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Gygaxian Fantasy Vol IV: Extraordinary Book of Names Product Type: Sourcebook Format/Price: Hardcover, $34.95, 208 pages Written By: Malcolm Bowers Ordering Info: TLG 3004, ISBN: 1-931275-56-4 Release Date: Now Available! Product Description: This is a book with tremendous scope. The author, Malcolm Bowers, has worked with Gary Gygax to bring you an indispensable resource tool, whether you play the game or run the game. 100,000 names. This book of names is chiefly meant for those who referee role-playing games, but it can help players as well as authors of fantastic fiction. It is a generic work, suitable for all game systems. It indicates why names are important, and how best to use them; and should help you quickly and easily produce large numbers of suitable names for particular groups, individuals, and places. Names lists from many past and present languages and cultures are provided. These names can be used in their own settings or transferred in part or whole to fantastic cultures and races. In addition, the book contains numerous invented names, and tables and methods to create more. It focuses on the needs of fantasy campaigns, but the names can be used in most genres - fantasy names can apply equally well to science fiction, for instance. The book is quite wide-ranging, and should be of considerable value to most campaigns. Names bring characters and backgrounds to life. The right names help evoke the setting, and add colour and interest to the game. Names are so intrinsic to our thinking that as soon as 'Guard #3' is named 'Rathgor' his character starts to take shape in the mind. You can then easily make him vivid in the minds of your players. It is perhaps no great matter to concoct a few names, but almost everyone dries up or gets stuck in a rut after much more than that. In most stories, an author rarely needs to handle more than a few dozen characters and locations; but a role-playing campaign has more of the flavour of a genealogy-replete epic, where hundreds of names might be needed. Even if you manage the people, the dubbing of scores of topographical features, territories, towns, and taverns can seem daunting. If you're playing in settings with a specific flavour, the problems may seem worse: how many Russian or Ancient Egyptian names can you come up with off the top of your head? Player adventurers may interact with dozens of characters in any game session. When introductions are in order, it's easy for the players, but the Game Master has to create names with a true-to-type essence for the encountered parties, sometimes on the spot, and keep it up session after session. With this book in hand, however, these tasks become trifling, even enjoyable! Players, too, may need help choosing a name for that special character. Names for Roman gladiators are hard to come by in the modern world. It's rarely a single name in isolation, either: there's family to consider, perhaps an entire lineage. Even fantastic names can be hard to get right. Plundering literature is a common start, but there are too many Aragorns and Elrics already in some games, and falling under the shadow of the original may be limiting. Game characters are rarely played like their namesakes in any case, so why not choose a unique designation? Of course finding exactly the right name might be a problem. Sometimes inspiration flags. A magician called Frizzlepoot won't inspire dread in his foes or respect in his comrades (quite the reverse, in fact). Fear not! Within this book lies the perfect name for your sleek thief, bold star pilot, or heroic warrior. The book include's people names from all over the world, epithets, places such as inns and taverns, spoof names and more. It includes how to create names, pronunciation guides, translations and how to name the coat of arms of a knight or land. It includes names for fantastic races, topographical features and titles for nobility. Though, as Mr. Bowers says, not utterly exhaustive, it is more than comprehensive in its breadth of material and its depth treatment. If you game and have ever had problems naming your character, then the Book of Names is for you. If you run games and have forever peopled your Inns and Taverns with same fat inn keeper named Bors, then the Book of Names is for you. If you design or create any kind of RPG games, modules, adventures or settings then this is the tool you will want on hand. The Extraordinary Book Names is a perfect addition to the Gygaxian Fantasy World series, bringing you yet another gaming tool you won't want to be without. Packed with over 100,000 names for your adventure games!