Character Naming Conventions

[Lam]

How about allowing glottals, but the accents do not differentiate.

They may be different but Ga'achta and Gaachta are the same unique name.

EDIT: spell fix

[Pax Keovar]

Apostrophes generally denote missing letters,right?

From Eberron:
d'Cannith = dragonmarked-Cannith
An unmarked member of the house would not have the d' honorific.

I think the French version of d' is short for de, meaning of.

If an apostrophe is pronounced at all, it can indicate a glottal stop.

[Blaeringr]

The apostrophe as used for glottal stops is essentially a foreign letter. If there is really a case to be made for the glottal stop, then there is even more of case to be made for all the many diacritics and foreign letters.

I'd like to hear a case made why the obscure glottal stop deserves special treatment over the many many other symbols that also have a clear meaning in their own contexts. If you actually have a case for glottal stops, then make a long list of all the other characters deserving the same treatment.

Are we going to insist on Russian names being allowed in Cyrillic text? Of course not. Just like for glottal stops, there are conventions for transliterating the weird sounds from many other languages. Gatachta may not result in a perfect pronunciation most of the time, but that's an authentic experience living in a foreign culture that doesn't share your precise verbal palette.

[Kobold Catgirl]

I just gotta say, I will be horrendously offended if Goblinworks leaves out the Kobold Alphabet.

Spoiler:

A @ B C D ð E F G H ಠ_ಠ J K L M ' N O P R ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) S T U V !!!!11!!1! W X Y #

If my culture is once again oppressed by James Jacobs and his racist conspirators, I will be forced to burn the Paizo Golem in gnomeffigy.

EDIT: The fact that my edit adding in a catface won't even work on the site only goes to prove what I'm up against.

Actually On Topic:

I hope that, once the game has launched, a thread will be started where people can go to ask about names they're unsure about and get advice from other gamers. There is a gray area, after all--names that are a bit clunky, or silly, or somewhat based on real words, but that aren't flat-out immersion-breaking. Plus, there's always the risk a fully original name is actually an obscure slur or something. ;D

Quote:

I'd like to hear a case made why the obscure glottal stop deserves special treatment over the many many other symbols that also have a clear meaning in their own contexts. If you actually have a case for glottal stops, then make a long list of all the other characters deserving the same treatment.

I'll address this, actually: The apostrophe is very often used in fantasy stories, much more often than other obscure characters. Corny as it is, it can't be denied. Drizz't. Eberron dragonmarked. A few particular monsters in Runescape.

[BrotherZael]

@Pax Keovar

THANK YOU! If you hadn't explained I don't know what I would have done with all these pax guys running around. Truly you've saved me a lot of time and trouble.

[T7V Avari]

Ryan Dancey wrote:

Punctuation in character names makes customer service very hard.

"I was just harassed!"

"What was the name of the character that harassed you?"

"Uhm, it was something like Za'kk'-unlu'n ..."

What are the odds someone gets that gibberish right?

And you know who likes gibberish names?

People who intend to harass other people.

That's a poppy cock reason! Zakk Unlun isn't going to be memorized anymore than what you wrote. Bad behavior usually ends up in your log and needs a screen shot to report almost every single time.

Punctuation gibberish is no different from any other gibberish.

[T7V Avari]

Lam wrote:

Repeating myself: This means no Glottals. Is this real the intent?

Ga'achta is not same as Gaachta

Glottals and hyphenated first names are not gibberish. They are common in the real world and little more common in fantasy worlds. There is no reason whatsoever to not allow a limited use of them. One for the first name, two for the second name.

[BrotherZael]

T7V Avari wrote:

Ryan Dancey wrote:

Punctuation in character names makes customer service very hard.

"I was just harassed!"

"What was the name of the character that harassed you?"

"Uhm, it was something like Za'kk'-unlu'n ..."

That's a poppy cock reason! Zakk Unlun isn't going to be memorized anymore than what you wrote. Bad behavior usually ends up in your log and needs a screen shot to report almost every single time.

Punctuation gibberish is no different from any other gibberish.

At first I was thinking "dafuq man?" but this is actually a good point. You don't need apostrophes to make a gibberish name. Actually, it is easier to do without in my opinion. ADadsaAYCVBJH being harder to process than ASD'ADSF'HOJN in my experience, the breaks giving meaningful "landmarks" in the name.

[T7V Avari]

Pax Keovar wrote:

Apostrophes generally denote missing letters,right?

From Eberron:
d'Cannith = dragonmarked-Cannith
An unmarked member of the house would not have the d' honorific.

I think the French version of d' is short for de, meaning of.

If an apostrophe is pronounced at all, it can indicate a glottal stop.

Hyphens have become popular for half orcs due to Skyrim's naming patterns.

Examples:

Morghul-zha
Oghbad-hai

[Pax Keovar]

T7V Avari wrote:

Hyphens have become popular for half orcs due to Skyrim's naming patterns.

Examples:

Morghul-zha
Oghbad-hai

I don't think Skyrim named the Uruk-hai.

[Nihimon]

I personally find names with certain sequences of 'rn', 'ii', 'mn', 'nn', etc. to be especially hard to identify at a glance when using proportional fonts.

[Bringslite]

I would really like a "select name from log" and click option feature.

[BrotherZael]

I'd like that, as well as the ability to "petition" for a name (or names) to be added.

[T7V Avari]

Pax Keovar wrote:

T7V Avari wrote:

Hyphens have become popular for half orcs due to Skyrim's naming patterns.

Examples:

Morghul-zha
Oghbad-hai

I don't think Skyrim named the Uruk-hai.

Yup it's as old as half orcs themselves, but Skyrim really made it popular.

[Beleriand]

Ryan Dancey wrote:

Punctuation in character names makes customer service very hard.

"I was just harassed!"

"What was the name of the character that harassed you?"

"Uhm, it was something like Za'kk'-unlu'n ..."

What are the odds someone gets that gibberish right?

And you know who likes gibberish names?

People who intend to harass other people.

I agree with the peanut gallery on this. Even seemingly un-gibberish names can be difficult to remember.

Are there any plans to have character names in the chat and combat logs be hyperlinks(or right-clickable)? So even if the jerk runs off you can easily right-click their name in the log and select the 'report' option. Maybe take the human element out of having to remember and correctly type names.

Kobold Cleaver wrote:

If my culture is once again oppressed by James Jacobs and his racist conspirators, I will be forced to burn the Paizo Golem in gnomeffigy.

Who left the kobold cage open again? Gotta keep that cage door locked!

[BrotherZael]

been promoted from nothing to "peanut gallery"

sweet.

As for the cage Kobold, I don't remember but I think there was bread involved

[Kemedo]

IMHO:

1st Name. Regular name, sugested by race, or free to catch. No more than 2 strait same letters. Alow one ' or - only (which count as nothing for the porpuse of uniqueness - like . (dot) in gmail account).

Last Name, family name.

Titles following and substituing Last Name as achievments.

Similar as is in SW:ToR, if I remember right.