Fantasy character names

ammama · Post by **ammama** » Wed May 11, 2005 1:46 pm

names

i usually get names from various sources:
From novels i've gotten some pretty good ones ; e.g. Shylock ('Merchant of Venice'), Hester Shaw (the mortal engines), Lord Asriel (The Northern Lights), Beorn,Gwahir,Smaug,(The Hobbit), Pancaspe,Leptine(Alexander Child of a Dream). I've used these before
I've guest starred some D n D celebrities to appear in my games e.g. Kreselack the Black Wolf, Acalia of Tempus, Jaheira, etc.
I also used to collect Warhammer and got some from there; e.g. Morathi the Hag Queen, Archaon lord of end times, Teclis, Tirion, Lord Queek, Kazak the one-eye, Orion the hunter, Ariel, Alariel.
There are loads of sources of inspiration. hav any of you got any?

Patrick · Post by **Patrick** » Wed May 11, 2005 7:41 pm

Hey Brynn post he names you use when you use them, I would love to see you choice after you choose it, I think we all would. (You don't have to chosse mine)

Brynn · Post by **Brynn** » Thu May 12, 2005 7:11 am

Thanks all

Yeah, I used many name generators, but the rest of them is not very helpful, based on mixing letters only. Some can come up with good suggestions, though.

Patrick, thanks for the suggestions but I don't like German-sounding names, sorry

Nova sounds really cool, though, I think I'll make up another character name of that, I have a male priest or fighter in mind... Hm... Nova alone sounds a bit short.

I found Taliesin on the internet somewhere, while looking up names of celtic goddesses related to magic/justice/wits. AFAIK she's the goddess of magic, which fits a female Mage perfectly

I kind of got used to the sound of it already

Actually I needed it to name my char in the "Tales of the Moon and Sword Inn", and I already introduced her as Brynn Taliesin there.

Erenor · Post by **Erenor** » Fri May 13, 2005 12:31 am

Does that mean you've made your decision, Brynn, or are you up for more suggestions? I liked the idea including fire or flame, b/c it really seems to apply to your character and her temperment. How about Brynn Firewind? Brynn Firestorm? Brynn Tradewind (sounds like an adventurer to me!)? Brynn Celestar? Just some ideas...

Brynn · Post by **Brynn** » Fri May 13, 2005 6:03 am

[QUOTE=Erenor]Does that mean you've made your decision, Brynn, or are you up for more suggestions?[/Quote]
Er... It's hard to decide... I kind of got used to Taliesin but if there's a better one I'm ready to change. Firestorm is cool, I'm considering it (maybe too obvious, don't know).

Now that Patrick mentioned Nova, I started to think about altering it to fit a male Priest or a Warrior...

Philos · Post by **Philos** » Fri May 13, 2005 10:29 am

Possible NAmes

The Greek language can sometimes offer some interesting choices.
The greek word for fire is pyr and the word for red is pyrros. Isn't one of the names given to red dragons (firebreathers) "draconis pyrranous" or something like that.
So doing some combining, how about something like:
Brynn Pyrshander
Brynn Pyrrani

Taliesin is certainly a great name, as well as one with a rich history. Not just from Celtic history. It was used by architect Frank Lloyd Wright as the name for his own home and work center that he designed and built in Arizona. Guess he liked the Celts.

Anyhow, a couple of ideas for you.

ammama · Post by **ammama** » Fri May 13, 2005 11:02 am

celts

i saw what someone mentioned about a celtic god and looked into it and found some great names for characters from celtic gods. in fact-just toying with the iodea- it might be kind of cool to base a party around celtic gods. names like cernunos, epona, maeglin, stuff like thatl all very kool

Patrick · Post by **Patrick** » Fri May 13, 2005 4:16 pm

Nova is cool. I think mine was Nova Scotia. Don't forget CasaNova or something Like Novaium.
Anyway that was cool Philos about Frank Lloyd Wright since I live in Az, but did not know about his house. I like celtic stuff.

Philos · Post by **Philos** » Mon May 16, 2005 12:11 pm

Taliesin

Patrick if you are interested here is a link to a page about Taliesin. It is near Scottsdale.

http://www.franklloydwright.org/index.cfm?section=tour&action=taliesinwest

Krusader · Post by **Krusader** » Wed May 25, 2005 2:00 pm

[QUOTE=Darkwind] Using latin names of stars or plants is a good idea btw[/QUOTE]
That's exactly what I did for some of my characters. Mixed them with common names that sounded cool to me, as I'm not good for inventing cool names. I remember using Silvae as a lastname for my druid.

Brynn · Post by **Brynn** » Fri Jul 22, 2005 6:23 am

And here I am again trying to find a name for a new character... So lean back

It's not exactly for IWD, but since this thread was already here I though I'd ask for help here.

The char in question is an undead mage, and I would like to find her a name that fits and evil, unmerciful, egoist personality... Someone who walks on a dark path, destroying everything and everybody on her way, never letting anyone escape her wrath. (She's not THAT bad, it's just her name

)

I was thinking along these lines:

dark, dusk, twilight, fear, curse, fire, flames, burning, to burn down, ashes, damage, wound, power, hatred, revenge, murder, pain, inivisible, shock...

These are the words that first come into my mind when I think of this char. I tried to make up something based on the Latin matches of these words but none of them sounded really cool... Someone mentioned the Greek language eariler - do you know a decent online Greek dictionary that could help?

Thanks a lot in advance

Philos · Post by **Philos** » Fri Jul 22, 2005 10:35 am

That would be me

Hi Brynn,

I don't know of any on line sites, I imagine they exist. Maybe try Google. I have a greek lexicon at home Eng to Greek and vice versa. I will try to research some those in your list if you like. If you have some other ideas list them as well. One name I had thought of a while back that might fit the bill is Astares Thanatou. Thanatos is greek for death and Astares is the word for star. So parsed out it would be Astares Thanatou or Star of Death (Death's Star). If she is following the "dark side" destroying all before her, well, there you go.

Aramant · Post by **Aramant** » Sat Jul 23, 2005 1:06 pm

"Verbrenne Schaden" is bad German for "burning damage", and "Finsternis Aschen" is bad German for "dark ashes". I kind of like those names.

For a D&D campaign I'm writing up, I'm using a lot of German, Dutch, and Norwegian words for NPC and town names. For example, the first town the party will start in is named Zuerstadt. "Zuerst stadt" is bad German for "first town".

I also look up name etymology stuff to find actual names with meanings. Speaking of which, here's a site for first names, and here's a site for last names. Maybe that will help some.

Philos · Post by **Philos** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 2:10 pm

I realize this might be too late for your new character but none the less, here are a few words from your list plus some related ones I thought of. I will try to find some more when I get a chance.

pyr = fire
pyros = of fire
cheir = hand
cheiron = hands
nekron = dead
nekros = of the dead
dynamis = power or might
emisaesen = hated
kaio = burn
kaiomene = burning
kainai = burning (different form)
phloze = flame
phobos = fear
phobaetra = dreadful or terrible
ponaerou = evil or evil one
skotia = dark or darkness

cheiron pyros = hands of fire

thanatos pyros = death of fire or fiery death

phobaetra thanatos = terrible death

Brynn · Post by **Brynn** » Thu Jul 28, 2005 2:10 am

Thanks!!! These are good to start with!

Philos · Post by **Philos** » Fri Jul 29, 2005 1:42 pm

No problem, glad to help,

Talamascah28 · Post by **Talamascah28** » Wed Aug 10, 2005 2:08 am

I have never had trouble finding names *knock on wood* to my characters. But if I am in doubt sometimes, I refer to the Name Generator at the Barrowdowns.com site, which is about Tolkiens Universe. Or I just mix names from books, films, other adventure games, historical characters and whatever possible I find.

My current team of misfits and such is following.....

Finnrill Fury-Axe. A shield dwarven fighter/barbarian. (Finn is my dad's name. I just added the Rill to it)

Lord Ravenshield III. An Aasimar human paladin of Helm. (Yes, Ravenshield is taken from a Rainbow Six game)

Derrick Sleepyfoot. A hafling bard. (He is not quite fast on his halfling feet, which the name suggests)

Kaen El-Marr. A human rogue/fighter. (He's the black dressed arab-looking guy, so I chose an arabic sounding name)

Emoyen L`anuriel. A female elven ranger/rogue. (I have used Emoyen before. L`anuriel is taken from a henchman in Neverwinter Nights)

Xusia the Dark Witch. A female half-elven sorceress. (Xusia is taken from a B-adventure movie, though that was a male sorcerer)

You are wellcome to rip off some of these names, if you want to. But heres some other names.

Arahael
Xavier
Marcus
Daneaz
Amandil
Mortimor
Katarina
and so on....

Brynn · Post by **Brynn** » Tue Aug 23, 2005 12:36 am

Well, after hours of sweating and thinking and looking up name generators on the net, I gave up on finding a matching name for the undead char. I changed her profile too, she became a Priest instead of a Mage.

And on one sunny day I got up with the solution on my mind!!! She has to be called Vendetta!

As the One Who Takes Revenge.... I actually settled with Vindicta, that sounds more girlish and maybe not as obvious as the Italian version

Hope you like it

perato · Post by **perato** » Wed Apr 05, 2006 5:39 am

I don't know where to else put this, but when you are planning your new characters name, you should check "Wandering Village" in Chapter 3. I really don't know what was going on in game makers heads, but those names; Leevi, Jari, Venla Tahvo, Suoma(Finland is also Suomi in our language, but Suoma is still a name in here.) and Carita are actually real finnish names(though Carita is written with K, Karita). Also word Kurttu is finnish word but i really don't know how to explain it in english. It is negative adjective and used to describe elderly people(ladies mostly), means that their skin is not anymore so smooth.

Because I am from Finland, these names made me laugh quite a bit. Especially because most of them are not anymore in common use. Though I have a Cat named Leevi and know persons named 'Jari' and 'Venla'. It would quite same if you found town filled with Richards, Roberts, Edwards and so on. I would also want to know if anyone else had noticed that their names were a bit weird for fantasy game?