Naming your Greenskin: 101

A crash course…

While I’m sure we’ll run into the odd LegoLOL stink elf, Gimleh stunty, and Aragoreo scumpire humie when WAR officially releases, I truly hope the majority of people will display some semblance of originality and tact when naming their characters. I know it isn’t the biggest issue in a game, but I hate running into characters with ridiculous names, which is probably why I gravitate to the RP servers. It cheapens my experience in some unexplainable way (maybe I’m just a snooty-patootie) and I rarely take these people seriously (though I doubt it was ever their goal to be taken as so). In an effort to help as many fellow greenskins come up with great, lore-realistic names, I’ve decided to write this mini-guide.

First and foremost, I highly recommend reading this introduction piece, titled What’s in a Name, so we’re on the same thought wavelength. While naming your character can be challenging, it really tells a lot about you and will ultimately affect in-game relationships. If you’re of the mind that you don’t care, then this article probably isn’t for you but I hope you’ll at least give it a try in the comments section.

I recently came across this useful greenskin name generator on the Big Choppaz guild website: http://bigchoppaz.com/modules/orky/. If you want to get a general idea of some acceptable greenskin names, press the ‘generate more’ key a few times.

Here are some randomly generated examples:

• Barfsmella Grimsnik
• Zogzod Grinkop
• Gutskrecha Skrotchadreg

While some of the names from this generator sound cool, they’re just the result of a concatenation process, merging orcy consonants and vowels. A truly great greenskin name tells a story about the individual it labels. Just think of some of the more prominent orcs and goblins throughout greenskin history: Grom the Paunch, Gorfang Rotgut, and Azhag the Slaughterer. They all have a simple, 1-3 syllable (at most) first name followed by a descriptive last name. Let’s try making a few up on the spot.

• Zomb da Flayer
• Galrug Scalpstealer
• Razzl da Sneak
• Snot Garrote
• Drenga da Despised
• Snafzg da Smrt!

These may not be epitome of greatness, but they only took a minute to come up with following acceptable naming conventions. You’ll notice that the most commonly used letters in greenskin names are “G,” “Z,” “U,” and “O.” Feel free to get creative, while keeping things primitive, as primitive is the greenskin way.

A good name-testing technique, which may seem utterly insane to perform in front of peers and strangers especially, is to speak your name ideas aloud in an angry, hybrid accent made up of Bob Hoskins and Mr. T. If the name sounds good when loudly growled in a deep, gangsta from Suffolk, UK, slangy kind of voice, you’re on the right track! “Skyva da Shank! Yeh best git on ovuh ‘ere and skin dis stunty ‘fore da boss ‘as yer ‘ead on a spikey bit, yeah!?”

So there you have it: the basics of naming your greenskin! If you need a bit of reading to get yourself into the greenskin spirit, might I suggest the Basic Role-Player’s Guide to Greenskins over at the Warhammer Vault and our very own Greenskin Lore section of this site? Please post some greenskin name experiments in the comments and let me know if you thought this guide was helpful or could be improved!

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