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Archpaladin Zousha
2019-06-28, 06:34 PM
Lately I feel like I've been in a bit of a rut in terms of my gaming: not only are my characters starting to appear the same in terms of trappings (mostly knightly do-gooder types, as if my username wasn't a clear indicator) but their NAMES are starting to sound the same: Arcalinte, Arloric, Aveyron, Arrandur, Orendel, Saraon, Soter, etc.

How do I break this bad habit?

Galithar
2019-06-28, 06:44 PM
Let your cat walk on your keyboard for 5 minutes.

Carefully go through what he typed until you find a random sequence of letters that sounds like a name.

More seriously, why do you find this to be a problem? I often have similarly acting and sounding characters because they are what I enjoy. Is the sameness boring you? Or do you just not want to be repetitive, for the sake of not being repetitive?

Archpaladin Zousha
2019-06-28, 07:04 PM
That would require me to HAVE a cat in the first place. I do like them, but mostly live vicariously through my two best friends, who both have a pair of cats at their respective homes.

It's problematic from my perspective because it shows a creative "blind-spot" for me: I seem to have a thing for names that start with A, or include components like -en or -er- or -on or -or. A good RP'er should be capable of coming up with more variety. If I play multiple characters in the same universe as well, then it gets worse, which is why I'm starting to get concerned. It's different if you're playing similar characters in different universes, you have plausible deniability, but you can't get away with that if your two characters are in the same universe and thus have a possibility of encountering one another and exposing the awkwardness!

Squire Doodad
2019-06-28, 07:28 PM
The world is full of names that don't exist. They are called gibberish. Wait.
Also names that sound like names but aren't names; Larteno, Tercha, Prin, Allesi, etc. Try looking for roots from other cultures, like polynesian or something?

It also sounds like the main issue is going with a small set of starting points, try going with a syllable that doesn't sound like anything you have done thus far.

Galithar
2019-06-28, 07:38 PM
Okay I understand. I have two methods I use when overcoming this, which I call naming paralysis, meaning you can't figure it a name so you repeat something familiar. I don't use them as a player but do regularly as a DM.

1. Replace the cat mentioned above with random smashings of the keyboard, and then try to find a name in it. Entertaining, especially when looking for outlandish sounding names.

2. Use an online random name generator, or random name table. This may not give you your final name, but it can spark something in that creative blind spot.

And the bonus points third option :P shamelessly steal from your choice of fiction. It works best when you AREN'T copying the character, but simply stealing their name, AND the rest of the table is not a fan of the same work of fiction from which you stole it so they have no preconception if you're character based on the name. I use this rarely if ever because the tastes if fiction in my group vary enough that the chances of me finding something that none of them recognize is very very low... I've tried, and there is always one person that says "Isn't that X from Y?" And I have to say yes, but I didn't think you knew them! Lol

Archpaladin Zousha
2019-06-28, 08:02 PM
Naming Paralysis, that's a good name for it.

I was actually looking at a few lists before I started this thread. The problem is that my eye keeps getting drawn to similar sounding names. "Ardulace" or "Erakasyne" just look more attractive than "Brigantyna" or "Felyndiira." :smallredface:

Galithar
2019-06-28, 08:27 PM
Eristar
Ralian
Brekt
M'Saktu
Issren
Droch'Nar

Maybe a few random name from me will help? Lol

Obviously some of those may require specific races to be fitting.
M'Saktu has to be from some kind of tribal society in my mind for example.

Imbalance
2019-06-28, 08:40 PM
Just pick something out of the phone book, maybe change some letters around. What do you mean, "what's a 'phone book?'"

Mike_G
2019-06-28, 10:29 PM
Go to the drug store. Lots of drug names sound like great fantasy characters.

Eladil
Vistaril
Crestor
Warfarin
Coreg
Naprosen
Lantus
Haldol
Narcan
Valtrex
Plavix
Losartan

Plus, you can use them as goofy in-jokes, like Narcan the Awakener, or Plavix the Bloody.

zinycor
2019-06-28, 10:39 PM
Why don't you try actual names for a change?

Galithar
2019-06-28, 11:19 PM
Why don't you try actual names for a change?

For many people, using a common (or even uncommon) name from their own culture takes them out of character near instantly. I for one could never feel comfortable in character as Robert the Conjurer. It just brings my mind back to reality from the fantasy of the game. (I sometimes struggle with this even in fictional literature where it is perfectly in place. EX Robert Baratheon from A Song of Ice and Fire)

I'm (hopefully) not the only one with this "problem" (If I am the only one I might have to remove those quotes around problem lol)

zinycor
2019-06-29, 01:12 AM
For many people, using a common (or even uncommon) name from their own culture takes them out of character near instantly. I for one could never feel comfortable in character as Robert the Conjurer. It just brings my mind back to reality from the fantasy of the game. (I sometimes struggle with this even in fictional literature where it is perfectly in place. EX Robert Baratheon from A Song of Ice and Fire)

I'm (hopefully) not the only one with this "problem" (If I am the only one I might have to remove those quotes around problem lol)

Then pick names from a different culture, Chinesse names are amazing, I often use them.

Kaptin Keen
2019-06-29, 01:26 AM
Try avoiding A. Literally. I'm telling you, A is the problem. Particularly as the first letter in a name, but A is just enormously overrepresented in roleplaying names.

Algeh
2019-06-29, 01:28 AM
Many years ago, after an accidentally very awkward conversation with my mother*, I ended up buying a used copy of The New Age Baby Name Book by Sue Browder. I've found it to be a really good source of names when I'm feeling stuck, because it gives lots of variants for each name along with where those variants are from. This is particularly helpful if you want all of the NPCs in a town to have names that kind of sound like the same group of people would have come up with them, since you can deliberately give them all Italian name variants or whatever. Back before everyone had the internet in their pocket all the time I'm pretty sure that book got more use during character creation than some of the actual sourcebooks I had. While I have not had occasion to buy more name books for a quite a while since I reached a point of diminishing returns, it at least used to be the case that baby name books were easy to pick up cheap in used book stores because people would get rid of them after they were done having kids. (It was always interesting to see the highlighted names and assorted notes in used name books, too.) I think I had 3 or 4 different ones that I'd bring for character creation sessions back in high school and college**.

*The summer I was 14 I was working on making a box of ready-to-use NPCs on 3x5 index cards for a rather large, sprawling, and poorly-thought-out-yet-very-highly-detailed custom fantasy setting I was working on. At some point, I decided that I should have at least 2 NPCs with names that began with every letter of the alphabet in my box of quick premade index card NPCs, and that they should all be "cool sounding" names. After a few hours of brainstorming on this, my mom came home from work and I asked her if we had a baby name book and if so where we kept it (with no context for why I wanted one). That conversation got MUCH less awkward once I explained why I wanted one...

** I'm sure I also caused a few follow-on awkward conversations between my fellow players and their parents when they came home from high school saying that Algeh said they should probably buy a baby name book and did they have one at home already...

Berenger
2019-06-29, 01:56 AM
2. Use an online random name generator, or random name table. This may not give you your final name, but it can spark something in that creative blind spot.

I like https://www.fantasynamegenerators.com/ - it has names for everything, not only fantasy. Just hit the random button for, say, aragonese or sarmatian names a few times and see if you like anything enough to keep or slightly alter it.

Knaight
2019-06-29, 02:46 AM
There's always stealing names from existing characters, historical figures, etc. Then you just vary your sources a bit, making sure the names fit the aesthetic of whatever game you're in. I might use a modern name list for a superhero game*, where for something more like D&D I might steal a minor character from Arthurian fiction, a viking saga, etc.

Then there's phonemes, where instead of taking a whole name from one character you look at particular syllables used by a language, cut that list down, and make a name out of that. This can also involve linguistic mixing. I wouldn't use this as a tactic for a PC, but I do this all the time as a GM, establishing wide rules that I use heavily in a setting. For instance I ran a game inspired by the Taifa Emirates, with both overt fantasy elements and heavy changes to the inspirational material (mostly to the tune of what they might have been had that culture stuck around for another few centuries instead of crumbling under attack from the outside). Fitting this I used both Spanish and Arabic names, a general name structure that was mostly firstname lastname but could easily add other common components (e.g. patronymics), and mixed them heavily. There were a lot of characters with a Spanish first name and Arabic last name or vice versa, which helped emphasize the cultural blending. This name pattern also made that game feel different to other games based in different areas, time periods, etc. Had I wanted to push a more fantastic and less grounded fantasy setting with the same inspirations I'd have broken both languages down into phonemes, and looked at where in names they tend to come up - which I ended up doing later in the same game, when the PCs decided to lay low very far away from Port Alhabri, and I ended up using a mostly Japanese phoneme set for a while (which is both relatively small and has some fairly distinctive rules on emphasis).

Or, for the lazier version - the "phonemes" for a given character are literally just the phonemes in 2-3 different names from different characters, rammed together somehow. You mentioned knightly characters, so let's pick some really famous starting names: Gawain, Pellinore, and Mordred. This gives the phonemes "Ga" "Wain" "Pel" "Li" "Nor" "More" and "Dred". So, some quick alternate knights might be Galin, Morwain, Galidred, Pelwain, and Peldred. All of them feel vaguelly Arthurian, because of the sources I obviously stole from, all work as names, and, critically, all of them feel different than they would if I stole 3 names from French or Spanish knightly fiction instead.

*Assuming I don't just take a first name from one coworker/former classmate/other associate and the last name from a different one anyways.

EGplay
2019-06-29, 05:37 AM
Go to the drug store. Lots of drug names sound like great fantasy characters.

Eladil
Vistaril
Crestor
Warfarin
Coreg
Naprosen
Lantus
Haldol
Narcan
Valtrex
Plavix
Losartan

Plus, you can use them as goofy in-jokes, like Narcan the Awakener, or Plavix the Bloody.
Hmmm let's see:

Efient, daughter of Prasu and Grel; twin sisters Mirta and Zapine; Oxaze; Salbut and Seret; Pravast (or even fully Pravastatine); Panto (ok, that one's familiar).

Cropped from just my own medicine...

This really works well, thanks!

johnbragg
2019-06-29, 07:33 AM
Pick a culture or two, loot the names of their towns and/or nobility. You can go for familiar--European cultures--or less familiar--pick a small country (Wales, Georgia, Finland) pull them up on google maps and start copying down place names. I use countries that either speak Indo-European languages, or are adjacent, because further away than that feels like random phonemes and/or kinda racist. (Somehow I feel okay doing it to small white European countries. Shrug.)

France and Germany are two familiar examples.

Wikipedia France, dynasty House of Bourbon, early Bourbons in France
Maximilien, d'Albert, Luynes, Armand, d'Aubigne, Maintenon
Rejected as common: Louis, Philip, Marie, Anne, Medici,
Not French, but worth listing: Concino Concini
Of note: Armand Jean Du Plessis, Cardinal Richelieu: Put Armand on the list, maybe Jean combined with something

Dang, this was easier when I was younger, and the default reference was the encyclopedia Britannica which had cool genealogical trees. French expy name generator was pick two of "Henri, Louis, Phillipe, Charles, Jean, Gaston, Maximilien, Francois, Robert, Xavier" and say them with a vaguely French accent.



List of German Emperors
Karl, Louis/Ludvig, Karloman, Arnulf, Konrad, Heinrich, Otto, Rudolf, Hermann, Lothair, Frederick, Albrecht, Gunther, Wenzel, Rupprecht/Rupert, Sigismund, Jobst(?), Abrecht, Franz, Johann, Gunther

Naah: Philip, Adolf, Theodore, Eugene
Not that German, but possible: Philip, Alfonso, Maximilian, Ferdinand, Mathias, Leopold, Francis, Augustus,

German princes in 1918: Adalbert, Joachim, Wolfgang, Ernst.

Map of Latvia: Liepaja, Saldus, Kuldiga, Vensplis, Talsi, Jurmala, Jelgava, Bauska, Salsapils, Sigulda, Limbazi, Valmiera, Cesis, Smiltene, Medona, Jekabpils, Daugavpils, Gulbene, Aluksne, Rezekne

Map of the Basque country of Spain--ehh, just sounds Spanish to my tin ear.

Honest Tiefling
2019-06-29, 12:23 PM
Maybe have the DM or another player provide you with a name. I mean, most people don't really get to choose anyway, so...

And perhaps try to imagine what preferences your character has. Letters, numbers, food, colors, etc. And maybe you can build from that to what your character (or their parents) would find an attractive name.

Phhase
2019-06-29, 02:18 PM
Use more consonants, double letters, and try to limit vowel density.

Errahk'Nor

Tenheg

Fordarak

Genthel

Nuarokh

Teeumakh

See what you can do.

Malphegor
2019-06-29, 02:38 PM
I personally try to do thematic names where the syllables refer to old roots that describe the character... But inevitably in actual play I end up making puns and bad name association stuff.

So for a necromancer, I went borghilde because star trek borg and minions.

For a paladinny frog from limbo, I called him Rahk because rock
music and croaking sounds.

If it helps any, I find that names that end or have strong emphasis on K at the end tend to make
me think of angry characters. Torbok the elephantman druid. Tsielok the Cleric of Spite and Envy. Acerak I guess.

-El as a suffix comes from pre-abrahamic religions and generally means ‘of the current main deity’ like a person who fights for a deity is Fightiel or something obfusticated to not sound so silly.

Starting with a vowel tends to make me think of heroic characters for some reason. Probably because it involves starting off opening your mouth without bearing your teeth in most cases. Dumb hindbrain.

I’m extremely guilty of using the prefixes Mal- or Mor- for names in a pinch. Mal as in malignant or Maleficus or whatever, generally evil. Mor is Welsh for sea, so a name like Morwen refers to seaspray (wen is white).

The Deej
2019-06-29, 05:07 PM
Go to the drug store. Lots of drug names sound like great fantasy characters.

Eladil
Vistaril
Crestor
Warfarin
Coreg
Naprosen
Lantus
Haldol
Narcan
Valtrex
Plavix
Losartan

Plus, you can use them as goofy in-jokes, like Narcan the Awakener, or Plavix the Bloody.

I actually once named a character "Ty Leneaux". He was a Cleric.

I often use several of the above mentioned methods, but also one more:

26 letters, 6 possible vowels (a e i o u y), and 20 other letters.
so use a d20 and a d6.

Pick a length, start rolling. Only swap letters manually when you can't bend your tongue that way to pronounce it.

Mike_G
2019-06-29, 05:31 PM
I actually once named a character "Ty Leneaux". He was a Cleric.



Love it.

I've played a lot of band-aid box clerics with names like that. Kormun (Corpsman), Mehdek, (Obvious) Ahren (RN) and so on.

I just noticed on day that lot of drugs sound like fantasy names and it's been a running gag with my group.

Tajerio
2019-06-30, 05:35 AM
If you own the game Crusader Kings II, go into the files on your computer and open up, in Notepad or similar, the cultures file to look through the namelists. That's what I do, and it gives me a tremendous amount of variation.

Archpaladin Zousha
2019-06-30, 08:27 PM
HOLY buckets, this got a lot of responses! :smalleek:

Thank you all! :smallsmile:

I've started juggling around a few names for the character I'm working on now. They're suggested drow names from 4e's Forgotten Realms Player's Guide, since I'm finding a lot of elven names are too similar to a character I'm already playing that I'm trying to avoid sounding like (Arcalinte Soter):

Briesril
Quewaun
Waeren
Yasesril
Zaketrin

Which of these would be coolest and least like the name "Arcalinte?"

Honest Tiefling
2019-06-30, 09:48 PM
Which of these would be coolest and least like the name "Arcalinte?"

Zaketrin, has quite a ring to it. Sounds the least as it doesn't start with A, and doesn't end in L. Also has harsher syllables.

zinycor
2019-07-02, 12:15 AM
HOLY buckets, this got a lot of responses! :smalleek:

Thank you all! :smallsmile:

I've started juggling around a few names for the character I'm working on now. They're suggested drow names from 4e's Forgotten Realms Player's Guide, since I'm finding a lot of elven names are too similar to a character I'm already playing that I'm trying to avoid sounding like (Arcalinte Soter):

Briesril
Quewaun
Waeren
Yasesril
Zaketrin

Which of these would be coolest and least like the name "Arcalinte?"

I would appreciatte it if you explain how you came up with those names

comk59
2019-07-02, 01:59 AM
When it comes to Random Name Generators, I will forever stand by https://www.behindthename.com/random/ .
For Elven specifically, I usually combine Finnish, Celtic, and Romanto. YMMV of course, but I like BehindTheName because when I use it my names don't a kind like a bunch of random syllables.

As far as the names you've come up with, I like Waeren or Yasasril personally. Assuming I'm pronouncing them the same way you are, anyway.

Archpaladin Zousha
2019-07-02, 04:57 AM
I would appreciatte it if you explain how you came up with those names
I...just said in the post you quoted. They're suggested drow names from the Forgotten Realms Player's Guide from 4e D&D. :smallconfused:

MoiMagnus
2019-07-02, 10:27 AM
My personal method is to make advanced names.

Example: Want to make a mage? I will be "Professor ...". A knight? "Sir ...". An aristocrat? I have a first name, a second name, and a last name.

By taking some constraints on the form of your name, it guide your inspiration to different directions.

zinycor
2019-07-02, 08:20 PM
I...just said in the post you quoted. They're suggested drow names from the Forgotten Realms Player's Guide from 4e D&D. :smallconfused:

Sorry, I did read your post around 3 AM. Missed it completely.

username1
2019-07-02, 09:58 PM
I keep a list of 100 random names on hand while dming. This way I don't come up with boring and similar names.

Zakhara
2019-07-03, 02:43 AM
I resolved this with the "Alphabet Strat." I wanted to play at least 26 characters, each whose name started with a different latter of the alphabet.

Messing around with phonemes helps too, of course, but that over-arching objective gave me the direction I needed to improve naming.

Archpaladin Zousha
2019-07-03, 07:11 AM
Sorry, I did read your post around 3 AM. Missed it completely.
I know THAT feeling. 'Tis cool! :smallsmile:

Faily
2019-07-03, 07:28 AM
I have a few ways to shake things up:

- First find a language suitable to the culture (this is in the case of made up cultures in settings). Like how Galt in Golarion is not-France, you could then choose something French or Latin. Most often this option is combined with using names from real-life languages/cultures.

- Steal shamelessly from other sources. Anime, manga, tv-shows, movies, comics, books, etc... I've personally done this one very often. This doesn't mean you have to copy the character in other ways; just because you named your character Bruce doesn't mean both his parents were brutally murdered before his eyes as a kid and is now turned into a vigilante.

- Make your own. Some settings and games have tables with prefixes and suffixes to go into name creation for a fantasy language (I know D&D has this for elves and drows). This also combines with the next suggestion...

- A name with a meaning. Instead of going for names that sound nice to your ears, choose a name because of its meaning. I once had a mute swordswoman whose name meant "silence". In one other setting I've played, templars of a sacred order abandon their real names and adopt virtues as their names, so things like Courage, Valor, Honor, Truth, etc, become "names".