The High Council of [City Name]

At least they have names

>Player: "What is the name of the town we are in?"
>DM: "You are in a town :^)"

I do this all of the time. End me.

This is probably the most overused faction I always encounter, but I struggle to find something else to replace it. What fills in the 'powerful yet susceptible' human nation gap that 'The Empire' always does?

>There's a magocracy

I love Ayy Town, lmao.

Yrthrag, where Dalix lives, got it.

What are some interesting names for places or groups you've used? What do you use to come up with names? When do you use a phrase versus a single word?

i don't exactly mash keys but i mash syllables.

or just name them after something big and obvious, like a city with a drop of the sky in it being named Skydrop, or Hightower for the wizard's spire that nobody dares enter that acts as an enormous landmark that can be seen for miles around. or whatever.

>The [#] Age

I have a long standing city from my games called "Port Lemmyjek."

It comes from the time I said "You arrive in Port... Letmecheck..." as I went to grab the map, the party laughed, thinking my half-mumbled "Let me check" was "Lemmyjek" and the name stuck.

I mean if we're just gonna do a wordswap

> The Protectorate
> The Confederacy
> The Union
> The Kingdom
> The Commonwealth
> The Dominion
> The Dynasty
> The Federation
> The Sovereignty
> The Republic
> The Empire
> The...wait, fuck

Also just mash together why not

> Hammerites
> Lightbearers
> Cathedral

Personally I just look up words in other languages. I had a faction called 'Dimokratia' once after the Greek word for Democracy.

Good show. You passed the test.

Because 'Empire' has negative connotations in the west?
I like the way the Exile/Avernum series did it.
>Not the Empire of Something, or the Something Empire. Just the Empire. It's understandable. There's no need for elaborate names when there's only one game in town.

Rate my governmental names:
>The House of Commons
>The House of Masters

Bland as fuck, so I guess 10/10

>house of commons
eh. only a shitty government would have that kind of entity.
>House of Masters
masters isn't particularly evocative. how about acknowledging their noble ancestry? Like "House of the Blooded?"

>The [Random Color] Guard

>The Principality
>The Republic
>The Hierarchy
>The Alliance
>The Hegemony
>The Imperium (which is different from the Empire)
>the City/Nation/Planatary/System State of (insert name)

>The [word anyone has ever used ever]

>The Imperium
except I can't really use this in fantasy without people going 'woah we 40k now?'

Really ought to just be the Cluster Fuck Coalition.

>The city is run by guilds
>There is no lord mayor or local baron, just guilds

it would be a republic, with the guild leaders acting as the senators and the guilds acting as the states

>made a twink tranny elf as a joke character
>one of her (his?) greatest goals is to smash the patriarchy and bring freedom back to the kingdom
>the dm later reveals that The Patriarch is actually a kindly old wizard that everyone loves and my character is just a dick who likes to stir up trouble

One of my favorite campaigns. Once you just say fuck it and give up things become a lot more enjoyable for everyone

I can talk about motherfucking Spirited Away without someone in my group of friends bringing up 40k. Might as well go all in.

Motherfucker I can't type today.
>can't*

>a kindly old wizard

okay no? like you literally cannot rule a nation as a kind man. the whole point of leadership is deciding who to dick over when, why, and how bad. If the captain of the guard says "we need more swords for fighting raiders" and the swordsmith says "sure, pay me" you can either: shortchange the captain, make the smith work for free, or raise taxes on everyone else. There are literally no other options.

a good leader will actively minimize the number and amount of dickings, but you cannot rule without someone having serious, legitimate grievances with you. If your GM pulled "everyone loves him" he's full of shit and fucking your character for no good reason.

>It has blood, shadow, or any other dark word in it

I reserve the right for my ghost nights to give themselves edgy names and/or titles.

It's not like Ser Chrysanthemum makes a very good name for an avatar of death.

In real life, yeah, but for a wizard who can conjure resources for free every day?

I'll give you that he couldn't be loved by literally everyone, and that you have to make tough budget choices as a leader, but that doesn't mean you can't be a kind leader.

sure, it's harder, but doable.

besides, there's no way that an old unassuming wizard that's somehow kept the more ambitious mages in check for decades isn't playing some 4d chess. rule smarter, not harsher.

>the town of Bloodshadow
>it's actually a pleasant place
>the name comes from the vibrant red leaves that cling to a local tree species throughout the year, providing shade from the harsh sun

The Democracy.

Good ole' Àtown.

Hey, if Death can name his horse Binky, a ghost knight can name himself after a flower.

Sir Clarence Fauntebonce, Dread Tyrant of the Black Gates

> simply killing monsters is very profitable, and a fast-track for growing as a person
>killing monsters very rarely results in the player's death or long-term injury
>there for some reason aren't armies, ambitious villagers, religious orders, animal hunters, or curious wizards constantly going out to kill and loot monsters. Even if this stuff is in the character's backstory, they're always teaming up with people of a different faith/race/rank/career
Nothing ticks me off more than stuff that doesn't make economic sense

Or it would just be an oligarchy ruled by the largest and most powerful guilds.

Where did he say the Patriarch was a leader?

It could just be a ceremonial position.
He could just be a social figure or celebrity.

That's hilarious

The Caliphate?

Look, ma. A faggot

Commonwealth abest it's criminally underused

what's wrong with a name like darkbad evilplace?
it tells you what to expect

>darkbad evilplace is informative
oh, it is.
darkbad, a corruption of "darkblood" refers to the dark red silt the flowing river feeds into the valley. Excellent farmland. "Evilplace" another corruption of the older "Ville platte" or Flat village. It's a very wide, open area with few changes in elevation.
the biggest danger here is the annual flooding which feeds the fertility of the land, but because of how flat it is, it can wash out many of the local residents. They've taken to keeping elevated storehouses, locally known as "Tree Cellars."

>In a dark and treacherous place

>What is the present-day United States

I'd shit my pants if I were to face The Chrysanthemum of Mercy if the guy carrying that name was known to fuck shit up.

I mean, Shitfuck Soulbloodfukker is easy modo for intimidation. Cute, flowery names for soul destroyers is where it's at.

>The Mankind
>Civilization
(as in: everything beyond it is Savagery).

>everything beyond it is savagery
how about The Ecumene? It literally means inhabited/civilized land.

I grew up in Ayton. Look it up.

My comfort boner awakens.

I once had the main town the players were in called.
Notgunnalookitup.
Players actually liked it.

>If the captain of the guard says "we need more swords for fighting raiders"
kindly old WIZARD

Count yourself lucky he just summoned up some swords in a safe but accessible place and didn't decide the weather should be swordy with chance of thunder shield showers today.

How can someone relate Spirited Away to 40k?

I actually really like this, especially if you go overboard.
>THE BLOODMOON ON THE TOWN OF GRIMSKULL SHONE BLACK AND RED IN THE SHADOW OF THE GRIM BLOODY NIGHT
I am not actually good at it, but when done dumbly enough I love it.

We're not quite there yet, but Trump seems to be actively trying to move it in that direction.

Well, now that Rune Priests actually do channel the spirit of Fenris, Haku being the river makes perfect sense.

Holy fucking shit tumblr, calm down. It's just a WIZARD.

Okay though, what names can I use for the governments of space faring races? I've already used [race] empire, kingdom of [race], and council of [race], and I had to rewrite the whole lore of a race just to make that last one make sense. Not to mention all the human factions I need names for.

The transtellar consortium of do-gooders

I can't

>To solve this quest, you must consort with the leader of the Thieves' Guild

I dont get it, high councils are pretty popular way of introducing people in the government

is it historically inaccurate?

>'Talk with the governor, he may know the answer'.
>Governor goes missing
>Cliche questline begins

Hey, it's better than having a quiche questline amiright?

>Monolithic and surprisingly homogenous Thieves Guild

I'm a big fan of consortiums, hegemonies, associations, confederations, ecumenes, pacts, unions, people's free democratic republics, leagues, coalitions, charters, and any group that just refers to themselves as the [demonym]smen or the [demonym]ers.

sprinkle some proper nouns in there, because what species is 100% unified and what government names itself after a species, and you've got some good shit.

>The X Guild
>X's College
>The [Insert Generic Nouns Here]s

you know, it is actuallt funny when you have a guild for every little thing
>fishers guild
>chairmakers guild
>nailsmiths guild
>beggars guild

First of all, you're making a monolithic race. Stop that. Seriously. Stop it.

Personally, I shamelessly rip off of a setting I know but my players don't. Right now, It's Infinity:
Pan Oceania (sub factions:
Svalarheima, Neoterra, Acontecimento, Military/Knightly Orders)

Yu Jing (Imperial Service, Birds of Prey, Wapanese Insurgency)

Nomads (Black Hand, Tunguska, Corregidor, Bakunin, Order of Saint Mary of the Knife, Teutonic Order [banished from PanO & hacking knights])

Ariadna (Cossacks, Americans, French, Scots)

Haqqislam (Hassassins, Sultinate, Black Hand, Qapu Khalqi [Corsairs/pirates])

>guildmasters guild

someone has to teach you how to run a guild

they have a secret war with the administrators guild

>Member of party is card carrying member of thieves guild
>People think it's wrong that you constantly treat them with suspicion

I get that it's a fantasy world where thieves' guilds are a thing, but come on.

>One Empire Limit

When will this meme end? It's okay to have different polities with the same title.

Though I guess if there's only 3-5 it's less bad. Not so much if you have 12+ polities

>The Adventurer's Guild
>They're [Beastman] but based off of [Human culture]
>Airships, steampunk in general
>Sci-fi settings where every member of a species is under the same government.
>The entire planet is a dingy medieval europe with basically zero fantasy elements. Its creator has every detail of its economy and tectonic plates autistically planned out.
>Majjjjjjjyycka
>Setting has 6-9 boring magical planes that have no actual reason to be their other than to make people stop reading about it before they even get to the actual fucking setting.
>Tolkien

but i like most of those

If i'm understanding your use of the word Monolithic right are you saying that it's a bad idea to have one race be strongest race? Because actually I have a bunch of different races of varying power, and no one race is the "strongest".
If you mean it in the context of whole space empires consisting of only one race, even though it seems like that's the case I'm planning to subvert that expectation in my players by having them all be surprisingly diverse, despite the fact that the factions were founded by singular races.
The problem with that is if I allow myself to call more than one faction a empire I'll probaly end up calling every faction an empire.
In my pre-rough draft of the setting every cation was an empire, and they were all competing to conquer more land.

>In my pre-rough draft of the setting every cation was an empire, and they were all competing to conquer more land.

Empires don't have to conquer land.

Oh you can only get robbed two times a year at most. Less if you've donated to the guild within the last 3 years.

he's a frogposter, user.

>If i'm understanding your use of the word Monolithic right are you saying that it's a bad idea to have one race be strongest race?
Not him, but I think you're misunderstanding his point. If I'm reading it right, you're doing a "land of hats" thing, where everyone everywhere is identical and based around a gimmick. Look at earth, we may have a UN, but that's mostly a puppet theatre. Instead we have a multitude of factions, what with the European Union, United States and other nations

Yeah I know. I'm honestly not sure why I added that last part in the post if it didn't have anything to do with what I was talking about.
I understand now. Sorry about that, I'm pretty tired right now and I guess I just can't think proper.

This implies the last 3-4 presidents weren't

alright I'll fix it
>Adventurer's Courts: bands of would-be heroes, sycophants, bards, and shady types orbiting legendary (and wealthy) former adventurers, hoping for funding to journey into the uncharted/delve into a tomb/recheck the seal on some ancient evil/etc etc
>they're [Beastmen] but based off [interesting concepts] that mesh well with [cultural aesthetic], but with some [unique elements]
>Airships aren't a thing, but various flying creatures/items serve similar purposes for trade and combat (gryphons, smol dragons, flying carpets, pegasi, sleighs, etc etc).
>the entire planet is an anything but dingy classical Mediterranean dripping with fantasy elements. while some economic details and climate stuff are mapped out ahead of time, most of it is left vague enough to be filled in on the fly as needed
>no neopagans were allowed near a keyboard for the making of any of this.
>setting has a handful of underworlds, strange realms, and afterlives, but they're all accessible from reality in some way. Just gated off by powerful beings, far beyond the capacity of most to reach, or outside the sight of most of the schmucks hanging out in Plato's Cave.
>don't rehash Tolkien for the millionth time

We've been doing that since the civil war

Literally what is the Gilded Age

>Silverstar
>Port Key
>Wai Li
>Daphi
>Bahgz
>Io Sumety
>Twi Ti
>Ell'Mafaad

what about adventurers courting investors to fund their latest hijinx, if the adventurers score big so do the investors, if the adventurers die, then there is no shortage of people looking to get rich quick

And then just wait until one of my players catches on.

>local king throws money at some dumb shit who underestimates the size of the earth
>accidentally lays claim to an entire hemisphere

Hmm, have you considered referring to "empire" as a thing a state has, rather than a thing the state is?

Like the Roman Republic was very imperial, despite not having an emperor. Same for the Principate de jure, but then it gets murkier because for ages the West based their definition of "Empire" off the Romans
Same for the British Empire, which wasn't really an Empire in the sense that it had an Emperor not counting Vicky as empress of India, that came later.
Hell, an empire is really only a nation that has subjugated other nations, which is a pretty loose definition.
...I swear there's a point in here somewhere

i keked hard
sometimes reality is stranger than fiction