Thiefling names

[edbonny]

Please, someone explain this to me. Is this an elaborate trick to get 14 year olds into the game?
Is there something I missed?

The old style tieflings seem more compelling to me than the distilled emo version we have today. When it comes to tieflings, I prefer their pre-4E flavor text. They first appeared in the early 1990s as a player character race for the Planescape Campaign Setting. If you want some amazingly detailed, awesomely flavored reference material, I wholeheartedly recommend reading up on tieflings there.

 

[Lurks-no-More]

Call me crazy, but I don't see how Art, Chant, Gladness, Hope, Ideal, Music, Open, Poetry, Quest, Random, or Reverence are "emo" or "goth" names.

They aren't, but the idea that tieflings are gothy, or in the game to pander to the emos/goths/whatever has become entrenched in the user base of this forum. In my opinion, it's a complaint only slightly more valid than the cries about MMOs and anime.

IIRC, tieflings were the most popular non-PHB race in 3e, and their background then was one of fiendish heritage, alienation, and struggles against internal darkness. You could even have a pale waif of a tiefling (sex irrelevant) with raven hair, weird-colored eyes and a shroud of shadow hanging over them, which is much more "gothy" than the 4e race.

 

[rkwoodard]

Black Company fan

Maybe one (or more) of the Dev were influenced (with or without intent) by the black company. But they just didn't quite pull it off:

Croaker (for the doctor)
Lady
Soulcatcher
Pawnbroker
etc.

of course names like: Art or Chat not so much the same feel. I can see Despair.

And Henry, If any of my players ever show up with a Tiefling named Sparkle, I will hunt you down.

RK

 

[Mallus]

Sorrow, Worry, Torment, and Fear all sound like names from the Malazan Book of the Fallen, which is to say like they sound like Steve Erickson cribbing Glen Cook in his Black Company novels, which is to --finally-- say, I approve!

 

[Obryn]

I like real-world words as names in fantasy settings.

It doesn't have to get emo. I mean, if you pick "Angst" as your character name, you take what you get. But Beauty? Art? Song? Chance? Readiness?

Those could be pretty sweet names.

-O

 

[Galethorn]

Turd

Heh heh heh heh heh. Turd.

Just for reference, my group has an elven rogue named The Impaler. The the is non-optional.

 

[Tewligan]

 

[Set]

IIRC, tieflings were the most popular non-PHB race in 3e,

At least in the minds of WotC developers. Due to the LA, nobody wanted to play them, and the number of builds involving that race was breathtaking in it's paucity. The 'Lesser Planetouched' of the Players Guide to the Realms were more popular, but the Aasimar still beat out the Tieflings due to their superior stat options.

From what I saw in play at conventions, or in builds on the message boards, Goliaths were vastly more popular than Tieflings.

I prefer to call them Cambions, anyway, being an old fogey, and have them act less whiny and more malevolent. Whomever compared them to Melniboneans, above, had an interesting idea, but I use that more to describe Drow. I think of fiend-blooded people as being more Incredible Hulk and less 'all alone, I bemoan my outcast state.'

 

[Lurks-no-More]

At least in the minds of WotC developers. Due to the LA, nobody wanted to play them, and the number of builds involving that race was breathtaking in it's paucity. The 'Lesser Planetouched' of the Players Guide to the Realms were more popular, but the Aasimar still beat out the Tieflings due to their superior stat options.

Funny. I've seen a ton of tieflings played (with or without LA), and no aasimar, ever. Maybe I game with people who didn't care about "builds" and were more interested in characterization? (Snark snark snark.)

 

[GreatLemur]

I long for a world where the Internet understands that "emo" is descriptor for music, not for personality. More to the point, it's an annoying, nutless style of music I was sick of when it was cropping up on punk rock sampler CDs ten years ago, and I'd sure like to never hear about it again.

Gandalf the Human Wizard.
Dorgan Bronzebeard the Dwarven Paladin
Aelar the Elven Ranger

Wait, so are you trying to say that "Dorgan Bronzebeard" doesn't sound retarded?