How did you choose the name for your homebrew world? How did you choose the names of the places, kingdoms, towns, etc of your world. When you drew your map did you name all the towns in the area? Or did you just put a dot and said this is a town (the PC's won't be going here for a while so No info needed)? Did you base the names off of any real world place?
Names of places?
- Thread starter redwing
- Start date
Crothian
First Post
redwing said:
Some names are real world place, others are made up. Sometimes I'll surf through the dictionary for either cool sounding words or odd words with cool dfinitions.
I try to name most of the cities, large and small. The towns and villages I havea list and assign them names as needed.
CRG
First Post
Firstly, I use english-derived names for towns. Smith's Falls, etc.
Secondly, for a cooler feel, I may take a foreign language (or dead language) and use words / names from it to represent towns in a particular region (old english, etc.)
Third, sometimes I'll just make stuff up.
For major places and people, they have names defined. For the "next small town" or "barkeep #121" I have lists of names I cross off (and note which person/place to which it was given) or solicit input from the players.
The soliciting input from the players has a few problems, though. As in all groups of friends, there are things that stick and are hard to shake. For instance, all enchanters or random people who own potion shops are invariably named 'Tim' by the party if they can get away with it. For mercenary fighters we get alot of 'Sven Thorssen' and 'Thor Svenssen' combos, as well as 'Groo'. All merchants the players want to call "Uncle Al". So be it. Its the price of pop culture I guess.
Secondly, for a cooler feel, I may take a foreign language (or dead language) and use words / names from it to represent towns in a particular region (old english, etc.)
Third, sometimes I'll just make stuff up.
For major places and people, they have names defined. For the "next small town" or "barkeep #121" I have lists of names I cross off (and note which person/place to which it was given) or solicit input from the players.
The soliciting input from the players has a few problems, though. As in all groups of friends, there are things that stick and are hard to shake. For instance, all enchanters or random people who own potion shops are invariably named 'Tim' by the party if they can get away with it. For mercenary fighters we get alot of 'Sven Thorssen' and 'Thor Svenssen' combos, as well as 'Groo'. All merchants the players want to call "Uncle Al". So be it. Its the price of pop culture I guess.
Each culture generally has a real world equivalent. Then I use online dictionaries and go to the local bookstore and thumb through travel guides.
In the online dictionaries I search for terms like city, town and village. This gives me terms that can be attached to numerous, but not all, population centers, similar to the way we use -burg (Gettysburg, Hamburg, you get the point).
Travel Guides have lots of great names. I always alter them.
I do not name or even place every town, but I have names in reserve in case the PCs go on an unexpected trip.
This link is a site with thousands of names grouped by category:
http://www.kabalarians.com/html/surf-by.htm
It is great both for naming NPCs and locations.
Corey
In the online dictionaries I search for terms like city, town and village. This gives me terms that can be attached to numerous, but not all, population centers, similar to the way we use -burg (Gettysburg, Hamburg, you get the point).
Travel Guides have lots of great names. I always alter them.
I do not name or even place every town, but I have names in reserve in case the PCs go on an unexpected trip.
This link is a site with thousands of names grouped by category:
http://www.kabalarians.com/html/surf-by.htm
It is great both for naming NPCs and locations.
Corey
Grazzt
Demon Lord
Most of the names in Alorel (my campaign) just popped into my head when I wasnt expecting them to. Years of being a musician (when I was..and before I got a real job 
) taught me to carry around a pen and notepad to catch ideas when they come..lest I forget them.
Some names, I just use a name generator I have. It reads info from a text file. Each text file is broken up so it can generate two-, three-, or four syllable names. I have about 20 files I use for "flavor." That way names in one country sound similar or at least sound like they go together and should be from the same country.
But I would say about 90% just pop into my head.
) taught me to carry around a pen and notepad to catch ideas when they come..lest I forget them.Some names, I just use a name generator I have. It reads info from a text file. Each text file is broken up so it can generate two-, three-, or four syllable names. I have about 20 files I use for "flavor." That way names in one country sound similar or at least sound like they go together and should be from the same country.
But I would say about 90% just pop into my head.
I use dictionaries just picking something. I keep everything rather simple. I have used other languages for some places.
I also take the monster manual and add 'ford', 'crossing', 'rest' and a few other words to them.
I also take the monster manual and add 'ford', 'crossing', 'rest' and a few other words to them.
Tonguez
A suffusion of yellow
My very first hombrew (back when I was about 14 I think) was called Terayne (ok - I was only 14!)
Later I learnt to use Maps and find real world places like Zhytomyr and Vzdvizhen' (which I still don't know how to pronounce)
and also culturally themed names - like my Yuan Empier and its capital Tien the City of Heaven and my African Campaign (Anziko) with cities (in the northern deserts) like Qahira and Amhra and of course Fez city of the Desert Fox.
As to cities and towns I dont even place them until they are needed at which point I put a dot where it should be and describe from there
Later I learnt to use Maps and find real world places like Zhytomyr and Vzdvizhen' (which I still don't know how to pronounce)
and also culturally themed names - like my Yuan Empier and its capital Tien the City of Heaven and my African Campaign (Anziko) with cities (in the northern deserts) like Qahira and Amhra and of course Fez city of the Desert Fox.
As to cities and towns I dont even place them until they are needed at which point I put a dot where it should be and describe from there
One way to name places on a home-brew world is to take a real world name and misspell it. "Johnston" becomes "Yunchon" with enough mangling.
Of course, before you name a place, a good thing to do is to determine what the location is known for. Let's say you have a town on a river near where a lot of orcs drowned fleeing from a party of adventurers. So you start with the name, "Orc's Doom". Mangle the spelling and pronunciation a bit and you get, "Ruchym".
This works best with a world that has a history. A past. Someplace where things happened before the campaign started. You could do without, but having a backstory to your world helps a lot.
Hope this helps.
Of course, before you name a place, a good thing to do is to determine what the location is known for. Let's say you have a town on a river near where a lot of orcs drowned fleeing from a party of adventurers. So you start with the name, "Orc's Doom". Mangle the spelling and pronunciation a bit and you get, "Ruchym".
This works best with a world that has a history. A past. Someplace where things happened before the campaign started. You could do without, but having a backstory to your world helps a lot.
Hope this helps.
arwink
Clockwork Golem
I generally make up names, keeping them simple or adapting things slightly from real world locations. To make things slightly more effective, big cities and important locations tend to get slang titles that become associated with it. The capital, Tyria, is known as the City of Seven Spires for the mountain peaks it's spread accross. The local campaign city, Eaglespire, is the Guardian of the Southern Border. It helps set the tone of the setting, and makes up for the somewhat simple and generic nature of the names.
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