u/IscahRambles

TL;DR version: I've made Elvaan and Mithra naming guides with lists of all existing character names (plus their FFXIV counterparts) so you can build your own character names from a confirmed lore-compliant base.

The Elvaan guide also covers resources for building from real-world names and attempts to track down name origins for the existing character names.

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With the expanded free trial announcement, it seemed like a good time to share some in-depth character naming guides I have been working on. I'm an FFXIV player, not an FFXI player (yet) so it has been written from that perspective and the lore section of the guide only covers FFXIV, but since the naming conventions are shared across both games, you'll still be able to make use of these for naming purposes.

While I don't have direct experience of FFXI, I've dug deep into wikis (and in some cases cross-checked quest videos) to find and verify as many names as I can.

Guides I've made so far with FFXI relevance:

• Elezen and Elvaan
• Moonkeeper and Mithra
• Near Eastern (used by Hume and Elvaan in relevant regions) – see part 3 for FFXI names; needs updating, see notes below.

I'm currently working on a Roegadyn/Galka guide and hoping to have that done in the next few weeks.

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I also need some help with how to group Hume names for a future guide (and updating the Near Eastern one with more names I found).

Specifically, some Humes in Bastok have real-world names from the regions that Near Eastern names are based on, but there's a big mix of sources for Hume names, so what I need to know is whether the real-world origins of Hume names (other than definite Near Eastern and Far Eastern ones) are indicative of them coming from different countries/regions of Vana'diel or if they're just a big mix with no significance to them having European or Native American or Arabic names.

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Anyway, I hope the guides will be helpful for people, and would love to hear any thoughts and suggestions you have on improving the guide or information, or if it has helped you find a name that you like.

I was trying to type an opening quote mark followed by an A, hit the keys too fast, got an ä – now it seems to be locked into never immediately typing the quote mark, just holding it in reserve until I press another key.

What key combination did I press, and what do I press to turn it back to normal?

I've seen a few people trying to translate the term Skyltborg using real languages but the simpler and lore-connected solution is that it comes from the established Roegadyn language used for Sea Wolf names, with the elements skylt "shield" and borg "castle" both already listed in the dictionary on the official lore forum.

Why "shield castle" and not "castle shield"? I would speculate that the term is the original Roegadyn word for the fighting style rather than just the weapon. "Shield castle" could be a compound term more elegantly translated as "fortress" or "bastion".

The placement of the comment box has been changed on mobile web and now appears as an overlay at the bottom of the screen.

On any given page, the first time you attempt to reply to another comment, the header in the comment box will say "Commenting on [post title]" and you have to cancel it and press Reply a second time to get the correct "Replying to [user name]".

I'm not going to go replying randomly to people to test this, but I assume if you fail to do this cancel-and-redo step, it will go in as a top-level reply to the post. (I have seen a few posts today that look like they were intended to reply to someone else!)

Additionally, because of the way iOS/Safari works, cancelling takes at least two presses, because the cancel button is right at the bottom of the screen now so the first attempted press of the button just brings up the forward/back/bookmarks/tabs row.