Proposal: Character naming dictionaries
I'm a bit of a linguistics geek. And few things bug me more in STO when someone has, say, a Vulcan or Trill character with an English name, esp when there's no backstory included to explain why this would be the case. There is also the challenge of figuring out a good name for a character when there is little to no canon for naming conventions in that species.
What I'm proposing is that I offer little naming "dictionaries" for the fleet, and anyone else interested, so that if you're stuck naming your Lethean captain or Tellarite BO or whatever, there's a handy list to pull from that will give you a name that sounds canon. I can put together these lists by feeding lists of names into a random word generator. The cool thing with this is that we can combine lists of canon names with lists of names that Stonewall users have given their captains and BOs, so that, not only will the name lists feel canon, but will also have a uniquely Stonewall flavour to them.
To give you an example of what I'm talking about, I fed a list of Bajoran names (for which there's plenty of canon) into a name generator, and ended up with this list:
BASSIM BRILKALA KORA GETTOS
HORANDI LEETTA MERAD SURMAR
IBUS BODAB BEMARA RAZAHNA
SURMAT HOLIBOK BASSA YNDAN
JOMAK HELAN UNGTAK YASSA
OSSARIN HELENA GALENNU HORAN
BRIKA TRAMONSA EBLAR SOLKA'S
ELIBOK BARA PALIBOK ORTARAM
ZIYAN KIRCO TENIS ORTARO
WOBARA KIRAM ISHAYRA KLIBOK
GENTT RENA TRANI SARO
TALIS LATRISH BODAR KIRAT
WINAR RANTT ADAN MARENA
OSSA ZAYDIS RAZA DEKORAT
HORILKA ALES BELENTT LARN
BARO WOBAR PELA YNDI
MIRRO GRAN NAPREL GENAYDIS
LAATH YNDAMOR OPAZA BALNORA
ROMAC GIRA MARIK TEETTA
TOLEM ROANE NAPREN LATRIKA
ADAR IJARN GANJOHL ESSIM
BARKA SOLEM MIKARA TORTARR
GANA NALA ERMAR NEREM
YNDAMI BRISH FALNA POLEM
ROMARIS BRILLRA GERO HOVAL
So, if you want to name your Bajoran a name that sounds Bajoran without using a name of an existing character, you can just pull two names from this list and bingo, authentic-sounding Bajoran name. That way, your Bajoran can have a nice name like Solem Latrika, rather than John Smith (or would that be Smith John? :-P ).
I especially want to do this for species that don't really have much canon for them. I think this can be a handy resource and service for a lot of folks, not just Stonewall folks.
If you have any interest in my providing this service, let me know, and I'll start on some lists. Once I propose what species I'm going to do the first dictionary for, I'll solicit names from the fleet the names you have given captains and BOs of that species, and then produce the list. In order for me to produce lists for species without much canon, I would need names from you folks to provide a sufficient number of phonological seeds for the word generator.
If there's no interest, I won't be able to properly do the lists, as I won't have sufficient material to provide the word generators.
Please let me know here or in-game if you'd be interested in my providing this service.
Thanks
Peace
What I'm proposing is that I offer little naming "dictionaries" for the fleet, and anyone else interested, so that if you're stuck naming your Lethean captain or Tellarite BO or whatever, there's a handy list to pull from that will give you a name that sounds canon. I can put together these lists by feeding lists of names into a random word generator. The cool thing with this is that we can combine lists of canon names with lists of names that Stonewall users have given their captains and BOs, so that, not only will the name lists feel canon, but will also have a uniquely Stonewall flavour to them.
To give you an example of what I'm talking about, I fed a list of Bajoran names (for which there's plenty of canon) into a name generator, and ended up with this list:
BASSIM BRILKALA KORA GETTOS
HORANDI LEETTA MERAD SURMAR
IBUS BODAB BEMARA RAZAHNA
SURMAT HOLIBOK BASSA YNDAN
JOMAK HELAN UNGTAK YASSA
OSSARIN HELENA GALENNU HORAN
BRIKA TRAMONSA EBLAR SOLKA'S
ELIBOK BARA PALIBOK ORTARAM
ZIYAN KIRCO TENIS ORTARO
WOBARA KIRAM ISHAYRA KLIBOK
GENTT RENA TRANI SARO
TALIS LATRISH BODAR KIRAT
WINAR RANTT ADAN MARENA
OSSA ZAYDIS RAZA DEKORAT
HORILKA ALES BELENTT LARN
BARO WOBAR PELA YNDI
MIRRO GRAN NAPREL GENAYDIS
LAATH YNDAMOR OPAZA BALNORA
ROMAC GIRA MARIK TEETTA
TOLEM ROANE NAPREN LATRIKA
ADAR IJARN GANJOHL ESSIM
BARKA SOLEM MIKARA TORTARR
GANA NALA ERMAR NEREM
YNDAMI BRISH FALNA POLEM
ROMARIS BRILLRA GERO HOVAL
So, if you want to name your Bajoran a name that sounds Bajoran without using a name of an existing character, you can just pull two names from this list and bingo, authentic-sounding Bajoran name. That way, your Bajoran can have a nice name like Solem Latrika, rather than John Smith (or would that be Smith John? :-P ).
I especially want to do this for species that don't really have much canon for them. I think this can be a handy resource and service for a lot of folks, not just Stonewall folks.
If you have any interest in my providing this service, let me know, and I'll start on some lists. Once I propose what species I'm going to do the first dictionary for, I'll solicit names from the fleet the names you have given captains and BOs of that species, and then produce the list. In order for me to produce lists for species without much canon, I would need names from you folks to provide a sufficient number of phonological seeds for the word generator.
If there's no interest, I won't be able to properly do the lists, as I won't have sufficient material to provide the word generators.
Please let me know here or in-game if you'd be interested in my providing this service.
Thanks
Peace
