What's In A Name?
Posted by 
Bastosa on Thursday, April 9, 2009 - 151 Comments Tags: guild chat, name, online identity, paid name change, princess diaries
Bastosa on Thursday, April 9, 2009 - 151 Comments Tags: guild chat, name, online identity, paid name change, princess diaries 
For me the most difficult part of World of Warcraft isn't raiding, it's not going after extreme achievements, and its not even struggling in the arenas. For me the most challenging thing to do well in WoW is successfully filling out the little box at the bottom of the character creation screen. You know, the one where you enter a name for your character?I don't know why, but I am terrible at it. Perhaps it's just the pressure of the whole thing, after all this is your online identity. People will identify you to this name, an in some cases even call you that to your face when you meet them in real life.
Let's face it, your character name is important. I think I learned this lesson especially well when dealing with the name of my Shaman. When I rolled up the toon I spent very little time putting thought into the character name. I was anxious to play, and try after try of "that name is unavailable" sapped all creativity from me.
Well as time went on I discovered I enjoyed playing the Shaman more and more, until low and behold she hit level 80. Level 80 in my mind was the big time, all the sudden you are in raids with your friends, people are yelling out your characters name over vent, and your identify is finally cemented.
With all that in mind, I ponied up the $10 and paid for a character rename.
Unfortunately my new name didn't work out so well. The name I thought to be a random formation of letters that had a cool sounds, turned out to be a direct reference to a Disney movie regarding a teenage princess... I didn't exactly see this as fitting to my face-melting conduit of the ancient forces of nature. And of course, my guild mates were more than happy to rub my unfortunate choice in my face day in and day out.
I did what any proud creator of a shiny level 80 character would do, and begged for help. Luckily the good people at Blizzard felt my pain and granted me an opportunity to correct my error.
After a half dozen Google searches for secret meaning, and running it by my circle of friends I landed on a new name for my Shaman: Jinxed. It only seemed appropriate after the first naming debacle.
This whole episode ended up bringing so pretty interesting gchat that I thought I would bring to you guys. How did you come up with your characters name? Are you happy with it? Furthermore what are some of the better names you have seen out there in the World Of Warcraft?
Reader Comments (151)
Yeah my mains name is the only one of that name on all US servers. So i like to keep it and everyone just calls me Moro which is cool. And my 80 druids name is Cheesse and yes i know it is spelled wrong but me and a RL friend both made druids ones name was macoroni and mine was cheesse. He is still level 20 but w/e now im a loner and im thinkin of changin my name
Guys i dont wanna prag but i think my name is made from the deps of AWSOMENESS. my hunter is called "Bonerboy" and the best thing is that if ppl say hey "Boner" it will just say "Hey ¤"#!"
My toon names are usually taken from books (K. Kerr's series, or R.E. Feist).
My Shammy's name (Nuvain), is partially taken from K. Kerr's series (Avain) but took Nu, instead of the A, as Avain isn't really a suiting name for a Draenei, imo.
my charecter name is Lrobinson
Lars my first name
robinson my last
L
+
Robinson
=
Lrobinson
i love the name :)
Tauren shaman named cowsgoemoo and orc dk named orcsgozug.
All my chacters names are made from combos of my real name
Jason Mullin
--------------------
Jamulson
Mulsonja
Jalin
Linson
Sonlin
I'll start to run at some point I"m sure, but I like it.
does Niferto seem good? ;P
My main character's name is my gamer-tag on most games (i.e. Quake III: Arena, Halo trilogy), Zandre. It's actually just something I made up from a random "I'm Bored!!" moment. This was back when I found Harry Potter an actually interesting book to read, and "Lord Voldemort" was just a big anagram (I think thats the right term) of his real name, "Tom (?) Riddle" So I thought I would just mix up Zander, my nick-name, didn't get very far before I found out most names weren't very appealing, then I found Zandre! Looked cool and I love telling people that it's NOT a French name.
As for my other toons:
Alternate - Human Rogue (he is my ALT, so whats a better name!?)
Akelys - Dwarf Hunter (Is pronounced Achilles, and yes, thats where the reference is from)
Shamanzilla - Draenei Shaman (Figured the "zilla" made him seem bigger and badder, and it does in an ironic way)
Mageo - Human Mage (can you guess where the reference comes from? -.-)
Polladon - Dwarf Paladin (the name is literally "Paladin with some vowel changes and an extra "L")
Zandrè - Human Death Knight (I liked Zandre, so I just added the "`" thingy)
One of my old guilds knew whose alt it was before I even told them whose alt it was (when I asked for invites to the guild, that is), they just looked for an outside-of-the-box-yet-still-inside-of-it kind of name.
I try to call my toons by certain everyday things, like objects, or proffesions, etc.
Skux - some ppl in NZ would know what this means lol
Favourite
Bartender
Neurofen (pain killlers)
Postitnote
.....and then there are some of my friends who has names like:
Car
Key
Accupuncture
House
Manbearpig - fits every class.
Well, for me I looked up the elvish meaning of my name for my first toon. Then, after that first toon and I created an appearance that I liked, I would name the character based on its colors. I would choose vague color names or just make up something. Some are Cerise and Silvalim.
i never really had trouble with names, so I can't sympathize. XD
i usually try to put somthing in a quest line or a title from another game into my names some tims people try to jack my ideas on other servers:( i love nameing!
My main is a Warrior called : Kamahl after Kamahl Pitfighter from a popular TCG & all my names are taken from there, like my wizard called Arcanis & dwarf named Balthor - not origional I know but I find using another fantasy based game you have love for the characters is very helpful & offers a large selection for all classes/races :D
I have always taken a pride to my name creation from even back in my D&D days so it was only natural to bring it over to WoW once I was introduced to it pre BC. My first toon was a gnome rogue that I named Hornswaggle just because it seemed to fit. Months down the road I started getting whispers from people thinking I named him after the WWE wrestler....whos a midget lol.
But, some of my current roster consists of....
Hornswaggle, gnome rogue
Rattlehed, Undead warlock, reference to Megadeth's mascot
RoySiegfried, BE mage
Vanderhuge, Draenai pally....MST3K reference
My main char has his name from a Dutch pupped TV show from the late 1960's.
Translated it is Bor The Wolf.
He is a neurotic wolf with his own cafe were he serves nuts and lemonade.
If you cut down a tree he starts to cry and if you rub him the wrong way he takes off to the scary woods.
My 2nd char is called Borretje witch means little Bor.
I have more chars name from the same tv show.
A woman mage I am levelling now is called Aemlin and is a char from wheels of time.
my main (holy pally) is chillidog.
my doomkin is skinnypete.
my holy priest is bacongrease
and my hunter is morepewpew
There is a bit of RP behind most of my toons. My main is a fury dwarven warrior: Noricironaxe (Noric Ironaxe) He prefersto dual wield axes but maces will do. Other than him I have:
-human holy paladin: Whiteheart
-NE BM hunter: Jex
-human holy priest: Naythis
-gnome frost mage: Frostfyre (made her long before the Frostfire bolt spell existed)
-gnome warlock: Shadowfyre
-Dreanei frost DK: Grimblood
-Dreanei ret pally: Orinica
-Dreanei shaman: Celestine
There are many more but I think you get the point. I do also have a lot of horde toons too. I'm not just an Alliance player.
my main is a warlock his name is munrah from the thundercats cartoon. i also have a shaman he is shamanadude, a rogue sneakuponya
oh yeah, I forgot...and my rogue on Executus is called Stabler...gnome rogue...
Ha character names, the 1 thing that I hate and also love.
Where do I get them? I listen to hardcore (gabber) music, so many dj's and songnames include well freaky/scary/sick/horror stuff which is what I like, as I'm a horrorfreak anyway.
So I came up with Speedrazor (hardcore party which was total ownage back in the early 90's), Toxicbrain, Parasomnia, Psychotica and stuff like that.
So ye my char names were important as I wanted them to be freakish in some way.
Im very bad at names so i just named my char after my irl name: Sýl
my DK's name is Ragnorak which means twilight of the gods...which is the end of the world. I think for an Orc DK it sounds pretty cool
My character name is Wrathcaller :P
Sounds cool, thats all :)
well i came up with my name because im addicted to anything and everything Star Wars.lol I play as a NE Hunter and even my pets names have something to do with the series.
Well.... i dont know how i choose my name on the toon but this is what i got.
Lagoon - my mage, i thought it sounded relaxed and laid back
Xegon - my paladin, just wanted a name with an X as the first letter ;P
i want to come up with "real" names that fits the WoW world yea i know its sounds like i'm a big RP nerd but really i'm not :P