Who cares about Otiluke, Mordenkainen, Rary and whatever geezer names they trot out.

[Herschel]

I doubt many people would be really thrilled at this point with "Jezebel's Fireball" .....

Nor explaining to their significant other what this is after a trip to Amsterdam or Reno.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

And in any case, the "Magic Missle" we have now is a conglomeration of those spells. So who would it be named after?

It's the "kleenex" effect. See also xerox, aspirin, and other names that became genericized.

 

[the Jester]

I like the sidebar idea; that, or a quick historical blurb in the spell text itself.

I don't know if anyone else remembers this, but:

With this spell, the caster creates the circular plane of null-gravity known as Tenser's floating disk after the famed wizard of that appellation (whose ability to locate treasure and his greed to recover every copper all well known).

 

[Herschel]

Even that would be cool, but I like the sidebar idea to tie the multiple spells to the archmages and a bit more info.

 

[Mishihari Lord]

I like 'em. I don't think they were ever that well known. I didn't know who they were when I started either, with Basic in '80 and AD&D soon after. Still, I always found them evocative. And I thought it was kind of cool when I finally did take the trouble to find out.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

An appendix, with write ups (and stats?) of the biggest names with some history as to why they made what they made would be cool, with a blurb that other spells and items were named for similarly insightful and creative casters.

Game history is preserved and passed down to new gamers, and DMs get seeds from which new adventures could grow. I could see an adventure in which the PCs discover a portion of a scroll that hints at other spells from Evard or Tenser...

 

[Umbran]

The difference here is that real world scientists are real people who have actually done something to deserve the respect, and that the use of their names is done to avoid confusion. D&D wizards are not real, not even in the context of the history of most published campaign settings, and their names are not needed to distinguish spells.

Does it matter if a spell is "Melf's Acid Arrow" if there is no other thing in the game called "Acid Arrow"? It doesn't do a thing to add to clarity. On the other hand, Euler's Number or the Pythagorean theorem are rather important to clarifying which number or theorem is being discussed...

Sometimes...

There's only one majorly accepted Theory of General Relativity (or Special Relativity). There's only one noted Uncertainty Principle. These names alone are sufficient to distinguish what you're talking about. But we still attach the names Einstein and Heisenberg to them most of the time. The Pythagorean Theorem could also be called the "Right Triangle Theorem", and be outright less confusing! Beethoven's 9th Symphony could be called the "Ode to Joy Symphony". We often keep the names, even if they aren't necessary.

Still, I'm not a fan of this style of naming spells after random wizards simply because I've never cared about them at all. When I first started playing with 3E I didn't have a clue who they were, the game never even briefly explained who they were, and I just thought their names were weird and out-of-place. Nothing over the last several years has changed that initial opinion.

Well, everybody's different, and we all find different things compelling or inspiring.

The real question is, is there a harm to naming the spells more colorfully? If there is no harm, then we should go ahead and have the colorful names, to allow them to inspire who they will. If there's harm, then we can debate the harm vs the benefits.

 

[Tony Vargas]

This is an issue with D&D Next that I don't know the design team has even looked at in any major way. In the latest survey, they spammed out all these old spell names, many with names of "some old Wizard or something" attached. I've been around longer than the game and they don't even mean much to me any more. What are they supposed to mean to newer players?

Sources of inspiration from the Dying Earth to Dr. Strange use flowery spell names: Phenahl's Second Hypnotic Spell, The Crimson Bands of Cytorakk, The Excellent Prismatic Spray, Thrindle's Combustion, The Flames of the Faltine.

They sound cool. You can develop the proper nouns in them or not. To the old player, they're a fun bit of nostalgia. To the new player, they mean nothing - but they may still sound cool.

And, the /name/ of a spell doesn't hurt anything, it's the horribly broken mechanics that are the problem.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I also wouldn't mind some proper names with spell names that were more truthful:

Malboro's Mildly Pokey Missile
William Rae's Ray of Slight Lassitude
Buster Jane's Detect Something Useful If You Guess Right

Of course, the way they have been does fit Vance in "The Dying Earth" and "Rhialto the Marvelous," where the old guys with named spells really knew their stuff, but the current crew is at least half bluster and fancy tap dancing.

 

[Drowbane]

I do. If for no other reason than it prompts a noob to ask a Grognard, "Hey, whats with this Bigby guy anyways?".

[grognard]You damn kids need to know your roots![/grognard]

Dropping the names from magic items and spells would be almost as insulting a move as what 4e did to the Forgotten Realms. Sure, its just "fluff", but...