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[GoblinCookie]

I'm generally in agreement, but the more I think about the issue, the more I can see how Toady might not consider it worth it. Even if a civ's naming convention is extremely short and they care nothing for past generations, a member of that culture might marry into a society that considers history very important, and they demand to know short-name dwarf's ancestors at least 3 generations back. So ideally, the game would make every dwarf's internal true name contain every possible thing that any external naming system might need to know. But, seriously. Consider the odds that
a) an intercultural marriage even happens,
b) the naming systems would be so egregiously different, and
c) the player actually double-checks to see if short-name dwarf's newly lengthened name is in fact historically accurate.
All in all, that's a kinda flimsy reason to keep everyone's entire family tree stored in memory, just in case they should happen to marry someone who cares about it. I mean, yeah, I'm pretty sure that's what the game already does (it does it for historical figures, at least), but on the whole, I'd rather have my game Load and Save faster.

It is not really a big deal since all the names are really just a list of numbers that are only actually turned into actual names when we see them.  The latter process is controlled by the cultural context, so basically only some of them get turned into names we actually see.

How often things happens is supposed to be no longer as predictable in the future as it is now, in any case it still applies at present.  I was talking about a system where a civilization changed it's naming system to add new words, say a civilization in a massive world, with loads of sites and very few civilizations, in which an adventurer has spoken to every single non-historical person in said civilizations.  Now we have tens-of-thousands of named individuals, all needing new names but the player is currently lagging on the FPS due to having built too many walls in their fortress, so the game then just crashes. 

Well, when one of the supporting documents opens with the difference between "family" and "progeny", you just know some hairs are going to be split. As for the nature of clans, I myself would say they're more often a society than a state, because they usually didn't exist in isolation, there was more than one family sharing influence over an area. Only when a single clan rose to dominance could they be called a state, and of course the more closely they approached 100% of the population (as some of the Scottish clans may have done), the more they both performed the duties of local government, and were themselves the governed. Whether you (or I) want to cast this in a tribal-system or feudal-system light doesn't much matter: One exerted control militarily, the other more economically, it made little difference to the ruled.

A society either is the same thing as a state or at least implies the existence of one.  If we say otherwise we end up using arbitrary category groups, so we basically making the same error in reasoning as a racist uses.  A bunch of individual independently pursuing their ends, cooperating and conflicting with each-other according to their personal wills does not constitute a 'thing' in the Ship of Theseus sense, simply because all the individuals have a single trait in common, that they all have the same great-great-great granddaddy.  You could equally say that they are all a thing because they all have white skin or whatever, hence the logical relationship between the idea of a society existing without a state and racism.

It would be even more convenient to NOT have a big chunk of an entity's visible name be taken up by a fact that, 99.9% of the time, a player couldn't care less about. Why do you insist on defending this notion? Especially when the example I already gave (a menu specifically for listing creatures by their civ/site attributes) precisely overrides the counter-argument you just made (some cultures won't include the civ/site in people's names)? Regardless, it is a bad idea for ANY culture to make its civilization and/or site name be a default, integral part of the average citizen's name. It is a bad idea. The idea is bad.

Nobody said we had to even display that information is fortress mode, for our own dwarves.  In fortress mode that part of the name can be not mentioned, except when they are visitors.  Similar to how racial information is not displayed for your own race. 

Your first statement makes no applicable sense that I can discern. Your second is analogous to saying that doctors would not object if hospital janitors claimed that they should be allowed to call themselves "doctors" as well, because both groups of people are equally employed by hospitals, the former just happen to have medical degrees while the latter do not.

Yes your hospital analogy is pretty much how a clan works.  Hospital janitors and doctors are both part of the hospital as the clan *is* the hospital and not the doctors in charge of it.

GoblinCookie, you are very clearly intelligent. But you are not as intelligent as you are stubborn, at times leading you to let your stubbornness take control. I think you would do well to bring those traits into a more harmonious alignment. Your choice of Game of Thrones does not provide a good example for the point you are trying to make--indeed, it provides a much better example of the Dunning-Kruger effect.

But let me respond to what you could have said. In real life, the "official and unofficial surnames" you mention are termed titles and surnames--every noble has one of each. Queen Elizabeth II is her title, while her actual name is Elizabeth Windsor, of the House of Windsor--and yes, the family does own Windsor Castle (among others). This would well support your argument--IF it were a typical case. Sadly, it's not, as the family is named after the castle not because it was a key part of their ancestral holdings, but because her grandfather deliberately changed the family's name (from Saxe-Coburg and Gotha), during a wave of public anti-German sentiment.
     To nail down what is more usual, I went here and looked for some name commonalities. Here's what I found:

TITLE		NAME		FAMILY SEAT
Duke of Norfolk		Edward Fitzalan-Howard		Arundel Castle
Marquess of Lansdowne		Charles Petty-FitzMaurice		Bowood House
Earl of Oxford		Aubrey de Vere		Castle Hedingham
Viscount Hardinge		Thomas Henry de Montarville Hardinge		Broadmere House

Etc., etc.
Now, mind you, there ARE some cases where the Title and Surname do match, and even some matches between the Title and Seat . . . but I didn't see any between Surname and Seat. Feel free to have a look for yourself, if you wish, I didn't try very hard.

My stubbornness is not taking control,  I was just applying your own logic concerning clans and families to a system you are more familiar with, the Feudal one; the logic is wrong but it was not my logic but yours. 

Firstly we are *not* talking about the modern world, so any examples after say the 1600s or so are not relevant to the case, since Capitalism thinks differently about these things.  Secondly we were talking about the etymology of the words in order to deal with your confusion over families and clans.  Of course they knew the difference between House of X and just a regular house, but one of these words derived from the other.  To say that clans are simply families because the word means 'offspring' is basically akin to arguing that House of X is simply the same as some peasant cottage somewhere. 

Originally the clan is a family, just as originally the House of X is just a house.  In both cases it outgrows the original concept, while the name remains related to the thing that it originally *was* it does not mean that it remains literally the same thing. 

Think of yourself and your family having a house in the middle of the wilderness, with no external governments or states ruling over you.  That part is easy, but then add a garden to your house.  How big is your garden going to be?  This is almost a trick question since your garden is in effect as large as you want it to be, up to the point that you encroach on some other independent entities land claims and then are strong enough to defend those claims.  Now one way or another the population increases and some other people turn up in 'your garden' to set up their own houses, if you turf them out then in this is a dead end since you are better off with more people around and you will ultimately lose control of your land to someone else with larger numbers if you do that. 

There are two functional arrangements you can adopt here.  The first is the Feudal arrangement, this means that you allow the other houses to exist independantly provided that they pay you for the privilege of being there, according to what allows you enrich yourself and defend.  The second is that you merge together with the other houses, to form a larger 'thing' over which you may or may not have some kind of leadership, this is the Tribal arrangement. 

In the Feudal system then what matters is which of the households you belong to.  So we end up the nobles being the House of X, because the House of X is originally the name of the first household of the place.  In the Tribal system what matters is clans, as in progeny; that is because they houses that got there afterwards are the 'progeny' of the first house, a relationship that may well be entirely literal or may well be metaphorical in the sense that they 'came after' the first family to arrive; the important thing is that the distinction between family and progeny makes sense when we are talking about families *as* progeny rather than individuals.  In both cases we start with a single literal family household and then we end up becoming something more but the etymology traces back to what they originally were. 

This situation creates more problems for Feudalism than for Tribalism, because in effect the former system did not really accept the transition on an ideological level.  Once we are now some castle with hundreds of unrelated guards and servants rather than some humble household, a crisis emerges a to the question of who is 'really part of the household' and that anxiety is where surnames come from.  The unrelated minions that might happen to live in the household have to be distinguished clearly from the real members of the household when in fact the distinction is in reality rather blurrier than it was to begin with. 

There's a BIG difference between deciding which of 2 names to use, and picking truly at random from a pool of thousands. Besides, if each dwarf's "choice" is based on their own personal values, ethics, and affinity for any existing family members of each of the two names, that can hardly be called random at all.

All those things are determined randomly to all intents and purposes.   

Yeah, when I said "the original dwarves" I meant precisely that, those who had no parents because they were the first of their kind.

And come the myth generator there will be a time and events previous to Yr0. 

[Bumber]

Take the clan stuff to PMs or another thread, guys.

I was talking about a system where a civilization changed it's naming system to add new words, say a civilization in a massive world, with loads of sites and very few civilizations, in which an adventurer has spoken to every single non-historical person in said civilizations.  Now we have tens-of-thousands of named individuals, all needing new names but the player is currently lagging on the FPS due to having built too many walls in their fortress, so the game then just crashes.

This looks like a flimsy argument to me.
1. You suppose the player has talked to every single non-historical figure in a civ.
2. You suppose (I'm guessing) that they must have historical children.
3. You suppose that these children are being born simultaneously.
4. You suppose the naming system is the straw that breaks the camel's back.

It's really just an argument against everyone being a historical figure.

[SixOfSpades]

Take the clan stuff to PMs or another thread, guys.

Agreed, it seems that my attempts at being a good influence are having precisely the opposite effect. So, dropping everything from recent posts except constructive suggestions about naming systems . . .


Factors that we largely seem to agree on:
1.     Multiple possible naming conventions, procedurally chosen during worldgen at the civilization level. Civ ethics would ideally be expanded to include some overlap with traits, (imposing positive or negative modifiers on certain traits of all citizens raised within that civ), and each civ would choose a naming system that basically fits their cultural values (especially FAMILY and TRADITION).
2.     SOME form of name inheritance, from parent(s) to child, would be an improvement, especially if it also allows the easy identification of siblings.
3.     Different castes within a society could have shorter/longer names than others. Nobles, and those high in the order of succession to become nobles, could have longer names indicating their illustrious lineage. Orphans, foundlings, bastards, and the disowned would not be able/allowed to use family-based name elements. Name elements could be stripped from criminals as a punitive measure. Certain name elements might not be used unless a dwarf marries. Dwarves kidnapped as babies would not even remember their names. Males could have longer names than females, or vice versa. Any or all of these would promote cultural flavor, as well as storytelling in general.
4.     Barring a UI improvement that increases the amount of displayable space in most lists, names should be kept relatively short to avoid the issue of names being edited to the point of illegibility.
5.     Some dwarves should be able to change their surnames, prompted by important life events. This should be a rare event, predicated only by truly noteworthy circumstances, but the rate of name increase created by starting new clans must be at least equal to the rate of name decrease caused by families dying off from voluntary sterility.
6.     Duplicate names should be avoided as much as feasible, except where it is actually intended for the purpose of indicating a familial bond. In general, first (given) names should no longer be truly random: At birth, the RNG picks a name element that is NOT currently being used by any citizen of the fort, and NOT being used by any member of the newborn's family (whether they're in the fort or not).
7.     In the event that a new name duplicates that of a dead dwarf from the same civ, ordinal numbering may be used. A dwarf might be named Likot Dustcastle III, after her great-uncle Likot Dustcastle II.
8.     Naming conventions would control only a dwarf's displayed, "external" name. Each dwarf's true, "internal" name would be far longer, as it contains ALL of the information required by all of the various naming systems, including that dwarf's complete ancestry. This would also include any possible aliases, used by vampires and/or criminals.

Any others?

[Su]

I am really not a fan of gender-specific length since it implies one is less important than the other(s) and I'm pretty sure discrimination is something toady has said he wants to avoid

ordinal numbering should only happen in bloodlines, not on an entire civ level. you shouldn't be able to call yourself "famous person the 2nd" if you're not directly related to them

wouldn't a "true name" be unnecessary? surely it would be possible to do a one-time calculation from the data we already have when the current name format changes, since it's not like they're going to be changing it often if at all

[Shazbot]

Castes, not genders.

[KittyTac]

and I'm pretty sure discrimination is something toady has said he wants to avoid

He said somewhere that he does not care.

[SixOfSpades]

I am really not a fan of gender-specific length since it implies one is less important than the other(s)

If it's so rare that it sticks out as noticeably unusual, then it serves the purpose of adding flavor while subtly reminding the player how foolish sexism is. Speaking of discrimination, aren't all elven societies completely matriarchal? There should probably be racial modifiers that influence the cultural modifiers that influence the individual traits.

ordinal numbering should only happen in bloodlines, not on an entire civ level. you shouldn't be able to call yourself "famous person the 2nd" if you're not directly related to them

Well, if you're not related to them (you could theoretically be a distant cousin), then the odds of your having the same surname should be zero. Even if somebody "earns" a name that a lot of dwarves would qualify for (e.g., "Goblinslayer"), each civ should probably prevent anyone changing their name to one that's already been taken. But, then again, there could be exceptions: Suppose a dwarf forges an artifact adamantine axe and then decapitates a hydra with it. Centuries later, after her bloodline has died out, another dwarf accomplishes the exact same feat, and is publicly acclaimed as Ingiz Azureblade of the Seven Chops reborn. Personally, I think that if any potential game mechanic allows for a cool story, that's an argument for its inclusion.

wouldn't a "true name" be unnecessary? surely it would be possible to do a one-time calculation from the data we already have when the current name format changes, since it's not like they're going to be changing it often if at all

It's just an expression for what the game knows but doesn't show us. Agreed, Toady might decide it's completely useless (except for aliases), but it's at least an idea worth considering.


Other name-convention thoughts:
All names fall into one of three categories--Given names, Event names, and Surnames. All cultures need Event names at the very least, and usually Given plus at least one Surname.
     Given names date from birth, and have 3 styles: random, limited, and guided. Random is just that: A word grabbed from the pool of names, with no regard for duplication. Limited avoids duplicates, as I described in my previous post. Guided is based on either the hopes of the parent(s) (usually something auspicious, like Tower or Empire), or the baby's traits/personality. Individuals may have more than one Given name, including names of different variations (although dwarves using a Random with limitations name will only need the one).
     Event names are triggered by events such as: becoming a child, becoming an adult, reaching a certain rank in a skill, getting married, becoming a parent, becoming the head of a family (no living ancestors, elder siblings, or elder spouse, must have living younger siblings and/or children), making an artifact, becoming a noble, or killing a significant number of enemies in combat. The styles of names themselves are, ideally, highly dependent on the variation of event: A dwarf who gets married might take his spouse's Given name as his Event name. A dwarf becoming a Professional Carpenter might be given a random or guided name, either by a superior Carpenter or by the general public. A culture might have its own special title meaning "head of household". Etc.
     Surnames are determined by parentage, and point to specific slots in the name of one or more ancestors. Many possible variations exist: Surnames can point to a 2nd Given name, a 1st Event name, a 2nd Surname, etc. The ancestor specified might be the male or the female, the older parent or the younger, or the superior gender (if the culture has that distinction) or the inferior. The ancestor might be 1st-generation (parent), 2nd generation (grandparent), etc.


0.     Dwarf Fortress's current naming system is "Ber Dustgirdle the Twinkling Notch, baron consort", for which the shorthand is:
1[Gr] 2[Gr]3[Gr] the 4[E9r] (of) 5[E9r], ( 6[E8] 7[E4] / 6[E3] )
Which all means--name elements 1, 2, & 3 are of the Given type, random style. Elements 4 & 5 are the Event type, 9th variation (combat kills), random style. And Element 6 can be either Event type, 3rd variation (skill rank), or Event type, 8th variation (nobility), with a special-case for Event type, 4th variation (marriage) to someone who is [E8] (noble).


I.     My own pet system is gender-specific: Boys get
1[Gl] 2[S<+¹1>] ( 3[S<♂¹3>] / if <♂¹3>=null then 3[S<♂²1>] ), which means:
Element 1 = Given type, limited style.
Element 2 = Surname type, pointing at the elder (+) parent's (¹) first (1) name element.
Element 3 = Surname, pointing at either the male (♂) parent's third name element, or (fires only if the father has no third name) the paternal grandfather's first name element.
Meanwhile, girls get the female-lineage version: 1[Gl] 2[S<+¹1>] ( 3[S<♀¹3>] / if <♀¹3>=null then 3[S<♀²1>] ).
Dwarves of both sexes would also get the same titles based on profession, combat kills, and/or noble title that the game currently uses. So an individual dwarf's name would look the same as the current system, but all of their ancestors/descendants of their gender would have the same 3rd name, while all siblings would share a common 2nd name with each other.


II.     GoblinCookie's system:
1[Gr]2[Gr] 3[S<☺Civ1>]4[S<☺SiteGov2>] 5[Gr]6[E4<♥5>] 7[S<+¹5>]8[S<-¹5>] 9[S<♀¹7>]10[S<♀¹8>] 11[S<♂¹7>]12[S<♂¹8>]
"Olondeler Treatycandles Bershorast Vucarurist Asenezum Cogstinthad"
1 = Given name, random style.
2 = Given name, random style.
3 = First word of the individual's home civilization's name
4 = Second word of the individual's home settlement's government's name
5 = Given name, random style. When combined with [6], creates the individual's "marriage two-string". Can be left null until marriage.
6 = Event type, 4th variation (marriage), pointing at the spouse's 5th name element. If the dwarf has no spouse, this name is null.
7 & 8 = The marriage names of the dwarf's parents, older one first.
9 & 10 = The marriage names of the dwarf's maternal grandparents.
11 & 12 = The marriage names of the dwarf's paternal grandparents.
Plus, I assume, the game's current profession / combat nickname / noble rank titles.
Of course, that's with the level of generational tracking set to 2. If it's increased to 3, these additional names are tacked on:
13[S<♂¹9>]14[S<♂¹10>] 15[S<♂¹11>]16[S<♂¹12>] 17[S<♀¹9>]18[S<♀¹10>] 19[S<♀¹11>]20[S<♀¹12>]
13 & 14 = the marriage names of the dwarf's father's maternal grandparents.
15 & 16 = the marriage names of the dwarf's father's paternal grandparents.
17 & 18 = the marriage names of the dwarf's mother's maternal grandparents.
19 & 20 = the marriage names of the dwarf's mother's paternal grandparents.
After the dwarf's profession/rank and possible combat titles are included, you're looking at a name about 24 words long. If the generational level is set to 4, the name increases to be 40 elements, and cranking the generations up to 5 (the highest that's been non-sarcastically mentioned) results in a name a staggering seventy-two words long. Truly the dwarven version of Johann Gambolputty.


III.     In contrast, the shortest name system that I consider plausible:
"Litast Mason"
1[E1l] 2[E3]
1 = Event name, 1st variation (becoming a child), limited style.
2 = Event name, 3rd variation (attaining an appreciable rank in a given skill).
This suggests a culture that uses the names for nothing but identification: They don't even bother to name you until you've proved that you're healthy enough to survive your first year, and then the only other thing people care about is what kind of work you do. No noble rank, no combat nicknames. Just the bare bones.


IV.     A hypothetical matriarchal / militarist society:
"Udib Bomrek Ingot" becomes "Udib the High Dagger of Trumpets"
1[Gl] ( 2[S<♀¹1>]3[S<♀¹3>] / the 2[E9l] 3[E9l] of 4[E9l] )
1 = Given name, limited style.
2 = Your mother's given name, the same as all your siblings.
3 = Your mother's family name . . . until you manage to get some combat kills, at which point your family names are stripped away & replaced with your battle title. The only way to escape your mothers--you belong to the army now, and any children you bear (IF you're female, of course) will carry part of your blood name for as long as your line endures, or until they replace it with their own. There is no mention of any father, or even marriage--the males in this society could conceivably be nothing more than sperm donors.


V.     A more vanilla setup, but playing with the order:
"Oar of Tragedy the Macedwarf, Theaterlobster Mafol"
( 1[E9l] of 2[E9l] the 3[E3] / 3[E3] ), 4[S<♀¹4>]5[S<♂¹5>] 6[Gl]
1, 2, & 3 = combat title and combat profession, if applicable
3 = civilian profession, if not
4 = mother's family name
5 = father's family name
6 = personal given name
In this society, what you do (especially if you do it well) is announced before your own name: Your reputation literally precedes you. Your family comes first as well, respecting the fact that you are an offshoot of them.


VI.     An oddly-ordered patrilineal system:
"Muthkat Bembul, Carpenter, of Shorast (Udib)"
1[Gr] 2[Gr], 3[E3], of 4[S<♂¹4>] (5[S<♀¹4])
1 & 2 = Given name, random style.
3 = Event name, profession.
4 = Father's (and dwarf's) surname.
5 = Mother's surname.
The parentheses around the mother's surname denotes its secondary importance. This would work well in a male-dominated culture, where the only reason to carry the mother's name at all is so that if your uncle dies leaving no sons, you could still inherit through your mother.


VII.     A gender-balanced double-barreled surname, proposed by Thundercraft:
"Likot Cogdatan"
1[Gl] ( 2[S<♂¹2>] / if <♂¹2>=null then 2[S<♀¹2>] ) 3[S<♀¹3>]
Element 1 = Given type, limited style.
Element 2 = Surname type, pointing at the male (♂) parent's (¹) second (2) name element.
Element 3 = Surname type, pointing at the female (♀) parent's (¹) third (3) name element.
Similar to the previous one, but with two equally-weighted lineage names; males (that have kids) will pass down their second name, and females will likewise pass on their third. A nice feature of this setup is that bastard children are easily handled: If the father's surname is unknown, the child simply inherits both of the mother's surnames.


Possibilities abound for procedurally-generated name formats. Given names, Event names, and Surnames can be placed in any order. Think up some more and I'll add them to this post, unless Shazbot thinks moving them to the start of the thread would be more appropriate.

[GoblinCookie]

Take the clan stuff to PMs or another thread, guys.

I'm sorry Bumber but we cannot enter into discussions about the naming system without discussions about the family and it's role in the wider society.  To do so would be pure ignorance. 

This looks like a flimsy argument to me.
1. You suppose the player has talked to every single non-historical figure in a civ.
2. You suppose (I'm guessing) that they must have historical children.
3. You suppose that these children are being born simultaneously.
4. You suppose the naming system is the straw that breaks the camel's back.

It's really just an argument against everyone being a historical figure.

The civilisation changed their naming system.  That is why everyone is having to change their names simultaneously.  So not a flimsy argument in context.  You also have to think about the various possible outcomes in the game, it does not do to just take the most common situation.

and I'm pretty sure discrimination is something toady has said he wants to avoid

He said somewhere that he does not care.

He is largely against adding in racial prejudices into the game, or at least that was the general response given on Future of the Fortress to the proposal that they be added in.  There was a bit of *on the other hand* but that was about it, it is not something that he is enthusiastic about in any case. 

GoblinCookie's system is something fairly close to this:
1[S<Civ1>]2[S<Fort2>] 3[Gr]4[E4<♥3>] 5[S<+¹3]6[S<-¹3] 7[S<♀¹5]8[S<♀¹6] 9[S<♂¹5]10[S<♂¹6]
1 = First word of home civilization's name
2 = Second word of home settlement's name
3 = Given name, random style. Used to distinguish from among siblings.
4 = Event type, 4th variation (marriage), pointing at the spouse's 3rd name element. If the dwarf has no spouse, this name is null.
5 = The 3rd name of the dwarf's elder parent.
6 = The 3rd name of the dwarf's younger parent.
7 & 8 = The 3rd names of the dwarf's maternal grandparents.
9 & 10 = The 3rd names of the dwarf's paternal grandparents.
Plus, I assume, the game's current profession / combat nickname / noble rank titles.

Possibilities abound for procedurally-generated name formats. Given names, Event names, and Surnames can be placed in any order. Think up some more and I'll add them to this post, unless Shazbot thinks moving them to the start of the thread would be more appropriate.

It goes like this, yes you got it mostly or entirely right but it is not very readable.  The system I advocate currently stands as follows.

[Personal Two-Strings]+[Civilization First String+Site Government Last String]+[Own Marraige Two-Strings]+[Parent's Marraige Two-Strings]+[Paternal Grandparent Two-Strings]+[Maternal Grandparents Two-Strings]+(further generations of grandparents up to the maximum allowable number in the entity file).

Because we don't see the marriage-name of unmarried couples we can assign a single string at birth to fill that 'slot'.  Then we can simply scramble the two strings to form a marriage name FROM the strings of both characters that marry.  That means that multiple marraiges of the same character will have the same theme, in addition it saves on having to actually calculate a new marriage string every time a marriage happens.

The two issues I can think of is what order the names of the male-line grandparents and the female-line grandparents will take.  However this is solved by having different arrangements for different civilisations, as the actual order in the file does not matter.  The other issue is what happens if, when our dwarves are less well-behaved we end up with illegitimate children?

I reckon that in the case of illegitimate children, the data of the mother's personal name (the first slot) should be used to fill the fourth slot for the parent's marriage.  This won't cause identity confusion because the child has a personal name of their own and because what is *in* the slots does not really matter to a computer it is entirely combatable with future generations of legitimate children.  They will just end up using what was originally the personal name of the mother *as* a grandparental family name, alongside other legitimate family names.

The same arrangement can also be used for pathogenic reproduction, when that is a thing.

[Bumber]

I'm sorry Bumber but we cannot enter into discussions about the naming system without discussions about the family and it's role in the wider society.  To do so would be pure ignorance.

The semantics of what defines a clan, state, or society has nothing to do with the inheritance of names. It's a tangent. The parts actually relating to the handling of names and titles are fine.

The civilisation changed their naming system.  That is why everyone is having to change their names simultaneously.  So not a flimsy argument in context.  You also have to think about the various possible outcomes in the game, it does not do to just take the most common situation.

If we're bothering to simulate a change in naming systems, there's no reason to have that change propagate faster than light. It can spread using the rumors system.

You at least have to be reasonable about your worst case scenarios. If the player does something extreme, like a 16x16 embark, then they must bear the performance issues.

[dragdeler]

Yes we don't need to display all the name information, actually the player should allways be able to choose which parts to show in menus. What about vampires? Well can a fake identity actually carry information such as age, gender, origin? Can you see the persons toughts? You see what I'm getting at: if there is no insight into toughts or if they are fake, show the fake identity, if not allways show the real name in menus, obviously. But we can add more flavor to conversations, if creatures refer to eachother differently according to their personal preferences, knowledge of the person they're mentioning etc.

But I'm against accumulative names, we don't need to substitute the whole legends mode with naming conventions. Hence I propose to keep our 5 string system, that should be plenty. Especially if you apply different naming conventions according to civ. For example: family names are very useless for goblins so they should be referred to by their titles oftentimes. Of course it's DF so there will allways be a useful exception to that kind of rule, able to enrich the game. And while everybody knows and agrees on that granularity, we (y'all  ) keep assuming that the other side is arguing for that single omnipresent system. I don't see why historical accuracy should matter when we're trying to build a "everything (fantasy) simulator"; the more different concepts that are drawn from reality (or real inspirations  ), the better it will be. I can not imagine how this helps to bring across our suggestion, surely Toady will know what to apply where, so that the thing actually spits out cool worlds that kind of work, even if it takes goblins to never starve or die of old age... you know that kind of thing. Yet we are discussing his moral views as if they needed to be translated to the game. If he considers himself an artist he is free to do that, but if I imagine myself in his shoes: I would have a hard time not to insta X the tab the second I read that kind of stuff. Anyway...

Please consider predefined prefixes and suffixes. Different civs could apply theirs to the two last strings in conversations. It's easy to imagine how they could use them pejoratively or laudatively according to immersive story telling elements. So no, I'm against granting more importance to the nobles by giving them more "space" to choose their names. Just define a syllabe you stick to the string to have that kind of important meaning (or meaningful importance  ?). As allways according to civ, personality preference, what the entity knows, and in the case of what the player sees in the menus: well, that what he is supposed to know.



Another piece of trivia that might help to bring across my point (because seriously I feel a bit mute): I've made myself an HTML document that contains thousands of songs, with their waveforms, artist, album, year, and direct access hyperlink to my drive. Thanks to my naming conventions which is "Artist - Song.mp3" I can garantuee you that I'll be able to hit any song with a combination of " - " or ".mp3" and less than 6 caracters via ctrl+f.

[SixOfSpades]

I've updated my "naming conventions shorthand" with a couple more examples. Hey, you know, when I said you guys should all suggest alternative naming patterns, I actually meant it.

Take the clan stuff to PMs or another thread, guys.

I'm sorry Bumber but we cannot enter into discussions about the naming system without discussions about the family and it's role in the wider society.  To do so would be pure ignorance.

As long as you grudgingly admitted (again) that clans are not governments, I'm good with that. Clans are, first and foremost, large families that share a name, and I shall continue to refer to them as such. And that's all I'll say about the issue in this thread.

He [Toady] is largely against adding in racial prejudices into the game, or at least that was the general response given on Future of the Fortress to the proposal that they be added in.  There was a bit of *on the other hand* but that was about it, it is not something that he is enthusiastic about in any case.

I think it's an interesting way of adding flavor, but I definitely think it shouldn't be common, and when it does occur it should show equal-opportunity bias.

GoblinCookie's system is something fairly close to this:

It goes like this, yes you got it mostly or entirely right but it is not very readable.  The system I advocate currently stands as follows.

The shorthand isn't supposed to be reader-friendly, it's for computers. You get the text description. I've updated my post to match your specs (I think), and included a preview of what happens when you adjust "the maximum allowable number in the entity file".

The other issue is what happens if, when our dwarves are less well-behaved we end up with illegitimate children?

Expect the name algorithm to come back with a lot of "null"s where there should be males, or along both lines if the kid is a foundling or whatever. The longer the names, the longer the child and its descendants are going to be bearing the mark of bastardy.

The same arrangement can also be used for pathogenic reproduction, when that is a thing.

Wait--do you mean parthenogenesis? As in, dwarf females spontaneously impregnating themselves with their own clones? This is certainly the first that I've heard of such a suggestion, especially considering that it doesn't happen among mammals. Although it would solve the "dwarves die out because they don't get married" problem . . .

Yes we don't need to display all the name information, actually the player should allways be able to choose which parts to show in menus. What about vampires? Well can a fake identity actually carry information such as age, gender, origin? Can you see the persons toughts?

The fake identity doesn't carry any information at all, because it doesn't actually exist: the real identity simply carries the fake name, and hides the real one. The creature's thoughts, preferences, etc., will all be true, except where the creature remembers to lie. He will say his name is "fake name" instead of "real name", and that he prefers to drink "swamp whiskey" instead of "dwarf blood".

But I'm against accumulative names, we don't need to substitute the whole legends mode with naming conventions. Hence I propose to keep our 5 string system, that should be plenty.

Yeah, I personally am firmly opposed to personal names being longer than 5 elements or so (apart from rare exceptions like royalty, or truly great heroes). Vanilla DF names have a hard maximum of 8 elements (and to reach that, you'd need to be a "consort" & get a 3-word combat title).

Please consider predefined prefixes and suffixes. Different civs could apply theirs to the two last strings in conversations. It's easy to imagine how they could use them pejoratively or laudatively according to immersive story telling elements. . . . Just define a syllabe you stick to the string to have that kind of important meaning (or meaningful importance  ?).

Well, you say you've been feeling mute, why don't YOU take charge of collecting all the prefixes & suffixes you think would be appropriate for names?

[KittyTac]

Re: Prejudice

I read somewhere that DF is getting a more complicated modding system, something akin to an actual programming language, that would allow us to basically do anything that modifying the source would do, but easier. So yeah, you could implement prejudice if you wanted to, at the time of release. I'd do that because that was very common pre-1400.

[dragdeler]

Well, you say you've been feeling mute, why don't YOU take charge of collecting all the prefixes & suffixes you think would be appropriate for names?

Because I fear I'll not be able to create an extensive list, and forget half, but okay let's give it a try.

-Comes from "location".
-Killed "creature".
-Wounded "creature".
-Tamed "creature".
-Related to "famous creature".
-Formerly related to "entity".
-Rules of over "entity".
-Priest of "diety".
-Encountered "diety.
-Prisoner of "entity".
-Survivor of "rampage or battle"
-Winner of "world gen event".
-First to climb "mountain peak"
-Abused body of "creature".
-Devourer of "creature".
-Created "artform"
-Created "artifact".
-Inheritor of "artifact".
-Thief of "artifact".
-Lost "artifact".
-Razed "structure".
-Took over "site".
-Forced tribute from "site".

These are quite a lot actually, so how do we manage with only a few strings (really 8? it's true that demon masters have long names... so if you're right that's pretty perspicacious; I suggest we leave the strings players can't access in adventurer creation to the ruling class then). I think we will need to link at least one title to the life goal, then have personality facets define the thresholds of how fast a creature settles with a title. If there are strings left they should be reserved to what creatures are most known for, so they would most likely require a check of the relations; and a keep track of how famous somebody or something is, so most likely the number of events attached to it defines the treshold.

I personally think that if you detach the process of gaining a title from the actual event it is related to, we should be able to bypass the title changing problem by setting thresholds prohibitively high, so that titles are kind of rare in order to save precious computation power and grant them more importance and meaningfulness. (We could actually create an event for gaining a title to come up with some cool stuff: imagine Urist being known as dragonslayer since the day Kulet made that awesome poem about it, that got really famous. But that might be a pipedream or only doable in rare situations.)

But now that I have kind of an extensive list I notice that these causal links are not perspective dependant, so the whole "bullying the guy we beat the shit out by calling him mean nicknames, or sucking up to authority figures" has no basis in this system as far as I can see. Which makes me sad but maybe it's for the best: it would have been confusing to see the prefixes and suffixes change in conversations. And ultimatively it would only have been some joke/ immersion / fifth wall thing that would have been spammed all day long.

There is some last thing which I would like to mention, which is the english translations of that gibberish and how they're used in the UI. See I allways found it very confusing when and how the game applies which language. Building in translations so that we don't need to know all the gibberish grammar when following conversations should be fairly easy. But maybe it's time to reconsider the "what language where" from a comprehensive design perspective, or just make it completly customizable? I don't know, do you guys also get confused by this sometimes? Sometimes I can't get by a translation app on my smartphone, just to be able to find somebody in third party tools...

Once I tried to replace all gibberish with english and if I remember well I kind of had it working with dwarven firstnames and only english after, but then the very save manipulation that allowed this feat, started to create redundancies and the LNP kept confusing me and I was new to DF and you know ... I quit

[Bumber]

The fake identity doesn't carry any information at all, because it doesn't actually exist: the real identity simply carries the fake name, and hides the real one. The creature's thoughts, preferences, etc., will all be true, except where the creature remembers to lie. He will say his name is "fake name" instead of "real name", and that he prefers to drink "swamp whiskey" instead of "dwarf blood".

Information pertaining to the current identity needs to remain distinct from any previous ones until cover is blown, however. Not sure how the new secret identities system maintains this. Does legends mode spoil things, or does info get filtered out by name?
Name changes:
-Mastered skill / profession
-Caused a war
-Brokered peace treaty
-Discovered knowledge

[dragdeler]

-Discovered knowledge

Yes!