So I suck with names ... Options

[Argentis]

Hey guys, how do you come up with names? I'm terrible with this at the best of times, and I'm gearing up to run my first game, and I'm going to need names for all sorts of people. Heck I have trouble naming my own PCs.

Any and all help appreciated,
Argentis

[Stahlseele]

something like this might help you with that.
http://www.behindthename.com/random/

[Poison Shadow]

For human-sounding normal names, just google baby names, or family names from various countries (depending on the enthnicity of the character). For dragons and wierd creatures, I just mish-mash syllables into something cool-sounding after saying random names out loud for a while. For nicknames and street names for runners, just give them a name that decribes what they do or what they're good at, like Cutter, Wheels, Hackman or something. Write down cool names you think up or overhear, keep a list that you can just look up if you're stuck for a name in the middle of a game.

[Angelone]

I usually just steal them or take existing words and mash em up.
Angelone is a song by Beborn Beton that described the character I was designing perfectly. "Angelone a decent perfection. A real b*tch at the same time."
Nimbell is my Vanguard character. Comes from the word nimble of course.
Seethrin is a brooding combat monster. Comes from the word seethe.

[deek]

Names come easy to me and I like to make them up. Granted, most have a fantasy sounding undertone, but for games like DnD and WoW, that works.

If I am not making a name up, I then just steal it from something. I have a DnD character named Barnaby Jones and a Combat Arms player named PatMorita...

[Dhaise]

My players have a tradition of giving each other handles and callsigns by the end of the first run. They come up with their given names etc before the campaign starts. The results are usually humorous or reflective of some big incident in the run.

[Red-ROM]

Something to keep in mind when coming up with names, make sure they are easy enough to say, I know in fantasy especialy, you can throw a bunch of syllables together and have everyone saying Geroanouline or Esoulwquiur. pre-gaming a list of names is key. I like spliting them into sub categories; punks, Yakuza, security, wage slave, screen names, magic users, native american. some of these are interchangable, but it helps me thnk of names when I can picture different types of people. Also, SR fluff is full of names, my personal favorite- Strawberry Switchblade.

[Ed_209a]

I pick real names for modern-ish settings by opening a book and taking the first name from the first full name I see, and the last name from the second full name. It gives natural enough names for me.

Street names are harder. A 400BP newbie is likely to get laughed out of a runner bar with a name like "Doomstalker" or "Killer McBloodletter". I go by the theory that cool nicknames generally come from others, lame nicknames generally come from the person themselves.

I come up with a name that isn't ridiculous, but isn't presumptuous either. Then I make up a story for how the character got the name.

For example, my last SR char was an Orc street sam named Monkey. He got the name from a teammate who got on Monkey's bad side by saying "someone get this fragging monkey out of my way before I have to put him down." The teammate had a bad, bad day after the 'run was over.

[Zen Shooter01]

Someone said already but it bears repeating that you can Google lists of baby names, as well as search terms like "Japanese surnames", "Russian names", and so on. You can also look in your local phone book. There is actually no shame in an NPC street samurai who goes by Roger Thompson.

But if you want cool street names, there are several reliable catagories of words. Common first names and honorifics. Animals. Metals. Astronomy. Occult terms. Computer terms. Industrial/mechanical terms. Weapons. Just mix and match them. The Titanium Tiger. Charlie Eldritch. Mr. Satchel. The Virtual Viper. Octane. Kid Wipeout. Miss Molotov.

[Fuchs]

I use the wiki name pages for regular names. Street names are rare in my campaign, and usually as pretentious as they sound.

[Veggiesama]

Take the first thing that comes to your head and stick with it. It helps if you have a really big head, so if you don't, make a list and keep it close.

Usually I pick some kind of "schtick" when I create a character. I do a little research and learn all I can about that shtick, then I choose an obscure name related to that.

For instance, I made a character in a D&D game with a bear animal companion. The bear was supposedly king of the forest and had a big harem of other bears. I named the bear "Lord Ursalon Grizzledore" (Ursa = scientific root for the word "bear", and Grizzledore = Grizzly + generic fantasy suffix).

My recent Shadowrun character was an eco-nut "peace out, man" type of character. I figured he liked Romantic-era literature. I named him "Walden" after Walden Pond, the place where Henry David Thoreau wrote a book about how to live "the simple life" (curiously enough, also known as Walden). Somewhat obscure, less so if you paid attention in High School English class. (The character's real name became "Henry Fairbanks". Henry = Thoreau's first name, and Fairbanks = the current economic crisis was on my mind).

I detest name generators. It's much easier to scan through the headlines to find a real-sounding name, then morph it to your liking.

[Dakka Dakka]

For SIN or other regular names I sometimes look at hte credits of movies or TV series and mix-n-match names of roles and actors. My mage for instance has a SIN for Gabriel McDowell, an amalgam of Gabriel Gray and Malcolm McDowell, a character and an actor on the Heroes show.

[Daishi]

Mash-ups of character and actor names from TV shows or movies are easy. Dive around imdb for a while just following links.

Street aliases can also be just about anything. Adjectives and a regular name or initial (Big Bob, Lazy J), daily items (Tea Bag, Eight Ball), simple characteristics (Red, Mumbles), random proper nouns (The Chinaman, The Professor), pop culture references (Papa Smurf, Gizmo) or just random phrases (One-Two, Noodles).

[TBRMInsanity]

Usually I make street names that describe what the character does. This seems to mesh well with the SR universe. It makes sense if your a Rigger to call yourself Wheels, Sideswipe, Rollbar, Torque, or Grease Monkey. The Mr. J will have a better idea of what missions to give you. As for real names I usually use on of those baby name sites. I tend to give elves either Gaelic (Irish or Cornish) or Welsh names, dwarves usually either Scandinavian or Scottish Gaelic names, Orcs usually African or tribal names, and trolls usually a name fitting of an English professor.

[Lilt]

Baby names & common names lists all the way. Some of the best names are ones with meanings that fit the character. IE: Two names I've used in the past are Sloan and Sebastien. Sloan comes from Gaelic, meaning man of arms/warrior, and was given to a tough old ex-ganger turned fixer. Sebastien comes from Greek, meaning 'revered', and was given to an elven Honguan (found on a list of french baby names).

A name I've found, and like, but haven't used yet is Elanna. It comes from the arabic meaning tree, and might be a good name for a nature oriented character (more likely an NPC as playing cross-gender isn't something I consider often).

I'd probably avoid giving characters completely run-of-the-mill names, unless it were to emphasize how normal the character was. I once played Jack Smith, who was a completely mundane Blacksmith, in a D&D game. Otherwise I'd consider avoiding names on any top-10 lists.

[Argentis]

Thanks for the replies, this gives me a ton of stuff to work with.

[Warlordtheft]

And for me, the hardest part is when a mook NPC needs a name b/c the runners decide to capture interrogate him. Usually I call him Bob Smith, or Jane Smith.

Happens more than I care to admit. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Veggiesama]

And for me, the hardest part is when a mook NPC needs a name b/c the runners decide to capture interrogate him. Usually I call him Bob Smith, or Jane Smith.

Happens more than I care to admit. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Do what I do when crazy players want to capture, torture, and interrogate a random moonk. When the player asks what the NPC's name is, you should look straight into the player's face and say the player's name.

"Well, would you look at that: what a coincidence. Still want to use the testicular electrodes on <name>? I'm not sure he'd like that. What do you think, <name>? Think <name> can handle 50,000 volts straight up the urethra, <name>?"

Sorry.

[paws2sky]

Something to keep in mind when coming up with names, make sure they are easy enough to say, I know in fantasy especialy, you can throw a bunch of syllables together and have everyone saying Geroanouline or Esoulwquiur. pre-gaming a list of names is key. I like spliting them into sub categories; punks, Yakuza, security, wage slave, screen names, magic users, native american. some of these are interchangable, but it helps me thnk of names when I can picture different types of people. Also, SR fluff is full of names, my personal favorite- Strawberry Switchblade.

#1 reason I stopped reading fantasy novels: alphabet soup names. I like to be able to pronounce names without twisting my tongue into a knot, thank you very much.

#2 reason I stopped reading fantasy novels: multiple, extremely similar, alphabet soup names in the same novel. I like to be able to remember who is up to what without making a web-style interaction chart.

I didn't need a 3rd reason to stop reading fantasy novels.

Anyway... good way to organize your list of names.

-paws

PS Strawberry Switchblade is hilarious. Where is that name from?

[paws2sky]

Mash-ups of character and actor names from TV shows or movies are easy. Dive around imdb for a while just following links.

Street aliases can also be just about anything. Adjectives and a regular name or initial (Big Bob, Lazy J), daily items (Tea Bag, Eight Ball), simple characteristics (Red, Mumbles), random proper nouns (The Chinaman, The Professor), pop culture references (Papa Smurf, Gizmo) or just random phrases (One-Two, Noodles).

Tea Bag!? Oh, I so need to use that.

-paws

[crazyconscript]

The amount of times Jack Smith has come up as a name around here is silly. There were 3 different characters, by 3 different people, in 3 different games that all used that name. They all found out later (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif) . And thats not counting the NPC's...

As for otherwise naming: I recently found a book that consists of 157 pages of names. Nothing else, just name after name after name....so i have taken to simply flipping open random pages, pointing my finger at a spot and picking a first name, then repeating for the second name. Before i started this method i actually tended to use the names of people i knew who werent in the current game and just mixing them up....

Tea Bag!? Oh, I so need to use that.

-paws

You've never known someone with the nickname teabag? My old rugby coach used to be called that, as did a guy a couple of years ahead of me in school. Then again we also had a guy called Table...seriously...
Other common nicknames i have known in my life are Mossy and Squiggles

[Stahlseele]

John Johna Johnson < = yeah, that one got vetoed for some reason . . *snickers* ^^

[crazyconscript]

Its always funny when you give someone a contact who's name is actually Mr.Johnson (IMG:style_emoticons/default/spin.gif)

[paws2sky]

You've never known someone with the nickname teabag? My old rugby coach used to be called that, as did a guy a couple of years ahead of me in school. Then again we also had a guy called Table...seriously...
Other common nicknames i have known in my life are Mossy and Squiggles

Actually, no.

My circle of friends were never really into nicknames. Thinking about it, I guess we had a few, but they weren't given out of some sense of camaraderie:
The Fun Sponge
Trench Coat
Dark Elvis
Jim the Gnome
Hamburger
Beaker

I guess we do have a couple, but they were only used because we know too many people named Dan!
Little Dan
Big Dan
Insignificant Dan

Okay, that last one was intended to be mean.

-paws

[HeySparky]

I don't have trouble coming up with names, really. They tend to come when I need them. And if they don't, I pick an ethnicity/nationality whose names seem appropriate, find a 'Meaning of Names' website and scour meanings until one jumps out.

One thing I always meant to do was grab names from spam.

Gmail junkmail names du jour...
- January Samuel
- Fatimah Emiko
- Rina Twanna
- Eryn Starla
- Zoila Candi
- Carol Shavonne
- Stephanie Ashley
- Ivey Hope
- Mallory Lory
- Jasmin Kai

I like Jasmin Kai out of all of those.