest git revision".


 * Gothic - A mapping style inspired by the GothicDM series.


 * Gothic99 - A Deathmatch mapset known for its ridiculously detailed first level, and one of the first instances of overdetailing. For a few years, most mappers did not want to be associated with "Gothic99" levels of detail, and would state this explicitly. If a map is described as "Gothic99-ish", it is usually not a compliment.

H

 * Heh - Heh.


 * Helled - A thread on Doomworld forums was sent to Post Hell with extreme prejudice.


 * Hitscan - Attacks in Doom that are not projectiles - they immediately register a hit on a wall or a thing. A "hitscanner" is a monster that uses hitscan attacks.


 * HMP - Hurt me plenty skill level.


 * HNTR - Hey, not too rough skill level.

I

 * ITYTD - I'm too young to die skill level.

L

 * Limit removing - Describes a map that runs in source ports that extend static limits.


 * Looks like Christmas - Originally the description of the BFG 2704's plasma fire, it is now used to describe texture choices that complement each other to the point of clashing and being overbearing (e.g. green wall with red floor).


 * Longtics - A modified demo format that retains precision lost during normal (shorttic) demos.

M

 * MAX - A "maximum" Doom speed run demo. Usually 100% items, kills, and secrets.


 * MUS - Doom music format.

N

 * Needs more detail - A running gag in the Doom modding community, usually in response to a map that has more detail than needed to convey a sense of place.


 * Nickbakery - Nonsense. Used to mean "Overreaction to drama" but use in this sense has been lost. Term references Nick Baker (NiGHTMARE).


 * NM - Nightmare! skill level.

O

 * OPL - The music format available for Adlib/Soundblaster cards for DOOM.EXE. Used FM Synthesis.

P

 * Pacifist - A style of play where the player must use no weapons unless required to get to the exit, relying on infighting to kill monsters.


 * Pinky - A demon.


 * Pistol Start - Playing each level in a mapset with no weapons or powerups acquired from the previous level. Useful for testing custom maps.


 * Plus - A patch for original Doom executables that extend limits, which have traditionally limited mappers' designs.

R

 * Rip and tear - A meme that pays homage to the Doom comic, which contains other gems such as "Sweet Christmas", "Huge Guts", and "Man-and-a-half".

S

 * Shorttics - A demo in the original format, complete with decreased precision while turning.


 * Slaughtermap - A map focused around challenging gameplay in the form of overwhelming hordes of monsters, most notably mid-tier monsters. Most slaughtermaps are made for Doom 2 due to the larger monster roster.


 * Slopes - Mapping features that allow mappers to create ramps, inclines, and angled architecture. Popularized by ZDoom.


 * Software - A rendering mode for a source port that supports a column-based rendering engine. "Software renderers" closely match the original renderer in Doom, and usually require no hardware acceleration. Some PWAD text files may stress to the player to play the maps "in software".


 * Source port - A custom version of Doom that runs on various platforms. May include extra features for modding or playing. The first notable one is Boom.


 * Spam - A compressed volley of plasma rifle shots, rockets, or BFG balls. Usually seen in Deathmatch, it can be used to "blind" the opposing player in dark areas.


 * SR-50 - SR-50 automation.


 * STARTAN - The texture name of the iconic walls in E1M1 of Doom. Since it is a default texture for sidedefs in many map editors, liberal use of STARTAN may be seen as lazy.


 * SVN - The "Development" version of a source port. short for, a content control system for software. Usually used in sentences like "Use the latest SVN".


 * Swingshot - The belief that turning quickly while firing the Super shotgun deals greater damage. Used by competitive doomers, this technique's effectiveness was debunked with the release of the Doom source code.

T

 * Telefrag - The act of fragging an opponent or monster by teleporting to his location.


 * THREE-DEE FUCKING FLOORS - A mockery of maps that used GZDoom's 3D floors to obnoxious ends. This would cause some players' computers to chug along at unplayable frame rates. The situation was compounded by the fact that ZDoom could not render 3D floors during this time, resulting in only a handful of players who had the hardware capable of rendering such maps being able to play them.


 * Torm - Adding detail to a map to the point of excess. Phrase comes from Tormentor667, who had a reputation for obsessive detailing to the point of performance loss in game.


 * Transfers - Sky transfer sectors. Source ports that implement these allow the mappers to showcase multiple skies in different parts of the level.


 * Tyson - To complete a map, usually for a speedrun demo, with the bare essentials needed to trigger lines and get to the exit. Usually this means pistol and fist only, but in certain situations the chainsaw is also acceptable.

U

 * UV - Ultra-Violence skill level.

V

 * Vanilla - Vanilla Doom. When describing a map, this means the map should run on the original Doom without problems.

W

 * Waggle - The term given to the rendering errors caused by imprecise trig tables of the Doom renderer. This causes some ledges and ceiling edges to "waggle" about when walking alongside them.


 * Wait for DoomScript - Usually told to a ZDoom forums user who requests a feature that would be difficult to implement using the available tools. DoomScript is a vaporware Turing-complete scripting language for ZDoom that would replace ACS.


 * Wallrunning - The phenomenon of going faster by pushing against an orthogonal wall while moving. Can also be achieved using things.

Y

 * You are the demons - A meme referencing a fanfic by Peter Chimaera, in which the protagonist slowly turns into a zombie. Notable for its many quotable lines and misspellings that some doomers deliberately misspell terms in homage to it.

Z

 * ZDoomism - A term for common mapping errors that may appear when a mapper only tests maps in ZDoom, without testing in other source ports. Can also be used as a term for the quirks ZDoom exhibits that other ports do not.