Serious first world problems: How do you name your Characters?

[Osvir]

For the title question: If I make up custom names, I usually do that in the moment. Look at the portrait, appearance, personality, and voice, ponder a bit "Does this sound like a Kalwhain? Or is it a Bloflof?". Word- and name scambling basically.

It's just gibberish in its own context, but combined with appearance, portrait, and sound etc. it usually makes sense aesthetically.

Edited March 23, 2015 by Osvir

[LadyCrimson]

When I first got into CRPG's I bought a baby-name book so I could just rifle through it and pick one at random if I liked the way it looked. The book had all kinds of exotic names and odd spellings that looked "fantasy game-ish" to me at the time. Heh.

 

These days I tend to just cobble together a name based on a chr's art looks or game function, with purposeful misspellings that = something that looks like a name at first glance.

 

Maybe for the first chr. in PoE I'll make more of an effort to come up with something less oddball.

[sparklecat]

I look up lists of recommended names for the setting and race/nationality and find something that feels good, maybe changing a few letters.

[guizhang]

i mostly use characters from tolstoy books. karenina, bolkonsky, bezuhov, vronsky  etc

[Luckmann]

Ulfric
Osric
Eldoth

Not entirely sure. I'm wavering in my decision to play a Deathlike since I decided to play my Bleak Walker wearing nothing but clothes. They can't wear helmets and the head models look a bit stupid, so without proper armour, it could end up annoying me too much. I'm considering a human instead (which is a big woah for me, like, humans?) and if I go with a human, Bleak Walker Paladin, no armour, duelist with a rapier, I'm definitely going with Eldoth.

Eldoth, aedyr aristocrat and heroic douche.

Edit: It also depends on what portraits will be available by release, to see if anything inspires me.

Edited March 23, 2015 by Luckmann

[Gamgee]

I came up with a cool Charr name in GW2 I like. I'm going to use it here.

 

Baalhaan Barca. A phonecian name. Just sounds cool for a smart strategist/warrior type of guy. So we'll see what class I'll make.

[hajlife]

Usually I would choose a name of a book character that I'm currently into but with PoE I'm thinking of something different. My character is definetly going to be an ex-slave so I want him to have no name at all and instead have a nickname. Something along the lines of "Maggot" or "Rat" :3

[Polanski]

 

Nice namegenerator! It would be fantastic if it had a culture setting as well. It could be possible that the devs actually patch something similar in at some point, as that should be quite simple. 

 

so Aedyr, Ixamitl Plains and Old Vailia naming conventions should be covered by the link I provided. For Deadfire Archipelegola, Rauatai, The Living lands and The White that Wends, we need to get creative.

 

 

Deadfire Archipelegola:

The language has Inuit roots, which has some beautiful names and sounds, so we can probably steal from there.

 

female: Panninguaq, Nivi, Pipaluk, Ivalu

 

Male: Malik, Nuka, Pavia, Inunnguaq, Aputsiaq

 

Furthermore the Inuit diminutive -raq and -nnguaq, which both mean "little/sweet" and are used with names from both genders, e.g. Pipalukraq and Nukaraq

 

http://www.nordicnames.de/wiki/Greenlandic_Names

 

Rauatai:

Lots of "auauauai" I guess. Based on the Maori language, so let us look there for inspiration:

 

Female names: Hauku, Airini, Ahorangi, Whina, Hahana

Male names: Arapeta, Maaka, Matiu, Rua (seems familiar), Marama

 

http://www.huggies.co.nz/parenting/parents-and-children/maori-baby-names

(I don't feel these fit so well, you probably need to put in some more au.)

 

The Living lands:

It sounds like a very disorganised place and alot of settlers from other places, so I think names from other cultures are all good. I have not been able to establish what the pre-dominant culture is though  

 

The White that Wends:

The only thing I have been able to establish is that the Pale elves and Boreal elves of the region have seperate and unique languages. And that the language of the pale elves has some roots in Eld Aedyran http://pillarsofeternity.gamepedia.com/Eld_Aedyran#Eld_Aedyran 

The closest we get to names for the pale elves would probably be using the aedyran names or old english/Anglo-saxon names.

 

Hope this helps a bit and that Josh or some other dev who knows might shed some more light on these unknowns. 

Edited March 23, 2015 by Polanski

[Bryy]

Why, like this of course.

 

 

As far as I'm concerned there's no other way to name your character.

But on a more serious note, I *hate* the fantasy/sci-fi trope of Weird Names.

[Evilpengins]

My main character's name will be Kvothe.

If anyone knows where that name is from we can be friends.

These books have loads of great names 'elodin' would be good for a Mage.

 

I use the silmarillion which has elvish root word dictionary which you then stich together to create a name such as Calenfallenar (green healer) for Druid.

[dorkboy]

Hátërs g'onn'a hâté.

[Nonek]

Master.

[BigBripa]

Is he big? Big Bripa. Is he lil? Lil bripa. Is he regular? Bripa. Yw

[dorkboy]

I'm thinking maybe Frodo. Has a nice ring to it.

[AgentZeus]

I'm thinking maybe Frodo. Has a nice ring to it.

 

 

I think I will trawl through some old Gemmell / Feist / Eddings books for a few ideas..... must stop looking at Brian's name generator or will have a list a mile long!

[Halsy]

Please stop with that stupid, 'First world problems' meme. Problems are problems.

[Azzy]

I usually go for something Gáidhlig female Fia or Faolan male for humans otherwise if I just randomly type stuff and whittle it down to something that sounds about right, helps if you know the setting and the types of names that fit your race/culture but meh.

Alternatively hit up Dwarf Fortress : Stukos, Kulet, Minkot, Quathari, Sareve or Bembul

[Polanski]

Please stop with that stupid, 'First world problems' meme. Problems are problems.

Agreed. I also think people have to name things in the entire world actually.

[Tabris07]

I plan to name my character Wade.  It's kind of a go-to for me

[CocoonMaN]

As offensively as possible.

[Valmy]

I always study the setting and find names that fit in reasonably well.

[Valmy]

Please stop with that stupid, 'First world problems' meme. Problems are problems.

 

Third World people playing this game have no problem coming up with names.

[Aramed]

I take an aspect of something like a character personality trait, appearance or part of their history and put a word to it.

Like if he was supposed to be a tall imposing fighter, I might take the word "tower" or perhaps "mountain".

Then I find that word in another language. Latin works well most of the time, sometimes I use German / Nordic.

Then I tweak the word to sound more like a name or mash it with an existing name to create a new one.

After that I'll either do the process again for their last name or give them a more common name.

 

So as an example, I want a strong and resiliant fighters name so I'd start with "Tower" and "Stone".

German gives me a cool name with that, Steintrum. Then I'd just give him a simpler name at the front.

Martin Steintrum.

 

For any RPG characters I'll usually use this method as I like to name names that mean something.

[Kimaka]

I name my characters within the naming conventions of where they're from and their race. Right now, I'm using the wiki as a guide to try to come up with a name for my character. Her name is Antha which is something I came up with on the fly for use in the beta. I want to transform that name to make it sound more Italian unless I find a name I really like. I don't usually pick a name based upon their meaning, but just something that sounds right for that character.

[Havelok]

If I can't think of a name right away, I turn to history and other languages.

 

Here is how I named my a character Prestogy:

 

I looked for words in other languages that translated well from "trick" or "fraud" and suchlike. I settled on praestigium, which is latin for "Magic Trick" or Illusion. 

 

Praestigium is a bit of a mouthful so I turned to the modern form of the word, Prestige, or the colloquial Presto. It's a little tasteless naming a character after modern form language however, so I looked for another word to compliment Presto. I settled on Prodigy. 

 

Presto + Prodigy = Prestogy. I used an o instead of an i in the form for it to better mimic the actual pronunciation of Prodigy (which is often pronounced Prod-oh-gee).