GM, what's this character's name?

>That's what you get, bitch!

Look at this whiny bitch that can't take a joke. Peace out, grimdark mcfucksgoats

>Players must make a Will save every time the emperor says Biggus Dickus

I hate grimdark a much as the next guy, but turning the game into a joke is the worst kind of that guyism.

Had an npc lizard man named Zuzen. Player thought he would be funny calling him Susan. Jokes on him, Zuzen has a +7 Athletics check and a bite attack. He didn't make fun of Zuzen anymore

Just stop giving a fuck and name your characters things like Beef McSlabCheese and Biggus Dickus.
Just because your names aren't serious doesn't mean you can't be engaged and immersed into the campaign proper.

Oh, oh, oh - and the most important part? DO NOT ACKNOWLEDGE HOW SILLY THE NAMES ARE. DO IT NEITHER IN-GAME, NOR OUT OF IT.

I can guaran-fucking-tee you that when you say Biggus Dickus for the 50th time with a straight face and a bored intonation, it will be torture to that player.

I'll be honest, that sounds like the single most retarded idea I've ever heard.

Even if you win, all you're doing is making your players uncomfortable, you're not actually making the game any better.

I do this every time, but only because it helps me actually remember the 300+ npcs/towns/roads we see

Yes you have, you've made the players stop making the game shittier.

>I am super serious and you must play my super serious game

Nope.

see

Get a better keyboard app.

>turning the game into a joke is the worst kind of that guyism.
This

>What, why. Think a little. No one childosh enough to do that shir will listen to a talk.
>Stop treating It so seriously, what's your problem, not ruining your perfect world, that's what your going to hear and unless he is already annoying to the rest of the group, It's you who will sound like a fag
Not that user, but you talk them so that when they keep doing it, you can drop them and not feel like an asshole for it.
I didn't talk to the guy I dropped because I, correctly, assumed he would never change.
I still think it was the wrong way to approach it.
He never had a clue anything was wrong, even years later.

And to be clear, I don't think any player has used an npc's actual name ever, unless they were directly addressing an important one.
They always refer to them as "that elf by the lake", "the fat cleric", "Lothar of the Hill People", "emo mage", "Captain Tightpants", or whatever.
That's just them not bothering to remember or giving nicknames to npcs and each other.
That's absolutely fine.
I also don't mind the occasional infantile joke at all. (Although, thank god I no longer have player quoting Monty Python every session)
But if they turn literally everything into a lolsosilly joke, fuck them.
They might not even know they're doing it, but unless you are going for a wacky comedy vibe, they're actively ruining the mood and you are under no obligation to tolerate it.

They're not ruining my perfect little world, true.
They are ruining my crappy little game though, and for some us, that's all the gaming we get.
I'd rather not spend it with someone who thinks it's genuinely, laughably funny every time a spell is cast, a creature is seen, or when they walk across the fucking town.

>Biggus Dickus?

I think you mean Phallus Maximus.

Cousin to Scrotal Testicus?

I thought he was related to that horrible coward Sans Testicles...

>Phallus Maximus

Sounds like a bad Transformers name.

You sir, need to take up a classier hobby. Us plebs will just have to deal without your perfect classiness.

Pip pip cheerio and all that shit.

Let them know that giggling OC corresponds to giggling IC and that not!Romans don't tend to leave name-gigglers uncastrated.

The rumor in the bathhouse is that he's the offspring of a demi-god, with ancestry linked to Priapus himself.

I was gonna ask who the fuck names their daughter Georgette, but then I figured if anything, they would be the kind of people to raise a bar wench.

Because the only options are "guys who accept lolrandumbSOsillylol humor in response to anything in game" or guys "snobbish guys who think their game is meant for loftier elements"?
Get fucked by a double-dicked racehorse.

I knew a Georgette once.
I've honestly seen prettier Georges.
I try to never mock the unfortunate looking though.

user, please tell me you understand the praenomen/nomen/cognomen/agnomen distinction, because I've studied enough Roman history to get super triggered when someone fucks that up.

I'm about to look into it before I name any characters, actually, because I'm rather anal about such things myself. I only have cursory knowledge at the moment, though, like number-names (e.g. in Gladiator, the main character's middle name "Decimus" implies that he's the tenth son of his family).

Nope. I'm literally hassled by 10+ people to run games as I'm the only one who 1. Reads rules indepth enough to do so and 2. Put enough time into it to run decent games. Being a shit? Get the kick. I've only ever had to kick 1 person because Lo and behold works 99% of the time. The guy I did have to kick was for completely unrelated reasons he was selling stuff he stole from my place on Craigslist, including my husbands underwear

I once met, no shit, a Thomasina. She was actually pretty damn cute.

I've taken Latin as an actual class and I'm still not willing to touch that. No sir. Two-name not!Romans, thank you very much.

Fun fact, big dicks were seen as crass and unattractive back in those times, which is how Priapus came to be.

Okay, user. Give me a moment to get situated and hold on to the used Japanese schoolgirl panties I automatically assume all Veeky Forums users are wearing and I will, on behalf of every classics professor I've ever had, give you the spiel on Roman naming conventions.

This is why all the characters in my campaigns are named like Snippy Dimbus and Grondo Hondo or stuff like that. Preempt them making fun of it by being already ridiculous

The guy who worked at the bottle shop down the road from me when I was 16 was cool as fuck and didn't care we were underage (simpler times). His name was Apple Tree. His parents were hippies.

Were her parents Puritans?

Right. Your basic Roman name has three parts: the praenomen, the nomen, and the cognomen. We'll start with the praenomen, literally the "first name". This doesn't work quite like modern first names; there are a severely limited number of options (generally each major Roman family used a total of maybe 3-5 praenomina for all their male children). Classic options are Gaius, Publius, Marcus, Titus, etc. Also fairly popular are (as you mentioned) numerical names like Quintus, Decimus, Septimus, etc. These were not always explicitly connected with birth order (although they could be). You mentioned the protagonist of Gladiator, Maximus Decimus Meridius. That's the classic example of how not to construct an authentic Roman name, because none of the components are in the right place. Decimus, as a praenomen, should be the first part of the name rather than the second.

>Next post I'll explain the nomen, the second part of a Roman name

I have a Tuco and Sentenza in my campaign, and nobody's complained yet.

Poor Lyubomir... Forever will he be known as "Lube"...

The nomen designates which gens you are a member of. The gens (usually translated as family or clan) was a very important element of Roman society; essentially, each gens was an extended family usually claiming common descent from an illustrious (sometimes mythical) ancestor. Some well-known gentes were the gens Julia (think Gaius Julius Caesar), the gens Junia (as in Marcus Junius Brutus), and the gens Cornelia (as in Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus). Over the course of the Roman Empire the gens (and the nomen) declined in importance; some laws that extended citizenship to many people assigned them certain nomina (so, for example, the nomina Aurelius and Flavius became as common as dirt). Looking once again at Maximus Decimus Meridius, the most appropriate choice for his nomen would be Meridius (not a real nomen so far as I know, but Decimus is a legit praenomen and Maximus is a legit cognomen so we only have one choice left).

>Next post I'll talk about cognomina and agnomina, the third, fourth, etc. parts of Roman names
>If I'm not being clear or you have questions feel free to butt in

Well, her name isn't Unless-Jesus-Christ-Had-Died-For-Thee-Thou-Hadst-Been-Damned.

Hot dog, this is exactly what I need. Lay your wisdom on me.

How could a numerical name be used other than to signify birth order? Was there some significance to choosing a praenomen like Titus or Marcus, or was it more like "it's what our family has always been naming boys"?

The cognomen, the third part of the Roman name, originally came about as a way to distinguish individuals within a family. With the limited options for praenomina, it became necessary to have some way to make it clear which Gaius Julius or Lucius Junius you were talking about. So you designated them as "Gaius Julius, the hairy one" (Gaius Julius Caesar) or "Lucius Junius, the stupid one" (Lucius Junius Brutus). Some of these personal cognomina could be inherited, especially if the original bearer of the cognomen did something especially notable (for example, the original Lucius Junius Brutus is the reputed founder of the Roman Republic). In this way, cognomina could denote specific branches of gentes - the Julii Caesares were a subfamily of the gens Julia, for example.

Once this started happening, Romans needed a further way of denoting specific people. Originally, there were a dozen guys named Gaius Julius but only one Gaius Julius Caesar (he was the hairy one). But now Caesar has become a family name and there are four Gaius Julius Caesars. So you add an agnomen, which is the same as a cognomen but comes after it. Now you have, for example, "Gaius Julius Caesar, the handsome one" (Gaius Julius Caesar Pulcher), "Gaius Julius Caesar, the one with red hair" (Gaius Julius Caesar Rufus), "Gaius Julius Caesar, the fat one" (Gaius Julius Caesar Crassus), and "Gaius Julius Caesar, the one who won the war against Macedon" (Gaius Julius Caesar Macedonicus - this is an example of an agnomen ex virtute, which I'll explain in the next post).

So to look once again at Maximus Decimus Meridius, we'll see that his name should really be Decimus Meridius Maximus
>Decimus: praenomen, probably common in his family
>Meridius: he's a member of the gens Meridia
>Maximus: he (or possibly an ancestor of his) is either a big guy or did something noteworthy enough that he's named "the biggest/greatest"

>Next post I'll explain the cognomen/agnomen ex virtute

The praenomen became less and less important over the course of Roman history. Usually gentes would stick to a limited number of praenomina. The eldest son frequently had the same praenomen as his father; other children would usually have praenomina belonging to illustrious members of the gens. Some gentes apparently avoided using praenomina that had belonged to ancestors that somehow shamed the family (for example, the two sons of Lucius Junius Brutus were traitors to the Republic and their praenomina, Titus and Tiberius, were according to legend not used by that gens).

Some praenomina were apparently connected with the actual circumstances of the child's birth; for example the name Postumus could be assigned to a boy born after his father's death.

Later in the Republic, and into the early Empire, the praenomen became less and less important and it was more common for most or all males of a family to have the same praenomen.

This
At least your players are making an effort to remember whos who and whats what
Stop being such a whiney faggot

Or you could give your NPCs joke names to begin with.
>he's a soldier (or lumberjack in peace time) with maximum strength and a BFS
>his name is Beefis

>hold on to the used Japanese schoolgirl panties I automatically assume all Veeky Forums users are wearing
Not all of us wear those as underwear

Not that guy you were replying to but I think he was being genuinely sincere in his sentiment, albeit a bit smug

Okay, so some cognomina and agnomina were assigned not because of the personal characteristics of their holder but because of some notable deed (usually military) they performed. The best-known example of this is probably Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus, who defeated Hannibal at Zama to win the Second Punic War.
>Publius: praenomen, quite common among the Cornelia
>Cornelius: he was a member of the gens Cornelia
>Scipio: his specific branch of the gens was the Cornelii Scipiones
>Africanus: conqueror of Africa, for his victory over the Carthaginians

A cognomen/agnomen ex virtute could be related to the place where the victory was won or the specific enemy defeated (Macedonicus, Africanus, Gothicus, Germanicus, Britannicus) or to some other aspect of the victory (Titus Manlius Torquatus defeated a Gaulish champion and took his torque as a prize; Quintus Fabius Maximus Cunctator got his agnomen for his favoured strategy - Cunctator means "the delayer" and he invented the "Fabian strategy" of avoiding battle during the Second Punic War.)

Especially later in Roman history, even this style of name could be inherited - for example Germanicus, father of the emperor Caligula and brother of the emperor Claudius, inherited the agnomen from his father, who was posthumously awarded it for his defeat of the Germans. Similarly, the emperor Claudius gave himself the agnomen Britannicus after his conquest of Britain, but the best-known Britannicus is Claudius' son, who inherited the name.

>Georgette
>gesundheit
What kind of arse-backwards, muffle-mouthed accent do the two sound even remotely alike?

>genuinely sincere in his sentiment
>You sir, need to take up a classier hobby. Us plebs will just have to deal without your perfect classiness.
I somehow doubt it.

In the late Roman Republic and the Roman Empire, names became increasingly complicated and the simple three- or four-name structure was no longer universally true. It became commonplace for emperors and other illustrious citizens to tack various ancestral praenomina, nomina, cognomina and agnomina onto their own names (and, since adoption was common, to modify their names based on their adoptive father's name) so, for example, we could have an emperor named Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus Caligula (better known as just Caligula).
>Gaius Julius Caesar: this is the classic triple-barreled Roman name based on the fact that Caligula was the adopted son of the adopted son of the adopted son of Gaius Julius Caesar (the famous one)
>Augustus: a bit tricky to define in terms of traditional Roman naming, this is automatically thrown in to your name when you become emperor
>Germanicus: an inherited agnomen ex virtute, as Caligula was the grandson of the original Germanicus
>Caligula: variously defined as either an agnomen or an unofficial nickname, derived from "caliga," the Roman soldier's boot, because when Caligula was a child he had his own military uniform including child-sized caligae; "Caligula" means "little boot"

It only got messier as time went on. The classic three- or four-part name was mostly only a thing in the middle and late Republic, but it's kind of seen as the "traditional" or "proper" Roman naming system.

>Next post I'll briefly talk about what people actually called each other

Ooh, like Shakespeare's Coriolanus. This is fucking great, gives me some ideas for characters. Kudos on your knowledge and articulate teaching, user.

He meant it as in "that name's so weird it sounds like a sneeze, gesundheit!"

>weird
Not really.
It's uncommon but nothing about is really weird.

So, once you get past the very Roman state when literally everyone in Rome knows everyone else in Rome, praenomina are almost entirely useless for designating individuals. Going into the Forum and shouting "Hey, Gaius!" or "Marcus, where are you?" is basically equivalent of going into a Veeky Forums thread and posting "Fuck you, faggot" without actually replying to a post. You want that faggot to see a (You) at the top of your reply and know that you mean fuck them in particular.

If you're speaking to an immediate family member or a close associate and there's no one in the conversation with the same praenomen as them, you can refer to that person as "Gaius" or "Titus" or what have you. Of course if there are multiple Gaiuses in the conversation you will have to get more specific.

If you don't know the person that well (but are still on somewhat equal social levels) you refer to them by the cognomen or agnomen that designates them to a level of specificity required by the situation: if there's only one Scipio in the conversation you call him Scipio, but if there are multiple you distinguish Scipio Africanus from Scipio Aemilianus.

In a formal setting, like for example a Senatorial debate, you always start with the praenomen and nomen, then get more specific as necessary. If there's only one Quintus Fabius in the Senate that day you address him as Quintus Fabius, but if the whole damn gens Fabia turns up for this vote you might specify Quintus Fabius Maximus, or Quintus Fabius Maximus Verrucosus, or even Quintus Fabius Maximus Verrucosus Cunctator.

If you're a literal plebeian speaking to someone of higher status, you'll want to either refer to them by their position in the cursus honorum ("Honoured tribune/great consul/etc.") or their nomen and cognomen ("Noble Pompeius Magnus, hear my plea for clemency") and throw in some flattering adjectives.

Exactly, Coriolanus was awarded that cognomen for taking the city of Corioli.

I've got class now, but if you have any questions ask them and I'll try to drop in later to answer you.

...storytime please. I really want to know how that one happened. So much that I don't even care you're gay.

That's how my player joked about it, anyway. Followed by repeating the name with a silly accent.

A few questions.

1. How would someone introduce themselves? My players' characters are a bunch of freelancers roaming the land in search of sword word. Let's say they were approached by a captain of the city garrison. Would he give them his full name? And would a common pleb introduce himself the same way?

2. Let's assume my players end up performing great, legendary deeds in service of not!Rome. Could they possibly earn cognomina ex virtute for this, or would that be something exclusive to native citizens?

3. Would being called, say, Caius Martius Crassus (the fat one) be an insult to Caius Martius, or would he be like "well, I AM rather portly, so the name is apt"?

I never knew I wanted to know this. Thanks user!

1. That would depend to an extent on the person. In your example, a garrison captain (or an average plebeian) would not be likely to have much status or an official cognomen, so he might just introduce himself by rank, praenomen and nomen - "I am Lucius Antonius, captain of the east gate." If he's somewhat friendly, or the PCs get to know him better, he might tell them to refer to him using his unofficial cognomen, if he has one - "Lucius Antonius is my father, everyone calls me Felix". If they meet someone of higher status (or someone who's a pompous fuck) that person might introduce themselves with all three names (or more if they have extra agnomina) and get extremely offended if they're not addressed in that way.
2. This one is tricky, because a lot of the best-known examples of cognomina ex virtute come from the late Republican period when you had to be a Roman citizen to have public office/military command. In that context, I would be inclined to say that while they might be unofficially referred to as such, they would not be properly granted cognomina ex virtute unless they were first given honorary citizenship and assigned proper not!Roman names (in this case, their praenomina and nomina might be adaptations of their own names or they might be named after their patron/employer). If you want to go the more Imperial route, though, an emperor can basically fling whatever name he wants at whatever person he wants (keep in mind though that emperors, especially paranoid ones, usually reserved the best victory names for themselves).
3. That would entirely depend on Caius Martius' personality and on who is referring to him as Crassus. If it's an affectionate nickname from a friend and he's not the kind of guy to get pissed off at that, he'd probably be fine. If he's a touchy asshole and a rival Senator is referring to him as "my learned friend, Caius Martius Crassus," well, that's a different story.

Keep in mind too that if Crassus is an inherited cognomen referring to his branch of the family, he probably wouldn't object at all. An excellent example is the line of Junii Brutii, descendants of Lucius Junius Brutus (the cognomen "Brutus" originally referring to "the stupid one"). According to legend, the first Brutus avoided the attention of the tyrannical last king of Rome by pretending to be an idiot, all the while conspiring to overthrow him and found the Republic. So a name that was originally insulting became a badge of honour for that family because of what the first Brutus did.

This is interesting as all fuck.

Featuring the centurions Gluteus Maximus and the hero Testacles of the XIV Legion.

Happy to educate all you fellow members of the gens Anonica.

Man I hate that. My players do that sometimes, but only if the names are... susceptible to that kind of thing.

Nowadays I already know how they think, and can just pick names that they'll like and never distort into something else.
For example, I know that, for some reason, they all basically cream themselves over vikings, so names like "Brunhuld Hajfktornhr" NEVER get made fun of, no matter how silly they sound. You just learn how to adapt.

>What's this planet called?
>Regina
>Vagina, ok

>The giant's name is Zephyros
>Okay, I want to ask Zephyr Hills a question
at least it's not just my players, because I've talked with other groups about the character and they call him the same thing.

I have the opposite problem.
>Make my fantasy names complex and/or hard to say because lolfantasy but with a clear nickname if shortened.
>Nobody ever picks up on them and proceeds to struggle with the whole fucking thing every single time.

>>GM, what's this character's name?
>>it's, uh, Gavin McLeod
>>haha gay cloud
>Okay, what do you think his name is?

>>what's this village called, GM?
>>Cropston
>>Corpsetown, okay
>Okay, what do you think the village's called?

>>okay, so you successully seduce the bar wench
>>what's her name?
>Up to you. Do you even want her to show up later?

>>the blacksmith tells you his son has gone missing...
>>what's his son's name?
>>Tom
>>haha does he have a friend named Jerry?
>Do you say that out loud?

>>what's this character's name?
>>John Smith
>>haha is that the best you can come up with?
>You've met no less then twelve elves and faeries so far. Have you not noticed they all had mundane Anglosax names yet?

>rhymes with fun

Testacles would be a greek name.

>>Do you say that out loud?

I run Paranoia.
Unless I just asked for a dice roll, EVERYTHING you say is either in-character or a narration of your character's actions.

Does an absolutely wonderful job of shutting down crosstalk.

Well, in my case, if they do decide they said it out loud, the NPC's response would be along the lines of "how did you guess?!", and a fellow named Jerry would be a witness in their investigation. It's both a reminder that you should probably save the out-of-game jokes for the mid-game feast, and that you do have some degree of control over the narrative.

>No, I don't actually have that many friends, really. Just my brothers Dick and Harry.

>Brutus avoided the attention of the tyrannical last king of Rome by pretending to be an idiot
2500 years of "I was merely pretending to be retarded" and counting.

If you did that I would be crosstalking all the fucking time since I just love DMs doing that kind of shit. I think it's a reward for me to control the narrative so much.

>give a guy the last name Namflow
>on the hunt and has a hatred for werewolves
>nobody points out that his last name is Wolfman fackwards

were the players able to read the name or only hear it?
because if they never read it they might not see it
you usually can't get the spelling just from the vocalization

Full name for rolls by the character, used roll20

maybe they didn't pay attention to it
maybe they paid attention but didn't see the connection between those
maybe they did notice but chose to keep quiet

Is this the first time you used something like this?