How'd your Hero Handle Come about?

[Overbite]

Kinda a spin off of another thread. Just wondering what inspired your names, what they mean, how you thought them up. ext... :)

For me "Veikira" is a name I came up with myself. It's Native American based though. Most of my Family on my Mom's side is Native American. Threw a Family Tree Report I had to do I found that one of my Great++Grandfathers had the name Tukovekera, which I thought was just the coolest name ever. Adjusted the spelling abit and there it is. Veikira (Veck-ear-ah). Been using that handle for about 5 years now. Was only right I give my main hero the same name...

[Kurai Inago]

Kurai Inago came from the name of a villian from a Story I've been writing for awhile, it means Dark Locust in Japanese.

[suburbanhell]

Phrase I use all the time "Thank you Captain Obvious" -- Captain Obvious was taken, so I promoted him. Major Obvious still sounds even more like a play on words so I kept it.

Miss Judgement, wanted one of the "mis-" words as another play-on-words superhero...

Dr. Flamestrike, initially was Flamestrike but that was taken, Flamestrike being a rather powerful fire spell in Ultima Online the game I came over here from.

Nurse Red Cross -- she heals...so do nurses...and the red cross....

Brimstonia - fire & brimstone yadda yadda yadda...

Atse'Hashke - Thesaurus search on other terms for Satan (he's demonic)

Muscular Beaver - former Cartoon Character of same name

Krystal Power (Formerly the Atomic Mistress) -- both names done through that hero name generator and tweaked to actually sound worth something usable.

[Quakester]

Quake is based of a character I played in the PnP Marvel RPG. His main power was a vibration blast but Energy was the closest I could come up with. Char's original naem was Seismic but that was taken.

[Thermyte]

Well, Trying to come up with a name the day before I got CoH, and I was talkin' with Kin. It started as Thermix, then Thermite, Then Thermyte. Kin had started to design him and said if I wasn't going to use him, He wanted to use him, of course I said...Hexxxxx Nahzzzz dawg.

[Got]

Back in 2002 when I first found CoH and went to sign up at the old boards I wanted to register as some sort of hard-hitting, smashy name. That was the only concept of my proposed character I had, he was going to be big. I tried a whole slew of names and every single one of them was registered, so the infernal forum told me. So I understandably thought, There must be something wrong with the registration system here, maybe I'll just test it, see if it's broken. So what I decided I'd do was randomly type in some letters (assuming I'd end up with something like jsdfbnp) and if it told me the name was registered, the system was clearly broken.

I let my hand fall on the keyboard and quickly hit enter without even looking at what I'd typed, sure that the forum registration was broken. Well... did I get screwed over.

"You've successfully registered as got!" it informed me.

"****!" I thought, "got? Bloody hell."

As dismayed as I was with the name, I was too lazy to PM Aura to get her to change it and I was certainly far too lazy to create a new e-mail address just so I could register again. And at least it wasn't jsdfbnp.

And thus I became known as Got, and I ended up working with it. It's served me well.

[inkblaster]

Inkblaster I've had in my brain ever since pdas started coming about.

The handwriting recognition thing was really cool, instead of with paper and ink, so for a time I referred to computers in general as inkblasters.

That was like 10 years ago, so I've had the handle for a while, usually just shortened to ink, which consequently is the first 3 letters of my last name swapped around.

When I spotted this game I thought, well that's a cool name for a hero too, and not many heroes made of ink, and not much chance of it being taken on me too.

sorry for the ramble, think I will some more since the servers are down...

The White Rabbit, I was messing with the character creator in Beta and wanted something that really looked unique, and for some reason those giant fins on the full mask caught my eye, reminded me of Arthur from 'The Tick'.

Then I remembered how all the villains call Arthur a rabbit, so I messed around till I had a decent looking rabbit.

Then I chose gravity for his powers, as in Beta wormhole actually drew everyone in the team to your location, 'down the rabbit hole' as it were. Of course that's been changed since, and gravity as a powerset truly is hard to do, thus my lack of playing the rabbit in a while.

The Paragon Falcon, I really like this name, and wish I had it on all servers, but think it's also cool of in the future meeting an alternate reality Falcon.

I was trying to make a character similar to Batman, as I'd just got my Batman Training Manual at Borders, was going to see how well it applied to playing the game. So I wanted a similar type of character, and I thought a Falcon would be similarly menacing like a Bat, and the claws set would work for the whole Falcon image.

But Peregrine Falcon wouldn't fit, and almost as soon as I realized this typing it in I decided to try Paragon Falcon, I'm surprised I actually got it, and just think it's uber cool.

Metal Mole, we'd done the Transcendant mission with a guy, I think his name was Super Mole. I thought that was cool, a hero named mole hanging out in the Hollows.

I was pondering what powers would work best for the Transcendant mission, and some other task forces in the game. I realized an invuln scrapper with stealth, super speed, and recall friend, would be a great tool for a couple task forces inparticular.

As a mole, he had to have claws. I also wanted a name that had the whole two words, same first letter deal, Mad Mole, too villainous, Maximum Mole, too over the top, Metal Mole, I could just picture his rusted power suit before I even hit the creator.

yeah, so there's a freaky peek into how my mind conjurs up random heroes, scary eh?

[D'Arkaine]

well i used to use Anakin a lot way before ep1...then ep1 hit and i decided i did not want to use that anymore. I had a secondary handle for use in fantasy type things that became my main one - D'Arkaine. It came about the most stupid way. I was playing Diablo 1 and there was a mission about Arkaine's Leagacy or some such. Just added a D' to the front. :)

Angrytownsman was from watching the frankenstein movie - the villagers with pitchforks and such. ;shrug

Vindicator was from a character concept back in middle school - before i was ever into the x-men or found out about a pre-existing character.

Any other names just seem to fit the individual characters.

[Randomus]

I'm not writing out the whole thing again.

Basic story, fell in love with a woman while living in Holland, decided not to do anything about it because I thought I'd be leaving in half a year and it wouldn't be fair, we were friends, she gave me the nickname Lord Randomus. I kept it ever since.

The end.

[Stalking Shadow]

Would the plural of Randomus be Randomi?

Stalking Shadow:
Orginally, I wanted his name to be "The Sniper". I was going for a shadow-skulker type name to go with his wet-working background. Evidentally "The Sniper" wasn't allowed to come into being, so I was left fumbling around with other names.

Then I remembered a couple short stories that I'd read that featured a character named "Detective Shadow", and I thought it was a cool name. So I tried just "Shadow". No dice. Then I tried "Shade". No dice. Then I tried, on a whim, "The Stalking Shadow", and I've been saddled with that admittedly unfortunate pairing of words ever since. I wish I could pay influence to change my name. :P

[AfterglowNoMore]

Where to begin? Afterglow came from a year long Flash Rogues fixation. Basically characters with gimmicks that make little scientific sense. So I looked at it, and noticed that a few of them had gun based gimmicks, and noticed that he didn't really have a light based Rogue, and viola, the original Afterglow was born.

Humor came to me after I saw a kid knock a box off of a shelf at Wal-Mart. The box contained a bunch of yellow smiley faced bouncy balls. After that it was all down hill for the oft slandered, always laughable Humor: Clown Prince of Justice.

Humor's best friend Captain Bourbon, aka Happenstance came to me in a vision as I writhed in pain on the floor of my bathroom after drinking a cream soda and eating some week old Domino's.

Parrot Man/Nerve came to me in a comic book shop coincidently. Well two of them actually. I took the worst parts of both of the owners' personality, rolled them into one and a bastard was born.

Epilogue/Order/Synchronicity/The Independent was supposed to be Humor's little brother, it's a really really complicated story that I might explain sometime, just don't feel like typing the short version right now.

My new character, The Modern Man was thought up on a whim to suit a story that I'm working on now which I'll probably post the first part of in a few days.

[Murphy's Law]

Murphy's Lawyer - Mentioned it to a friend of mine as a name for a gag character. Created him...and then had so much fun he became my main and took him all the way to 50

Omega Strike - Wanted a name that sounded powerful for my tank. Somewhat ironic, since as an Inv/SS tanker he does very little striking :)

Freedom Prime - Wanted a patriotic name for my "All American" hero. Freedom was taken (of course) so I tacked Prime onto the end.

Xander Kreign - A play on my real name

Nippon Tuk - Another gag character, a Katana scrapper from Japan :)

Marshal Lawless - Praetorian version of Murphy. Wanted a similar naming convention that played on their A) ties to law enforcement and B) the fact that he is the "evil" Murphy.

As far as the rest...usually I just try to pick a name that fits the AT/powersets for the character.

[Mana Child]

My main is mana child and it started when i was playing Magic the gathering .when that game came and I played mostly green whennie decks with a crapload of mana and a friend just kept calling me that and it stuck. :) :chuckle:

[Lawmaker]

Back in the mid 80's i created heroes for myself and all my friends. Since I didn't want the names to be too blatantly obvious as me and my friends, I always created some connection to them either through their initials, first or last name, or something in their superhero name.

In my case, my last name is Law, hence forth the hero who stops law-breakers is: Lawmaker

That and I always like the idea of finding myself in the newspaper:

Lawmaker opposes the President's new reforms

:chuckle:

[Blur]

I believe someone from pcity suggested Blur as a name. Original name was Wind Runner.

[Poison]

Blah blah (same as Rando, told it a dozen times), favourite comic: Poison Elves. Cool songs I used to listen to back in 98/99: Alice Cooper "Poison" and Prodigy "Poison". Used to be called "The Main Man" when playing Quake, Q2 anc Counter-Strike, but then changed it to Poison for my CS clan. Registered as such on the CoH forum on November 2001. Decided to make a hero using my nick in January 2002.

[ChairLegOfTruth]

ChairLegOfTruth originates from a scene in an issue of Transmetropolitan wherein Spider Jerusalem beats Alien-Love-Messiah Fred Christ half to death with a chairleg while uttering the lines of: "Listen to the chair leg of truth! It does not lie!", "The chair leg of truth wants to know things Fred. The chair leg of truth wants to know when you first go involved with Gary Callahan" and the classic "Do not offend the chair leg of truth. It is wise and terrible". It sounded like a superhero name and when I arrived at the old CoH fora just before the beta it sort of leapt to mind as an ident. It had been my title and sig on a fora where I was a moderator so naturally I used it.

Omega Man was first concieved as a Superman analog in a superhero setting I created for a PnP RPG. It was just after the whole "Death of Superman" arc in the DCU and Omega Man was concived as a comment of the revolving-door-in-heaven prevalent in so many comics. In short he was invented dead as a message to the players that character death was irreversable. Since he was supposed to be an iconic hero of the setting I named him after it so Earth Omega gained, and lost, its Omega Man.

Deava (or Deva as she was and Devi as she should be; doh!) was created after a theological debate.
++[Simplified Background]++ She's a old testament angel and a former gate-keeper of Hell (the origin of the phrase "hell hath no fury like a woman scorned"). However after The Ressurection G-d had no need for devils (basicly the angelic police sent to punish those who disobay His will) so she retired. Then after a couple of millennia of hanging around Heaven the mass death of the Rikti invasion shocked her so much she beseached Him to let her return to the mortal plane to fight beside the mortals. She was permitted but without her celestial powers. So she's learnt to use more mundane energies to strike her foes.

Special Brew... well after a few experiments with Gaelic and Doric names it seemed that only one was suitable for a Scottish Alcoholic Speedster, called Bruce. "Aye well tha Brew; ee's always been a bit 'special' if ya ken whut ah mean..."

[Stan Walker]

Stan Walker-


Long story short ..Stan Walker is my quantum double..the name is what my stage name was when i used to sing for a living. He's big, hes buff, hes powerful. He gets to say and do things in a way that i cant in real life..hasnt everyone always wanted to be the hero? Through RP and my writings I can do that with Dect. Stan Walker

[ThunderMace]

Big Thor fan.
Thunderstruck and Thunderstrike were taken. :)

[Rottweiler]

I had an old picture I drew wayy back when. While flipping thru some old Champions character sheets I cam across it.. a german villain - short, stocky (somewhere in between Wolvie and Puck) with the colors of a Rottweiler. At that time I was about to register on the pre-beta CoH boards and I thought I'd give it a shot. With as much as I've seen the character grow, I'm so glad I did.

I also had a character, Anarchy, I wanted to transfer over from Champions to CoH. His real name was J. Denimore, lead singer of a band called Tone Death. I thought the hero name was too obvious so renamed him after a great Judas Preist bit (and also because I decided he was the Problem Child of Paragon City)... Hellion. This was long before anyone knew the gang was to share the name, but I always consider it they liked my music. >:]

I messed with the character creator one day and came up with a Foxy Cleopatra-lookin', afro and hiphugger woman of action named Sista Mercy. After playing her and discovering I actually enjoyed defending more than fighting, I 'serioused' her up, renaming her Mother Mercy.

I wanted something 'radiation'-sounding but alien so I made a play with 'X-Ray Vision' and called my Rad Def girl X'Rae V'zzyn.

Galactic Guy is just about as cheesy golden age as you get.

Tasadin was a chaotic-neutral mage my friend Simon, from the UK, played in D&D when we were at camp in NH ages ago.

Rumble Bee. just sounded catchy and kid-tough.

[The Icy One]

I'm guess you mean Forum Name/Global Channel Name... so if thats it... I'm not completely sure, my name kind of mutated over the years. It's always had something to do with Ice though... so the basic concept and creation of my name was the cold, cause being cold rules over being hot. I wish I was more cold than hot right now... >>

[Masked Revenger]

Well, back in High School, the first Batman movie came out, and I was thinking of that scene where he had the crook over the roof, saying "I'm Batman." I thought, wouldn't it be funny if he just dropped him at that point? (Yes, I have a sick sense of humor. Just ask Dynamo-Man).

So, I drew that up as a one page comic with the Batman character called Raven. Eventually, he evolved to become a Gucci wearing rich-hero and total Batman parody. So, eventually, this all lead to the thought of, "If Raven is the defender of the night, who defends the city during the day?" So, I needed a character that was similar (i.e., no powers), but the opposite of Raven in every way. So, he had to be poor, wear bright colors, and use no gadgets. Thus was born Masked Revenger, with his red and yellow costume, working at the local Mimi-Mart. When I got my copy of CoH, a few months after release, I knew that I wasn't going to get Raven as a character (Though I tried, the closes I could get was Ravenscorn), I decided to make my main Masked Revenger, and I've since re-worked him into a more "serious" hero.

Captain Noble came from another character that originated in the Raven strips I drew in school. I figured that Raven needed a Superman type character, and so I created Captain Valiant! The biggest difference between Sups and Captain Valiant is that Cap shot lasers from his fingers instead of his eyes. So, I decided I wanted to re-create him in CoH, made his costume pretty close, and made him a blaster. Unfortunately, the name was already taken, so I called him Captain Noble, instead.

Xaiolin Cowboy came from watching that cartoon show called Xaiolin Showdown. There's a character in there, Clay, that's a Texan, and wears a gi with a cowboy hat. I thought it was funny, and created Xaiolin Cowboy as an homage.

Most of my other characters are created specifically for the game, and are thus concepts that use in-game things as a base or inspiration.

Chris

[Akamaz]

I've used Akamaz for everything from forum handles to E-mail stuff, It comes from the lone wolf series of books, and int the Giak Language it means "Doomwolf" it's been my nckname and other handles for about 13 years now.

It's the same reason my former main (akamaz) came into existance

Agent Q. is from his last name Quentin

Mikoto was the first name of my hero system Character, a poor emotionally traumatized full conversion cybors who couldn't touch.

more on that later...

[GargoyleKDR]

Bayne - It is my RL middle name. I rarely get an opportunity to use it in RL so I use it from time to time in MMO games as character names. Before CoH I used it as my in-game support staff name for Electronic Arts Virginia's (aka Kesmai Studios/Gamestorm) MMOG Multi-Player BattleTech.

Coronae - I was looking for a word related to astronomy that expressed a dual nature of a stellar body. After a few google searches I came upon the plural of Corona. It fit what I was trying to do with the character, so I used it.

[Cryogentic]

CryoGentic- came from my personality and likes as well as a past game I played a few times. Why its gentic instead of genetic is becasue I wanted it to be more original and cryogenetic is not much of a name

KryoGentic- is just a way to have the same name for an evil split personality but spelled diffrent

Amicitia- is a latin word

Heavenly Light- came because I modeled her after Joan of Arc so I wanted a holy sounding name

[Libertyman]

Libertyman - I wanted a golden age american style hero
Trunten - been my nickname for years my high school teachers even called me it
Tigero - Wanted cat person so made tigero and put a o at the end...im so creative it burns.

[Tsarmina]

Tsarmina is a char in a book. The villinous wildcat queen of a thousand eyes to be exact. From the Redwall series. When I decided to register on the pre-beta forums, she popped into my head. I have been Mina ever since. :) I eventually even made her ingame.

Hollis' name... well. I stole it. There is a lass working for my company with that name. I wanted to swipe her last name too but I think that would have gone a bit too far. The space pirate part came from a rather vivid dream.

Screamin' Mimi. My sister's nickname, given to her by Gram. Of course we just call her Mimi now. I just used the random button until I found something that looked wild.

The others are either chars I created to fit a name or vice versa.
Oh, and the very first character I made in game... on AM's beta account was called Azure Star.

[Maveric]

Maveric - not inspired by Maverick, the mutant from Marvel comics. not inspired by the combat pilot named Maverick (played by Val Kilmer) from the movie "Top Gun". not inspired by the Movie or TV series "Maverick" about a poker playing cowboy.

When CoH was 1st announced i joined the pre-beta forums. there were 7 choices (origin templates) for heroes and i was really interested in the description for the "Superior Human
Superior Human - Superior Humans have normal origins, but they have made the choice to devote their entire being to mastering certain skills for the greater cause of heroism. Without any natural powers Superior Humans transform themselves into heroes through discipline, perseverance, and expert training. Relying on their developed skills instead of magicial abilities or innate super powers allows super humans to excel at skills to a much greater degree. This also makes their use of weapons and other items extremely effective. These self made heroes can have access to certain special items the allow them to reproduce some of the superpowers possessed by other origin types, but these items cannot ultimately compare in power to the mystic artifacts or high tech gadgets other heroes wield. Superior Human's flexibility of mind and training mean that he or she can use a wide range of more generally available items. Unlike any other origin type, super humans can learn to use any type of item in existence, magical or technological. All these skills make the Superior Human the most flexible of all hero classes.
i soon created an origin based on my playstyle; soloing often, grouping infrequently. basically he was a loner, an indepenent operator, someone who didn't belong to standard "justice league, avengers", a nonconformist, someone who goes against the grain. after searching the dictionary i found the word Maverick. the word is actually an eponym (A word based on or derived from the name of a person) with an very interesting word origin *i'll spare you the lengthy origin of the word...

Definition: One that refuses to abide by the dictates of or resists adherence to a group; a dissenter, being independent in thought and action or exhibiting such independence.

this described the character that i wanted to create, perfectly. i left the "K" off of Maverick for two reasons. #1 - i was positive this name would be taken before i had a chance to claim/reserve it. #2 - i'm a lazy typer :p

Alienware - inspired by an Alienware computer advertisement. was certain that this name would have been chosen, but wasn't...

Statesider - i wanted to make a patriotic character, tribute to statesman. i was suprised this name was not already chosen...

Ironheart Golem - i wanted to play a character that was an offensive defender. i chose radiation/electricity, radiation to weaken the villians and electricity to deal out damage. while making the avatar i decided to make a robot themed character. i had a very hard time picking cyber/robot names that were not already being used. i really wanted the Ironheart name, so i just added the golem part emphasize that he is a contruct and not an actual hero wearing armor, or a sentient robot. however, Golem implies magic which is not how his origin later would turn out...

Frostbrander - i wanted to play an Ice Blaster and had a very hard time getting an ice related name that wasn't already chosen. the name was inspired by a dungeons and dragon magical sword with ice based powers. i was really suprisedit had not been chosen.

Phantom Falcon – i wanted to play a controller, which is not my usual cup o' tea. i wanted to try an illusionist who would have flight as his travel power. Phantom = illusionist, Falcon = flier, name rolls off the tongue phonetically...

[Maveric]

Inkblaster I was trying to make a character similar to Batman, as I'd just got my Batman Training Manual at Borders, was going to see how well it applied to playing the game.

care to elaborate? there is a real book called the "Batman Training Manual"? you must be talking about a PNP roleplaying supplement, right?

-Mav

edit: no ****! it's a real book. just read a review on it. Ink, how did you like it?

http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/forums/showthread.php?p=983087#post983087

[Dynamo-Man]

My very first character was called Heavydrop, which was my "Hollywood" call-sign when I was in the Army at JRTC. It’s a paratrooper term for hooking up a huge parachute (or actually, multiple parachutes) to a large piece of equipment and dropping it. I had a slight weight problem, and everyone always made "fat" jokes (though in hindsight, I’d love to be that "fat" now), so I figured I would take a cool sounding name before someone labeled me "Jabba" or something not-so-flattering like that. Heavydrop was a scrapper, and was basically a military vet who came home to find his town overrun with crime and decided to do something about it. He has since been deleted because he was just uninteresting to me.

Dynamo-Man was my second character (out of about 30 or so, so far), and a direct result of watching The Incredibles. Mr. Incredible is my ideal superhero. Big, strong, and invulnerable. So, I searched for words that bespoke strength and power that weren’t taken already. I was actually hoping for Mr. Dynamo, but that was taken. Even Dynamo Man was taken, thus the hyphen.

Hero-Man is my attempt at making a truly "generic" hero.

The rest of my characters have all been in-game inspired, or a direct knock-off of(I prefer the term "homage to") a known character. Like Rabid Muskrat, who was a direct rip of Wolverine.

[Maveric]

I've used Akamaz for everything from forum handles to E-mail stuff, It comes from the lone wolf series of books, and int the Giak Language it means "Doomwolf" it's been my nckname and other handles for about 13 years now

I knew that word sounded familar! I bought the Lone Wolf roleplaying book/novels almost 20 years ago when I was in junior high school... i hadn't though of that series in ages :)

-Mav

[Jade_Dragon]

I have a number of Internet Handles as well as superhero names, and since this thread seems to cover all the bases, so will I...

Jade Dragon - Originally, the character was Green Lantern. A friend of mine from grade school and I created some superheroes, and I started writing stories about them. In about high school I decided that I didn't want to continue using someone else's creation any more, and so I redesigned Green Lantern. Although I kept the basic costume design of the Golden Age GL (with cape and a pointed collar) I changed the colors around, and added some little touches like the spiked gloves, and ninja-style mask, tied in back.

I also changed his powers, probably using Mayhem from Cloak and Dagger as an inspiration. She could generate a green mist and fly on it, so I just extended that concept, so J.D. could manipulate the mist to form cages or shields. As Green Dragons from D&D breathe a green mist, the dragon theme came naturally to me. I knew he would have an object that he would use to recharge his powers, and a statue of a dragon was the obvious choice, so all that was left was to make it jade, and give him the name Jade Dragon.

Blue Diamond - As I said, a friend of mine had helped me create some superheroes, and Blue Diamond was his creation. Although he was originally described as bionic, his name was Blue Diamond from the very start. (He supposedly fired blue, diamond-shaped missiles from his hands) When I redesigned Jade Dragon, I redesigned B.D. as well, and changed him from bionic to a Superman-clone. He kept the ability to fire energy from his hands, but in a beam, not missiles.

As with Jade Dragon, I wanted him to have an object that he drew power from, and naturally I made it a blue diamond. I made his object a battery, that would absorb power over a 24 hour period, and transfer it to him by touch. B.D. could then use that power to fly, punch people, deflect bullets, or anything else. I described his ability as the power to turn energy from one form to another inside his body. He could create any kind of energy, from kinetic to heat, but the limitation was, it could not leave his body, except for the one exception of his hand beams. (And as discharging his energy directly like that uses it up quickly, he doesn't usually use the beams as much as just punching)

Bloodwolf - Bloodwolf was born of a conversation with a DM on a free form role playing board. The DM was trying to tell me that "superheroes don't belong in a sword and sorcery world", as an argument against the old problem of god-like heroes. Of course, that was my argument, the gods aren't modern creations, they are what Tolkein based his genre on, and yet superheroes are as much their descendants as elves and dwarves.

But of course, what the DM really wanted was an adventure that was more "down to earth", with human issues and storylines, instead of demigods leading massive armies and weilding power on a planetary scale. I intended to prove that that, TOO, can be part of a "superhero story", by creating a D&D character that was quite obviously based on Batman. The name Bloodwolf came out of his backstory, I needed him to leave a mark behind, so I came up with the wolf's head, drawn in blood.

Sandy - Sandra is a name that I often use for female characters in my stories. The first Sandra was a D&D character, a sorceress who also had fighter ability, as a split class. I thought of her as a sort of split personality. Later, I used the name for the female main character in a werewolf story that I wrote. She was similar to Sandra the D&D character in many ways, most notably in the waist-length brownish-blonde hair.

When I created Sandy, it was first as a sort of half-human, half-robot, for another game. One major inspiration for her was Gally, from Battle Angel Alita. I wanted her to look like an amalgam of human and robot parts, though, almost disturbing, as if they were fighting for dominance. I finally wrote her into a fanfic, and continued to explore that conflict. She was named Sandy because "she was sort of the color of sand", (or the robot parts anyway) but there were also some obvious similarities to the werewolf story.

Although I use Jade Dragon here, I have used other handles in other boards, and in other MMORPGs. I've even used a couple of them as superheroes.

Brandon Dragoncove - This was my main character, when I was a D&D player. He was a fighter, with a two handed battle axe as his weapon, and he also had a rather obsessive love of wine. Despite his size and strength, he was a clever character, and very friendly and outgoing. This was one of the first handles I used when I started playing in online RPGs, although I used him mainly for fantasy RPGing only. (For chat I usually used Alan Midnite)

In Earth and Beyond, I used Dragoncove as my main Trader character, carrying over Brandon's personality, so he was a very friendly, helpful person although just a bit of the con artist. I also used the name for my SWG character (with the first name Brynden, since I couldn't get Brandon) but sad to say, I lost interest in that game, so I didn't renew the account.

Alan Midnite - As mentioned above, this was the main handle I used when I wasn't using the name Dragoncove. This was back in the days of the BBS, and I did a lot of programming, on my Commodore 64, so I would upload some of my games to some of the boards. Alan is my middle name, and "Midnite" I used because I would often become engrossed in a program and lost all track of time. So I would often look up and realize it was midnight. :D

One of the games I wrote, by the way, was a spaceship game much like the Star Trek one where you fly around from sector to sector shooting Klingon ships. When I saw the game, I thought, "I can do that" so I wrote a version where you actually have seven ships, not just one, and are fighting an invasion. (So the ships move around, and you only have a limited time) I designed the seven ships to be parodies of famous spaceships, like the "Aeon Hawk" and the "Exitprise" but the first ship, and title character, was a jet black, swept wing fighter named "Midnight", with a cloaking device.

When Earth and Beyond came out, I was amused to find out that the Jenquai Warrior ship looked EXACTLY like my design for the Midnight, right down to the swept back wings. And of course, it had a cloaking device. He was my first character, (with Dragoncove second) named "A'alynn", with Midnight as the ship's name.

Eventually, Alan Midnight also developed into a cyberspace detective, who I wrote a story about. I plan to write more, but right now I have only one. I've continued to use the name "Midnight" for him, however, rather than the "Midnite" variant I used to use as a handle. I will probably save that form of the name for a handle, although I rarely use it any more. In the meantime, Alan Midnight and his partner Rachel have been created in CoH, although I don't play them that often. (Alan I'm not going to play until I can give him Pistols, as he's not a long range fighter)

Blayyde - When I played Car Wars, I came up with a character named Richard Blayyde. It was a joke, because I could then name his team "Blayyde's Runners". :D I liked the name so much, though, that it became my third character in Earth and Beyond, a Jenquai Explorer. I chose the wing style that looked like blades, and gave his ship the name "Silverstrike".

Because of the relationship to Car Wars, though, this will probably be my character's name in Auto Assault. It's also the handle I use most frequently these days, for going online with my PS2 or the like.

[Juggernaut]

*i knew who Tsarmina was*

wee. i love those books.
anywhoot.

Visakrmi - Sanskrit for 'beetle'. Mainly since she's probably going to end up teaming with Icy's Psy-Beetle, and I had no good ideas for heroes when i decided to get CoH in the first place. But now I'm really fond of her and her hardly pronouncable name. :3 Coleoptera was her first name idea, but some fool had it. >.>; So i went with Visakrmi because I like India, and one of the most common beetles there is the Rhinoceros Beetle. Which is likely my favorite beetle if i had to choose one.

Ghostflower- Ever since I saw the Bodysliders, I knew I wanted to make the girliest guy I could possibly muster. I think I did well. Now he's one of my babies :3. Ghostflower came basically from the idea of getting a French name, and i was running through things like, Fleur de Lune, and Lune de Fhantom...eventually I said screw it, and went with Fleur de Fhantom, but I changed it, because I dont like the double Fs or the 'de'. o.o;;;. as a Yaoi fangirl, im particularly proud of little Rene ^.^

[Remianen]

Remianen – is the name of my first character in EverQuest (which was the first MMO to "hook" me since I HATED Ultima Online and Meridian59). He came to personify me in that game (except for the casual, slow leveling part). While I learned the ins and outs of that game and learned how to hustle (farming mobs for plat using his druid abilities, etc), he became me oddly enough. So from then on, he became the main protagonist of every story I’ve written in a variety of different games and genres (AO, Earth & Beyond, WoW, etc). So, while it wasn’t really intended, it just so happened that way. Since then, if a Remianen is created in any MMO I play, I must (MUST) by personal law, powergame the living shiz outta the character (because it’s ME). 18+ hr a day play sessions, multi-boxing, whatever it takes.

[Noble]

Noble
This character came to me shortly after I joined the pre-beta CoH boards. I was looking around at super groups and began toying with an idea for a hero. I started doing random searches on the web until I decided that I wanted a hero who had a origin that dealt with some sort of science.

Soon enough I stumbled on the Periodic Table of Elements, an I noticed that there was an Element there that I had already been using as a forum name for CoH, and before that it was a character name for a Star Wars Galaxies character that I had planned out but never used. That name was Argon Riker. Argon was an element in the Periodic Table of Elements, and as I looked at it I noticed that it was a part of a row of six other elements, all in the far right column of the table. I observed these six elements for a little bit, and suddenly it hit me that, "hey, this would be a pretty cool thing for a character. Power by the six Noble gases of the Periodic Table of Elements."

Shortly thereafter I began looking up practical, everyday uses for these elements, and this is what I found (as related to Noble's powers).

Helium - flight

Neon - grants great resistance to heat and cold

Argon and Krypton - grant Noble unlimited 'night vision' which mean he can see clear as day during the night time. The blaze within his eyes is nearly as intense, and as hot as the sun, and he has no eyeballs because of this.

Xenon - makes Noble's skin harder than steel, increased mass and density, and inhuman strength

Radon - the fluid that runs through his veins in place of blood, causing his 'blood' to potently radioactive and it keeps his body from hardening and becoming non-moving. It acts sort of like oil for a car engine, keeps it running smoothly.

As for his character, I was an idealist at the time and I wanted to make a hero most like I wanted to be. So the name Noble ended up having a double meaning, and I didn't even notice it at first. A man of noble character who was given his powers by the Noble gases of the Periodic Table of Elements. I also made him a scientist because I have always been really interested in science of all categories. Why I picked a Chemist though, I don't know.


Countryman

This one came to me a little while after 9-11. Inspired by my own growing love for the USA, so I started to do some brainstorming. I pulled up an old character I had who was called Patriot. He originated from a Lego character I used to play with soem odd 13-15 years ago. Incredibly strong, and a battle-loving maurader who was, strangely enough, quick to make friends. Patriot himself wasn't really a patriot of anything at all. I just thought it was a cool name at the time. Once I began thinking about applying him to City of Heroes I realized that his name was far to generic and likely to be taken, so I started flipping through a Thesaurus. I toyed with Minuteman, loyalist, banner, and many others, but I eventually settled on Countryman because it pretty much seemed to sum all of those up in one. I even gave him a pony tail in tribute of The Minuteman from Freedom Force. He was every patriotic hero I could think of, Cap AMerica, The Minuteman, and Statesman, all summed up into one. Patriotic, powerful, and the people's choice for hero. Then he evolved into some darker, but that is a story for another time.

[Darknesse]

Darknesse: It's my "gamer" tag actually. I used to be Rocksteady on every game and my friend was always Bebop. My friends called me Darknesse (i'm not sure if it has the "e" or not) back when we played football, and it stuck.

Engine of Ruin: Something I say all the freaking time, usually Shaq is involved though.

Rage Incarnate: Was thinking about the incarnate AT, and figured that Statesman is hero incarnate, and I wanted to represent Darknesse without deleting the char, so I took it.

The rest just sounded cool to me.

[The Widowed]

I knew that word sounded familar! I bought the Lone Wolf roleplaying book/novels almost 20 years ago when I was in junior high school... i hadn't though of that series in ages :)

-Mav
Hum de dum, hum de dum...oh, look what I found on our bookshelf!
http://img144.echo.cx/img144/9061/lonewolfbook7ip.jpg
Vintage 1986. That's pretty old, isn't it? :)

Those books beat Choose Your Own Adventure by a country mile, wouldn't you say? :D

[WingedAvenger]

Holy crow, I think I remember those books. Were those the ones that you could actually build up a character with stats and equipment as you read?

I read a lot of the Choose Your Own Adventure books, but I read even more of the Time Machine books (if anyone remembers those).

Back to the topic now...

Dragonfly was really the first real comic book-ish character I ever came up with. I remember wanting really badly to come up with a cool character similar to Spider-Man, something that was more "classic-sounding". I ran through a number of basic concepts and names, looking for something that caught my interest. I wasn't even really sold on Dragonfly until a while after I first thought of it. I was sure that I wasn't the first person to think of using this name in a comic book, but at the time I had no idea who was using it or in what capacity (I've since educated myself all about previously established characters in both Marvel and independant comics with the name). So I ran with it, combining inspirations from Spider-Man and Iron Man to create his style and backstory. Remarkably, his costume in CoH is very close to the original design concept I had, though he's missing his dragonfly chest logo and, noticably, wings.

Cactus Man was inspired directly by another character I saw during CoH beta that had a "cactus" theme. I just came up with a better name and a quick background which surprisingly worked.

Sand-Crab got his name from a Lego vehicle a friend of mine built when we were kids. He used to have a big bucket full of Space Legos, and we'd spend hours building ships and bases with them. Every ship had a name, but the only one I remember to this day was the Sandcrab, a one-man land vehicle that could dig tunnels underground and travel through them. I was thinking about this one day and I realized this would be a cool power for a superhero. The rest is history. (I was bummed though when I saw that both "Sandcrab" and "Sand Crab" were taken on Virtue, so I had to settle for the hyphenated version.)

Accelerando comes from the EverQuest 6th level bard song "Selo's Accelerando". When you play it, you run faster -- hence his superspeed. I typed the word into a language translator and found out that accelerando also means "accelerating" in Italian, so I decided to make the character an Italian in his backstory.

[Greblaja]

Blue Hammer
I was playing around with the Marvel PnP rules a few years ago (actually, over 20 years) and came up with a creation that had density control, leaping, and some other stuff that I don't remember. Anyway, I had visions of this hero flying through the air, gaining speed due to less density, altering his momentum at the last second by increasing his density, then, whammo, striking the bad guy. Seemed like a hammer shot to me. Of course, just Hammer would be ok, but not so super hero sounding, so the color prefix was added. I really liked the potential of such a hero, so I decided to try to make him in this game. Funny sidenote: about 6 months ago, I found the old card that had his specs from the Marvel game - the name read 'Gray' Hammer. Oh well, guess we'll just stick with blue for now. :)

Foerender
Foerender is my stock dwarven family name that I use in other games. I got the name using the delving.com's name generator. In City of Heroes, Foe is not a dwarf, but he does wield an axe. The hero Foerender is also loosly based on the first superhero I thought up (Fireman - lame name, I know, but I was 12). He had an axe that he could light on fire and throw around (ala Thor - he always got it back). In City of Heroes, Fire/Axe seemed to be a natural to bring him to life.

Megatop Quahog
Megatop Quahog has long been my IRC "real name" (as opposed to my handle, Greblaja). Quahog, if you don't know, is a type of clam, and the official shellfish of Rhode Island. The name was inspired by a Big Audio Dynamite album named 'Megatop Pheonix'. /shrug Like Bill explaining why that fight team called themselves 'The Crazy 88': "I guess it sounded cool".

The Hare
Leaping/Martial Arts ... wanted something with that played off of rabbit or hare. I never dreamed Hare, by it's self, would still be available. Go figure.

American Ant
Mostly inspired by the game itself. Wanted to make a patriotic hero, and wanted to make a short, tough guy.

[Lawmaker]

American Ant
Mostly inspired by the game itself. Wanted to make a patriotic hero, and wanted to make a short, tough guy.

LOL That is sweet!! He looks a lot like my character from Beta (well... one of my characters)... USAphid (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v114/Rehven/AphidActionX2.jpg)

He still is around, but only at level 1 on Virtue, but I plan on taking out of the mothballs when the "Statesman" epic Archetype comes out :D

[Greblaja]

LOL That is sweet!! He looks a lot like my character from Beta (well... one of my characters)... USAphid (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v114/Rehven/AphidActionX2.jpg)

He still is around, but only at level 1 on Virtue, but I plan on taking out of the mothballs when the "Statesman" epic Archetype comes out :D

Lol - seperated at birth, eh? Here's AA in beta:

http://members.cox.net/greblaja/heroes/americanant01.jpg

I played him a fair amount towards the end of beta. Too bad we didnt run into each other back then - would have made a great photo op.

[Remianen]

Okay, my names:

First off, the shrike is my personal familiar of sorts. We share a similar fighting style, that's for sure. So I have a "shrike" division of my brood. Then I use an adjective to personalize the name to the character. Also, "The Raven" by Edgar Allan Poe is one of my favorite poems and, also admiring that bird's more subtle qualities, I use it a lot in my names.

Xel-Ha I got the idea for after a Spring Break jaunt. It's the name of an eco-park just south of Cancun (in "the Riviera Maya" section). Since Xel-Ha's backstory calls for her to be a Mexicana, I figured the name would be appropriate.

Encienda, Inercia, Glaciera, all Spanish (Light, Inertia, and Glacier). Exposé comes from frustration with the name generator thing. Same with Lady Expose. Terris is a blatant rip from EverQuest (goddess of nightmares = Terris Thule) but I figured few, if any folks would pick up on it. Canceria was supposed to be a rad/rad defender but I forgot the powerset I had chosen during the 90 mins it took me to settle on her costume (it was dark/dark).

Platinum Dawn I got during the costume design process. She was supposed to have silver, red, and yellow as colors but I decided to drop the silver and just go red/yellow. But I liked the name too much to get rid of it.

Ameristar is my first emp defender. I wanted her to be kinda Silver Age without being so.....well, Silver Age :p I was going to name her American Star but duh, it was taken. So I contracted the two words.

Gigawatt goes without saying (elec/elec blaster) and Lady Ion is my rad/rad defender who had to have a rename due to my Canceria faux pas.

Generally speaking, I just find two words I like (from any of a dozen languages) and try to put them together. Thus, Flame+shrike, Flame+raven, etc. My next character's going to be a controller of some kind. Maybe named Fiera Bruja or Bruja Caliente, perhaps even Bruja Es'Caliente. Hmmm.

[Half Life]

I always was gonna do a Radiation based character, originally I was gonna name him "The Dark Pimp" because of his background story, but the name filter wouldnt allow the world Pimp, so i had to think of a good Ratiation name, Half Life seemed to fit so its what i went with.

[Rottweiler]

Maveric - not inspired by Maverick, the mutant from Marvel comics. not inspired by the combat pilot named Maverick (played by Val Kilmer) from the movie "Top Gun". not inspired by the Movie or TV series "Maverick" about a poker playing cowboy.

The role of Maverick was played by Tom Cruise, while the role of Iceman was portrayed by Val Kilmer.

/film buff

[Sebastian Kain]

I'm the President...what more do you need to know?



















Note:I'll add more to my Silentkilla866 handle..when I get to formulate it properly

[Mjolnir]

M'jolnir : I originally was going to use force blasts (Energy) when I created this character pre-CoH on the old boards. I wanted to use it like a hammer (so I thought what's the most famous hammer?) Anyway come game day Mjolnir (without the ' was taken (by someone who was saving it for me I found out much later)) so I have my current name and since I changed my mind and settled on tossin' lightning I kept the name because as we all know the hammer summons lightning also :)

Atomic-Ant: Was created as an homage to the Hanna-Barberra cartoon Atom Ant

Sly Sword was named after the sword in the movie "Sword and the Sorcerer".

Corpsman-HM1: came from my 15 year stint in the US Navy as a Hospital Corpsman and my rank when I got out. (E6).

Storm Leader: Well heck he's a Storm Defender and it sounded cool and wasn't taken :)

[Maveric]

Sly Sword was named after the sword in the movie "Sword and the Sorcerer".

http://www.badmovies.org/movies/swordsorcerer/swordsorcerervid1-ic.jpg

http://www.itsonlyamovie.co.uk/cover%20scans/the%20sword%20and%20the%20sorcerer.jpg

http://www.badmovies.org/movies/swordsorcerer/swordsorcerer6.jpg



http://www.badmovies.org/movies/swordsorcerer/

one of my favorite movies! what's not to like about a 3 Bladed sword that can fire off 2 of it's blades like missles, and if it the third blade gets broken, you can twist the hilt and remove a dagger from within the sword's base.

*See the Sword in Action! click here* (http://www.badmovies.org/multimedia/moviesi/swordsorcerer1.mpg)

also, gotta love the spring-loaded Blade Guantlet.

-Mav

[The Widowed]

*thinks*

The Widowed: "The Widow" was already taken. That's about it. :grr:

Bloodywedd: The name is a variation of a villainess' name from Welsh legend. Blodeuwedd was created by a wizard to be the wife of a great warrior, but she ended up betraying both of them. Bloodywedd's something of a betrayer herself. While Blodeuwedd mostly seduced and manipulated men into doing her work for her, Bloodywedd's just as likely to personally take care of anyone she doesn't like. Ergo, the "meaner" name. ;)

There are more alts, but I can't be bothered to do them right now. Bye.

[Lorash]

Lorash was from the very first AD&D character I made in 1979: Lorash D'Genfall, a Paladin.

[Maveric]

*bump* because the thread is interesting and hope more people will contribute to it...

[MaligneFamily]

I made Atom Slash as my non-Maligne family hero (Back then it was three opposing brothers representing Good, Neutrality, and Evil... The only name to survive that is Light Cry) for an SG. Then I found myself loving Atom and had him be my highest at level 16... Been my main since then. Lord Paragon, is a purely COH creation... Though I'm going to transfer it to any game now.

[TheImperial]

Woah. grave digging.

I'll toss in my two cents later.

[Twilight]

Woah. grave digging.

I'll toss in my two cents later.

Yeah, where'd "Mineral" come about anyway?

And did anyone ever figure out what the "BG" stood for in BGMasta?

[TheImperial]

Yeah, where'd "Mineral" come about anyway?

Mineral was the name of my very first hero for CoH.

I wanted to somehow pay homage to The Thing (best. hero. eveeerrr.), so I came up with a guy who's mineral count in his blood would skyrocket and solidify through his pores, creating a rocky exoskeletin/skin. Ergo, Mineral.

[Twilight]

So...did he ever make it to the game?

[The Widowed]

*basks in a stellar display of thread necromancy* :singdance

I completely forgot about this thread, I admit. :D

[Joe Schmoe]

I honestly don't remember how Joe Schmoe came about.. I'd have to ask a friend in high school to see if she remembers because she was there. I wanted a new AIM identity, and we somehow came up with JoeSchmoe4Ever, with a new persona with it and everything.

I know it had to do with the fact that my real name shares common letters with Joe Schmoe, but how I came up to this conclusion.. I just don't remember.

Then not too long after, I found the CoH boards.. And that was the first that I thought of for a screen name. When I started playing other online games, I started using "Joe Schmoe" or something similar just incase any CoH peeps would recognise it.

Eventually, I started the whole oracle type character, and I immediatly named him "Joe" as it fit perfectly.

[TheImperial]

So...did he ever make it to the game?

Nope, my interest in the character pretty much died out when Templar and the WILD5 came along.

[Cloud Runner]

Cloud Runner came from a combination of things. After playing the game "Cloud" I desperately wanted a flying character. Then I thought of WoW and these boots I had seen in game. They were called the boots of the cloudrunner and so he was born...

[Moon Jump]

I still don't like my name. :cry:

When I made my Sailor Moon based character I hadn't really thought of a name for him. I do remember playing a guy named Jump, or Moon Jump on XBand (A Video Game Modem for the Mega Drive/Genesis & Super NES) and thought it was a cool screen name.

That idea went into my head, along with the travel power so I just ended up calling him Moon Jump. I really wish I knew Japanese or another language to give him a better name that would be like Lunar Knight, but then people would probably thing I was ripping off Moon Knight.

[Mezzanine]

Well...Mezzanine stems from the word medianus meaning in the middle. Most commonly used to describe floors, the mezzanine being in between two floors. In the character Mezzanine's case this would be referring to purgatory, in which she had entered when the last of nine cursed stars fell to earth to spark a nasty chain of events. It's a whole thing...I am done here.

[Charon]

Originally when I found the CoH boards, I signed up with the name 'Shotgun', and set about writing the origin for a character who was largely Punisher inspired, but was more of an ex-gangster than anything who saw the error of his ways and turned into a murderous vigilante instead. ;)

However, as I was thinking about something slightly more original, I had the idea of giving my character a signature weapon which I hadn't seen anybody else use yet (Rhino and such already had plans to use gun wielding characters at the time.) I'd seen Mr. D's post asking for heroes to join The Bone Squad, so I sat down and thought about a new character. Having read about Charon recently, writing up a report on Ancient Greek Mythology for a history class, I decided to put a spin on the stick he used to row his ferry across the River Styx (Or Acheron, as I later found out was the -actual- river. But nevermind,) and give my hero a quarterstaff.

I'm a massive Batman fan, and at the time not a huge fan of the god-on-earth type heroes. So I mixed the mythological concept with the concept of a Ancient Mythology major who lost his wife to organised crime, who was plunged into a subconcious, delerious dream when he was left for dead by the mobsters who killed his wife. In this dream, Charon told him he must exact revenge for her death, and it was not his time to enter the afterlife yet.

... And thus, Charon was born. :)

Mr. Mud was an entirely spontaneous concept I came up one day after being burned out on CoH for about three months. I just fired up CoV, picked some powersets that I'd never played before and typed in fitting names until I got one... 'Mr. Mud'. I thought up the backstory and costume later, and now he's my first and only level 50.

[Snakebite]

Well I first tried Speedy, of course knowing it was probably taken or not allowed I opted for Speedster. Unfortunatly Speedster was taken and I really wanted to have Speed in my toon's name. After looking at my original outfit, which was heavy on the lightning, I thought hey lightning strikes fast so why can't a speedster! So I tried the name Striking Speedster and it worked :)

As for Relic Fist, well I wanted it to sound magic based and really old so Relic came to mind first. It was taken so then I had to sit back and think for a bit. While I was thinking I remembered my first hero on my friends account. Her name was Infinity Fist. BING! a light clicked and I tried the name Relic Fist and lo-and-behold it was available :)

[Graphite]

Woah, thats one massive bump. Good find, Mav. Its nice to see some of the old names again too.

Back on the Prebeta boards, some one posted a link to the Dr. Pepper webpage. They were sponsoring X2 and had created this neat little hero flash game. It was basically a microversion of Heromachine and the costume pieces you sellected determined your powers. You could then play rock paper scissors with other peoples creations. All in all it was actually really really cool.

So I started playing around with the thing, mix matching pieces, when I came up with a design of a stone right arm and a cyber left arm. At that point ideas just jumped out at me and with in seconds he had a origin, costume, personality, name, the works: A time traveller from 21XX here to stop Crey Industries from crossing human and rikti dna, taking on the name Graphite in order to write a new future for mankind. That was back in the days of the old power system, so I gave him a mix of mutant and tech powers: Cyberware Origin with regen, forcefields, teleport, power punch, super strength and density control. If I ever get a scanner, I still have a print out from the game.

When I got into beta, he wasn't neccicary my best character (I had about 20 concepts at that point and about four I wanted to stick with) but I wanted to play a tanker and figured he would be the best to play with the costume generator. Over time the bio fleshed out and I was really enjoying the play style, so I stuck with it and he quickly became my main. Funny thing is Graphite is also the character most like me and I'm not sure how much was unintentional design. People were of the habit of using their hero names as handles, so when we moved to Cohguru I decided to change to Graphite seeing has he was my favorite and most known by character.

(The Adept) Wu Shu Warrior came from a Shadowrun concept. Basically a blind pistol elf adept. I'm terrible with names so just ran with Adept. Wu Shu Warrior came about from Badge Titles. With out a pistol power set, Adept never felt right and was canned. During I2, the Martial Arts animations were revamped and badges were released. Since I couldn't use the name Adept, if figured it would be cool if the name became the title. Wu Shu is a style of kung fu and translates to Chinese Boxing and adding Warrior gave the whole thing a nice ring. Sadly I messed up with the Origin. Still new to the game, I had no idea Adept has a magical tone and went with Natural. He's a natural, highly skilled, an adept. Made sense to me....

Greux is my old Dark Age of Camelot character brought over here and I'm amazed how well it worked out. Greux is a hybrid of Grey, cause Kobolds have greyish skin, and Pollux, who was a renouned boxer and I was big into using mythology names at the time.

Gaiden comes from Ninja Gaiden accept a more heavily dragonic theme. Khamsin is a desert storm in Egypt and popped out of the dictionary when I was looking for names for my sand mage. Cold Fusion sounded like a good name for a Tech Ice Blaster but was already taken so tacked on the R for coolness factor. Cybermancy is also stolen from shadowrun which has some awsome art for the Man and Machine source book, which is the name for using magic to keep overly cybered characters alive. U-235 is the isotope for fissionable Uranium and seemed like a good name for a Radiation villian.

[bpphantom]

Woah... back from the dead! :)

Hrm... names. I have a lot of them. 12 in fact, and that's just Virtue. Their origins are all pretty boring. Suffice to say that in most cases the names are either a theme thing (Orbweaver - Arachnos - Spider - Orbweaver Spiders), or just a reflection of the powersets, (Nuclear Shadow - Rad/Rad Corr).

Yeah, I'm just boring with my names :)

[Gaia]

My handle here on the boards has kind of mutated. Back in pre-beta I initally signed up with my old chat handle from Comic Book Resources, GL1. I have tons of Green Lantern comics.

So I eventually felt that did not suit me. So I switched it to Kida, the atlantian princess initally, but I started to write a little character called Kid Atomic. Initially the character was a girl, kind of miss libertyish. Hince on the pre-beta boards I was known as Kida. I had Gaia1 as a back-up account for those days the boards flipped out and accounts locked up.

My other handle was Capt. Thunder. It was strictly for usage with the Midnight Society and writing pulp stuff at that point. I use it on the Paragonian Knights board because I'm too lazy to change my Guilde Portal account to anything else.

But as soon as the game went to beta every variant of Kid Atomic or Kida was taken on their beta boards same with in-game so I was out of a name for the time being. Till global came along and I managed to snag it finally. So the name was permantly changed to Gaia or Gaia1. I figured I may as well use it as much as possible. Also I'm a mom in RL so it kind of fits me (and my main character is green :D )

[Cruse]

Oh! This is neat. Well, hm.. my sister and I *loved* this show called Third Watch. Our favorite was the character Cruz (http://imdb.com/gallery/hh/0004137/HH/0004137/iid_872643.jpg?path=pgallery&path_key=Texada,%20Tia). She was all kick butt and taking names. We were just gah-gah over her. So when our brother said that he'll give us his City of Heroes account, our first thought was to make a character like her. So she went on Victory and made the character. I looked over to see it, and saw she made the typo "Cruse" instead of "Cruise" or "Cruz." But it seemed to stick with us. We made her on a lot of the servers, but eventually came to Virtue and made her. My sister played her for a bit, then stopped playing CoH. And I took over the character. Of course, now Cruse is nothing like the character in Third Watch. Due to the fact that the character in Third Watch doesn't have a rapid mole creature on her shoulder and isn't an alien that eats metal. But hey, what can you do? But here's one thing: My sister and I were crying our eyes out when Cruz on Third Watch died. :(

Let's see.. Kichi.. As interesting a character as she is, her name isn't too interesting. The first version of her was actually named Dexy, but I switched it out when I found the name Kichi.

Awesome was actually made as a joke. I tend to say awesome waaaay too much, and people always tend to point it out. So I tried to /friend the name Awesome. It wasn't taken. ;) So of course, I made the character. And now that she's 20, her title is actually "The Awesome" so she's... The Awesome Awesome. But Awesome is *nothing* without her sidekick, Awesome Sidekick.

Track Ten was made from my favorite song on a CD of mine. I was having a hard time thinking up a name, but was also listening to the CD. So I went to change the song to number ten on my CD, and it said "Track 10." It sounded catchy, so I used it.

Thyra is a Greek name I looked up.. and rofl.. yeah, she's from my Xena phase.

Sunmanitu is Lakota for "Coyote." A week or so ago my friend and I were going to make new characters. I've always wanted to make a native american because my birth father is part native. But I've never gotten around to making one. It's nice to have something reminding you of the person you've always wanted to know, eh?

Annnnnnnnnd... the rest names I have are just random, sadly. :( I have an alt problem.

[Tarberetta]

Tarberetta: Taryn + Beretta, that's it.

Kitten's Rage: Just wanted a character who is always angry (much more so than Tarby). I thought a permanently angry and irritated catgirl would be different from all the others. Name also partially inspired by Rage Against the Machine.

[Seadevil]

Seadevil came about because I was just trying to get a cool aquatic sounding name. I got lucky. :lol:

Doctor Synn was SUPPOSED to be Doctor Death, but the name was taken. So, I went with one of those 'Evil sounding but really his name' names, ala Doctor Doom, Count Nefaria, etc. So, Doctor Synn was born.

Every other name has related to their powers in one way or another.

[Snowdog]

Lets see,

PoleKitty-Easy, she was bitten by a mutated skunk. Skunk=polecat. She's a girl, so PoleKitty. (who was originaly going to be a guy, but the name polecat was taken)

Kelly Lamb- Thats her name, it's not like she can have a secret ID so why bother? though as a villain she was called Lambchop, which she hates.


Snowdog- Nickname i have had for 20 years since I was in the army, and based on a song by Rush.

[Cold Quake]

Oh! This is neat. Well, hm.. my sister and I *loved* this show called Third Watch.

RIP Third Watch. *sniff*


When I was first thinking about a hero name for COH, I wanted it to be inspired somehow by Alaska (I do this more often than is rational...). The first thoughts that popped into my head were "cold" and "earthquakes". This led me to making Cold Quake a Stone/Ice Tanker.

Having already played through an MMO with a character that was, well... gimped, it didn't take long for me to go straight for a FOTM-type character. I named him "Masked Poet" because part of my original background for the character was that he'd speak only in rhymes (this background lasted all of one night). :P

[Jade_Dragon]

Awesome was actually made as a joke. I tend to say awesome waaaay too much, and people always tend to point it out. So I tried to /friend the name Awesome. It wasn't taken. ;) So of course, I made the character. And now that she's 20, her title is actually "The Awesome" so she's... The Awesome Awesome. But Awesome is *nothing* without her sidekick, Awesome Sidekick.

A running joke has developed around an episode of Home Movies where the main character, Brendon, falls in love with a girl who's making a video for the rock band he hangs out with all the time. At one point they're making small talk (he's hitting on her, and she's obviously not paying attention) and he says "Awesome." She turns to him and says, "Did you say, 'awesome'?" At which time he says no. So she turns back after saying something more positive, and Brendon again says "Awesome".

It's since become a running joke for whenever anyone on TV says "Awesome", for me or someone else in the family to say "Did you say, 'awesome'?" Typically it happens most often in commertials. :D

[Nerfed]

My main comes from the old Marvel Super Heroes pen & paper RPG... her name was originally Miss America, a wannabe protoge of Captain America. In COH, that name was clearly off limits (beauty pageant trademarked), so I had to come up with something else.

Miss Liberty and Ms. Liberty were right out being taken by NPCs... other patriotic-themed names are common throughout comics, so I had to be creative. Also, I like alliterative names, so I didn't want to take the easy way out with a name like "Freedom Girl" or "Justice Maiden".

I came up with Liberty-Lass using a thesaurus to find words to work with the alliteration thing.

[Kozzma]

Kozzma
A Long time ago back in the dark ages in 1979; I played a game with sticks and tree bark called D&D. I had a Paladin who was named LordKoss. This is still is an alias that I use today. But when I started playing DAoC, I wanted a name a bit less boisterous, so I decided on Kozzma, the nephew of my paladin. who was young cocky and energetic and became the bane of LordKoss. In CoH, Kozzma is the nephew of Nicola Tesla (see Surveillance Report 15677/18132 on Kozzma (Unknown)
Subject: Electronic Diary entry decoded
http://www.creyindustries.com/viewreport.php?id=18132)

DarkEspresso
I am a network systems engineer, some of the work I have to perform starts at 3am in the morning on a Sunday. So to stay up I drink lots of coffee / Espresso, I needed a name for the Dark /Kin corrupter I had just created. I guess it must have been just a bad Bean.
(the one regret is that I had created Espresso about 3 months before CuppaJoe left and I missed the good by party )

Most of the other characters are a play off of the background I have selected.
(http://www.citygametracker.com/userlist.aspx?userid=3078)
With one exception..

My Invuln / Mace tanker, Aflac. It was just a long night. I make no apologies. I was delirious. I have written the company for permission with no response, and the bio is a tribute to the greatest Duck Ever (http://www.citygametracker.com/Account/mycharacter.aspx?charid=28203)

[Knightward]

Knightward - I had the idea for the character before actually buying my own account, but I was struggling for a name. Knight cause he's a ghost inhabiting a suit of armor, and ward because of the whole superhero job of protecting the innocent and warding off evil. Still haven't come up with a better name actually, not that it matters at this point.

Satan-Claus - Satan Claus was already taken. And I just had to have a joke on a Santa character.

Ragnarok's Bane. Kennings are awesome. And since I made a Nordic character, it made sense to give him a kenning for a name. Couldn't find anything that really fit him, so I tried coming up with my own kenning.

I got other heroes, but there isn't much to say with their names.

[Jade_Dragon]

May last post in this thread was when it first started, and that was before City of Villains came out, if you can believe it, so that tells you how old this thread is. :D At any rate, since I already covered my heroes, I guess I'll go ahead and add my villains.

Silver Bolt -
My Crime Fighters characters, Jade Dragon and Blue Diamond, were created back when I was in high school. I "borrowed" Electro to be their main rival. Eventually when I decided to recreate the characters as my own, I changed Silver Bolt's appearance, making his colors black and silver instead of green and yellow, and getting rid of the distinctive lightning bolt mask. (Although the "crossover" pattern on Electro's chest became a major part of Silver Bolt's look, and in fact became the anchoring point for his amulet)

I also gave him a common origin with the other Crime Fighters, thus giving him a reason to be their rival -- he wants their powers. This also meant that he got his powers from an object, as JD and BD did, so I gave him his silver amulet. I had a nice visual image of his amulet sending out "tendrils" which actually became the silver parts of his costume, so eventually I decided to make his secondary color red, with the silver of his amulet covering or even tracing the red lighting pattern. This gave each of the Crime Fighters one of the four elemental colors, blue, green, yellow and red. (This also identified Silver Bolt with Fire, which fit him)

The actual name Silver Bolt actually came from Car Wars, as I had used the name to refer to one of my cars. There was a silver colored pickup truck in the counter set, and for some reason the name "Silver Bolt" popped into my head. I don't know where it came from, but when I decided to make SB's object a silver amulet it was a logical next step.

Experiment OEBR1 -
Originally he was named "Experiment" and a random string of numbers, as I was just trying to come up with a random name. This was back during Beta, and I was playing with the character creator, generating random costumes. This one black costume popped up, with bright cyan highlights, and this sort of mystical looking pattern on a character with two robotic arms, and a hood. It really struck me, there was this shadowy "Cloak" feel to him with the hood, and the robotic arms on the one hand and the mystical sigils on the other seemed to make him a mix of Magic and Technology.

I had already been thinking about creating a character that looked like the Technology origin, but was actually Magic. The hood and the black color naturally led to him being a Dark/Dark Defender, and I came up with the idea of him being a robot that was animated by a demonic spirit. I played him for a while in Beta, but for some reason he never caught on with me. I did create him after release, but only to keep the name and look fresh in my mind. I didn't even remember the original name, and picked another three number combination. I think later I realized that I had "randomly" picked the name of the character from Lilo and Stitch.

At any rate, when City of Villains came out, I decided he would make a perfect candidate for a Dark/Dark Corruptor. I fleshed out his background a bit, and came up with the acronym "Occult Energies Battle Robot" (Model #1) to use in his name instead of a string of numbers.

Loopy Loup Garou -
Loopy's one of my favorite villains, and is probably the only one, outside of Silver Bolt, who was totally fleshed out prior to his creation. I originally created him for the Smackdown vs Raw PS2 game, using their Create a Wrestler mode. I had originally bought the game for my sister and her husband, and he had created a huge, superhumanly muscled character in green tights as his character. I decided that I wanted to create a similarly outlandish character, and after finding a wolf mask in the list of accessories, decided I wanted to create a werewolf.

I named him Loup Garou after the Cajun term for werewolf, but I soon started calling him "Loopy" as a nickname. There were a number of really good wrestling moves that matched his character, including several biting moves, and it just seemed natural to make him this boisterous, somewhat crazy wrestler character that would act "loopy" in the ring. After I brought him into CoV, I just went ahead and added "Loopy" to the start of his name, so he's Loopy Loup Garou. (Besides, just plain Loup Garou was taken :D)

Psycommando -
He's another character that originally appeared as a random costume, and just stuck with me. He was this bright, pastel colored character in military camoflage, with this big peace sign on his shirt. I thought immediately that he was a great concept, this crazy, drugged-out hippie who's still stuck in some war somewhere and doesn't realize he's no longer in touch with reality. At first I made him a Blaster, but after CoH came out I realized he was the perfect fit for a Mastermind. His men would still be following him around, whether through misguided loyalty or just for the money, and could constantly comment on what a whack job this guy is. Even his name seemed obvious from the start.

Unfortunately, he's been overshadowed by Hitwoman Mandy, who I guess clicks with me more. I won't go into her, though, since she's not original. (She's Mandy from the Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, in case you haven't been paying attention :D)

Dragon Lord Morgon -
I won't go into him, for my own reasons. (I can't really say what those reasons are, since that would give it away, wouldn't it? :D) I will say, though, that the name came from a combination of Morgoth and Sauron, from Lord of the Rings, with maybe a bit of Smaug mixed in. To be honest, the character was created by my father, and he came up with the name for him.

[thatsmystapler]

Well my name thatsmystapler is from the movie Office Space as most know.

Stone-henge was a character I created long ago as a leader for a team of teen heroes. He turned to stone and shot electricity. Alas I settled for stone/stone and will probably go fire.

Man-O War was because I was trying to come up with a spines character because there weren't alot around back then. The poison got me thinking of poison fish and the Portuguese Man-O-War and thus he was born. Had to play around with variations of it though.

Texas-Holdem started out with me making a character nameds Spade that my brother and I created as kids. The name Spade was taken though, so I started playing with various card names and then Texas Hold'em hit me. I went and put a cowboy hat on him and tweaked the costume a bit and found a variation of the name that wasn't taken and he was born. Probably my favorite visual to this day.

Storm-Caller was just some generic name I came up with for my grav/storm controller.

Body-Bag was because I wanted a scary name for his visual for PVP.

The Darque was created because of my dark corruptor. I get to use the phrase "Everyone is afraid of The Darque" and it makes him all scary. He plays off fear.

Chess-King was inspired by Dr.Pyscho. I wanted a mind-controller who was just totally reprehensible. I wanted him to be really over the top too. And this guy dressed up like a king controlling people like chess pieces sprang to life.

Buzzard was a name I couldn't get in CoV beta. So I created a vulture-themed character named Scavenge. Then CoV went live and Scavenge was taken but Buzzard was free so it all worked out.

Tyger Shark was because I wanted a shark arch-nemesis for Man-O War. ANd the tiger striped pattern played well with the name. Had to settle for a variation ont the name though.

Scaregrow was because I created a scarecrow looking character but then gave him plant powers and it meshed well. One of my favorite names I came up with.

Star-Shadow was a space sounding name that I had for a blaster and then remade into my PB. Ended up being a popular name that alot of people have.

[Gold Rush]

There is an even older post similiar to this thread. I am not sure exactly where it is, but I would be willing to bet it is on one of our earlier boards, PCity or somewheres.

I know I posted there, but here is a synopsis. I will try to be short ( :P ) .

* Gold Rush = Actually, I was playing with the "famous super-hero name generator" whose name and web-page I forget but I know there is a link around here. I went a step further, wrote down my favorites, and played with those names.

During one of my outbreak initial outings. I saw a character named "ESREVER-HSALF", although strangely, a villian one (when CoH was the only game in town). This was decidely a clone, but I had noticed other Flash clones and the weird habit they had of giving them the Lightning Mask when the original hero never had one.

This image was swirling in my head as I was on the CoH character Generator. I had decided I wanted an Electric/Electric Blaster in adition to my Scrapper. I was actually thinking of a robot (Robot could generate it's electricity) and playing with the robot designs. I was actually also thinking of an old villian called "The Battery" as well, who is an old "E-Man" villian from the comics, if anyone remembers him. But during this, I stopped and decided to try out a speedster design, which is also what I wanted. I left the robot body on. I had the villian "Professor Zoom" in my head and instead of a "tacky yellow", I went gold. The tights shined very nicely over the robot body. Having an eye for color, I went with complementary colors of black and bronze/brown. I put the lightning bolt as an homage.

I then looked over my list of names. I think I did write down "Gold Rush" and matched the name to the figure. Seemed a good fit. And I could not take my eyes off him. Very cool-looking figure. :)

I like to think synchronicity of thoughts and plans sorta formed him out of the nether during the creation process. :)

* BioHunter - (Bio-Hunter, BioHunter-Silver) - I've used this name on the net over the years. "Stolen" from something else. Used to be "Captain Harlock" but I let that name go to someone sorta unworthy but not. Then "Lupin the Third", but I wasn't much of a pirate/hacker in my mind, so went elsewhere. I was interested in (and still am) Japanese Live-Action. Actually, Japanese Anime was starting to become too common (I get bored if it is too easy to get or too many folks like something). So, the Japanese Sentai TV series "Bioman" came out, I saw a cool "Bobba Fett" like Bounty Hunter on that show called "BioHunter" and used his name ever since! :) I've roleplayed him online and in games alot. Used his name for my call sign in "Photon" when they used to have places for that and more. Unfortunately, there is a horror-anime named "Biohunter" but it has nothing to do with the live action series. VERY FEW people know of the character; I've only met 2 in all my online years, although, in japan, according to a poll in a Hobby Magazine that is probably 10 or more years old, "BioHunter" was the second coolest "Bad Guy" voted for from a Live-Action show right after...

* Hakaider - From Kikaider. Many Hawaiians know this show as do Japanese. Recently made into Anime, so many Anime fans know it, too (although most do not know this was originally a Live-Action show). This is actually my default name if "BioHunter" is taken. I don't use him much, since the traemark clamp down and scrutiny. He has become a bit too famous now.

* Kamen Rider Zex - Some of you know Kamen Riders. Some do not. One of the Kamen rider shows (Live Action) was brought over to the US by those that corrupted the Power Rangers. He was called "Masked Rider" here. I still get waves and nods in-game from people remembering. :) Anyways, he was suppossed to be "ZX" instead of "Zex" but CoH ate the name (strange bug that I am not sure they fixed). He is roughly based on "Kamen Rider Black/Black RX" series, but I put my own spin on it. There are many derivative Kamen Rider shows in Japan, so I made my own. Many fandoms and stuff, so I should be safe (although, I am ready just in case the "generic" hits me ;) ). There is no "ZX" or "Zex" show out there.

* Ultraman Jet - Same thing as Kamen. Made a "new" member of the Ultraman family. I noticed the metallic suit of the CoH creator resembles the lines of latter day Ultraman protrayals. The mouth I could not do fully, so I just assume it's an intake, like a Jet. And thus the name and some powers.

* Dark Detective - Batman homage, but I intend to do more with him. Throw in some of "The Shadow" in there. Lucked out on the name, although I was debating "Bat Detective" (another Suer Hero name genertator result). I (wisely) decided to keep away from any "Bat" reference. This actually works better with his mysterious origin.

* Duke Doomsday - This is a bit of a cheat. Pretty much a Doctor Doom homage, but I remembered during the big Marvel vs. DC series, a "Doctor Doomsday" appeared; he was part Dr. Doom and part Doomsday. So I snagged that and changed it a bit. "Doctor" would be too obvious, so I made him a Duke. Sounded good. It also helped his origin. Since he is not a "Lord" he vyes for the top with other nobility, particularly his family. Then I threw in a family inspired by "Captain Marvel/Shazam". This inspiration was also "helped" by these very forums, when I was considering the name "Count Doomsday", because I thought it had a evilly Dracula reference and a bit old-style villian cheese line I could throw in about "Countdown to Doomsday". Many people voted to avoid the "Count" title, because of their Seasame Street experience, so I did. Although I did make "Count" into a "cousin" of sorts, but have yet to use him out of the starting area. :) I also plan a Prince and a Lady or two, but my Virtue slots are thin. :) I tend to overplay his personality, but many folks seem to like it. :) Prime Silver Aged Doom!

* Motor Man - Also on another server. I liked the character "Robotman" from DC's Doom Patrol. This character also shares many things with Marvel's "The Thing" personality-wise. Man trapped in ugly body. I saw a hero called "Locomotive Man" and thought that was neat. Wanting to be different and not steal from another player, I lost the steam power. :) He isn't on Virtue, but should be. The Thing is also one of my favorite comic heroes (Yay Imp!). RP can be a bit angsty, but it is fine. :)

* Martacsus Hellfire - He is basically a living breathing commentary of the evils of corporate america, particularly Wal-Mart. That was his origin. Made him a devil to underline the point. He is either the CEO or a head Executive. Probably best to make him CEO... He can be easy/hard to RP, depending on certain things. Many folks seem to like him (although no SG yet...) Of course, he is a villian.

* Madam Blue - Not on Virtue. Bareley played. Dark/Dark powerset, I think Blaster. Think Styx. Now think "Sweet Madam Blue". Kinda a mysterious character actually.

* Death-Skull - I wanted a Villian who could throw Dark/Dark powers, since I like blasters (but I love scrappers). So, this works. Wanted a death theme. Thought a bit on Ghost Rider and again the Amalgam line of DC/Marvel came to mind, especially with "Ghost Rider" types, but I threw most away, since I didn't want a speedster this time. I made him into a spirit of vengance, but an unknowing one. Gave him a New York/Bronx accent. He died in a war. I am toying around which war, probably WW2 or thereabouts. He quite doesn't know he is dead and doesn't know his powers. Easy RP, too. Another that needs an SG. No motor bike here. I have 2 heroes waiting for one that I know will never come (ergo, those 2 have NO travel powers! ). Lots of design in my villians with flight and Super Jump in mind, generally speaking.

That is it for now. :)

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Gold Rush