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Glossary

The 1.13 community has two decades of jargon behind it. Forum posts, changelogs and old documentation use these terms without explanation — this page decodes them. Each entry links to the page where the topic is covered in depth.

0–9

1.13 — The mod this whole site is about: a community-made overhaul of Jagged Alliance 2 that adds hundreds of features and externalizes game data into INI and XML files so it can serve as a base for further mods. See What is 1.13?

A

A.R.C. — The Arulcan Rebel Command website on the laptop, hub of the Rebel Command feature. Unlocks after the Omerta food-delivery quest when the feature is enabled.

ASD — The enemy's Arulcan Special Distribution: a budget system the Queen uses to buy and field tanks, combat jeeps, helicopters and robots. See Know your enemy and The strategic war.

AIM — The Association of International Mercenaries, the in-game website where you hire most of your mercenaries via the laptop. See First steps for hiring advice. Not to be confused with AIMNAS, a large item-and-maps mod built on 1.13 (see Mods based on 1.13).

AP / BP — Action Points and Breath Points: what a merc spends to act in turn-based combat, and their stamina/energy reserve. 1.13 uses a 100-point AP scale, and both systems can be tuned in APBPConstants.ini — see the configuration overview.

Arulco — The fictional country where Jagged Alliance 2 takes place, ruled by Queen Deidranna until you show up. The walkthrough tours it town by town.

B

Bear's Pit — The long-running community forum at thepit.ja-galaxy-forum.com, home of 1.13 discussion, mod releases and support, with an associated Discord server. See Links & community.

Bobby Ray's — The in-game online gun shop, which becomes available once you seize the Drassen airport. What it stocks in 1.13 depends on your game progress and item coolness (see those entries). See First steps.

C

Coolness — A rating assigned to every item in the item XML data. As your campaign progress rises, items of higher coolness start appearing in shops and in enemy hands, which is how 1.13 paces its enormous arsenal. See XML data files.

D

Data-1.13 (and Data-XXX) — The folder that holds the 1.13 mod's data, layered on top of the original game's Data folder: the game looks in Data-1.13 first and falls back to Data. Mods built on 1.13 ship their own folder in the same pattern, e.g. Data-AIM for AIMNAS — see the configuration overview and the VFS page for how the layering works.

DEFEAT_MODE — A Ja2_Options.INI setting that defines when a lost battle counts as a defeat, with its morale and loyalty penalties: any loss (the default), only losses where the enemy was alerted or saw you retreat, or only battles where mercs actually died. See Retreat, defeat & capture.

Dirt — Weapon fouling, half of the advanced repair/dirt system (on by default): every shot dirties the gun — faster in dusty sectors — and a dirty gun jams more until a merc with a cleaning kit removes the fouling. See Weapons & ballistics.

Drassen counterattack — A massive enemy counterattack the Queen launches at Drassen early in the game, infamous for wiping out unprepared squads. It is controlled by TRIGGER_MASSIVE_ENEMY_COUNTERATTACK_AT_DRASSEN in Ja2_Options.INI; see Starter tips for surviving it and Early game for the details.

Dynamic opinions — A Flugente feature from 2014: mercs form and update individual opinions of each other as the campaign unfolds, feeding into morale, dialogue and team chemistry. The MeLoDY laptop site (see below) visualizes the results. See Morale & opinions.

F

Facilities — Specific buildings in specific sectors (such as Cambria's hospital) that offer extra map-screen assignments and bonuses, at a price and sometimes at a risk. The system was introduced by Headrock's HAM mod and is long since part of core 1.13. See Facilities & assignments.

G

gamedir — Community shorthand for the game-data half of the project: all the Data folders, INIs and XMLs, as opposed to the executable's source code. It is maintained in the 1dot13/gamedir repository on GitHub; in the SVN era it was the GameDir folder of the data repository. See Project structure.

H

HAM — Headrock's Assorted Modifications: a collection of bug fixes, externalizations and gameplay features (including a suppression system) created by modder Headrock, starting around October 2008. HAM was merged into the main 1.13 code in 2009–2010, so its features are simply part of 1.13 today. Its dedicated wiki, once a major reference for 1.13 mechanics, is no longer online.

I

IMP — The Institute for Mercenary Profiling, the in-game website where you create your own custom mercenary; unlike hired mercs, an IMP has no ongoing salary cost. 1.13 greatly expands IMP customization and lets you create several IMPs. See First steps.

Iron Man — An extra-difficulty option on the new game screen: you may only save in a sector that is free of enemies, instead of saving anytime. See New game options.

L

LBE — Load Bearing Equipment: wearable gear such as vests, harnesses, holsters and backpacks that provides your merc's inventory pockets under the New Inventory System. See Inventory & LBE.

M

MeLoDY — A laptop website (unlocked with dynamic opinions, see above) that analyzes your team's personalities and relationships. See Morale & opinions.

Mini Events — Optional random campaign events that pop up on the strategic screen with two choices each. See Random events.

MERC — More Economic Recruiting Center, the game's second hiring website, offering cheaper mercenaries than AIM. See First steps.

MOLLE — 1.13's modular pocket system for LBE items: a carrier (like a leg rig or vest) has a number of free pocket slots and an available volume, and you attach pocket items to configure it — as long as their total volume fits. See Inventory & LBE.

N

NAS — The New Attachment System, which displays attachment slots around an item's picture and uses XML-defined slots to decide what fits where, allowing far more (and bigger) attachments. It requires the New Inventory System and a resolution above 640x480. Player guide: Weapon attachments; modder reference: Attachment system internals.

NCTH / OCTH — New Chance To Hit and Old Chance To Hit, the two selectable shooting models. NCTH aims for realism by factoring in many more variables (and is tuned via CTHConstants.ini), while OCTH is the classic system many players keep for its consistency. See New Chance to Hit.

NIS / NIV — Two abbreviations you will see for the same thing: the New Inventory System, which replaces the vanilla inventory with a more granular one built around LBE gear (official docs often say "NIV"). See Inventory & LBE.

NSGI — The New Starting Gear Interface: it shows all of a merc's starting gear items on the AIM website and lets each merc offer up to five selectable gear kits, defined in MercStartingGear.xml. See Starting gear (NSGI).

O

OCTH — See NCTH / OCTH above.

Overheating — An optional weapon-temperature feature, off by default (OVERHEATING in Ja2_Options.INI, or the Weapon Overheating toggle on the new-game screen): every shot heats the gun, and a hot gun jams more and wears out faster until it cools down. See Weapons & ballistics.

P

PMC — A private military contractor website that sells regular and veteran militia once you have started training militia; hired militia arrive via airports, harbors and border posts. See Hiring & contracts.

Progress — A hidden value that increases as you play the campaign. Together with item coolness it determines which items appear in shops and in enemy hands; the "Progress Speed of Item Choices" option on the new game screen controls how fast this happens. See New game options.

R

r7609 (revision numbers) — Numbers like r7609 or r8610 are SVN revisions from the era when 1.13 was developed on a Subversion server. r7609 is "the stable" that many older mods require; since development moved to GitHub in 2022, new builds are published as releases instead of r-numbers. See Version history.

RPC — Recruitable player character: a local in Arulco (such as Ira, Dimitri or Hamous) who can be persuaded to join your team, as opposed to mercs hired from AIM or MERC. See NPCs & recruitment.

S

SAM site — A surface-to-air missile site. Four of them (sectors D2, D15, I8 and N4) protect Arulco's airspace and will fire at Skyrider's helicopter, so flying over their coverage is expensive and dangerous until you capture them.

SCI — Single Click Installer: an all-in-one package combining a 1.13 executable and matching game data (sometimes with a mod included) that you simply extract over a clean JA2 installation. SCIs were historically posted on the Bear's Pit; today's GitHub all-in-one releases fill the same role. See Installation.

Sector notation (A9, B13, ...) — Sectors on the strategic map are addressed by a row letter plus a column number: A9 is Omerta, where you land; B13 is the Drassen airport. Underground levels are stored separately — map files use names like A9_B1.DAT for a sector's first basement level. The walkthrough uses this notation throughout.

SLF — The archive format of the original game, holding assets such as sounds, animations and tilesets (e.g. tilesets.slf). The VFS can mount SLF archives as well as uncompressed 7z archives. See Virtual File System.

Snitch — A minor trait (written by modder anv, merged in 2014) that turns a merc into your informant: midnight gossip reports on the team, propaganda and rumor-gathering in towns, even undercover work among prisoners of war. See Snitches & informants.

STI — The image format used for JA2 graphics such as merc faces and portraits, limited to a 256-color palette and usually edited with the STI Edit tool. See Faces & portraits.

Stracciatella — JA2 Stracciatella, a separate open-source project that runs vanilla JA2 on modern systems, including Linux and macOS, at higher resolutions. It is not based on 1.13 — see the FAQ if you just want vanilla JA2 modernized.

Suppression — The suppressive fire mechanic 1.13 adds (originating in HAM): heavy incoming fire reduces a target's AP and can force it to the ground, and enemies use it against you too. See Playing 1.13.

T

TableData — The Data-1.13\TableData folder, home of the XML files that define items, weapons, merc profiles, enemy drop tables, difficulty settings and much more. See XML data files.

Tons of Guns — The "Available Arsenal" choice on the new game screen: Tons of Guns enables 1.13's massive expanded gun list, while Reduced keeps a smaller arsenal. See New game options.

Transport groups — Enemy supply convoys, a third kind of enemy group besides patrols and attack groups (off by default; STRATEGIC_TRANSPORT_GROUPS_ENABLED). They run between the Queen's staging area and her mining towns, drop everything they carry when intercepted, and feed the enemy war machine if they make it home. See The strategic war.

V

VFS — The Virtual File System, which builds a unified view of the game's files at runtime from stacked profiles of folders and archives, configured in vfs_config.ini. It is the machinery behind the Data-XXX layering and makes mods easy to distribute and combine. See Virtual File System.

Volunteer pool — An optional militia rule (MILITIA_VOLUNTEER_POOL, off by default): Arulco holds a single, finite pool of people willing to fight for you, and every militiaman trained consumes one volunteer. Liberating sectors, recruiting civilians and the Rebel Command Draft Civilians directive refill it. See Militia.

Sources

  • The previous 1.13 starter documentation and play guide (2019, r8741 era) by tais and Yunotchi.
  • Ja2_Options.INI and APBPConstants.ini from the current game data: github.com/1dot13/gamedir.
  • VirtualFileSystem_Setup.txt v1.1 by BirdFlu, from the 1.13 documentation.
  • The New Attachment System design document, the New Starting Gear Interface readme, and the MOLLE design document, from the 1.13 documentation.
  • "A nice face guide by Kazuya" (creating new faces), from the 1.13 documentation.
  • The JA2 v1.13 Map Editor manual (sector map file naming).
  • The old 1.13 pbworks wiki "Features" page (suppression, AP scale).
  • "Headrock's Assorted Modifications: What is it?" from the archived HAM wiki (the live wiki is no longer online).
  • The Jagged Alliance Fandom wiki (AIM, MERC, IMP and SAM Site pages).
  • The Bear's Pit forum (Single Click Installer threads).