Naming Powers

[chronoplasm]

I wonder why WotC doesn't draw more from real-world terminology when naming powers?
This article onfencing terms gives me some great ideas for powers.
Fencing terms - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Appel sounds like a skill power using bluff.
Ballestra would be like 'shift 1, then attack, you gain combat advantage until the end of turn' or something.

 

[weem]

I would imagine it's because they are heavily focused on drawing in new players - and things such as "Twin Strike" and "Cut and Run" give you a good idea of what they are about.

Terms such as those used in fencing (if used) would require (for me anyway) a lot of uses of the power before I started to associate the action to the term - which is not a good thing when you are trying to make things easily accessible to the largest number of people as possible.

 

[eriktheguy]

I started off agreeing with Weem.
But then I considered that many of 4e's powers have names that are not at all obvious. For example, I never knew what a 'riposte was', but after reading the text of 'riposte strike' it was obvious to me.
Some more creative power names would be cool. Fencing terms would be neat.
Obviously you can call your own powers anything you want, but that goes without saying.

 

[Davachido]

You could always reskin the names of powers when making your character to make them more flavourful to your specific character. Say if you made a duelist rogue using the rapier powers/feats from dragon you could use the fencing terms a lot.

Just be sure to keep the actual name handy if your DM wants to look up the power you are using.