One of my gaming conventions (I won’t say peculiarities) is to give the same name to the same class from one game to the next. Maybe it helps me remember what they are. Maybe I’m just uncreative. But it’s been going on for so long now, I just can’t stop.
Is it a Ranger? Then his name is Travis (Rangers are always male, for some reason). Why? Where did the name come from? I have no idea. It just seems to fit.
Is there a Cleric in the house? In that case, he’s Maurice (yes, really). Unless I go with a female; in that case, her name is Maureen.
Mages? Mordred if male, Morgana if female. Paladins are always Arthur (yes, a definite Arthurian influence in these cases).
Rogues can’t be anything but Fingers, whether male or female. While they usually don’t bother with picking pockets, they’re good with traps. So the name fits.
Fighters are almost always male, and that’s Mokor (you may recall him from The Mokor Letters, but that wasn’t his first adventure by any means).
Of course, if I’m replaying a game, I don’t re-use the names. But certainly for the first time out, those are the ones. What about you? Do you do this, too? Have set names for certain classes? Or do you just pick something different each time?
I think Scorpia we all have habits like you.
For me, my names are:
Paladin: Pal
Ranger: Randy
Fighters: Sir Col
Rogue: Halfwit
Cleric: Bro
Mage: Presto or Merlin
So, Scorpia, when are we going to start the most unusual skills?
Take a look at these skills from Fallout 3:
Solar Powered
Ranks Available: 1, Requirements: Level 20, Endurance 7
With the Solar Powered perk, you gain an additional 2 points to Strength when in direct sunlight, and slowly regenerate lost Health.
Lawbringer
Ranks Available: 1, Requirements: Level 14
Once you have the Lawbringer perk, any evil character you kill will have a finger on their corpse. This finger can then be sold to a certain person (whose identity is disclosed when you take the perk) for caps and positive Karma.
Same here scorp. My main character if male is always Sturm Winger and if Female is always Rachel Winger. They go ways back since my 1st ed Ad&d gaming days.. and since then no matter what the game. its always them. :)
mage = agnari
thief/trapest = gunagi
fighter(F) = khadaji
fighter(M) = zhalid
cleric = godlessone (which started out as one just slightly less powerful than a god, till i realized it also suggested no believe in a god, a cracking good setup for a cleric)
ranger = tunguska
Bargeral. In fact the name was first made up for Sierra’s “The Realm” MMO, the first game I ever played where your name had to be unique from the other players. I’d rather come up with something original instead of Lancelot12, Or @rthur. xX_Merlin_Xx is not a name, sorry.
That or some outlandish sounding semi elvish random name if I’m playing a female. But these never repeat. Sometimes they are thematic, like most of my WOW characters had a Y in them.
I tend to use the same character names as well. I’ve been using the following character names pretty commonly for several RPGs: DaveO(fighter type), Mr. Wizard, Shazar(mage), Taarna(fighter/cleric), Chop Suey(fighter), and Sylvan(bow user).
I actually have a list of names from my old pen and paper days of both my PC’s and NPC’s I invented for campaigns. I have it sorted by what class they were and I pick one when I start a new game.
The only name I don’t use anymore is Coby Cobin since he was the name of my PC for a brand new class I created for a pen and paper game that was plagiarized by an actual company. The plagerism was so blatant that all the stats, descriptions, everything was ripped off word for word. Unfortunetly my lawyer said we had very little chance to win so I didn’t persue legal recourse. That was when I learned to copywrite, not create stuff (even casually) for other people’s game systems, and never ever ever let a friend walk off with a copy of your work until you published or copywrited it. So Coby died by treachery of a friend and if I ever see that ‘old friend’ again I may just break his nose for Coby.
More than names, I have a set of characters that I have been using for 15 years or so. I still have hopes to write a fantasy book on these characters.
My first one was Petrin, that I used as both the Quest for Glory hero, and the Avatar for Ultima series.
Scorpia, what have you done when playing Legend (aka The Four Crystals of Trazere), that has the most unusual character classes out there? Do you have a standard name for a Berserker, Troubadour, Assassin and Runecaster? :-)
Being the creative person that I am, I generally use names such as Iolo, Gwenno, Janna, Dupre, Geoffrey, Mariah, or Shamino. Originality never was my strong suit. I generally use Xian for the main character since after all it is me playing him, but the party members use the above convention.
I think many of us will use the same repeatedly. It provides a continuity from game to game, and it provides an mnemonic where you can instantly associate their name with their class. I dislike it when it isn’t an option to name your character.
I see you left out your other class name, the Fooz…whatyamacallit.
I use the following when I can:
Fighter – Eric Seablade
Rogue – Mauve d’Or Mul
Mage – Forestall Grimm
Why? They were the stock characters in the default game of Tunnels of Doom on my good old TI-99/4a.
Unfortunately, most of the time, the silly name limitations in games don’t let me enter them… ToD was unique for a long time in allowing 15-character names. I was furious when Avernum 4 put an arbitrary 12-character limit on names. WHY?! For a vintage game I can cut some slack, but there is NO excuse for a modern game with plenty of memory and display flexibility.
I love how in Daggerfall, Morrowind, and Oblivion you could customize and name your own class whatever you wanted and even give it a discription.
I may be the only person who played a class in Morrowind named, “Astronaut” in homage to “Planet of the Apes”.
Vag, wow, tough luck with with Coby. My sympathies. “Astronaut”, huh? I guess you figured “Charlton” would be a bit much?
Xian, I see you prefer the “ultimate” in names ;)
Pedro, never played Legend. For games that don’t have standard classes, I usually make up a name for the character(s). Or else, go with whatever I think is closest.
In Avernum 5, I went with an all-feline party. One was the main tank, another the archer, and the other two were the spellcasters. I resurrected a name from Morrowind (I think; maybe it was Daggerfall) where I had a feline; her name was Mwerin.
That made it easy. The four were Mwokor, Mwerin, Mwaurice, and Mworgana. Obviously, all from the same clan ;)
But hey, it’s good to know I’m not alone with this practice. In fact, I kinda surprised it’s so widespread. Maybe gamers tend to think alike. Scary ;)
I always use Beltsniffer as my main hero’s name. I don’t know where it came from but it always puts a smile on my face when a game puts the name into a conversation: “Ah Beltsniffer, I see you have a quest now.”
I also always name my saves e1, e2, etc. I’m sure it would help to call them something useful, outside of town??, but it’s just one of those things.
At least in the Spiderweb games, I always use the same names. In Avernum games, the default portrait for a human male fighter looks so much like Richard Garriott that I always name him Lord British. My female slith fighter gets named Diana in a simultaneous homage to the TV miniseries V and the goddess of the hunt. The priest/fighter invariably gets named Friar Tuck, and the sorceress gets named Elyse, both for default-portrait reasons.
In Geneforge games, I always go with a Shaper class with the red/black palette and name him Akio, the Japanese equivalent of the name Lucifer, who’s been known to favor those particular colors. The creepy burning red eyes on the portrait and general Shaper pitilessness towards the value of life call for no lesser name than the Lord of the Flies himself.
Scorpia, this is slightly off topic but I strongly recommend you give Legend a try. It has a fantastic magic system (best one ever made imho) and awesome puzzles.
Grayson, uh yeah, that is an unusual name ;) Just imagine the monuments to this hero who saved the world!
Pedro, I’ll keep that in mind. Thanks.
I tend to vary them from history and lit
cleric: Friar Tuck, Sister Tereza
paladin: JenDark, Orlando, El Cid
fighter: Angela Deth or Angel Adeth (wasteland), Kalkin, Alaric, Ffhard
rogue: Gray Mouser
mage: Ged, Morgwanna
ranger: Locksley, Strider
Avernum feline: Whiskas
Scorpia,
BEFORE you try Lengend READ the reviews. It is getting a lot of bad press. And rightly so. I could not even get it installed correctly. You would do better with Dungeon Lords which is available as a RPG collection along with Gothic 3 at only $30. About 10 to $20 less than Legend for 2 games yet.
Huh, E.T., why are you trying to compare Legend, a game from 1992 or something, with Dungeon Lords or Gothic?!
Just to make sure, the game I’m talking about is this one:
http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/four-crystals-of-trazere
It’s one of my top 10 favorite RPGs ever
@ Scorpia – I would have named that class “Conneticut Yankee” but it wouldn’t fit.
Coby was a learning experience. I don’t blame the company as I believe my ex-friend passed it off as his own creation. Again, learning experience.
Pedro,
If you’re not aware, a game called Legend: Hand of God has just been released. And many people will call this game Legend for short. Word of advice, stay AWAY from this game!
E.T., gotcha. I have no intention of trying this new Legend game. :-)
I do recommend the 1992 Legend for any fans of good old dungeon romps with great push lever/block puzzles and a great magical system
Pedro, other great games similar to the ’92 Legend from about the same time (IF you can find them), would include:
Eye of the Beholder (SSI)
Dungeon Hack (SSI)
Wizardry VI Bane
Dungeon Master (FTL)
Pedro, I finally read up on Trazere (note I avoid the “L” word so no mistakes can be made ;). Found a review that detailed the magic system. Umm, no thanks. I had enough “mix and match” spells with Ultima. Sorry.