Terminology
This article contains a list of informal terms and concepts commonly thrown around by anons within tournament threads. Official rules and terms such as the Elite Eight, Series Limit, etcetera will not be listed here and can instead be found in the official tournament rules pastebins.
Asterisk (*)
An asterisk (*) is a symbol unofficially assigned to a character to denote a contestable tournament win or deep run. Any performance that may be considered invalid due to rigging, off-site brigading, or other illicit methods is sometimes marked with an asterisk by anons. The most notable example is Spinel's controversial Ms. /co/ 2019 victory, which was revealed a year later to have been influenced by brigading from a Facebook group. Despite a lot Spinel* posting, host stats anon !!rkK6EtYmPFl later stated that asterisks would not be officially given to any /co/ tournament winner under any circumstances. This policy has remained in place across all main tournaments to the present day. Since then, asterisk-posting has become a common joke and a way of expressing dislike or dissent regarding a winner.
Several members of the Elite Eight in Ms. /co/ 2022 were also controversially given asterisks by host NightShiftAnon !!9A2duD1C25+, who claimed their runs had been rigged. However, most anons rejected these asterisks due to the questionable legitimacy of the rigging allegations and the underhanded behavior of said host.
Campaigning
Campaigning is an important tournament concept which refers to the act of bolstering a character's thread presence and persuading others to vote for them. This often takes the form of the creation of Original Content, such as art, writing and music, as well as character discussion and roleplay. Campaigning is widely seen as a significant factor in a character's success, with less traditionally popular characters being able to make it big thanks to a strong campaign. The tournament victories of Recette, The Batter and Zorak are often cited as notable examples of the impact effective campaigning can have.
The nuances of campaigning have long been a subject of debate and, at times, contention over voting values and tournament meta (see the "Silent Majority" section). Campooner is a commonly used -oomer variant of the term, typically directed at those who vote primarily or exclusively based on campaigning and thread presence rather than on the innate merits of the contestants themselves, particularly when less reputable characters achieve strong tournament performances through campaign-driven voting.
/dbg/
/dbg/ (standing for Death Battle General) refers to the Death Battle/VS battles/powerscaling community on 4chan, primarily centered around the Death Battle threads on /co/, of which there is always one active at any given moment (despite generals theoretically not being allowed on the board and most of the discussion in the threads relating to /a/ and /v/). It has been noted as the successor to /dbs/ after the decline of the Halls in 2024-2025. Around this time, the general's userbase became prominent in the tournaments, notably associating themselves with characters relevant to the Death Battle web series such as Ruby Rose in Ms. /co/ 2025 and Kratos (aka "KINGtos") in King of /v/ 2025; tournament discussion is also known to occur within /dbg/ threads.
Like its predecessor, /dbg/ is notable for hosting a large amount of posters from other boards, or "crossboarders", with said posters exporting the general's content and culture to their home boards, as Death Battle threads occasionally are created and even reach the bump limit on /v/ and /a/.
/dbs/
/dbs/ (standing for Dragon Ball Super) denotes the posters of the series and characters of Dragon Ball, and their /a/ general of the same name. Despite being shitposters unrelated to any of the main tournaments, they have become a common and generally tolerated, sometimes even welcome thread presence. /dbs/ tourney posting begain in Ms. /co/ 2021, and has been a presence during virtually every notable tourney since.
Memes and lingo pulled directly from the /dbs/ general are common, such as epic battles between Bejita and TARDku, or "five minute Frieza's" announcement five minutes before the end of a round. Despite their presence, /dbs/ posters usually have no serious professed bias in the tourneys themselves and remain aloof from matches and results. Some exceptions include direct participation in pertinent side-tourneys such as Heroes and Villains of /a/, occasional shitpost spats with DTVA, and Goku's simping for Brisby.
DTVA
Characters of animated series produced by Disney Television Animation. In the /co/ tournaments, it most often refers to Amphibia and The Owl House (and The Ghost and Molly McGee for a brief period) and their respective characters and posters. They are usually a main victim of spitevoting because of questionable shitposting and controversial albeit popular presence on the board, and general hatred against nu-Disney. They were arguably the first largely speculated instance of the wider attitudes and conflicts regarding "zoomer" era oriented animation on /co/ at negative play in tournament performance, and have come to be emblematic of this brand of perceived spite.
The term has been debated over the years due to its confusion with all general Disney Television Animation. Hence for more specificity it is sometimes called "nu-DTVA." It is also sometimes extended to any popular Disney animated show post-2015, especially the other big "loretoons" such Star vs. and Gravity Falls which have had a somewhat better board and tourney history but with still a degree of stigma attached.
Duck Match
The Duck Match was an oft-anticipated match-up between the two cartoon icons Daffy Duck from Looney Tunes and Donald Duck from Disney. The idea of it had been brought up for years, with it gaining particular steam in Mr. /co/lympus 2020 before it was quashed there by Tom defeating Donald in the fourth round (Tom would later go on to defeat Daffy himself in the finals.) By chance, the match-up ended up happening immediately upon Daffy's return in 2022, coming as early as the second round due to the use of a randomized bracket that year. In the end, however, the match ended up being more lukewarm than anything to many anons despite all the hype around it happening. As such, it was looked upon as a disappointment overall in retrospect.
Since then, the term duck match has become short-hand for specific thematic match-ups that get hyped up as a possibility in anons, often with the expectation that they will likely not live up to the hype around them. Several other match-ups that have happened since the actual Duck Match could fit the term, with prominent examples including the "Jack-Off" finals in King of /v/ 2022 and Krabs vs. Plankton in Mr. /co/lympus 2024. After the match between Joker and Gordon during Mr. /co/ 2024, some anons began to directly use it as the prime example of a good duck match that actually lived up to the pre-built hype surrounding it.
Falseflagging
Falseflagging refers to the act of posing as a supporter of a contestant while creating posts that paint said character and/or its actual supporters in a negative light, either in an attempt to get the character to lose or simply for the sake of trolling. Usually, most falseflagging attempts are obvious, but more insidious falseflags have been attempted where there is a genuine intent at ruining the reputation of a character. Examples of common tactics used by falseflaggers include spamming fat fetish or otherwise unpleasant art, "campaigning" with AI generated images, attempting to frame the character as being trans, and generally being a nuisance in the threads in the name of their target. It can be synonymous with the phrase psyops (psychological operations).
Flavor of the Month (FotM)
Flavor of the Month means "the most popular person/thing at a particular period of time". The term is generally used for characters who are hyped up and receive much attention due to new releases, or in some cases, significant events such as creator/actor deaths (sharing an overlap with "Pity voting"). Since recency bias is arguably an inherent factor to elections, characters who benefit from FotM attention tend to perform well, but it may also paint a target on their back and leave them susceptible to being spitevoted out of the tournament.
The standout example of a FotM character winning the tournament is Ms. /co/ 2019 champion Spinel, who first appeared in Steven Universe: The Movie on 2019 September 02 — just eleven days before the tournament began.
Jobber
A jobber is a character that consistently underperforms, particularly one that repeatedly loses in the early rounds despite high expectations, perceived popularity, or favorable seeding. The term is derived from the professional wrestling scene, where a "jobber" is a performer whose role is to lose matches in order to make other competitors look stronger. In tournament discourse, a character may be labeled a jobber after developing a pattern of disappointing results, even if their overall performance is still decent.
While most often used derisively, the term has also been applied affectionately to long-running participants with a history of bad luck. One of the most famous jobbers in 4chan tournaments is Battler Ushiromiya from Umineko.
Metagaming
Metagaming, also known as Strategic Voting, refers to the act of consciously voting with the aim of manipulating the bracket, rather than just voting for the picks one actually prefers, usually in the hopes of eliminating perceived strong characters in favor of weaker opponents for a better chance at another character's success. This can also be done in order to try and force a "fitting" match-up. A commonly referred to example of metagaming is Ms. /co/ 2021, in which many anons found the Elite Eight of the tournament to be underwhelming due to their favorites having been strategically voted out by rampant metagaming.
Midcarder
A midcarder is a character whose tournament performance is generally average or moderately successful, consistently achieving respectable results without being considered a serious favorite to win. This moniker is used more frequently for characters that seed decently, possess general popularity past the tournament's board, or easily qualify for every tournament outing. The term has its origin in professional wrestling, referring to wrestlers who are inserted into midcard time slots for bigger events. It's at least some acknowledgement to their skill, but also a sign that they fall below headlining stars.
As the tournaments have gone on for longer, some former Elite Eight members have sometimes been considered midcarders at present. A good example of this would be Mr. Incredible in Mr. /co/lympus, who has had a rough time going further in brackets following his current record run in 2020 and the backlash following in its wake.
Powerhouse
A powerhouse, also called a heavy hitter, is a character that consistently performs well and is widely regarded as a serious contender to win. Powerhouses typically possess a combination of broad appeal, high reputation on their respective board, and reliable thread support, making them formidable opponents. This includes characters who make the Elite Eight multiple times and have a record of knocking out other powerhouses. It is generally expected that powerhouses are the likeliest pool of characters to become champion going into a tourney, and are hence the "conventional" outcomes. Being labelled a powerhouse often leads to the character getting extra attention and higher expectations, which may encourage a character's hype, or conversely, paint a target on their back (most of the time both). It's of note that being a powerhouse does not denote high seeding or high thread presence, but rather the record of success across a series of tournament editions. Powerhouses lacking thread presence are (derogatorily) called silent powerhouses. Metagaming sometimes arises to combat perceived powerhouses in order to give one's favored picks a better chance, or simply to bat for "underdog" or more "interesting" outcomes. Examples of characters seen as powerhouses include Skeletor, Raven, Daffy Duck and Scout prior to their wins.
Pityvoting
Pityvoting is the scenario in which a character receives votes from anons specifically due to a recent event of unfortunate nature in relation to them, such as the cancelation of their series or the death of a voice actor. This is often a point of contention for these characters, as arguments break out over whether or not their success is founded primarily on sympathy for the character's series/VA rather than the character's actual merit. The major example of this arguably is Dr. Mrs. The Monarch in Ms. /co/ 2020, who through the cancellation of her show got a handful of votes in her favor that contributed to her victory.
Silent Majority
Under its general usage, the Silent Majority is an unspecified large group of people who do not express their opinions publicly, a term popularized by U.S. presidents Calvin Coolidge and Richard Nixon during their political campaigns. In the context of these character tournaments, the term is commonly used to denominate the large majority of anons from Brazil who vote without participating or directly interacting with the tournament threads, where all the discussion and campaigning takes place. Silent Majority picks are defined by having massive success despite often having no thread presence to speak of; while this is an indication of a character's innate popularity among the board's denizens, the Silent Majority is viewed unfavorably by some and its association with it to be the sign of an contestant undeserving of its tournament success. With sometimes more than a thousand votes going into the round polls, debates between silent and meta/campaigner approaches to the tournaments often arise. In 2023, official measures by the hosts were implemented to discourage Silent Majority voting, with the voting forms moved to the OC anchor rather than having them at the top of the thread, to encourage anons to interact with the thread rather than simply voting from the catalog, although all of this has since been rescinded.
Spitevoting
Spitevoting refers to voting for a character for no other reason than to add a vote against the other character in the match-up. Reasons for spitevoting tend to either be a case of metagaming, hatred for a specific character/series, or simply an anon seething over his main losing to the character in question during a previous round.
Tribute
A Tribute is a real-world offering to a character from an anon (assumingly) in their support. This typically takes the form of drawing or printing out the character on paper and then either offering something to the image or using the image as the tribute itself. Tributes have ranged from food, coins, fire, to various bodily fluids. Tributes of a seedier nature tend to cause wild and mixed reactions.
Team F.A.R.T.S.
"FARTS" is an acronym used in Ms. /co/ to refer to the characters Frankie Foster, Azula, Raven, Toph, and Shego, grouping them together based on their status as prominent heavy hitters who consistently seed highly and perform well due to their populairty. The acronym also reflects the fact that all five characters returned in 2021, when the term first gained widespread use. Frequently used within Ms. /co/ tournament discussion, some have criticized the acronym for potentially harming these characters’ chances by creating a stigma that frames them as predictable or boring “silent majority” picks, encouraging votes against them or generate backlash against their perceived dominance. “FARTS” has also been extended more loosely to describe other characters who share similar traits outside the original group, particularly other heavily favored characters from 2000s-era media who are seen as consistent high performers in the tournaments.
With the victory of Frankie Foster in Ms. /co/ 2024, a just-for-fun vote was held to determine what the "FARTS" acronym should change to in Frankie's permanent absence; it was voted to be renamed to "ARTS", with the second most common preference being "RATS". Following Raven's victory in Ms. /co/ 2025, further mentions of the group have almost completely dissipated from tournaments discussion.