Terminology

• Boomerang (Fleetlock) - Calculating the time a fleet should return from a mission, and launching an attack that coincides with that fleets return.

• Drop colony - Colonizing a planet near a target, with the intent of launching an attack immediately, giving the target a minimal amount of time to respond. This is best done by colonizing the slot next to the target, but any planet in the same system will reduce the attack time enormously, even compared to an attack from the next system over.

• Farmer - A player who spend the majority of their resources on building mines.

• Fleet / Resource Saving (FRS) - The act of sending your ships and resources on missions for set periods of time in order to protect them from attack while you are not actively playing the game.

• Moonshot - An attack, often from an ally with mostly harmless ships, with the stated intent of attempting to produce a moon. Alliance mates will often "trade moonshots", each attacking the other with equal-sized fleets, so that both get the same chance of forming a moon.

• Ninja Defend - A "Ninja Defense" is when someone sends an attack fleet thinking they have the superior force to take out their target, but when they arrive they find that their fleet is obliterated because the defender managed to get a support fleet in before theirs arrived. The timing is critical because the attacker can send a probe when they are just a few minutes out to confirm nothing has changed and if they see a massive fleet they will recall. Of course the defender's Ninja fleet arriving even a second after the attack fleet does the defender absolutely no good.

• Ninja FRS - The act of removing ones fleet and resources mere moments before an attacking force arrives, thus doing so in stealth leaving the attacker with no gains or glory.

• Oracle Lock - When someone who has an Oracle has your fleets locked in with an attack timed to land mere seconds after your fleets land at your planet. Or if it is a truly long deploy or attack they have oracled, they can lock it in with a harvester and join it later with the full fleet.

• Shark - A player who spends most of their resources on attack ships, and little or no resources on defenses, relying on FRS to protect their ships and resources.

• Slow probing - The act of delaying an attack by joining with another fleet just before it arrives, typically delaying an attack for up to a minute. Usually, this is done with a Hermes probe since it can catch up with an attack in the last few minutes. The purpose is to probe the target during the extra time, to see if a fleet has arrived to Ninja (see above) the incoming attack.

• Turtle - A player who spends the majority of their resources on defenses.