Slang: Alliance Special Operations
Rebel Alliance Special Ops Teams take a lot of trouble to ensure that their jargon is at least twice as obscure as anyone else's.
Some Special Ops Teams also like to engage in conversations with members of other branches of the Alliance in order to see just how long they can get away with talking at cross purposes. Special Ops especially enjoy confusing the stuffing out of Alliance Intel operatives, who have their own slang, although most Special Ops Teams have figure out all of their phrases. With a Special Operative around, conversations seem to get just plain weird: phrases like "5-G takeoff," "cuddly toy," "take a gander" and "she's cute" have completely different meanings.
The following list is already somewhat out of date, as Special Ops Team slang is constantly revised to ensure that no one else is ever in danger of understanding what Special Ops personnel are talking about.
# Chicken Alarm: A hazard assessment, follows an exponential sequence: 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, and 13 Chicken Alarms have been known. 13 is a Death Star sighting, 8 is a fleet arriving in-system, 5 is a solitary Star Destroyer, 3 is a ground army, 2 is a small fleet, l is any other sizable operation. This term is also used to rate the relative danger of a mission.
#G's: (7G's, 8G's) Number of hostile aliens.
23er: In Alliance Intelligence, an agent who has made 20 field assignments and been retired; in Special Ops, any very competent agent.
ABH: Average Bounty Hunter, or rather, above-average bounty hunter.
Acquisition Run: Any combat operation presenting opportunities for large-scale theft.
Battery: A lot of chickens huddled together, enough to make even a Special Op slightly nervous.
BBH: Boring Bounty Hunter, the common run of target practice.
Bear: Balinaka.
BH: Bounty hunter.
Birdwatcher: ISB Agent, from "Imperial Sunbathers and Birdwatchers" (Special Ops crew tend to have a low opinion of the ISB).
Black: Any large denomination (1,000 credits ) that is probably "blackmarked" and traceable.
Boring: Either "extremely dangerous" or "no threat at all" or possibly both at the same time. Only Special Ops know how this one works.
Boys in White: Stormtrooper.
Brass Mine: A Special Operative.
BUG: (Big Ugly Guy) Any hostile alien.
Bursting: Physical: Dealing with a large predator by waiting until it opens its mouth and then feeding it a live grenade or thermal detonator. Conceptual: Entering a known enemy trap with much more firepower than the trap can handle, or using an enemy's offensive action as an opportunity to do him harm.
Can't: Tank (deliberate misspelling).
Cat: Orryxian (Not that any Orryxian would appreciate this).
Catnot: (Contraction of "Categorically Not") Refers to Kashyyyk, the Wookiee homeworld.
CB: Cybernetic Bronchitis. Nickname for Darth Vader.
Chicken: Any Imperial operation or personnel.
Chorus Girl: Imperial AT-ST Walker.
Coop: A lot of chickens huddled together.
Cuddly: Incredibly Dangerous.
Cute: Extremely Dangerous.
Defenestrate: Throw person out of window.
Delimit: A Wookiee attacking in hand-to-hand combat. Any hand-to-hand combat attack by a very strong opponent. This word is believed to be a corruption of "de-limb it."
Difficult: Easy.
Dobbin: Imperial AT-AT walker.
Doesn't: A Wookiee.
Don't: Plural, several Wookiees.
Drink Vouchers: Money.
Duck: Any undercover Imperial operative that is trying not to look like an undercover Imperial operative.
Dumb Orphan: Orphan with valuable information.
Easy: Difficult.
Easy Easy: Easy.
Entertainment: Combat.
ETLA: Extended Three-Letter Acronym. A Four Letter Acronym. See TLA.
Fatigue Scanning: Looking for the weak spots in a system or organization.
Fear Gland: Self preservation instinct. Considered a bad quality in Special Ops.
Firework: Anything containing a reasonably large fusion reactor.
Fish: Fish.
Fish: Mon Calamari (or any other aquatic species).
Fish: Trouble (obviously, depends on context).
Frac: Fraction of a credit, particularly any non-Imperial currency unit.
Fracs'n'Blacks: Large quantity of money in all denominations.
Frag: Fragmentation grenade, as in "Frag 'em!" Gander: Grenade.
Gark: Any flying species.
GBH: Gross Bounty Hunter, i.e. Boba Fett, Zardra, Dengar, IG-88, etc.
Gnu: Gun, slugthrower.
Grease: Funding for bribes.
Grease the Servos: Funding for bribes.
Greenhorn: A new Rebel soldier who's way too eager for combat.
Greenie: Rodian.
Gray Man: Imperial Intelligence Agent.
Gronk: Any species capable of generating a par-ticularly loud cry/alarm call. As in "Gronk!"
Gruff: Any canine-appearing species.
GS (Groundshaker): Imperial AT-AT Walker.
GUB: Great Uncle Boba, refers to Boba Fett.
Hammerheads: Ithorians.
Headhunting: Physically locating an enemy's "head" or main nerve center with a view to destroying it.
Headshot: Any single operation that renders the rest of an enemy's operations useless.
Hijack: Con, bribe, trick, order or otherwise persuade a complete stranger to render assistance in some task.
Hitching a Ride: Using someone else's intelligence network or facilities, usually without their knowledge or permission.
HSS (High Speed Surgery): Disabling an armored vehicle or starship by cutting a hole in its hull and injecting a grenade or thermal detonator into the gap.
Hundred Club: Those individuals whose bounties exceed 100,000 credits and are still at large.
Interesting: Very Dangerous.
Invite: Explosive device.
Jack: Anyone, as in "Hi, Jack," said to a complete stranger.
KSA: Kinky Silver Armor. An Imperial Radtrooper.
Leech: A spook with `acquisitions' skills (security, etc.).
Less Boring: Dead. See Boring.
Lightly Tronned: A tron where the vehicle crew survives. See Tron.
Livestock: Assorted weapons, explosives and heavy artillery.
Mildly: (Adjective) Extremely.
Million Shot: A "very easy" mission. "It's a million to one chance, but it might just work."
Mindspook: A spook with Force skills.
NRU: Nice Red Uniform, an Imperial Royal Guardsman.
One Percenter: Mission carrying a 1% survival chance. A "standard" mission.
Orphan: Rebel soldier or pilot stranded in the field.
Penned Orphan: Orphan captured by Empire.
Planters: Ithorians.
Plastic Soldier: Stormtrooper.
Portable: Anything a Special Op finds necessary to remove. Even if the item in question weighs 60 tons and has been molecularly welded to the ground, if a Special Op needs it, it will be removed.
PSC (Plastic Soldier Carrier): Imperial AT-AT walker.
Raisin-head: A greenhorn who's seen too many war holos.
Red Carpet: Large quantity of explosive devices.
Salting the Ether:' Generating spurious plans for non-existent missions and broadcasting them in tight code in spare bandwidths to keep Imperial Intelligence's Analysis Bureau from getting bored.
Sandman: Imperial sandtrooper.
Scoping: Estimating resources needed for an operation. Or, maintaining surveillance on members of the opposite sex (Depends on context).
Scrip: Corporate or Planetary currency.
Season Ticket: Several explosive devices.
Severely Tronned: Where practically nothing survives. See Tron.
SideThink: Peculiar Special Ops mindset, blending opportunism, careful planning and lethal efficiency with a healthy dose of mindless recklessness and pure cockiness.
Slimebottom: Hutt.
Slug: Hutt.
Smart Orphan: Orphan without any particularly valuable information.
Snowman: Imperial snowtrooper.
Spook: A Special Operative, particularly a solo one.
Squawker: Any flying species.
Squid: Quarren.
Squid Head: Quarren.
SS (Skywalker Surprise): Mission carrying a 0.1 % survival chance. An "interesting challenge."
Star Destroyer: 174,000 design flaws waiting to be exploited.
Sweet: Cute and cuddly.
TAD: A thermal detonator. As in, "Add a TAD to fix that Imperial squad."
Takeoff: Eliminating prime weapons, while leaving the heart of an objective intact. For example, destroying defensive ion cannon while leaving a power plant intact, or downing the bodyguards of a powerful but unarmed crime lord.
TAM: Threatening Armored Man. An Imperial Storm Commando.
Ten Percenter: Mission carrying a 10% survival chance. An "easy" mission.
TEPM: (Thermal Exhaust Port Mission) Mission carrying a 0.1% survival chance; an "interesting challenge."
Thinking Sideways: A compliment.
Thousand Shot: Mission carrying a 0.1% survival chance. An "interesting challenge."
Tinfish: Imperial seatrooper.
Tinfish Bucket: Imperial AT-AT Swimmer.
TLA: Three-Letter Acronym.
Toy: Melee or heavy weapon.
Trawling: Out looking for "fish" (see "fish").
Tron: Cause opposing vehicle to suffer a "spectacularly debilitating irreversible maneuvering capability deficit," or crash. "That's tronned it."
UCT: (Universal Cutting Tool) A Lightsaber.
Vapor Op: A hopeless plan, of the type produced by greenhorns, laser-brains and raisin-heads.
Very Dumb Orphan: Orphan who "knows too much" and must either be rescued, silenced or discredited in some way.
Wake-up call: Grenade.
Won't: A town or a Wookiee village, believed to derive from a deliberate misspelling of "town."
Wotshisname: Practically anything or anyone, mainly depending on context. As in "Tell wots-hisname to get up here with that grenade!"
Wolf: Shistavanen Wolfman.
Yellow Stuff: Stabilized ytterbium.
Source[edit]
This first appeared in Galaxy Guide 9: Fragments from the Rim by Simon Smith and Eric Trautmann, published in 1993 by West End Games.
