The Name Game Part IV: Game Titles (And Why Your Campaign Should Have One)

Salutations, nerds! Today I want to take a moment to talk about game titles. A lot of home groups don’t have them, but plenty of character sheets (looking at you World of Darkness) have slots for ‘campaign name’ on the page and promote doing so. So, allow me to put on my saleslady hat and try to convince you this is a good idea.

Force Grey is a D&D gameplay show with a band of adventurers put together into a special operations team, originally to hunt giants. The campaign title sets up the premise wonderfully. Also who doesn’t miss Joppa?

Name that campaign

Game titles sets the tone

Let me open up with a couple of examples you might be familiar with already.

“Ingest Quest” and “The Scarlet Sisterhood of Steel and Sorcery” are very different games, and very aptly titled ones. Even if you’re not familiar with them, I bet you can tell just by looking that this is the case.

First of all, Ingest Quest is campy as all hell. So is the title. It’s about a group going around to write a cook book and all of their flavorful adventures. You know at a glance that this is not going to be a somber game. It rhymes, it’s colorful, and it’s the kind of fun that we the players are having every time we sit down to do a session.

That isn’t to say it can’t be dark sometimes (I’m looking at you soupy mess of floating eyeballs!), but it is a largely comedic game and that is fully intentional.

Meanwhile, The Scarlet Sisterhood of Steel and Sorcery is exactly what it says on the tin. It’s about sisterhood, and while it can be very campy and roleplay heavy, it also has its super serious moments. Things are far more likely in this game to be that somber fantasy vibe, but on the whole? It’s an adventure story.

While both of them are fifth edition Dungeon & Dragons (okay so Ingest Quest is Spelljammer, but we’re playing it in 5E so it counts) they’re entirely different genres and the titles drive that point home. Give your players a title before they start and they’ll play to it. It gives everyone an idea of what is expected of them, and personally, I think that increases the fun.

A campaign name gives players a solid handhold for reference

If you run out of ideas to challenge your players, there’s always Tiamat from the Rise of Tiamat adventure – an aptly named adventure.

Especially if you play more than one campaign with the group you’re gaming with. You know you’re going to go back and reference this stuff later, and no one wants to be sitting there groping around in the dark for what they’re talking about with that callback.

“You know, that game we played where you were the wizard, Tom? Yeah, the one where Susan blew up that citadel!”

Try to find a way to do that without tipping the hand to what story you’re going to be referencing, I challenge you. But if you have a handy title, it makes it easy. My home group ran through Tyranny of Dragons and we always know what we mean when someone says, “Remember that time in Tyranny?”

On the other hand, there was a game I ran set in a coastal citadel that the players all loved but we never gave it a title so there’s always this awkward moment of “Hey, do you remember that game where everyone was racist against Dragonborn” and it takes a while. Lessons learned the hard way, friends.

Game titles ground characters and make them feel more established

When you reference characters, it’s easy enough. You say, “Hey, you know Ron from Harry Potter?” or “Luke from Star Wars,” and everyone knows what you mean. That same thing rings true with your own characters.

“Remember Releloth from the Ragnarok Campaign?” instead of “Hey, do you remember that crazy necromancer I had that almost destroyed everyone’s plans?”

There’s a shorthand, sure, and those descriptors can be really fun in the right circumstances. That said, when you can reference your character like that, as someone that has a set place in the world and a setting they belong in, a campaign they belong in, it feels like you’re referencing someone from a book. It lends credence to that character and, at least on a subconscious level, it feels like you’re talking about something of more substance than just “this character I played once.”

So, how about you? Do you name your campaigns or just charge right in? Do you have a campaign name you’re particularly proud of that you want to share? A system for naming them? Do you just go by the town they were predominantly set in or the world you were in at the time? Go by the characters that were in those games? Let me know in the comments below!

From the Nerditor’s desk

Turns out this post is a revival of sorts for a series that came before my time. Check out the earlier installments of the Name Game here on the site. I’m curious myself to hear some of your game titles and campaign names. I like to name individual sessions or episodes too, even if just to help give a little structure or keep the goal clear in mind.

And speaking of names, I’m excited to discover what we learn about the next adventure story Wizards of the Coast will unveil at the Stream of Many Eyes event June 1-3. The obvious bet is beholders are invilved but who knows?

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