Give Me Names

Post by **Surlethe** » 2006-05-09 06:03pm

I need Star Wars-sounding names, and I need them quickly. I don't want recycled names, and I absolutely suck ass at making up my own, so I turn to you all: I'm now taking suggested names for characters in my fic. Hell, I'd be grateful if someone simply gave me pointers on how to make names.

Anyway, shoot.

Darth Raptor · Post by **Darth Raptor** » 2006-05-09 06:10pm

Male:
Rand Sejin
Adyn Foth
Lairon Garnack

Female:
Layne Kyvnin
Fayla Rindsen
Xyna Plavos

Take them or leave them. They're the best I could do in this hypoglycemic state. o.O

Sonnenburg · Post by **Sonnenburg** » 2006-05-09 06:11pm

I wrote this in the destruction of Star Destroyers Rampant; I hope it can help.

Naming characters is sometimes almost as much of a chore as creating them,
so here's what I have to say on the subject of naming (taken from a letter I
wrote last summer on the subject).
Federation names are easy, of course. Any reasonable human name will do. I
once named a character off of a name I found on the back of a CD that was
nearby at the time. When you need to name aliens, if there's an established
culture it's good to look at the names. Vulcans, for example, tend to start
with softer characters and end with a hard sound (Tuvok, Spock, Serak), so
when I had to create a Vulcan name I chose Selvik as a Vulcan name.
Cardassians have a back of the throat quality (Garak, Dumos, Dukat), so I
came up with Tulvek. Star Wars names are a lot harder. Sometimes they can
have obvious english derivations (Skywalker, Darklighter, Winter), but most
they seem rather
alien. What I do is just read over a list of names and see if it kind of
fits the style of the other names.
For truly original names, think in terms of culture if you can. Klingons,
for example, are warriors, so their names have connotations of power
(Kah'less, like a subdued battle cry) or craftiness (Gouwron, rolling out of
your mouth like a slithering snake). If you have a race of xenophobes, your
names might have a whisphered quality to them (Henisss, Raltiive, Silpheeen,
to just make some up on the spot). The name Kalib was to reflect that this
was an ancient yet powerful man, it demands respect.
The last rule is to always have your name be pronounceable. Granted
pronouncing may be difficult, but if it looks like you had a smurf dancing
on the keyboard, the name won't look good.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-05-09 06:16pm

Names are the hardest part of writing.

Prozac the Robert · Post by **Prozac the Robert** » 2006-05-09 06:41pm

I wonder if you might get somewhere with spoonerisms. Just take some ordinary names and mess up the sylables to make it sound a bit alien but still stick to human speaking paterns.

David Smith -> Savid Dith,
John Prescott > Prohn Jescott,
Tessa Jowell -> Jessa Towell (now that's someone who always knows where her towel is),
Dave Lister - > Lave Dister

You get the idea.

Then maybe swap the order of the names around. I think Jescott Prohn sounds like a better name than Prohn Jescot for example.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-05-09 06:44pm

For SW-esque names, thats the sort of shit I do. Change a letter in a regular name, and you've got crazy sci-fi names.

Noble Ire · Post by **Noble Ire** » 2006-05-09 06:50pm

When I need Star Wars names, I just type random combonations of letters until I find something that sounds right, alien but not too alien. For example:

Imala Ryceed
Truul Besteen
Fillus Hykar
Flitch

GrandMasterTerwynn · Post by **GrandMasterTerwynn** » 2006-05-09 07:21pm

Combine random ethnic names from the thousands of baby-naming sites out there.

An exercise: Let's go to a baby naming site. Any one will do.

Now let's find names by origin. Any exotic place will do. Let's try Persian.

Scrolling down the list, I find a name that strikes my fancy: Danil

Now let's pick some other funky ethnic origin, like . . . umm . . . Scandanavian!

Scrolling down the list . . . it's possible to name a baby Hammer? Let's keep looking. Aha, here's one: Gyda.

So our randomly named character becomes Danil Gyda.

Easy!

Darth Raptor · Post by **Darth Raptor** » 2006-05-09 07:23pm

And here I actually fired neurons to come up with mine...

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-05-09 07:30pm

Noble Ire wrote:When I need Star Wars names, I just type random combonations of letters until I find something that sounds right, alien but not too alien. For example:

Imala Ryceed
Truul Besteen
Fillus Hykar
Flitch

Those names are AWESOME! Truul Besteen! Fillus Hykar! I feel the need to RP growing lol

Noble Ire · Post by **Noble Ire** » 2006-05-09 08:00pm

Stark wrote:
Noble Ire wrote:When I need Star Wars names, I just type random combonations of letters until I find something that sounds right, alien but not too alien. For example:

Imala Ryceed
Truul Besteen
Fillus Hykar
Flitch
Those names are AWESOME! Truul Besteen! Fillus Hykar! I feel the need to RP growing lol

Heh, thanks.

*gives self gold star*

I wish I had a formula for 'em, but generally, I just pick syllables out of a hat, so to speak.

Duckie · Post by **Duckie** » 2006-05-09 08:05pm

When in doubt, "Filipe Enormowang" makes a good name for a character.

Other than that, I subscribe to the "Crazy-Ass Baby Names" and/or "Change A Letter" philosophy of Sci-Fi Names.

Post by **Surlethe** » 2006-05-11 04:24pm

Awesome! Thanks, everyone!

Singular Quartet · Post by **Singular Quartet** » 2006-05-11 07:36pm

I hate you all, cause when I needed a proper name, I actually came up with it. Well... with non-humans, anyways. Humans always get human names for some odd reason...