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Official Valorant cover image.

Valorant Terminology Explained: Thrifty, Half-Buy, and More Terms Defined

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Valorant has an abundance of eagerly excited players that jump into the experience each day and with the game’s popularity, there will always be terms that are utilized in the game by others to explain something in a quick and efficient manner or even for just general conversation. If you are hearing terms that you don’t really know what they mean then this article is for you. Through this guide article a table of terms will be listed with their relevant definitions noted, you will know more about Valorant terms in no time!

Valorant Terminology You Need to Know About

There are a lot of terms to be overheard, from Thrifty to Half-Buy it is likely you have no idea what these may mean upon first finding out about them. The table below will list some of the terms you will be wanting to know about while playing through the game.

Term Definition (What it means)
Thrifty This term is when a team wins a round against the enemy team with having loadouts consisting of around 2500 credits/cash less than the other team and spent less than the other team during that round.
Half-Buy If you are told to ‘Half-buy’, it means that your team wants you to buy as much great gear/equipment as you can in a round (or just general equipment) while still having enough to full-buy the following round.
One Tap If someone on your team calls out that an enemy player is ‘One Tap’, or ‘One Shot’, it means that an enemy only requires one more shot to eliminate them.
Flick Performing a ‘Flick’ is when you get a headshot kill quickly on an enemy after bringing your weapon’s sights/aim up to the other player in a quick fashion.
Roomba Your team hasn’t suddenly spotted a vacuum cleaner on the map when they call out this term. A ‘Roomba’ is a community term for the ‘Boombot’ by Raze. 
Dink This is simply a headshot that doesn’t kill the enemy so your teammates may say something like: “Oh that was a dink”.
ADS This is a much more common term in the gaming community, it stands for ‘Aim Down Sights’, or ‘Aiming Down Sights’. If you are aiming with a weapon, you could be said to be taking advantage of ADS.
Counter-strafe Counterstrafing is when you are moving in one direction but firing towards the other direction away from your movement destination.

As can be observed, there are a bunch of terms that have to be found out about and this is just a selection of some of the most popular terms. Nonetheless, they will give you a start with getting used to the terms and how to correctly say them yourself. Get ready to dive back into those servers with the learned knowledge of new terms!

Valorant is available at this very moment on PC.


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Author
Image of Gordon Bicker
Gordon Bicker
Gordon is a contributing writer for Attack of the Fanboy, a Games Design (BA) Honours student, and a Video Game Ambassador. He has been writing at AOTF for over a year and a half, with four years of games writing experience for outlets like Green Man Gaming. When he's not busy, he'll no doubt be experiencing games, writing poetry, playing guitar, adventuring, or happily starting a new Skyrim playthrough! As an avid Final Fantasy XIV player, he also hopes that you'll gain a warm feeling from his community stories. Gordon has reported on Fallout 4 and Destiny 2, whose favorite genres include action RPGs, MMORPG's and First Person Shooters but is always experimenting with many other types of games.