We were talking a little on the discord about stupid names. We’ve all come to know the Adjective-Noun Adjective-Noun format that Games Workshop has been using to name everything these days, and it’s a terrible system, what are some example of the worst named things for you?
Some of my (least) favourites:
Ossiarch Bonereapers literally means Bonepower Bonetakers.
Killaboss on Corpse-rippa Vulcha
Beast-skewer Killbow
Hurakan Windchargers i.e. they charge at the wind?
A lot of the silly “sounds as” names for AoS are stupid beyond belief.
Ogor instead of ogre
Orruk instead of orc
Aelf instead of elf
Duardin instead of dwarf
Truly something only a total wankkor ™ could have created
I thought it meant Bonberk Nosenibbler?
I’m really looking forward to The Old World where they’ve said they won’t be doing this
Just switch to any non-English language on games-workshop.com and basically all names which they tried to translate are hilariously awkward (I can speak for the German version – but French / Italian / Spanish do not seem to be much better based on my very limited knowledge of these languages). A few examples from the new IG release: Fluchklinge (Baneblade), Wächter-Spähläufer (Sentinel), Todesstoß-Raketenwerfer (Deathstrike). Pretty sure there are more and even better examples… Ironically, Baneblades were always called Baneblades as long as I remember and they only recently started translating everything (and at the same time saving costs with obviously non-qualified translators)
I think it’s only a matter of time until we get Raummarineinfanterie…
Idontneed Thesekin
As memed in the early days of the podcast. Admech terrain names are peak GW staff meeting brainstorming.
Battlezone: Mechanicus – Transterranic Gantries
aka… bridges with cranes
Battlezone: Mechanicus – Galvanic Magnavent
aka… bridges and a stove
Enjoyable that they are largely duplicate sprues in different combinations with GW facepalm combo-jargon slapped on the front of the box. I wonder if they used a name generator to determine what sprues went in the box.
Wankkor…haha 
I just listened to 5 minutes (or what seemed like 5 minutes) of Malcador listing pseudo-nonsense placenames/***torums in The End and The Death: Volume I. To say I zoned out for a bit was an understatement.
I can’t imagine what its like to try and read that.
The fun part is watching videos of GW designers talking about these strange names they have invented, and not only do they often each pronounce them differently but they also aren’t consistent themselves.
The alienating part about this is the half-assed attempt at world building that goes along with it. There is nothing per se wrong with having a copyrightable name for common fantasy races. Take for instance the Elder Scrolls. I’m fine with Dark Elves being called Dunmer etc. as they are noticeably different from your average D&D Dark Elf and their lore arguably more refined. Then AoS comes along and tries to sell you classic fantasy with strange names.
I think we can be a bit harsh with GW. Making fun of the not pronouncing names (often names in an ostensibly different language) the same? Who does? The town ‘Derby’ in the UK is pronounced Darby except by English speaking tourists who strangely pronounce it Derby. Why I can’t think. For those UK based here, how is the city of Bath pronounced, short vowel or long vowel? Now don’t get me started on scones. I’ve seen families torn apart by that question. The idea of one pronunciation is very modern. Indeed spelling in English did not settle down until the early modern period.
As for silly names, my nearest town translates to modern english as ‘the old White House on the River’ this is near the villages ‘Hot mill Valley’, ‘Little Valley” and ‘ The Holy CowShed’. We forget where names come from. We use them and they sound normal e.g. jellyfish…. Just think about that what a silly name. If GW named a war machine the ‘SpitFire’ coz it spat fire we would laugh at them. Think of our iconic planes hurricane, mosquito, the Flying Fortress. There is more: chieftain tanks, leopard tanks, stinger missiles. Storm troopers (say what?) who launched ‘lightning wars’ in 1939. The UK had ‘the Desert Rats’ in WW2 ( OK officially the 8th army but no one called them that)The UK has army groupings known as ‘The Black Watch’, ‘The Blues and Royals’, the Americans have navy seals (I don’t think they are cute and cuddly with flippers). We forget, descriptive names just become names like surnames ,Fletcher, Carpenter, Cartwright. Yes GW do like their two part names the first often in the native language and the second descriptive but that two part is common in English speaking army groupings
Navy Seals
Airborne Rangers
Marine Corps
Household Cavalry
Grenadier Guards
Welsh Guards
Creating a world specifically NOT modelled on history is not easy. They also have given us non standard fantasy, Kharadron Overlords, Idoneth deepkin even daughters of Khaine are no longer standard evil elves. I don’t like the Stormcast but they are not standard.
Mind you I can’t defend bad translation!
I think we should start making our own titles up for GW’s made up lingo… Here is my contribution:
Opulent Coalition of Procedure
Squallhurl Perpetuals
Marvelous Accord of Disorder
Laborers to Twilight
Ambitious Federation of Passing
Spiritdecay Grimpotentates
Splendid Union of Wreckage
Sorrowpique Blockheads
The primary issue is that they are unwilling to use terminology that is already understandable leaving every word used inscrutable and therefore forgettable to someone not already familiar with the entire force.
Take a couple of your examples - Navy Seals and Household Cavalry. ‘Seals’ is a unique term, but if you know how modern militaries are organized than you can surmise that this is part of the armed forces associated with maritime activities. For Household Cavalry, I know right away they are mounted and likely elite even though I don’t even know whose military that is for.
Contrast that with the Hurakan Windchargers. Unless you know the lore of that specific army you don’t know what Hurakan is or implies about the unit, and Windcharger implies at most that they are going to charge you, and given they have bows that doesn’t even seem to be correct.
Contrast that with older thematic names - Executioner, Fanatic, Bloodthirster, White Lion. These are memorable and short. I may not know anything about any of them off the bat, but I only have to remember a couple familiar words. Also note that these are specialist units and that most units in most armies are things like Spearman, Goblin, or contain a helpful term like Chariot.
I don’t know what GW think (who does). But I suspect they would say that they have tried to create a truly fantastical setting in AoS. Let’s face it it is not even set on a globe but on 8 huge flat plates floating in space with one of them acting as a sun for the others. Dude, what were they smoking!
As such they have decided (rightly or wrongly) to distance themselves from historical war games and actively avoid prosaic terms like cavalry, spearmen etc. I suspect they would argue that their naming system adds colour. Is that needed for the game? No. But let’s face it the game is a game of dice, maths and markers. Figures are not needed certainly not painted ones. Lore/fluff is not needed but adds colour. Take the Huadron Windchargers. They could have called them elf mounted archers. Easy descriptive. No problems. You could have Chaos dwarf elite infantry. Easy descriptive. But we are happy with immmortal guard (they is not immortal in my games!). So if they go for colour and avoid prosaic terms like cavalry etc what do you get. For a start they may argue that elves/Aelves whatever don’t speak English or any other extant language so the first part is a made up elvish word (to underly their exoticism I guess) the second vaguely descriptive. Windchargers implies in English speed or possibly cavalry given the use of the word charger to mean specifically a war horse. I think the Aelves are all about elemental spirits in the fluff so Wind would fit with the lore. Just as immortals fits with the lore when explained that the unit is always kept up to strength.
You picked up my example of the household cavalry fair enough. But the black watch are not black, do not dress in black and are not a reconnaissance unit. The grenadier guards are a mechanized infantry unit used for offensive purposes and don’t rely principally on grenades. The navy seals, well the first bit tells me they are navy the second ? What they are fast in water slow on land? No it’s just like Windchargers it gives you a vague sense that they are amphibious. In the British civil war there was a unit known as the lobsters, nothing to do with the sea but they had heavy armour.
White lions, Phoenix guard, Lothern sea guard (made up word/place followed by vague description), silverhelm etc all acceptable because we were used to them. Now you could say they were all elite units, yes, but AoS is less about massed ranks of structured infantry so….
We may not like the direction that GW has decided to take, but the naming system fits philosophically with it.
@Uther.the.unhinged Absolutely. Designing something that is not based on history is a lot harder. But as a designer you then have the task of explaining how every element in this world is a consequence of its natural circumstances. To pick up one of your examples, GW most likely did the opposite with Kharadron Overlords: they designed the race (“dwarfs with blimps”) and then tried to squeeze them into the universe, inventing the lore as they went along. Stuff like this breaks the immersion and AoS is full of this (although I may be in the minority by saying that the Idoneth Deepkin are one of the better designed races). I want to be fair to AoS but it just cannot compare to other fantasy worlds that have been created by individual artists that put some actual thought into it.
40K on the other hand is much better in that respect but the lore exists since the 80s / 90s. I love some of the recent releases they did for Necrumunda, so they certainly can still do it if they have good source material.
Yes you are right I think about Kharadrons. (I will forgive them as I love the models. If ever I collected order….). But as you say AoS is young. It has not had 30 plus years to build its lore. And we might get chaos dwarfs soon. But I fear they will have ‘interesting’ unit names. Hey ho
You know some unit names that fit the structure though?
Nuln Ironsides.
Infernal Guard.
there are some good examples for AOS like Blissbarb Archers. Why? Because they’re ARCHERS. that’s A REAL THING. It’s evocative of something!! I can learn what a Blissbarb is. I’m SO happy to learn. I’ll buy a book and everything.
Some examples. I don’t have a problem with “Astra Militarum”. At all. I
have a problem with “Putrid Blightkings” because it’s evocative of nothing. The unit names for the Khorne faction are similarly just a slide-a-wheel jumble of generic Khorne words. Similarly the difference between the entire Blormflarp - sorry Stormcast - roster is. There’s nothing intuitive about the difference between an “Vindictor”, a “Vanquisher” and a “Sequitor” is. And not all of those words are even SEO’d. Vanquisher is a great example. That’s not jumping to the top of your google results without the word Stormcast bolted on the front, and you just as easily do it with the word “Archer”. As for Sequitor? IT’S NOT EVEN ENGLISH.
The Primaris went in the same direction, albeit with a slightly less crippling gap between name and role. At least Intercessors can be argued to intercede in stuff. At least Hellblasters, at certain times, blast hell. It’s not evocative but if you force it, maybe it will become evocative over time.
But the meaninglessness is the central issue.
Meanwhile at GW creative studios
Thank you for, as always, putting it more eloquently than I could
