Fantasy Gaming Names

[Ssadral]

Suffice to say, but I have gamed for a very long time and one of the constants are the way people name their characters. You know, it usually has "blood" or "dark" or "strong", pretty much anything that could be construed as cool I guess. I to have been guilty of looking for that cool name, not only in Fantasy but other games... though I do find the higher percentage definitely resides in fantasy.

Now there is nothing wrong with that, your character is your character and you should enjoy them however you like. I just want to know why isn't there more John Smiths in gaming?

Right now I have moved away from cool names, and I have been getting inspiration from t.v. and movie credits to mash together a character name. It has been fun doing it and it has brought a unexpected side-effect in that my characters have become the "dark horse" in heroism.

 

[Theroc]

>.> I think I have about 1 or two characters with the naming mechanism you mentioned.

One is Rhiannon Fleetwood, one of my first PbP characters here on Enworld.

And, none of the characters in an active game right now have such a name.

Most of my names come from a 'random fantasy name generator' which seems to just take letters and mix them.

 

[Ourph]

All of my characters are named Flex Hardpeck.

 

[Ssadral]

All of my characters are named Flex Hardpeck.

I guess I should add "Hard" to "Dark", "Blood" & "Strong".

 

[weem]

I've been big into the nickname thing. Here are my primary 4e character names thus far...

Goliath Warden - Duerik (pronounced Dew-Rick) we have taken to calling him "Dew", or "The Dew"

Human Invoker - Lo'Savian "Sal" Merkayder

Goblin Rogue - Kitzzk "Kick"

Arborian (Tree) Druid - Reyadenthaern "Redthorn" Lighthallow

Particularly with the last one, I like starting with a nickname that I think is fitting and then building a name around it.

 

[Nai_Calus]

Grimdark Bloodstrong will be my next character's name.

I tend to play Elves or variants on such and thus use a lot of stuff that sounds like it's been ripped off from Tolkein, and for humans come up with fantasy-ish names, or use old-fashioned sounding normal names. Here're some of the monstrosities I've come up with:

Elves/Eladrin/Half-elves/drow:
Nai Calus
Vel Theryn
Ephram Theryn
Celenden Theleril
Isri Arellan
Kerazt Vareth
Erselan Celetharn
Elsharen Telsar

Humans:
Danien Kesar
Wilfried Engel

Non-humans:
Thrull Elfkiller
Darmal Thornbottle

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Some of my D&D PCs names over the past 10 years:

• Klor-Kon, Bounty Hunter (1/2 Orc Ranger)
• Arion Dragomir (Human Players Option Cleric in 2Ed, Ftr/Cleric in 3Ed)
• Myrskitar Kaitolaiinen (Human Homebrewed Warrior/Sorcerer variant)
• Adragon van Bastern (Human Sorcerer/Fighter...my "Mage-Brute")
• Johnny Bones (Human Ftr/Thief...a 1Ed style PC done in 3Ed)
• "Gay" Pierre Chanson (Human Specialist Wizard: Diviner/Fighter/Ranger/Spellsword)
• Zjax "Yellowjack" (Githzerai Monk/PsiWar/Lucid Cenobite...my Polearm-wielding Dex-based Monk)
• Sister Anika Shrike of the Merciful Order of Weapon-Sisters (Human Ftr/Monk/Kensai...used at Dallas ENWorld Gameday)
• Crom Trews (Dwarven Ftr/Thief)
• Rubric Gildenberg (Gnome Ftr/Ill in 2Ed & 3Ed)

This list doesn't include any of my PCs from a campaign dating back to 1985, from 1Ed through 3.X, which is a bit more Elf-centric.

 

[Thunderfoot]

I can honestly say I have never had a character with the words, blood, dark or strong in their names. (or hard)

Actually I my group once had an entire party with the first name George. Needless to say, it was humorous at first but quickly got annoying as well as confusing. I've always tried to name my characters with a bit of "realism" about them, especially if they are human. Geldof Moonbow and the like all sound like a really bad hippie names, I'd rather have a John or Claire or some 'boring' name and then let my character's personality grow without some sort of "prejudice" attached to a name I picked out at first level.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

In all fairness & honesty, that aforementioned 1Ed-3.X campaign has some names like that.

One of my longest running PCs is Darkethorne (a Drow MU/Rgr/Druid)...his younger brother goes by Steel Spider.

Another PC I run in that campaign is White Lotus...married to another one of my PCs, Black Opal.

All of those, however, are aliases. Nobody has ever asked their real names...

 

[pawsplay]

My NPC names are very unlike these. One blackguard was named Anton Lagrand, with Anton being a random A name that sounded like Andrew or Armand and Langrand being a scramble on Garland, the name of the villain in Final Fantasy I. The lich got named Valencia after a bag of oranges, the ancient blue wyrm queen was named Draniel which is a cross between Dragon and Danielle, and the witch Higarla is a cross between Hilda and Karla (Karla being a common witch's name in anime for some reason). I named a whole crew of dwarven guards after British kings. One of my players always wanted to know if Aethelred was ready yet...

As for PC names, I did once play a Toreador named Catclaw, a knife-wielding teenaged piano player and gigolo. My other PCs that I can recall include Cobin Chardwell (bard), Mister Mittens (abjurer), Brodascyn Devilhawk (evoker), Vladimir (cut-throat and juggler), Rachel Vanscoy (Silver Fang and former cheerleader), Zazu Zazz (Son of Aether and DJ, real name John Riley) and I think Pongo Overbridge (halfling), not necessarily in any order.