So I was looking at name generators and lists hoping to find a name I like that somehow was also available. That's a lot harder than it sounds. So I write down like 15 names and go see if any of them are available. I don't google the names I picked off the list beforehand, I just pick whichever names catch my eye and that I'd be happy to wear in Elanthia. So I make my character and in a somewhat miraculous event one of the names I liked is free. So I start playing him and think I should google the name and see if it's been used in a book or something. It ends up being a Skyrim companion's name(Marcurio). My question is, I like this name a lot but will it be looked down on or immersion breaking if I use it to others?

tl;dr Is it acceptable to use names from books/games/movies?

Given just how much fictional content is out there, it's arguably inevitable to run into some inadvertent overlap here and there. While seeing thirteen versions of Drizzt or Legolas gets really old, really fast, intentionally or unintentionally using lesser-known names from even popular works isn't something I'd ding anyone for. If you can come up with something original that isn't an eyesore, cool, but if not, whatever works (so long as it doesn't violate Policy 6).

I certainly wouldn't find Marcurio to be immersion-breaking for me.

---
Walsor Gryhm says, "Hmm, a most impressive weapon of note. I'll give you 16 silver coins for it."
You think to yourself, "This deal is getting worse all the time."

>It ends up being a Skyrim companion's name(Marcurio).

For what it's worth... I've been multi-tasking lately. As in, I have been replaying Skyrim while logged into GS.

As a person who literally has Skyrim up on her other screen right now...

... I would not have recognized that name. I wouldn't worry about it!

(PS - We all know Mjoll the Lioness is the best follower anyway.)

Signed,
Raelee and her Strings

>Speaking to Zyllah, Alyias says, "See? Raelee knows all."

Thanks for all the replies, I feel more confident that every Skyrim player isn't seeing my name and rolling their eyes now, which is a good thing.

Most of my character names are random, meaningless nonsense that I like the sound of and seem to fit the race/culture in my head.

My earliest character, Ravinder, might be the sole exception to this. It's an Indian name OOC, composed of two names, Ravi (the sun) and Indra (the King of Gods), and just happens to be a name I've always liked. When I first created him in 1995ish, I gave him a rather corny surname of "Sun-Star."

He went demonic when PC permadeath was still a thing, so I took the opportunity to quietly retcon his surname to "Alabyran" when I remade him later. And THAT name is inspired by the in-game abyran demon archetype. :)

Berkana (BEHR-KAHN-NA) comes from the Celtic rune of the same name. I was big into pulling a rune each morning when I woke up, and each evening when I went to bed at night, and that rune often "stuck" to my fingers.

I also liked that Berkana was symbolic of the birch tree, which yields in tempestuous storms; and that all of the feminine mysteries are contained within the rune.

It also was indicative of a fresh perspective, a good start — which I was doing after having hit a wall physically and emotionally with my warrior.

Add to that, it can symbolize a rebirth or a burst of creativity. Definitely changing from a square to a pure caster was a big adjustment, and her own personality just developed from there.

I liked that the Berkana rune frequently signals that, in personal relationships, emotional support, nurturing, and a "standing by" of loved ones is primary.


The warrior's name is identified as male, despite my having added an extra vowel to her name to more feminize it. One definition of the name amuses me:

"People with this name have a deep inner desire to create and express themselves, often in public speaking, acting, writing, or singing. They also yearn to have beauty around them in their home and work environment. They are excellent at analyzing, understanding, and learning. They tend to be mystics, philosophers, scholars, and teachers. Because they live so much in the mind, they tend to be quiet and introspective, and are usually introverts. When presented with issues, they will see the larger picture. Their solitary thoughtfulness and analysis of people and world events may make them seem aloof, and sometimes even melancholy."

I laugh because this is close/true to myself as well as the character.

~* Berkana *~

"Yet from those flames; No light, but rather darkness visible."
"The most obvious Truth is hidden deep within, and only you will ever know it."

Talinvor came from an attempt at Talon, which to my chagrin was already used. That was me 15 years ago, trying to be wicked cool with a short and succinct name like Bleeds, Blades, Briars (wait... why did they all start with 'B'?)

Failing that course, I thought perhaps I could find something that would allow it to be more culture-ish. Tahlad led the Dhe'nar. How about combining Talon with Tahlad and add a glottal stop to make it more stand-out and dhe'nar-ish, So his name became Tah'lon.

But wait! GS doesn't allow an apostrophe in the first name (just the last)!

Ok ok, now what do I do?

In the meantime, brothers decided to make twin characters (we still grumble about that decision now). We came up with a mutually liked last name of Vorrith.

Surion Vorrith, Tal's twin ends up being named after a military helicopter. He liked the copter and the name.

So how to get Tah'lon Vorrith to work? Well, he is a bard. Bards have stage names and authors have noms-de-plume. I started writing a story, where he was incognito and on the spot - the first and last names got mashed together phonetically to make "Talinvor".



-==Social Media Stuff==-

Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/talinvor

Twitter:
https://twitter.com/vorrith

Website:
http://tahlon.obsidiantower.com

Oh my goodness, such thoughtful replies. Okay so let's take another stab at Saffrey. We know why I picked the name but what about her parents?

So the elven word for sapphire is lule, eyed or having eyes is henib. So she could be Lulehenib (sapphire eyed) or Heniblule (having eyes of sapphire).
Having grown up in the West, her parents took to calling her Sapphire in the common tongue and more affectionately Saffrey.

Should she ever need to formally introduce herself, it would be as Heniblule. Pronounced He-nib-lou-lay.

Most of my name inspiration for the past few years has come from a name generator program I wrote based upon letter combinations and logic which appeal to me personally. It generates a whole lot of garbage, an occasional interesting names, and lots of ideas that just beg to have a letter replaced here or there, a prefix or suffix added or subtracted, and suddenly you have an interesting seed.

Marijka started out as one of those, but I intentionally evolved it aiming for an Eastern European feel as I was in the mood for linguistic influences that are uncommon to me. Significantly later I googled it and discovered that it's actually a valid (if unusual, apparently) name in Dutch. The original pronunciation I had in mind, which was abandoned the same day, sounded very Russian or Lithuanian to my admittedly inexperienced ear.

Saepre, as well as the very similar Keprae, came fully formed from my name generator. I have a fondness for ae combinations, or more accurately, the æ dipthong, and this appears to come up disproportionately often in the file of generator-generated name suggestions which I keep as interesting ideas.

Aetammel has been around long enough that I don't recall entirely for certain, but I believe that it was a combination of two name generator suggestions. There's that uncommonly common æ again.

Kamiel predates my name generator entirely. I believe it was made up from whole cloth, but it may have been influenced by existing names at some point. I've been using it for healer characters across any number of games/settings for well over a decade now.

Nakaira is another name generator product, which I believe I tweaked to add a vowel or two but mostly is faithful to the original suggestion.

Ping me out of the forums sometime and I'll drone on and on about a naming convention project (unrelated to my name generator) until your eyes glaze over...

---

https://gswiki.play.net/Marijka

Laelithonel: Mari is like getting a giant wheel of smoked gouda with a cute pink bow on it
Laelithonel: it's exciting. i'd love the wheel. i know eating it will kill me

I'm struggling to think of where I came up with Alisaire. I vaguely recall it being a more vaguely feminine version of Artaire, which was an old character of mine predating playing GS and who, very briefly, was rolled up in GS3 either in the late 90s or very early 00s (just before creating Alisaire) as a dark elven bard. I have always pronounced her name as "Alice Air", as in, "Come Fly the Friendly Alice Airs!", with a slightly stronger emphasis on the -AIRE part. She pronounces it Al-ee-SHAR-rah, written most often as Ali'sharra.

I have a few names that were less inspired, and a couple - including my sorcerer, Nehari - who came straight out of the GS name generator. Sometimes you can get some good ones out of it.

>PS: GK- the origins of that lie in a chat room...

LIES AND SLANDER.

- Overlord EK

>You now regard Eorgina with a warm demeanor.

In OOC terms:

At the moment I am really only running one character. With my spare characters that might eventually become more real, I impose the constraint of: "It has to plausibly sound like it could be a name, avoid concatenating words or gibberish or tweaked spellings." Then it is a question of sound parts that are mood appropriate, like how Tolkien constructed Black Speech to be clearly dark. Morgoth, nazgul, and so on. I might use a random name generator to spark inspirations for things to twist into names.

"Xorus" is not consistent with this process, it is just something I came up with when I was 11 or 12. I ended up using it when it became possible to use it. Initially it was not. It was freed up in a name purge almost twenty years ago. It is short and reasonably name-ish. It has held up well for something coined by a brain that young.


In IC terms:

I am gradually developing a world setting specific academic discipline for the character. It is increasingly looking like "philology" should be part of this background. The nominal premise is that his true relatively secret background is in a cult, and the cult members are basically born into theological roles. "Xorus" is one of those roles. It is supposed to mean something to the effect of "dreadlord", which isn't something that would be widely known. The surname is the actual identifier, but it has no familial meaning. In his case he is the Xorus Kul'shin. Kul'shin is an adopted nom de guerre. It is "shadow of death" in the ancient dead language Iruaric, which still exists in the Broken Lands.

Except Kenstrom's telepathic NPC Rodnay refers to him as "Dreadlord" because he is looking directly at the meaning. And that apparently has spread around enough that even Larton's wife refers to him as Dreadlord in public now. What that actually signifies is opaque, and you'd have to be deep into some very dark cult to be at all familiar with it.

That being said, the study of dead languages and mythology is part of the character's Faendryl-facing adopted identity, so I have an excuse for it. The idea is that there have been failed attempts to understand the origins of the Dark Elven language, which shares no etymological roots with any known language of this world or the demonic ones.

The premise he will roll out when pressed on it is that in the academically constructed proto-language the linguists have speculated for Dark Elven, the term that is most closely transcribed as "Xorus" means something to the effect of "dreadlord", and that it is related to ancient heterodox mythologies and fanatical religions from even before Despana in the Southron Wastes regarding the resurrection of the Ur-Daemon. He will dismiss it as a pseudonym he uses for his field work, because it is too dangerous to use a Faendryl identifying name, since he has to frequently interact with very dangerous figures and sinister orders. And that leveraging this mythology has currency in some circles.


Pronunciation

Since it is supposed to be meaningful in some esoteric dead language, and possibly a relative of the Dark Elven language which is likely demonic in origin, it is probably the case that only Dark Elves are physically capable of correctly pronouncing it. Humans and so on will just pronounce it as: "ZOR-us." There might be a slight, almost sub-audible click at the beginning, which is why it is transcribed with an X instead of a Z. The exact pronunciation presumably goes outside the human sensory range for phonetics.


- Xorus' player

(And regarding the original post: As long as it is a minor character, accidental overlaps are no big deal. If it is a very recognizable term in something else, however, it will be glaring to people familiar with that source material. Even if it is being missed by everyone else. Better to not uphill battle the preconceived images tied to it.)

I don't mind names that are found in books or other existing fantasy. In line with Mourne's thoughts, I usually only find them jarring if the name is something extremely recognizable or mainstream. Personally, I dislike names like Synnamon (Cinnamon - random example) more than a random moniker borrowed from something the player loves, purley because misspellings are jarring in and of themselves.

As such, I will admit that my Gemstone character names have all stemmed from an obscure book series that I read years ago. How I've chosen those names has varied: Some days it was just a name that I liked and wanted to use, other times there were names that just seemed to suit the characters to which they were given. In the end, I prefer to spend most of my creative energy on the character itself and the nuances of their personality rather than their name. (That's the fun part for me.)

Abrimel (AB-rih-mell) - Unfortunately the ostentatious troublemaker has a nickname, Bree, that doesn't quite match with the actual pronunciation, but we can blame that on Nicolao.
Azryen (AZ-ree-yen) - This was chosen because, to me, it suited the character's androgynous appearance and encompassed the contrast of his abrasive personality.
Cethe (seeth) - I love the simplicity of this name, especially when paired with the complexity of the character it belongs to.

-JD
(Ohi guys, I'm still alive! I'll be back to normal capacity again soon.)

>Unfortunately the ostentatious troublemaker has a nickname, Bree, that doesn't quite match with the actual pronunciation, but we can blame that on Nicolao. -Bree

Nico only gives this-isn't-your-name-at-all nicknames to his favorite people. Nyah.

---
Walsor Gryhm says, "Hmm, a most impressive weapon of note. I'll give you 16 silver coins for it."
You think to yourself, "This deal is getting worse all the time."

Once upon a time there was the heart of a bardess ... out in the real world.

The Bardon nagged her for three weeks, maybe longer, to come and see Elanthia. He was RELENTLESS.

Figuring she had met her equal, she formed a plan to at long last hush him up by just doing what he had asked, and she could then go on with her pale shade of an existence. She had sort of promised him she would go see this new creation of his, anyway.

And so one last time he asked ... and she complied. He gave her the beta page number. She entered.

Downward she sank through the layers of text until she was staring at a screen asking her for a name. She should have expected this, but she came completely unprepared.

And there she paused over the HUGE number of agonizing decisions she had to make - cluelessly.

Profession
It was a process of elimination. She was not a fighter, nor a thief. She was not a mage. That left cleric.

... er, what's a cleric again? Oh, well, onward

Gender
EASY .. female.

Name
5 years of Latin never failed her in an emergency. And this was clearly an emergency. Lux for light. -elle because she was female. It wasn't a Latin solution, but this wasn't Rome. And then she made up a surname, which was more of an echo than anything else. She was feeling the pressure of time tick, tick, ticking.

Lightclad.

[It turned out there were no surnames in GS2.]

Race
Wow, she had to pick one! She picked Elf. She'd read Tolkien, et. al. There are ELVES in fantasy!

It must have taken 20 minutes to create that character. And before you jump to any conclusions about stats and stuff, the questions above were pretty much all there was to creating the character.

And this was how Elanthia fell into her life. Unexpectedly. Some things were never the same again.

This was just about names, so I will stop this story right there.

I will add that I was utterly STUNNED to find the name still untaken in GS4 when I returned a few years ago.

The Luxelle of GS2 is a great-great Auntie for the Luxelle that adventures today. I ... have a family tree to prove it. Some people have even SEEN said family tree.

---
;tune towncrier
Rohese: "... the TownCrier (tune in if you haven’t, it’s without doubt the best thing to ever happen on LNet)"
Xanith: "It's flat out amazing"
Doug: "100.times ^"

TownCrier News Submission link: http://bit.ly/TownCrierNews
Town

I never had plans for Pup. No intention to rp him long term or make up a past or really anything at all. The name has no secret meaning and dont even know why i picked it. The character himself grew i to who he iz and his history has slowly build out as time goes on. Now i have more a backstory for him but even that does not include the history of his name.

It's less interesting than most stories, but I actually picked up Bristenn Mires from this program called EBON/Everchanging Book of Names, which is a pretty cool name generator I'd use for D&D etc back in say '98 or so (my convert status says 7/17/97, but I dunno). It was intended to sound British/Welsh with a little Anglo-Saxon tilt but within the ole medieval fantasy genre.

Though it was by chance, it was actually several days worth of considering different names (some of which I used for alts over the years, others like Colfren became his middle name, etc), but this one just sounded right for the character I set out to play. I don't think by any other name he'd be the same character- which goes to show you how much it resonated with me via a eureka moment when I pieced it together.

Pronunciation-wise, the double consonant is intended to give a slight bit more emphasis to the second syllable of Bristenn- so, bris-ten, in a way that while similar to 'Kristen' it has more of a stop consonant (I think that's the term) with the hard t and a little germination/elongation with the n. Mires just sounds like that- mī(ə)rs, ala quagmire, or wallow in the mire, etc. I'm not really a linguist, so I'm more or less guessing on the terminology, but you get the gist.


-james, bristenn's player

---

You think to yourself, "FFF-"

A giant white bunny hurls a powerful lightning bolt at you!

You evade the bolt by a hair!

"Necios" means foolish or silly ones in Spanish. I chose it to match my personality a few years ago. I have since become quite serious. Perhaps I should visit the rename pavilion.

It is pronounced "NEH-see-ohs" though after incredible bouts of consternation and correcting others, I have begun responding to "NEK-ee-ohs", "Neshious" (rhymes with Precious - thanks to Naamit for that gem ;)), and "NEEK-os," among others.

---

GameMaster Necios
Overlord of Icemule Trace
Champion of subject/verb agreement
Honorary BADNAME committee chair

The ghostly voice of Dirvy softly says, "Just shove my soul back in me where it belongs."

<Dirra Crawfinn>

This is absolutely no relation to my ranger, Diria, by the way.

Starchitin

A severed gnomish hand crawls in on its fingertips and makes a rude gesture before quickly decaying and rotting into dust. A gust of wind quickly scatters the dust.

>> It is pronounced "NEH-see-ohs" though after incredible bouts of consternation and correcting others, I have begun responding to "NEK-ee-ohs", "Neshious"
(rhymes with Precious - thanks to Naamit for that gem ;)), and "NEEK-os," among others.




... my screen reading program pronounces it as "Nee-see-ohs". Dare you call a robot program wrong? Haha.

I'm always too amused at how my text-to-speech program actually read's people's names versus how people indicate it should be pronounced. Sometimes it's pretty spot on, though sometimes not.

About two years ago I came up with a new character concept... a near-sighted burgal gnome who used crossbows. Yes, the concept for him was cartoony, but my previous main was a jerk so I went in the opposite direction. His name was Squintey, har har, but he would tell people his real name was Barthollomew. While I was toying with his training to see if a gnome wizard crossbow user would actually work I had a conversation with another player who said, "So why don't you just name him Barthollomew?" So when I figured out the best stats and skill training I wanted I just rerolled him and couldn't be happier with the outcome.

Why Barthollomew? It was part of his cartooniness to have a long multi-syllable name that was a bit silly. I haven't seen it used much in any capacity and it was available. The name itself is biblical but means "son of" someone or another and has no colorful meaning.

Chad, player of a few