I was reading a post by Surcum the other day when he wrote "Surcum / Marcus" or something like that and I realized his name was an anagram (for the first time). Anyhoo, I thought it would be interesting to find out the origins of some of your names... Some of them I know already, some I think I have a good idea of, so I will speculate a bit.. feel free to do the same.

As for my name? Draagun is the the name of my MPBT(multiplayer battletech) clan. I suspect it was spelled that way because <DRAGON> was already taken. When I came to EQ, I named my character after the clan so that I could be identified, since by the time EQ started, DRAAGUN had already been around for years and was probably the best known clan name in MPBT. The "soulstealer" part was just my surname cause it sounded like a cool necro surname. When we got the ability to change our surname, it was changed to "Dwarvepunter" because I used to love killing the Dwarves on the BB docks.

Anyhoo, here are my Speculations about other peoples names:

Frymn
Because in real life, he is a fireman.

Rugen Because he collects model tugboats and that is the sound of his favorite one.... Or something to do with "tugging" I dunno.

Joxur Originally Yenn or Venn or both (I can't remember) I am guessing since adding a "X" or a "z" to a word was all the rage to make it cool, When Joxur rolled his bard, he figured he would be running a lot (jogging) decided to make it cool by adding the X.. or - It's like "Joker" cause he's so goddamn funny.

Worthy Self esteem issues, I guess. He wanted to let you know that he was a WORTHY cleric to add to your raid.

Tarot .. because she is so into tarot card readings.... Maybe she was eating tater tots while making her necro... hmm.

Venen Random name generator.

Given I suspect, he was rolling a rogue and had the foresight to think about a surname. I bet he was going to have a clever name like "Given Ittoyafrombehind" some something along those lines....

Binkee...halfling name. Because he wanted to be sucked on? Not sure why the furry toes though....

Vanamar Because he was living in a van down by the river at the time.

Crowde Control Sounds like an unimaginative enchanter alt.

Cakvala Something to do with the sound a person makes when gagging on something.... I dunno. This one has me stumped... weren't you an enchanter?

Nimloth Klingon for Necromancer (little known fact)

Anyhoo, would really be interested in reading how / why most of you decided on your names. Most of us have been using the same names for so many years that we are miffed to see it in use anywhere else. I know anytime I create a new gaming character and Draagun is already taken, I am pretty pissed. heh.

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Both my names are totally unoriginal.

Venn because phonetically it was the same word used in the 13th Warrior to describe the bad guys. Sounded cool. BTW, Yenn was a RL friend of mine and we were two separate warlocks.

Joxur because that was the name of the only character I could tolerate from Xena when my ex-wife used to make me watch it, clockwork-orange-style. Think the character was a bard so it sprang to mind when I made Joxur the bard.

Crowde Control was my character in EQ, pretty much just named him after his role. Was never an alt.

Rugen Payne was purely me playing with letters and sounds trying to find something that sounded like it matched the little dwarf model on my screen. I am guessing you are pronouncing it "rug in" from your comments, which is incorrect. Roo gehn is how it is said.

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My usual character names:

Bearne. Was Bearne Ekkid. It's just a play on words "bear nekkid" combined with the gay male definition of 'bear.'

Dreorg. It's a modification of an Old English adjective that means "dripping with blood." The word is "dreorig" and is use in Beowulf to describe the benches in the mead hall Heorat after Grendel's attack.

Gromitt. only used for gnomes or halflings. Started as a pen-n-paper D&D character who started at level 1 as "Gromitt the Not Yet Famous" and graduated through surnames like "Gromitt the Occassionally Spoken Of," "Gromitt the Rather Well Known In Certain Circles," etc. His EQ version was Gromitt Gunn (another play on words).

Other than that, I usually go for names that have the right sound for the game / race / class in question. Like a frost mage named Eis, or blood elves named Rialanth and Eralor.

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Hope is the new black.

Like the magic hair grow shampoo?

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Board name Krby because my initials are KRB and one of my co-workers way back when I was at an upstart ISP started calling me Kirby due to that. I thought that it would be a decent message board name so I went to just Krby and for added uniqueness I added the 71 to the end (year of birth and my football number)

I give up. lol.

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It's pronounced like the Six Fingered Man. Geez - what kind of geek are you?

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Hope is the new black.

Surcam because Sucram doesn't sound very cool.

Phread (pronounced "Fred") was my Ogre. And because of the Flintstone look of the buildings in Ogguk I was going to attempt "Phread Phlintstone." Anyway, I was going around Ogguk with a hot key that I pressed as I passed people that was something like "Me am Phread . Me not dead. Me no bard but singin' not hard." Then some dark elf stopped me and asked me what my last name was going to be and said that maybe because I like to sing that maybe I was "Right-Said-Phread." So, about 14 levels later I became too sexy for my shirt (but not the drive-thru) and became "Phread Ritesaid."

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vanamar was given to be by the random name generator (or some variant thereof was and I just changed the spelling). I've used it in most mmorpg's in some form since.

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World of Warcraft: Kallaystra, Gweila, Steakumn, Tarathia [ Feathermoon/Horde ]

It was that obvious?! Very true though. I pretty much cycled through until I saw something reasonable. Sounded good.

I chose Jeka mostly because I wanted a 4 letter dark elf sounding name. I didn't research or anything, just the sound. The same with my last name. It turned out to be Russian or German or something. Before that I had a troll warrior named Chubb Adubdub, cuz trolls were chubby, and the last name is a clever play on the nursery rhyme Rub-a-Dub-Dub.

i'm the guy in the op

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Aaramis - reference to the musketeers; altered spelling for some pathetic semblance of originality. Was also previously a D&D character name when I was a teen, and continued with it in EQ.

(my alts:
Aerendil - reference to LoTRO, but altered the spelling (1) to be more consistent with my other char, having an "A" to start the name, and (2) the LoTRO spelling was "Earendil", and given the penchant for creating shortened nicknames in MMOs, I didn't want to be known as "Ear".

Telomir - reference to a character in the Exiles trilogy by Melanie Rawn.)

Varan from the obscure giant monster movie 'Varan the unbelievable". Also the genus for Monitor Lizards is Varanus and I owned a Monitor long ago.

Lorax of course from Dr Seuss. He was a druid after all.

Elessar was obvious. I used it in MUDs looooooooong before those fucking movies came out and ruined everything. Taliesn is an intentional misspelling of Taliesin (the Welsh poet or "bard").

Tyral is a tribute to my patron god, Tyr. I pronounced "Teer-all" until someone messaged me during a Lanys Live show and insisted it should be pronounced "Tie-rel." I asked around and pretty much everyone agreed that I was pronouncing my own name wrong, so I went with the majority. lol

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Not that I'm well known, but Uluth was a character in a D&D realm back in the day, Dark Sun I think. His original name was Uluth'Gak which became my iksar's name because it was the only thing I could think of that sounded reptilian and wasn't cliche.

Siriath was a D&D character I made that was an elven ranger. So, he was my first character that I created during the Velious era.

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There is no such thing as right or wrong; only pleasure and pain.

Alts:

Shoehead Footinmouth - Dwarf Zerker. I just liked the name Shoehead, when I asked in guild for last name suggestions two people typed "Footinmouth!" at the same time, so I had to do it.

Fooshun Reactorr - Gnome Wizard. Get it? sigh.

Uglore Zigzog - Troll Sk, Old D+D character named, just liked it.

Goke Bodysnatchurr - Iskar Necro - Old japanese vampire movie, Goke - Bodysnatcher from hell.

Dansurr Prancervixen - a guildie had alts named Dasher and Blitzen, so I used a few more reindeer.

miramicha cause I wanted something unique in google,

oh wait, I had that long before google existed =p

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Jake Rivers - Senex Legio
Get off my Lawn alliance

Tyral -

They were wrong.

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Hope is the new black.

I had the names Rune and Spite for my necros on other servers and I wanted something that sounded 'magic-y' and both those were already taken on Lanys, hence 'Tarot'. Many people assumed I was some variation of pagan for a looooong time because I didn't discuss religion for a loooong time. (Though when people emailed me asking me if I did tarot readings I'd tell them I knew how, but no...I do not.)

Hazel (my cleric) is based on Hazel Stone from the Heinlein books

Rishara (another name I commonly use) is from a short story from one of the Marion Zimmer Bradley anthologies, though I forget the name of the story (though I do remember what it was about) I liked the name.

Redfeather/s/ for when I need yet another name or a hunter-y name, based on one of my parrots who's an African Grey (they have red tail feathers).

Marian - my real name. And I use '3' or variations of it like '333' when Marian is taken on email addys etc, because I'm the 3rd Marian (mother, grandmother also Marian).

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Bzalthek: First toon, random name, troll warrior = Bzanx. Liked the BZ combo and troll shaman on Lanys was Bzalthek. Over the years all my toons adopted the BZ prefix. (Bzasha, Bzera, Bzartok, Bzergle, etc.)

There was a certain unmistakable style to that Random Name Generator. I can't quite put my finger on it, but I know it when I see it.

Rugen: What sound does a tugboat horn make in cartoons? Isn't it like "aaaROOOOOGhEN" No? Lol, I did a youtube search (briefly) looking for the sound I was talking about... heh. That is NOT what I was talking about. But funny, nonetheless.

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Maybe I am thinking of like an old-time cartoon car horn... shit I dunno.. "The cow goes bark"

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Thank you! I'll go back to pronouncing it the way I wanted to.

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for my actual toon names...

My first Diablo toon was a barbarian named Gwr. It seemed like a good Barbarian name and at that time I was a big Mark McGwire fan.

Later I created a Diablo Paladin named Ghanis (pronounced Guh-haa-Nis). This was a re-spelling/pronouncing of Guinness

I then started playing EQ, my first EQ toon was a Barbarian Warrior Gwr (continuation) and not too long later came the Wood-Elf Ranger Ghaani (pronounced guh-HAAN-e) I had thought about making a Wood Elf Druid named Ghanis to continue that line but I enjoyed the Ranger too much. By the time Ghaani hit 20 Gwr was long gone (hated the blind Barbarian Warrior - I couldn't see to go into Blackburrow from Halas) and Ghaani got the surname Draaght.

It wasn't until a few years later that a Pakistani friend and co-worker informed my about Mirza Habib Ghaani (pronounced g-HAN-e). Was strange cause I thought I jumbled the word.

Other EQ toons:
Larz Ktulu - Barbarian Shaman, Ode to Metallica
Zozan Montreaux - Erudite Mage, Ode to Led Zeppelin
Renezart - Iksar Shadow Knight
Skeert Uhnuthin - gnome Shadow Knight, seemed like a good Gnome name

When I moved to WoW I decided to take the Ghaani name there so I created the Night Elf Hunter, Ghaani. Shortly thereafter I created the Pally, then named Guuinnes (misspelling to seem different, but still pronounced the same). I flip-flopped on these as to which was my main and alt. I also brought over Zozan as a Human Mage but he became a bank mule.

After the Absolute Chaos implosion I wanted to start over on a new server so I created a Dwarf Warrior on Gnomeregan right after it opened. I thought that this would be my new main so he had to have a good name worthy of a Dwarf so he took over Guuinnes. When transfers were opened up to Gnomer, I decided to bring my Pally over (he was still better geared than anyone on the server and I hadn't played him in six months!) But since my Warrior had the name Guuinnes, I had to change his name. Gabbath was chosen. Look up Gabbatha, the place of the Judgment seat - good Pally name. I think I was the only Gabbath in WoW. I know I was the only Ghaani.

My first character here was Adastra Perardua. Originally came up as Adas on the RNG, it chimed my memory about an old saying "Ad Astra Per Aspera" - the Astronomer's creed (to the stars through hardships). But it seemed too chipper, and since necromancers aren't feel-good, so I did a search online and found Ad Astra Per Ardua, which means "Through adversity to the Stars" (more at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Per_ardua_ad_astra ).

I'm a big lore/story freak. I don't know if anyone remembers the novice stories I posted about Adastra, but I wanted to be Agnostic, since I couldn't worship Luclin. (I still pronounce it Lou-Klen.) But apparently the period of time where you could be an Agnostic necro passed once I got my account, and I had to choose Cazic-Thule. Meh.

A few levels later, I rolled up a Dark Elf Shadowknight to give the class a try. I took a Romanian-esque background for her, and as a joke, I named her Syuni D'zpecyzczn (Sunny Disposition). She became my favorite, and I played her through three retirements.

My first character was Bauldar, pretty self explanatory. Baldur's Gate had come out recently and I liked the name but didn't want to copy it letter for letter.

Snarky came a few years later. It was more a play on the word Sarnak than just using the word but as I played her more it turned out to be a great description.

Neesha just sounded like a good female Dark Elf name when I was trying to come up with a name. She never had a last name.

Little-known fact: My first character in EQ was an Iksar Monk (I got the game when Kunark first came out). His name was Sss something or other. I hated it because I never saw any other races as a n00b, just Iksar after Iksar, so I made Neesha just so I could see some other races running around (little did I know that Dark Elves were hated by so many races). I liked the idea of a female badass who dealt in dead things so I continued to play her and never touched the Monk again after like lvl 8.

I like this thread-- fun reading .

My name Fribur came from the random name generator on EQ. It means nothing. I really like it though, because I have yet to buy a game, sign up for an online service, and find the name already taken. It's unique, yet simple to remember and pronounce.

If you find a Fribur on any other game you play, it's likely me.


Now don't be an ass and take it on some new game :p

I'd been playing UO on the pacific server since like November of 1997 and left Japan to go to North Carolina. While my personal goods were en route my neighbor in the dorms was playing EQ as a wizard. I saw him running around and whatnot and was intrigued. Night was really night! Little glowy orbs acted as flashlights!...spells looked cool, etc etc etc....

I played UO for a month or 2 longer at most and picked up a copy of eq. When I make a char in one of these games I first pick the class, sex and then appearance. I'll sit and stare at the character rotating on the screen until an appropriate name pops into my head. Larreth just seemed like a druidy, celtic kind of name. I believe I was one of the first druids to have the Wolf related surname as well. Larreth Wolfsong just kind of rolled off the tongue. Helped a bit that I spent more time in wolf form than out lol...

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Larreth Wolfsong (long retired)
Lanys T'vyl, Everquest

Zinky, Lvl 60 Warlock
Thunderhorn, WoW

Cakvala is what came from the random name generator in EQ. So yeah!

Cakvala Mal :0

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"Creating Havoc and Pie Since 2001!"
My Website: http://www.anthonyhays.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/cakvala

Austriana was a random name I picked one of the very few times I played DnD with my ex-husband. I liked the name, and it sounded "elfy," so I kind of kept it around. I've been asked if I'm from Austria before because of it...and while it was unintentional, I do have Austrian heritage. :p

Isendre the cleric is named after a minor character in Robert Jordan's series.

Daenerys (my enchanter) is named after a character in George R.R. Martin's Song of Ice & Fire series.

Mitzada, my ranger, is named after the mountain Masada, in Israel. In Hebrew, it's pronounced like my ranger's name.

I've also used the name Livanna before in various online situations. It means moon in Hebrew.

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Most of my character names are Sumerian deities. I used to study ancient near eastern society.

Mine is my Hash name.

My primary, Xianle, is a Chinese name that is often found in old stories and legends. Happytiger also ties into the Chinese theme and is actually a brand of candy.

My alt, Livak, is a name I chose to be elven-sounding while being harsh, representative of these amazing people growing up in the dangerous lands of Faerun.

I also had Anathae, which is a corruption of my real name, Nathaniel.

I always played chicks in EQ to get free stuff.

^
win

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Hope is the new black.

Cakvala took his last name from my alt Taso Mal (Vah Shir Rogue). I have proof! He wanted to stroke the kitteh!

I'm just kidding of course.

Cuchulainn Setanta was my primary, and a name that a few also took in various spellings. He was Ireland's greatest hero (Celtic mythology has always been an interest of mine). He seemed to tie in well as a barbarian.





For his surname, I simply took his original name (Setanta).

I can't remember my alt's names anymore, so I can't explain about those, heh.

Happytiger was Xian's last name, not Xianle's, if I recall correctly.

Ah, you might be right Jox. Always got those two mixed up.

I think Happytiger was Xianle's surname. Xian had something else.

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World of Warcraft: Kallaystra, Gweila, Steakumn, Tarathia [ Feathermoon/Horde ]

I think Xian's last name was Tian or something like that.

Yes i had a attraction to your furbal rogue!

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"Creating Havoc and Pie Since 2001!"
My Website: http://www.anthonyhays.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/cakvala

Nope, it was Xianle's.

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My first character I ever played on lany's was <Dragoonist> he was a half elf warrior. I named him after the Playstation game Legend of Dragoons. Love that game.

Then Kelinye just popped into me head when I was creating a female dark elf. For some reason it just seemed right.

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Lich Lord of Lanys

So it had nothing to do with...


Really?

And Bello isn't just "boy" in italian?





My Sig Rules

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I knew I recognized that name

Vexana: Tried for something evil and hawt for a dark elf. Vixen, ebil.. go fig. Been using it since.

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Oh my

Wakkagud Ondahed is supposed to sound like Whack a good on the head. Figuredit sounded like a trolls name and ran with it. Wikhed Wayze is another variation on spelling and pronunciation word play. Also had a gnome wizard named Paulee Gnomial.

In Tribes lore there is a guy named Harabeck Weathers, all my EQ characters had variations of that and Harabakc was the rogue which I played until I quit.

DarkOmen is from my old Diablo days, I collected 160 ears in 2 days on 4 different characters(40 inventory spaces), it was a bad sign to see me coming.

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Marauder Harabakc Goat

Bovinity Divinity: The Ben & Jerry's ice cream of the same name.

I have no idea why I used it. I just did, ages and ages ago on my first troll SK character in EQ and it just kinda stuck.

I made a Wizard named "Home" with the intention of giving him the surname "James" at level 20 because I thought I was ridiculously clever. I made it to level 6 and was killing stuff in west commons or something when a GM stopped me and told my that my name was a violation of the rules and asked me to change it. I refused, so they named me Zatronn. I was going to rebel and reroll another wizard, but apparently I am too lazy. I did name him Zatronn Homejames at 20 though, as a token display of ineffectual rebellion.

What the fuck is a "Home James?"

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It's typically something you would say sarcastically or playfully to a person named James who is to drive you to your house...unless you're in a sitcom playing a rich person, in which case you say it in as condescending fashion as you can.

Nimloth was the name of one of the white trees of the Númenor (which ended up being seeding of the trees of Gondor), it may be Klingon for Necromancer but that's certainly not the origin.

Khaless Waela means foolish trust in Dark Elven.

I scare myself with my own geek levels sometimes

Home James is related to the term Home Slice, which in tern is related to Homey.