It will baffle me how you people come up with the names of your campaign settings. I can appreciate it, as a competely alien sounding name just seems to enhance the overall other-worldly feel fantasy roleplaying is supposed to provide, but I have seen some ridiculous names for campaigns in my day...
...on the WotC boards, of course.
So how do you guys come up with these names?
Also, this is the introduction of my new epic-sci-fi-mini-series, BANANAKRON:2096, the game of Cyborg Ape Nationalist Socialist Invasion from Mars.
and I'm not kidding, either.
Kishar is named after the Mesopotamian earth goddess.
Shadowfell is named after the manifestations of... :ahem: ...shadowfells... on the world of Ord.
I was driving alone in a long car trip, and started saying words out loud until I found some that sounded okay. This is also how I work on my languages!
Seriously. I like the repeated A sound in "Jade" and "Stage."
a being of great divine might came to me in a prophetic dream and insisted i use the name "Xiluh".
(read: i think i got it from a random name generator; it looked exotic enough for my taste, so i chose it.)
Well, let's see now:
The Age of Kings.
The age of kings is the name of the current era the world in in, and i tend to name my settings after something about them as opposed to the name of the world/country.
Shadow's of the Last Alliance.
There are all sorts or extra hidden meanings and stuff in this, mostly as a result of me thinking i'm far cleverer than i actually am, but i don't want to say them because they would be spoilers if i end um doing my campaign. Suffice to say i helps describe the setting and i thought it sounded cool and set the right mood. On reading it, it make's me think "okay, this must be a politically based campaign on the verge of war between former allies". or maybe that's just me. who knows
...As it is in Heaven.
Obviously this is the later part of a line from the Lord's Prayer (at least i believe it's called the Lord's prayer. i'm not religious myself) which goes "Thy will be done, Thy kingdom come, On earth, As it is in heaven." This was used because the setting is in an alternate earth and focuses mostly on conflicts between heaven and hell and between the christian church and the old god/new gods/other stuff.
Vorsatz.
"Vorsatz" is a german word that means "Resolution". No particular reason for the resolution bit, but the world is partially based on germany - among other things - and uses a pigdin of english and german words, so i though it seemed appropriate.
"Kaa'dril" just kind of showed up out of nowhere
King
I get a lot of ideas from my dreams. Sotrylines, poetry, cool artwork, solutions to math problems... It's rare that I produce anything creative that wasn't partially taken from a dream.
Though abandonment was named for the fact that humanity abandoned the gods.
I've recently had an obsession with other languages, and frequently use somewhat unreliable tools such as Freetranslation to come up with names for my settings. Vannerfelle is "water trap" according to the Norwegian on that site (don't know how accurate it actually is).
Mine is taken from the greek translation of "Renaissance": ÃŽ'˜ÃŽÂ½ÃŽÂ±ÃŽÂ³ÃŽÂÃŽÂ½ÃŽÂ½ÃŽÂ·ÃÆ'η. It looks an awful lot like the Roman letters spelling out Avayevvnon. But when it's not in greek lettering, two Vs look funny, so I dropped one. Presto: Avayevnon!
The world of Cebexia discussion thread (http://www.thecbg.org/e107_plugins/forum/forum_viewtopic.php?17379) has a whole pretentious "What's in a Name" block in the first post explaining where the name came from. Abridged version: I ripped off the name CeBeGia and changed the G to an X to make it sexier.
Ah, the good, the questionable, the ugly, and the pretty damn cool. Very interesting all, very interesting...
It has definately revived my faith in other-language-based campaign names. Really, its the true meaning that I find to be more impressive, and while I understand everyones struggle for individuality, I often wonder why wouldn't one just use the english word?
...but what about BANANAKRON? Does anybody wanna play a space-monkey-seiged B-movie hero? How about a nihilist ape? The president of the formerly united states of America? I'll let you get away with it (it's not like you'd have any special privaleges, anyway).
I make mine up either by repeating random words in the air, or, once in desperation, using a random name generator.
Italia obviously came from 'Italy', whereas Aelwyd came from welsh (I can't remember the exact words). Most of Laarath's place names come from welsh, too.
Quote from: V - L0XAh, the good, the questionable, the ugly, and the pretty damn cool. Very interesting all, very interesting...
It has definately revived my faith in other-language-based campaign names. Really, its the true meaning that I find to be more impressive, and while I understand everyones struggle for individuality, I often wonder why wouldn't one just use the english word?
...but what about BANANAKRON? Does anybody wanna play a space-monkey-seiged B-movie hero? How about a nihilist ape? The president of the formerly united states of America? I'll let you get away with it (it's not like you'd have any special privaleges, anyway).
Translating the world name out of english makes it feel more exotic and creative, while rewarding those who understand the mentioned language with the little bit of flavor the name holds.
For my new setting, however, I'm seeking to craft the world's name from english words.