How did you choose your name?

[Joe_Schmoe]

In the mid-2000s I played a game called Runescape, a game that was mostly played by teenagers with names like "Ipwnj00noob", "Psykogodkilla", "l33t badaz", "Ipwnurmom", etc. I figured with a name like Joe Schmoe there's no way I'd be mistaken for a 12 year old, and the name stuck for all these years.

[Felien]

Base on Sword Art Online and I role the dice till I got a decent “family name”.
On my alt is because how ppl was saying my name wrong and my “family name” is how they decided to call me.

[Rowde]

Show my age...

Way way back I was trying to register to play a Telnet RPG... Before I could actually play I had to send in a detailed bio of my character. The game was more on the RP side, there was a full list of player characters available and I guess in the interest of variety they were giving bonus allocation points for starting your name with less common letter characters and for playing less common races (it was sci-fi RPG). Based on that I chose a less common race whose naming convention was that their names were incredibly long and mostly looked like gibberish, and thus were somehow condensed (either as some kind of acronym or a set of the beginning letters in the name) when being addressed by other species. I chose to begin my name with 'R' because that was one of the less common letters to begin a name with.

iirc, my species were telepathic jellyfish things who usually had mind-based abilities (mind-control, mind-wipe, etc.) and generally looked down on other species. I don't remember the full name tbh... Rowdethiclurminoxdecart... it went on... but I know I intentionally shortened it to 'Rowde' because my idea was that the name would be pronounced like 'loud' only with 'r' in front. However, that dangling 'e' on the end would most likely cause ppl to mispronounce it as 'rowdy' so then I would have to correct them... basic lifeforms that they are... it brings me no joy in having to constantly redress them.

At any rate, as part of the bio I had to write like... my character's immediate intention or something... and as the game was in progress, I had to catch up on the established lore and such. Apparently I misread something though, as my character sheet was rejected and the GM pointed out the reason why (iirc I was thinking I was secretly an assassin on a covert mission in the Federation based on some war I had read about... but apparently that war had already been resolved and the faction I was supposed to be from had been dissolved...) and although they did offer me some suggestions about how to tweak the character... it had already taken me a crap ton of time to roll that one and I was like... already "married" to the idea I had created so... ehhhhhh... never actually played the game.

I kept the name though. Went through a couple transitions here and there. When I played OG PSO on Dreamcast 'Rowde' was Purplenum iirc... but I wasn't a big fan of spears (Characters' names determined their ID tags, which in turn affected their common loot drops) and by dropping the 'e' my ID tag changed to Bluefull for swords. So I was 'Rowd' in that game... until one of my friends thought I got the name from a jobber character in Suikoden II... and I wasn't having any of that so that silent 'e' got reattached ever since. Sometimes when we play medieval or high-fantasy games I insist that the name is pronounced 'row-day' instead because I'm wearing my fancy pants... Ser Rowde of House Rowde...

FFXIV was the first online game I played where I could put in a separate surname, and I felt like Rowde was better suited for that. So it could be a 'family' name for alts if I wanted.

[Dezee]

My nuts......wish I was kidding

[SamSmoot]

Split version of my WoW character's name, Fugubar.

[MeeDeggiThePunisher]

Sevro is my favorite character from a book series. Red Rising Trilogy if anyone is interested.

[Sentaryuu]

Celi Roronoa

People will probably think this is weird and cringy (since most probably don't care for shipping) but the name "Celi" is the name of a made up child of Zoro and Sanji from One Piece that I thought of. And "Roronoa", the last name of Zoro. Not the most creative, but who cares, right? As long it is a name I love and I have loved this name since I created him (he was created at a time I was really into Zoro and Sanji, still love Sanji tho). And if I ever did change his name, I would only change his last name. I am way attached to the name Celi.

[Clover_Blake]

Following the official naming conventions for every single of my characters, I chose names that I liked and found fitting for each of them.

[Sigma-Astra]

I guess since other people have mentioned their alts as well, maybe I should join the boat though I'll try to keep the alts far more condensed than my main character.

Lorelei Kaioh - Female Xaela

This one was a spinoff from another main character that I would role-play a lot as in the same campaign that Soma came from whom gave birth towards my main character's name in XIV. Though, I call the XIV Soma the "discount version" because they are nothing alike at all. The original Lorelei Kaioh was an ill-tempered, grouchy, cold, and aggressive woman. She was mostly a b*tch, but still loved by many people as a lot of them found her cynical and sadistic nature funny sometimes, even funnier when she tried to have "better" intentions. She was also Neptunian royalty from the setting that she came from and plays heavily with the lore from that setting.

Lorelei is German for "alluring, temptress" and Kaioh is Japanese for "Sea King". So, her name roughly translates into "Alluring Sea King" which is great because she's also a siren. She's a blue-toned Xaela and I felt that fit the most in order to represent her ties with the sea.

Aurica Vexus - Female Midlander

This one was a bit of a crossover between two different games at the time and I just wanted to play around with the character creator and make a Hyur. I love the Ar Tonelico series (except for 3, that one can pretend to never exist) and one of main female protagonist from the first game is called Aurica Nestmile. Ever since a college friend introduced me towards the first game, I've always loved Aurica's name and design. As for the surname, I was sitting in the room while a friend was playing Birth By Sleep and I heard the names "Vexen" and "Ventus". So, I threw both names into a variable melting pot and Vexus is what popped out. The whole name rolled off the tongue easily, so I thought it fit well.

Astra Lunae - Female Xaela (Excalibur Only)

At the time of this alt, a bunch of old friends begged me to play on their server and datacenter. However, i didn't want to uproot my main character from Sarg and leave my static and friends. So, I made another alt. During the creation of this one, I was also enthralled into playing XV and that game uses a lot of Latin based naming conventions. "Astra" is Greek for "star" and Latin for "of the stars" while "Lunae" is Latin for "day of the moon". So, her name means "Day of the Moon & Stars". She too, is also a blue-themed Xaela like Lorelei.

[ADarklore]

My in-game character's name is Ryoto Kurama. Considering he's a Miqo'te, I wanted a tie-in to a famous anime catboi... and my favorite is Yoko Kurama... while technically not a "cat" neither is Ryoto... he's a fox demon, but is just confused for a Miqo'te.