Terminology

Thank you to the users involved with the Terminology thread on the forums for organizing many of the definitions found here.

Contents: # A B C D E F G H I K L M N O P R S T U V W Z

#
 1st stage hatchling 
 * A hatchling that has just hatched.

 2nd stage hatchling 
 * A hatchling that has matured (usually marked by growing wings) and now has a gender.

A
Abandoned page/AP
 * Sometimes: Abandoned pile – See also: Abandoned Page
 * Where abandoned eggs and hatchlings go. Found here.


 * AP Block
 * Occurred when there were too many creatures in the abandoned pile. Users would be blocked from collecting eggs from the cave until the abandoned pile was reduced. This behavior has been retired.

Adopting
 * The act of receiving of a dragon.

Alt
 * Abbreviation for, referring to secondary sprites for certain dragon breeds. Alt Blacks and Alt Dark Greens are dragons that can be obtained only by breeding for example.

 Alt lottery 
 * Catching or keeping an egg and raising it until it hatches to see if it is an alternate sprite, with no intention of keeping the hatchling if it is the normal variety.

 Artists 
 * Also known as spriters, artists are users who have created the dragon sprites and other visual assets for Dragon Cave, often working in collaboration with others. Artist credits can be found at the bottom of a dragon's "view" page.


 * Note: Always check an artist's permissions before manipulating any Dragon Cave sprites.

ARK list
 * Abbreviation for Acts of Random Kindness. An honorary listing of site members who have shown kindness towards other members enough to be recognized for it. ARK list members can be identified by a gold badge in their signature.

Army
 * A huge number of a specific breed that someone has amassed on their scroll. Their scrolls often contain small numbers of other breeds, and dozens of the breed of choice.


 * It can also refer to when the abandoned page or cave entrance are full of the exact same egg.

Arrowhead lineage
 * Arrowhead is a lineage that combines 2 opposing stairstep/staircase lineages to form an "arrow" shape.

 Auto-abandon 
 * Automatic abandonment of bred eggs. This can occur if a user is scroll locked and breeds additional eggs, or in the case of multi-clutches.

B
Bloodswap
 * When a user is looking to trade for a dragon of an identical lineage pattern, but unrelated dragons. Used to continue lineages without inbreeding.

Bouncing
 * Transferring an egg from one user to another, then back to the original user, usually to remove the effect of a BSA.
 * Previously, picking up a low-time egg from the AP and then re-abandoning it, causing the egg to gain an extra day before death.

 Bred 
 * Antonym: caveborn
 * Describes an egg, hatchling, or dragon that was produced by breeding, rather than generated by the cave. User preference varies when it comes to choosing between a caveborn or bred egg/hatchling.

Bred only
 * See also: hybrid.
 * A dragon breed, or variant of a breed that can only be produced by breeding. Bred only variants are not available in the cave. Examples include the alternate form of Undine Dragons, Black Dragons, and Dark Green Dragons.


 * If an entire breed of dragon can only be produced by breeding, and is not found in the cave, it's considered a hybrid.

Breed
 * Action of breeding two dragons to make a new egg.
 * A specific type or species of dragon.

Breedable
 * Antonym: Unbreedable
 * Any dragon that can produce eggs when bred with another dragon is considered breedable. Some dragons can only breed within their morphological types (such as ).

Breed Specific Action (BSA)
 * See also Breed Specific Actions
 * Specific abilities granted to different breeds of dragons, often used to affect the growth or behavior of other dragons.

Burned (scroll)
 * When a user has violated the Terms and Conditions to an extent that their account is removed. All dragons on their scroll disappear, and visiting the user's scroll returns the message, "You pick up the scroll labeled "< NAME >" only to find that it is charred and impossible to read."

C
Catch
 * Refers to a user gathering specific eggs, sometimes on behalf of another user. Breeders will occasionally enlist catchers to pick up auto-abandoned offspring of a multi-clutch. During high-demand releases, users may offer to catch for others that are having a hard time collecting the new eggs themselves.


 * Note: Catching should never require another user to log into your scroll. Never give your password to other users.

 Camping 
 * When a user sits spends extended time on the Abandoned Page, waiting for something they want to pop up.

 Caveborn (CB) 
 * See also : bred
 * Describes an egg, hatchling, or dragon that has been generated by the site and stolen from one of the . These dragons display no parents in their lineage view. User preference varies when it comes to choosing between a caveborn or bred egg/hatchling.

Censorkip
 * Used by forum filters to replace inappropriate language. Depicts a tiny Mudkip sprite.

Checkerboard lineage
 * A type of even generation lineage pairing two different breeds, with the male of each pair always representing one breed, and the female of each pair always representing the other. This creates a checkerboard appearance of alternating breeds in the lineage view. Example: a 4-generation Monarch x Grave checker

Clean lineage
 * A "clean" lineage usually means a lineage without inbreeding. It may more specifically refer to lineages that are short, even-gen, or that have a clear pattern.

Click
 * When a user clicks on an egg or hatchling, visiting its "view" page and increasing that creature's "click" stat.

Click happy
 * Describes a person who cannot seem to control their clicking finger, and is relatively successful at getting what they click. The usage is similar to that in "report happy," where someone reports every minor infraction they see; a click happy person clicks every egg, rare egg, hatchling, etc. that they see out of reflex, whether they truly want said dragon or not.

Clutch
 * See also: multi-clutch.
 * The number of eggs produced by breeding, or eggs acquired in one instance.

Code
 * The 4 or 5 character alphanumeric identifier unique to each dragon. Some users will collect and trade for dragons specifically for an interesting code.


 * Word code
 * An unusual case where an egg's randomly generated code spells a real word.


 * Number code
 * An unusual case where an egg's randomly generated code contains only numbers.

Completed list
 * A list of all completed dragon requests, pending potential release to the cave. This list is currently private.

Cooldown
 * of eggs: the 5 hour period after stealing an egg from the cave, during which the egg cannot be abandoned or traded.
 * of actions: the time until an action can be performed again. For example, a dragon that performs incubate will not be able to incubate again for 7 days.

D
Datamonster
 * Refers to a data loss on July 20th, 2009, during which certain dragons disappeared from users' scrolls. TJ rescued/revived most of the lost dragons. The event was personified as the Datamonster, "an evil dragon that devoured users' dragons."


 * Datamonster Survivors (DMS)
 * Dragons which were restored after being "eaten" by the Datamonster.
 * Datamonster Survivors Lineage Project (DMSLP)
 * A breeding project that involves listing all the survivors of the Datamonster, breeding purebred generations from those survivors and documenting the lineage.

DC
 * Abbreviation for Dragon Cave - the site.

 Dragon Cave Internet Relay Chat (DC IRC) 
 * The DC Chat was a place where everyone could hang out and chat with other users, moderators and TJ. The IRC has been retired and replaced with a Discord server.

Description
 * See also: Description
 * A custom, user-written text that appears under the regular description for a dragon. Descriptions may be written all adult dragons and frozen hatchlings, via the Actions page. Before being published, descriptions are reviewed by members of the site and moderators before it is allowed to appear on the dragon's page.

Doctored lineage
 * Sometimes: Dead lineage, dead line
 * A lineage that technically fits the requirements of an even-gen or purebred lineage, but only because the dragon or dragons in it that did not fit the lineage requirement were killed after breeding, leaving only a tombstone. In the past, users would create these kinds of lineages to make it look like their dragon was a low generation offspring, but this has not been possible since a generation counter has been added to the lineage view.

Dorkface
 * Offspring of the Gold Dragon Midas Dorkface. Considered desirable by some players. See forums for more information.

 Drop 
 * When new eggs appear on the front page.
 * 5 minute drops: Drops that occurs every 5 minutes (XX:05, XX:10, XX:15, etc).
 * Hour drop: Drops that occurs on the hour, and usually contains more eggs than the 5 minute drops.

Dummy
 * for trading: A random egg or hatchling offered on a two-way trade. The offer itself usually has no value to either participant, but can be used to confirm what user is receiving a gift.

E
Egg rush
 * See hour drop.

Egg killer
 * See view bomber.

Egg lag
 * Cache lag that can cause an egg to appear a few times after refresh, even after the egg has been picked up.

Egg lock
 * See also: scroll lock
 * When a user has collected the maximum number of eggs their scroll can hold and cannot pick up any more, though they may still have space for hatchlings.

Egg sequence
 * See also: Egg sequence
 * The progression of an egg cracking as it nears hatching.

Egg sitter
 * A person or group of people who will look after another user's scroll while they are away. This includes helping any growing dragons to get views and making sure they don't die.

Emergency
 * An egg or hatchling with very little time left to mature before it dies. The exact point that makes an "emergency" differs between certain fan sites, but is usually reserved for growing creatures with less than two days remaining.

Emergency Room (ER)
 * A common name for a page inside fan sites where low-time eggs are listed to help them get a higher rate of views and increase the likelihood of their survival.

Earthquake (EQ)
 * See: Earthquake

Even gen lineage (EG)
 * Stands for "even generation" lineage. These lines have no gaps or missing tiles. The only cave-born ancestors are in the initial generation.
 * Example: sixth-generation even gen.

F
Fan site
 * See also: Click Sites
 * A website created by Dragon Cave users that have tools to support others in playing the game. Many fan sites include hatcheries to help users raise their dragons, though some include additional tools like inbred checkers and lineage previews.

Festival of Eggs
 * See also: Festival of Eggs
 * An annual Easter event to hunt for non-hatching eggs that appears in random DC pages. Participants collect these colorful eggs in an Easter basket. When the event is over, those who participated received a small Easter basket badge on their scroll.

Forcing
 * The use of the Kill action or Earthquake BSA on an egg to attempt to force it to hatch early.

Fog
 * See also: Hiding
 * When an egg is fogged, it is hidden. It looks like it is covered in a cloud of fog. It will not receive any clicks or views.


 * The Fog (of 2008)
 * See also: Replacement Project
 * The few weeks where the whole cave was covered in a fog. Dragons could not breed, no eggs were found at the cave entrance and dragons were covered in a fog sprite. This is the period of time between the copyrighted ("old") sprites, and the user-made ("new") sprites. Sprites were replaced at this time.

Freezing
 * Using the freeze action to prevent a hatchling from maturing to an adult.

G
Gender
 * In a hatchling, to reach the second stage, causing the gender to be visible on the "view" page and players' scrolls.

Gender heavy
 * When a scroll has significantly more dragons of one gender than the other.

GD
 * General Discussion section of the forums.

The Giving Tree (TGT)
 * A popular thread for gifting eggs or hatchlings.

Glitch
 * A bug or unintended behavior in the site's code. Glitches should be reported to the Help section. Note that exploiting bugs for personal benefit is agains the Terms and Conditions.

GoN
 * Abbreviation for Guardian of Nature - A breed of dragon obtainable only through the Summon BSA.

H
Hatchery
 * A very common name for a page inside fan sites where non-emergency eggs and hatchlings can be viewed to help them grow.

Hatchling
 * Sometimes hatchy, hatchie
 * A young dragon, just emerge from its shell.

Haunting
 * See: camping.

Held eggs
 * Eggs that have been produced by a breeder, but not dropped yet. When producing a mutli-clutch, users have 1 hour to select one of the held eggs to keep.

Hide
 * See also: Hiding
 * The act of fogging an egg to prevent it from getting views.

Hoard
 * To collect many dragons of the same breeds.

Holiday Dragons
 * See also: 
 * Limited release dragons that only appear during certain holidays, such as Halloween, Christmas and Valentine's Day.
 * Specifically,, which are referred to as "Holiday Dragons" in the Dragon Encyclopedia.

 Hybrid 
 * A type of dragon that cannot be found in the cave, and can only be produced by breeding. Examples include Geode Dragons, Shallow Water Dragons, and Storm-Rider Dragons.

I
Intensive Care Unit (ICU)
 * A high-traffic hatchery to help mature a very low-time egg or hatchling.

Inbred/Inbreeding
 * When a dragon is bred with a family member, such as a sibling or its parents. Inbreeding is often accidental, but may be done purposefully in order to maintain a purebred lineage.

Incubator
 * Image with small pictures of all or some of a user's dragons.

Incuhatch
 * The act of waiting until an egg is under 5 days, then using a Red dragon to incubate it down below 4 days, making it able to hatch as soon as it has enough views.

 In queue 
 * The time between an egg or hatchling being abandoned, and it appearing on the Abandoned Page. The AP displays 30 eggs, sorted by time. Eggs younger than the 30 appearing on the page cannot be seen, and therefore cannot be picked up. These are considered in queue.

IRC
 * See: DC IRC
 * Abbreviation for Internet Relay Chat.

K
Kill limit
 * See also: Killing
 * The maximum number of times a user can perform the kill action on creatures on their scroll. The limit is currently 5 uses every two weeks.

L
Lagmonster
 * The personification of the lag experienced in the cave. First appeared on March 17th, 2009, causing users to suffer extreme excruciating pain waiting for the cave to load. Since it's appearance, many users have rallied behind the creation of a lagmonster dragon.

Leetle
 * Stylized spelling of "little." A very small sprite.

Leetle Tree
 * See Leetle Tree.

Legacy sort
 * The old custom sort, where users can sort their dragons by giving them a numerical value.

Legendary Trio
 * The combination of Ice Dragons, Thunder Dragons, and Magma Dragons. Together they can Summon a Guardian of Nature.

Limbo
 * See: in queue.

Lineage
 * A dragon's family tree. Only bred dragons have any kind of lineage, those picked up from the cave won't. Some people will pick up certain dragons because they like their lineage (like the names, breeds, etc of the dragon's family).
 * A family of dragons which follows a certain criteria or pattern:
 * All dragons are of the same breed (purebred lineage)
 * All pairings are formed by dragons of two breeds only (for example, only gold x white pairings)
 * All dragons have a themed name or a family name (ex. Dorkface, Thuwed)
 * All dragons descend from the same dragon (ex. Dorkfaces all descend from Midas Dorkface)

Locked scroll
 * See: scroll lock.

Lost in Trade (LiT)
 * No longer applicable, with secure Teleport trading. LiT was a thread in Site Discussion where users could request the return of an egg or hatchling picked up by another user when attempting to trade via the Abandoned Page.

Low-gen
 * Abbreviation of "low generation," refers to dragons with short lienages.

M
 Market 
 * The dragon market (found here) where users can exchange shards for dragon eggs.

Mass breed
 * When a user or group of users breeds many eggs of a specific breed or breeds within a short time. This can sometimes result in a wall.

Mature
 * When a hatchling reaches its second stage
 * When a dragon reaches its adult form.

Messy
 * A dragon whose lineage doesn't follow a particular pattern. Usually a long and irregular lineage.

Misgendered
 * In relation to DC, usually refers to a hatchling that matured to a gender that the owner didn't want.

Missingno
 * See Glitch Dragon
 * A dragon that doesn't have a species. There is only one in known existence, and it looks just like a cloud of fog. It is named after a glitch in the early Pokémon games.

 Multi-clutch 
 * Producing multiple eggs from a single breeding. Originally, all dragons had the chance to multi-clutch when bred. Currently, only Celestial Dragons and are capable of multi-clutching. If a breeding results in a multi-clutch, the owner may adopt one of the eggs produced, and the remainder will be auto-abandoned.

Mystery egg
 * The eggs that show up in the biomes during the the hour and 5 min drops. Only the egg description is included to give hint of what the mystery egg might be.

N
ND
 * Abbreviation for Neglected Dragon

ND Experiments
 * An abbreviation for Neglected Dragon Experiments. This is a group of users who carry out controlled experiments to try and find out how to create a Neglected dragon from various theories.

NIB
 * Abbreviation for non-inbred, often used in trading.

Nursery
 * A less common name for a page inside fan sites where emergency eggs, or eggs and hatchlings in general, are listed so that people entering it may give them views and also copy their codes and post them elsewhere if they feel like it.

O
Off scroll
 * Referring to when a dead egg/hatching will be removed from one's scroll. It takes 2 weeks for dead dragons to be removed.

P
Perfect gen lineage
 * See also: Even/Perfect Generations thread
 * A lineage is one in which all dragons are of the same breed. Color variations and alt status usually do not count against the "perfect" status. Nowadays, this is more often referred to as "PB" or "Pure Bred".


 * Even Perfect Generation
 * A combination of even gen and perfect gen. In this case, to be even perfect, a perfect lineage dragon must also be even gen.

Phantom clicks
 * When you click an egg or hatchling, but the creature's "click" stat does not increase.

Phased out
 * See: retired.

Pillow shaded
 * A type of shading where the lightest shades appear in the middle of the sprite, and the darkest around the edges. This is avoided in Dragon Cave sprites as it results a flat, unprofessional finish.

Poke/Poking
 * Users will say that they are poking their eggs/hatchlings as a show of being frustrated that they haven't hatched or grown up yet.

Pokemon Invasion/Pokemon Night
 * See: Pokémon Night

Precog
 * See also: Precognition
 * Short for precognition, used to note what gender a S1 hatchling has been predicted to be by an Aeon Wyvern.

Prize
 * General term for Tinsel Dragons and Shimmer-scale Dragons.


 * Prizekin
 * Non-prize offspring of a prize dragon.

Progress List
 * The Progress List shows the current development of sprites for new dragon suggestions.

Pureblood/Purebred (PB)
 * PB dragons are dragons with all the same breed in its lineage. The lineage type itself can then vary such as being even generation or a staircase.

R
Rainbow sort
 * A sort option that arranges a user's scroll by dragon color.

Rare
 * See also: .
 * An egg/hatchling not usually found.

 Reflex click 
 * When you see a dragon (egg or hatchling) on the abandoned page, that you may have been hunting before, and reflexively click on it. Even if you currently do not want it.

 Retired 
 * A breed that is no longer available in the cave.

S
S1
 * See 1st stage hatchling.

S2
 * See 2nd stage hatchling.

SAlt;
 * Not to be confused with "salt", a nickname for Blacktip Dragons
 * Abbreviation for Spriter's Alt.


 * SAltkin
 * Offspring of a Spriter's Alt.

Saurian
 * See also: Saurian.
 * A language used in Star Fox Adventures that has been adapted by TJ, for the usage of announcing a new egg or some other important announcements. These announcements can be found in the "News" section of the forum. The language itself is basically a scramble of English letters. Announcements in the most recent years have dropped the use of Saurian.

Scroll
 * A user's collection of dragons.

Scroll goal
 * Any goal a member has for their scroll, like collecting all kinds of dragons.

Scroll limits
 * The maximum number of eggs and hatchlings a user can have on their scroll at one time. Scroll limits increase with each trophy level.

 Scroll lock 
 * Scroll filled with eggs and/or hatchlings, so one doesn't have room for anything new from the cave or the AP.

SD
 * Abbreviation for the Site Discussion section of the forums.

Secret caves/links
 * See: Hidden Pages
 * Links to certain parts of the site that have no specific way to be reached from the site itself.

Shards
 * In-game currency, gained by catching, breeding, and raising dragons. Can be used in the market to obtain dragon eggs.

Site maintenance
 * Occurs daily at 3am EST. Maintenance time varies and can take up between half and hour to more than an hour and a half. During site maintenance, DC will be inaccessible/unavailable.

Stalk
 * See camping.

Snag (before Teleport)
 * Commonly used term for what people do when they manage to get a trade-intended egg from the abandoned page.

Sniping
 * The act of deliberately spying on an ongoing trade or gifting between two users and then attempting and succeeding to acquire the egg before its recipient. No longer applicable with the introduction of secure Teleport trading.

Soft shell
 * See also: Dragon Sickness
 * When the views and or clicks of a dragon are too high and the egg becomes sick, and will die if not taken care of.

Sprite
 * Refers to the pixel art representing the dragons and other creatures of the cave.

Spriters
 * See artists.

SSS
 * See also: Dragon Sickness
 * Abbreviation for Soft Shell Sickness.

 Staircase/Stairstep Lineage 
 * Stairstep/Staircase is a lineage which starts with a caveborn pair and adds a caveborn dragon with each generation as the mate of the previous's offspring, causing the lineage to form a pattern resembling a set of stairs. Example: an 8-generation stair step


 * Double Staircase: A variation where you use second gens to build the stairs as opposed to cbs.
 * Spiral Staircase: Alternating Gender: A form of staircase in which the bred dragons alternate genders every generation.

Stats
 * Statistics of a dragon, usually written in the form of Views/Unique Views/Clicks

Swiping
 * Accidentally interfering with a trade, this being different than sniping because it is an accident and occasionally the person who swiped the dragon will try and find out who the trade was actually meant for. No longer applicable since the introduction of secure Teleport trading.

T
Thuwed
 * See Thuwed Lineage.

Timing Out
 * When an egg or hatchling runs out of time and dies.

ToD
 * Abbreviation for Time of Death, the exact time (usually down to the minute) at which an egg or hatchling runs out of time and dies. ToD is used mainly in ND Experiments.

Trading
 * Exchanging eggs and hatchlings between users via Teleport.

Trading Hub
 * See also Trading Hub.
 * The on-site location to post trades and garner offers. Found here.

U
UFT
 * Abbreviation for Up for Trade, referring to an egg or hatchling which has been offered for trade for another egg/hatchling.

 Unbreedable 
 * May refer to:
 * a creature that is not capable of breeding, such as Paper Dragons, Undead Dragons, and Vampire Dragons. These creatures can only be obtained from the cave, or from certain actions.
 * a creature that cannot "breed true," or produce its own breed when breeding. Examples of this include Guardians of Nature and Sinomorphs.

V
Views
 * The number of times an egg/hatchling is viewed. The max number of view:unique view ratio is 15:1.


 * Unique Views
 * One unique view is given to each egg/hatchling viewed from one IP address.

 View bomb 
 * View bombing: the act of putting an egg or hatchling in multiple hatcheries, or otherwise generating an excessive number of views and clicks on a growing dragon in a short amount of time. This is often done maliciously to another user's dragons, with the intent of killing the growing dragons through sickness.
 * View bomber: a user who engages in view bombing.

W
 Wall 
 * When the Abandoned Page is mostly to completely full of a single breed of eggs.

Wilderness
 * See also: Wilderness Page
 * The Wilderness is where released adults and frozen hatchlings go after being removed from a user's scroll. It can be viewed here.

Z
Zombie
 * Undead Dragon. It can be obtained by killing an adult/hatchling and then reviving it.