So where did your forum handle come from?

Pretty simple question, where did you come up with the handle you use on the forums?

Me? Well, I always liked squids. Okay, maybe like is too weak of a word. More like from ages 6-11, I was OBSESSED with squids. I have really no idea what triggered this fascination, all I know is that I read books about squids, watched tv shows about squids, dressed up as squids for halloween, and even had a four foot long plush giant squid that I slept with like a teddy bear.

Thankfully the (rather unhealthy in retrospect) obsession waned over time, and now squids are more like a subdued interest rather than a full blown obsession. Even so, my forum handle will attest that my inner six year old never quite left.

Starflier was the best name I had early into my time with CoH and became my Global when we had the chance to change them the first time. Changed my forum handle to match. The Starflier is the starting ship in the game Freelancer, although that hadn't actually come to mind when I was coming up with the name originally, even though I love that game.

Name of my first character, created while playing my Booleg Edition trial account. Also the name of my global.

The sad thing is, I've got a small stable of lv50 characters, but Fleeting Whisper only just recently hit 41...

Um, well, gee, I wish I could give you a great story about my forum handle, but...

It's my name. Seriously.

Yeah, I know, kinda lame, but I've yet to meet anyone face to face with the same name (although I know they're out there), so it tends to be reasonably distinctive.

Only recently have I used my forum Handle as a character name in game. It actually has it's origin as the name of a halfling character in old table top RPG's.

It's true origin is in an old pop song


Yes, I am just about that old.

Like Nestor my handle is my name as well although I did make "Manny" in CoH as well, started out as a MA/SR scrapper but is now a TA/A def and is a whopping level 21.... so sad.

I've used it forever. I have an entire character, albeit silly, with his history all thought up. I've made him in City of Villains as an insane, clown-like alien being that is a Zombies/Traps MM.

His name is Blarg.

And strangely enough, it all started from something really silly. It was when I was a little kid.

Me and two friends were playing with action figures. WE had ALL of them sitting out, and had this big battle going. All of a sudden, and for no reason, one of my friends picked up a little alien dude and said "Blaaaaarg!"

I thought it was HILARIOUS. It became sort of a trademark for me, and I said it frequently. Eventually I made it the name of an alien I made up. That alien became a clown. Eventually, I decided it was an alien clown with an underground empire underneath the Earth's crust, who genetically modified chickens into deadly fighting machines!

Aaaaaand that's it. It's just some stupid name that I got from some stupid game. I and love it so.

I wish my story was more interesting, but hey.

Years ago, I played a game called 'Nox', it was my very first online game and I created an identity of Kemli. I've always had a liking for the name and I've used it through every game that I've played since. It was also my first characted on CoH, a fire fire blaster, back in the day when it was cool to hang out under the City Hall floor. He was deleted within a month however, as the play style just wasn't for me. Go figure. I've yet to actually re-create him.

Oathbound is the name of my first character to hit 50.

Before that my Forum (and global) handle was AderronGuardian. Aderron was the name of my main character (and again first level 50) from the last game I played (a Warden in Dark Age of Camelot) and it was what everyone knew me by. Guardian is my home server.

@Oathbound & @Oathbound Too

One of the First if not the first characters I made.

The spelling come from a George Carlin quote about how he liked guys who said Cockaroach.

It's the same as my global handle in game.

Angryellow is my global. It's obviously a combination of the words Angry and Yellow. Angry, because that's how I feel most of the ******* time. Yellow, because I'm a high-yellow black guy. I have no characters named Angryellow by the way.

It's the title of a novel by Bruce Sterling that touches on transhumanism, politics and philosophy. Besides, i've always liked portmanteau words.

Well...

Ignatz Stormcrow was one of my first characters from PnP DnD....a Gnome Illusionist/Rogue who I came to love. The character was created in 1986 and is still one of my favorites...tied with a human Paladin named Martel Blackthorn.

Heraclea, the character, predates my first session of the game by a good seven or eight years. She was a character I made for drawings.

Her basic story was sort of a mix between the Wonder Woman myth and a female version of a strongman character from an Italian sword and sandal movie, rather in the Maciste/Goliath/Ursus vein. The name "Heraclea" is of course Heracles, or Hercules, given a feminine ending.

The character seemed a natural for the game. Being the first character I made, she became my global handle and my forum handle as well.

<《 New Colchis / Guides / Mission Architect 》>
"At what point do we say, 'You're mucking with our myths'?" - Harlan Ellison

My first character, naturally. That's him in the avatar too.

Interesting responses, lotsa character basis mentioned... mine's nowhere near as interesting.

I live in Houston, TX, so houtex it is. That, and I use it for many other forums. Just is who I is online.

Yes, there's other 'Houtex's out there (mind the 'h' on mine, k?)... they're imposters, shoot them on sight.

/ok, not really, but do give them a hard time for me, ok?

It's a real life nickname. I've used it as a forum handle and the like all over the place. I didn't have a Camper character until I finally made a Widow named Blood Camper recently.

I think I may have told this story already in a similar thread...

Also, as promised in that other post (since it is indeed, another day), I will answer how 37 got to be my favorite number.

Back in HS, my friend and I spent a lot of time in two places, his house's basement watching movies and messing around on his computer down there, and at McDonald's (he worked there). So, one day after playing one volume or another of You Don't Know Jack we went to McD... and listened to the disk in his car (the game disk had hilarious spoof commercials on it, after track 24, IIRC). At any rate, his car only had a casette player, so in order to listen to CDs, he had a CD player hooked up with a casette adapter, and a plug into the cigarette lighter. Naturally, whenever he turned off the car, the CD player would lose power and "forget" what track it was on, so we had to remember for it. At any rate, when we got to McDs this time, we left off on track 37 (just after an ad for Ubernostrum, IIRC).

So, when we got back to the car we skipped to track 37 and were on our way. Around this same time, we developped a "Nifty Scale" (from pi to 37). And so, we began seeing how close to 37 things were on the Nifty Scale. Also, we started noticing the number 37 in all kinds of movies (notably in Chasing Amy) and TV shows, in the background of scenes, in dialog, addition of numbers on license plates, etc. It seemed to be everywhere.

And so, the number stuck for me.

Well my name is Erik, and I do something with music(writing mostly) so a combination of Erik and Lyric.

Normally my online username on fora and such is Maestro...but well...in the game a villain is using that one, and I'm pretty sure I can't use it on the forum...so, oh well.

Thorny Devil. is the name I gave my first Villain, a Zombies/Dark MM. It comes from this cute little creature
My forum and global were Bio Lizard at first, which is the name of my first Hero.

It's the name of my in-game global and first character; Obscure Blade on Guardian. A Broadsword/Regen, picked because that seemed a good combo for a new player. The "Blade" of course referred to the sword, and "Obscure" to my being totally unknown in the game. For some time I was "ObscureGuy" on the forum itself; when the new forums were announced I decided I wanted something a bit more superish sounding, so I changed my name to Obscure_Blade, and then had the underscore removed when the chance was offered.

Obscure Blade the character only recently reached 32, and in fact only reached 10 a bit after Safeguards were introduced. I stopped playing him for a very long time, since both his build and costume were badly done. Not knowing that the "X" button in the costume maker unlocked color choices from being matched all over the character made my early characters look odd.