Naming your cities

[Theov]

Do you just follow the naming conventions of the game or do you give names to the cities you make yourself?
There is already a thread for this at the Civ1 forum.
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=373473

I remember having named islands Madagascar. Naming cities Panama (for if it was just one tile to connect seas). Or Greenland when there was nothing but seals, ice and or oil.

 

[DWetzel]

I usually let the game name the cities itself. Once it gets up around New X 2 or 3, I might start throwing stupid names on them if I'm in the mood.

Only if a city's primary purpose is to do one specific thing (e.g. serving as a canal, clearing a jungle tile to help speed a road along so my artillery can get through, or claiming a resource in an otherwise crappy location) will I name it myself, and then I'll name it something suitable (like "Iron Desert", or "Jungle Clearing", or "Canal City".

 

[timerover51]

I will play around with the city names a fair bit. Real cities that are on the coast are on the coast, inland cities inland, and so forth. I have also added cities in the editor for additional names.

 

[Pacioli]

I usually let the game name the cities itself.

Same here. I seem to recall a civ that runs out of game generated names fairly quickly though and you're forced to come up with new names yourself. I don't recall which civ that might be.

 

[CKS]

The Maya.

 

[Opies]

I don't think I've ever named a city myself. Not the part of the game I'm interested in

 

[Raliuven]

I usually let the game decide. The exception is if I am running a test/simulated game. In that case, I rename them as City #1, City #2, etc. It is just easier to say City #1 produced 3fpt,5spt,3gpt than to remember that it is Tecexlticwhatsitsname. Helps keep track of core cities too, the further out the test goes. That could be applied to a real game, but I like the added flavor of having city names.

 

[Ataxerxes]

I usually like the flavor of keeping the city names as is. It feels more like you're playing the Aztecs, Zulu, whatever if you keep the names.

 

[CommandoBob]

Well, in CBob03 Germans in Tu-tus, where the goal was a Cultural Victory...

City Names
The default German names are NOT acceptable. Remember, we want to demonstrate our culture. So we will name our cities after composers. German ones first, if you can think of one, and then others. Some composers are well known by just their last name (Beethoven, for one) and that is all that is needed. Others may need a first and last name.

And be careful. A city named Beethoven and one named von Beethoven and a third called Ludwig von Beethoven are all different cities, but mentally would be hard to keep separate.

If a person is really clever, they can combine the composer and a noted work into the city name. And here again, Beethoven’s Fifth and Beethoven’s V are just a little too similar.

Note too, that Beethoven’s Fifth and Beethoven’s Symphony No 5 in C-Minor Opus 67 are both the same work but the city names are very different.

Generally, I don't go for default names if I expect to have a lot of cities.

I have used as city names:

• State capitols
• Top 400 Restuarants (HOF Cultural VC as France)
• Top 200 Science Fiction books (HOF Space Ship VC as Sumeria)
• Texas Counties (254 of them) (HOF Domination as Egypt)
• a few Beatles songs (HOF Conquest as India)
• a few Jethro Tull songs (GR27)
• 'Mongo' based names (in GR28 we were Mongols thus Mongo ...)
• some Roger Miller songs (GR29)
• some Abba songs (GR29)
• Top 200 wealthiest people (HOF 20K City VC as China)
• Nations of the world (HOF Diplomatic VC as Russia)

I just don't like the defaults and will try to avoid them if possible.



And some defaluts (Aztec, Maya and Inca come to mind) are not an option.

 

[CommandoBob]

I will often rename cities to reflect the nearby luxury or strategic resource. One Horse Town and Tie-Dye Frenzy, for example.

 

[Kaidonni]

I *always* rename my cities. I actually change the name of any civ I play, and my preference is to rename to New Normandy. This means that I prefer to pick the names of places from Normandy itself (where I have holidayed often). New Bayeux, New Caen, New Rouen, New Falaise, and so on and so forth. As far as I am concerned, at the moment I am not playing the Americans, I am playing as the New Normans. When it comes to empire building, it is MY empire!

 

[ianwelch]

I pick random shows or movies and name after characters. Such as Vaderville; Skywalker City; Homer Town, Bart Central, etc.

 

[darski]

I used to name cities in alphabetical order - but that now takes too much conscious awareness. Now I tend to follow Cbob's naming strategies but my Capitol is almost always Aabrax after the famous CFC guy. That Aa combo keeps my capitol at the top of the list.

I like to name the cities myself as it tells me more about their locations or functions than the standard in-game names.

 

[DWetzel]

OK, I admit, I forgot a couple of my pet naming conventions.

1. When capturing cities from a reasonably large Egypt, and later settling nearby, the town nearest to "This" will normally be named "That".

2. When capturing cities from a reasonably large Carthage, and later settling nearby, the town nearest to "Iol" will normally be named "rofl".

 

[darski]

OK, I admit, I forgot a couple of my pet naming conventions.

1. When capturing cities from a reasonably large Egypt, and later settling nearby, the town nearest to "This" will normally be named "That".

2. When capturing cities from a reasonably large Carthage, and later settling nearby, the town nearest to "Iol" will normally be named "rofl".

 

[Desertsnow]

When playing Egypt, I'll sometimes add Luxor/Al-Uqsur, Rashid (aka Rosetta), Port Said and Suez when the first cycle ends.

When playing the Celts, I'll sometimes add Béal Feirst (Belfast), A Coruña (yes that city has Celtic origins), Llanfairpwllgwyngyll (Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch is unsurprisingly too long), Aberdeen and sometimes other city names.

When playing Germany (less common now than during my Vanilla days), I'll add Düsseldorf, Jena, Flensburg, Bamberg and others.

 

[Quintillus]

These days I generally stick to the standard names. Exceptions are when I'm playing as Germany, where there are too few names and I'll generally add a few additional German cities on in-game to avoid getting to New Berlin 3 too quickly. And when I'm playing as America at times, as I know a lot of American cities and my hometown is not included in the defaults. I also used to skip Hunt Valley a lot, thinking it sounded more like a salad dressing brand than a city name.

In the past, I was a lot more likely to add custom names when they cycled over to New Whatever. I remember having an map of Italy in an atlas out and having used more than half the towns in Italy in one game as the Romans. I almost always went for the real-city-name strategy rather than the resource-based names, although I do like the sound of Tie-Dye Frenzy.

 

[Desertsnow]

I know a lot of American city names myself but I have rarely played the Americans.

 

[Zefyrinus]

I usually use the standard name, but correct the misspellings. I even rename enemy cities to correct the misspellings of their city names. But nowadays I usually rename the civ I'm playing as, and use a historical atlas as help in determining what it's city names should be.

Same here. I seem to recall a civ that runs out of game generated names fairly quickly though and you're forced to come up with new names yourself. I don't recall which civ that might be.

Germany, France and India. Seriously, there's craploads of cities in India, I don't understand why they had to resort to using names of rivers and other non-cities.

 

[Smellincoffee]

I mostly accept the game's suggestions, though I alter Germany's city names to follow the German spellings.