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<blockquote data-quote="Bradley Hindman" data-source="post: 6424188" data-attributes="member: 91764">In my opinion there are three reasons that players don't remember NPC and PC names:1) Strange names with little cultural traction. (I am glaring directly at Forgotten Realms with most of its names apparently produced by a random syllable generator.)2) The natural human tendency to forget names that aren't repeated enough. (How many names do you remember from a party full of strangers?)3) The natural human tendency to be lazy. (We've all done it.)As a DM, I try to be very forgiving of the first two and gently remind the players of names whenever I hear, &quot;you know that guy with the whiny voice who hired us.&quot;Long ago, to combat reason 3, I started naming all the minor NPCs that the characters ran across with the same name.&nbsp; They players quickly realized that if they didn't care, I wasn't going to either. Solved the problem right away and provided some interesting discussion and roleplaying about why &quot;Fuad&quot; was such a common name in these parts.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Bradley Hindman, post: 6424188, member: 91764"] In my opinion there are three reasons that players don't remember NPC and PC names: 1) Strange names with little cultural traction. (I am glaring directly at Forgotten Realms with most of its names apparently produced by a random syllable generator.) 2) The natural human tendency to forget names that aren't repeated enough. (How many names do you remember from a party full of strangers?) 3) The natural human tendency to be lazy. (We've all done it.) As a DM, I try to be very forgiving of the first two and gently remind the players of names whenever I hear, "you know that guy with the whiny voice who hired us." Long ago, to combat reason 3, I started naming all the minor NPCs that the characters ran across with the same name. They players quickly realized that if they didn't care, I wasn't going to either. Solved the problem right away and provided some interesting discussion and roleplaying about why "Fuad" was such a common name in these parts. [/QUOTE]

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