Fininte naming conventions

[Liadan]

Yliakum isn't our world, so that's sort of irrelevant. If both spouses agreed, they could take on the wife's name (by asking a GM).

true enough, but those who created it are from our world, therefore there is a leeching (so to speak) of our ideals into Yliakum. =)

[Raa]

* Raa leaves, unable to respond to people who want to go on about gender inequality when there is no such problem with it.

[Leama]

What if someone leaves the game for say one year and wants to return and finds his character name is being used by someone else? Is that fair? I hope Frak and many others return before they loose their names then. Grroww, Althos, Magmir and Frak please return before someone else takes your identities.

And another thought, say someone thought of the name Grroww and there are players still around who knew him; how would they know it was not the Grroww they used to play with?

[SerqFeht]

And another thought, say someone thought of the name Grroww and there are players still around who knew him; how would they know it was not the Grroww they used to play with?

Talking to the imposter for 30 seconds

[Leama]

But what about the players who want to play again with their old characters? They cannot have them back if someone is using their names? Just look in the R.I.P. section for proof. After all people come and go all the time.

[Rongar Elani]

Loosing rights on your name? Quite frankly, that's silly. The only change to the current name system that should eventually apply is that you are able to share surnames on request, in my opinion anyway. And maybe that the surname of the marriage-proposing person gets changed to the one's who is proposed to, or the other way around.

There is no need for having duplicate firstnames either, just be creative when choosing a name or use a (fantasy-)name generator. I wouldn't want my reputation to be ruined because another Rongar is doing some humbug.

[emeraldfool]

There's only one way around the whole 'finite names' thing I can think of. It's a system employed in Anarchy Online (and I think also 'Matrix Online', and a few others).

Basically, your primary name is your 'nickname'. It's the name that the system responds to, and the name that appears in chat/groups. But you can also choose first names and last names, which can be duplicates of other names. OOC, people are referred to by nicknames, but IC they're often ignored - going by the first and last names you chose yourself (which, outside of RP, are inconsequential). The nicknames are unique, and can be virtually anything, giving an unlimited number of monikers.

It would get around the problem of  90% of the decent names being taken by people who'll never come back (plus their alts) and may even force people to think harder about their characters (i.e. "So, where'd you get a nickname like that?")

Just, thinking out loud here...

[duskDN]

Ok, well I see that a good deal of the conversation has defenently strayed away from my original argument. The last post has what I perceive to be an excillent idea with the nicknames, but I have to ask what is so horrable about /tell Creg Smith rather than /tell Creg. And the same such can be said for the buddy list. Is that truely so horrible that it is inconcevible!?

[Liadan]

Ok, well I see that a good deal of the conversation has defenently strayed away from my original argument. The last post has what I perceive to be an excillent idea with the nicknames, but I have to ask what is so horrable about /tell Creg Smith rather than /tell Creg. And the same such can be said for the buddy list. Is that truely so horrible that it is inconcevible!?

okay, what if your options are /tell Craig Smyth or /tell Creg Smith ? Or how about /tell Creg Smyth? What if you've met them all and they just happened to be brown-haired Ylians? Wow...so who do you want to /tell?

[Erisnas]

Just a quick note to add on the discussion:

From past to present name came from:

Taken from father's name: Johnson
Passed down: John Smith -> Craig Smith
by occupation: Tailor (often respelled to things like Taylor)
by location: (cannot recall an example)
by events, usually tragic;
by description;

As for women not taking her husband's name in the past.  Up until the 19th-20th century it really didn't matter.  If both spouses agreed that the wife would keep her maiden name it would rarely be recorded and they could just start referring to her by that name.

The fact that the buddy system only uses first names will need to be refined eventually.  As the project of PS grows it will become more and more of an issue.  Hopefully something can be resolved.

On the Grroww statement.  You should be more worried about someone possibly being able to take the name Grrrowww instead.  This will only get complicated as things go on.

[Seryn]

Here's an idea:

I'm currently making a character (or trying to) named Seryn Wolfblade, but the name Seryn is already taken, as is 'Serin'.

So I thought of using middle names.   These could have no importance whatsoever other than each middle name must be unique.   That way, characters can have the same first and last name (last name can still have the warning so that you don't go messing with families).   /tell and other things that use the first name can use either all three names at once (ex: Seryn Reigald Wolfblade), the first and middle names, or simply the middle name.

[Dekafpx]

The fact that the buddy system only uses first names will need to be refined eventually.  As the project of PS grows it will become more and more of an issue.  Hopefully something can be resolved.

I'd say it's already an issue.  I just signed up and am trying it out, and I can't find a single first name that fits the character that's not already taken.  I'm starting to get so frustrated with trying to find one that works that it's seriously tempting me to just give up. I did take a look at the rest of the char creation system using another name that I don't want to use(but is available), and I do like the idea of it, which is half the reason I'm still banging my head against the name wall.  I wouldn't be surprised if quite a few new players run into what I have and just turn and leave without even saying anything on here.

[duskDN]

I'd say it's already an issue.  I just signed up and am trying it out, and I can't find a single first name that fits the character that's not already taken.  I'm starting to get so frustrated with trying to find one that works that it's seriously tempting me to just give up. I did take a look at the rest of the char creation system using another name that I don't want to use(but is available), and I do like the idea of it, which is half the reason I'm still banging my head against the name wall.  I wouldn't be surprised if quite a few new players run into what I have and just turn and leave without even saying anything on here.

The game's playability should not suffer from an artistic vision... and if people are already having trouble coming up with names that will be accepted by the system, than this is already happening.

What is a great fantasy world if no-one can see it?... quite simply, its a delusion. http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/delusion

[Bakin_Fundinson]

Names occupied was an issue for me in the creation of both my characters; for my first character, a Hammerwielder, I spent half an hour trying to find a name which was
a) A good name for my char RP-wise,
b) Available for use
So yes, it's an issue already. Don't know what the devs will do with that in time, but for now, it can be *made* to work

About naming conventions:
The location naming could be: Lancelot du Lac (from the Lake)
With dwarves, you use 3-5 generations of names to achieve accuracy, e.g. for court or such.
Bakin might say something like this: "I am Bakin, son of Fundin, son of Balin, and I have come here to gain Justice!"

[Prolix]

Perhaps it is something of a failure of imagination. Your dwarf does not need to sound like every dwarf out of the Lord of the Rings, nor are your preconceptions of their naming conventions necessarily accurate. I do admit that it can be a bit of a problem coming up with a name at times but that usually means you are not being creative enough.

One thing I would like to see, though, is for the random name generation code to have the duplicate name check included so that you do not have to suffer rejection when you take this course. I had 5 random names in a row rejected because either the first or last was already taken. That is just not proper.