givin' traits... again

**Salahedin** · 12-20-2008, 19:07

The old noob's post. Again.

But why is it so complicated to give/remove traits for romani?

Okay okay I know, I should read the 10.000 previous threads on this topic. But you know what? I did so, an still I have problems with this.

Now. I know I should type "FirstnameA Romanvs" from A to Z. That worked a couple of times.
Typing just "Firstname" worked also though. And now I'm just getting tired to reached Z to find the same answer : character not found.

A solution would be not all that f... generals having the same firstname! I have about 40 family members, and half of them are called Caivs, Tiberivs and Qvintvs.

How is it that romani all get the same name? And is there a way to change that? I don't care about one of my general being called "Darth Vader" as long as I can give him the traits I want him to have.

Ah. And is there a way to make them sharp/charismatic/vigorous? Didn't succeed on that also. What a pity.

**Mediolanicus** · 12-20-2008, 19:19

Well, go complain to the Romans I would say...

They were known by their nomen and especially their cognomen outside their family. Their preanomen was only important to distinguish between those with the same nomen and cognomen.

So the list was limited.

**Aemilius Paulus** · 12-20-2008, 23:22

How is it that romani all get the same name? And is there a way to change that?

Yes there is. Go to Wikipedia and type in "Roman names" and you'll get a list much larger than the EB one, although some of those names were quite uncommon historically. You can use them, as they are mostly historically accurate. I'm currently looking for that EB file that has the list of names. Give me some time and I'll find it...

**Aemilius Paulus** · 12-20-2008, 23:31

Ah, there it is. Go to EB folder, then to Data, and you'll find a bunch of folders and text files in the Data folder. Look for the descr_names.txt file and open it. There you can mod all the faction names. You might also want to mod DESCR_NAMES_LOOKUP.txt file just in case, which has the complete list of names, but it is not arranged, while the first text file I named had all of the names in categories by faction.

**Atilius** · 12-21-2008, 04:49

Originally Posted by Salahedin

A solution would be not all that f... generals having the same firstname! I have about 40 family members, and half of them are called Caivs, Tiberivs and Qvintvs.

How is it that romani all get the same name?

If half of your characters have one of three names you're just getting unlucky. However, the Romans used very few different praenomina. EB's Roman praenomina include the praenomen of every Consul who served from 300 BC to about 50BC.

Roman families also tended to use the same praenomina over and over again. For instance, during our time period we know of no male member of the Fabius Maximus family not named Quintus. All male Cornelii Scipiones were named Publius, Lucius, or Cnaeus.

And then there is the Claudius Marcellus family, who used the same name for at least 10 generations:

M. Claudius Marcellus, c. 331
M. Claudius Marcellus, c. 287
M. Claudius Marcellus, (no office)
M. Claudius Marcellus, c. 287
M. Claudius Marcellus, c. 222 and 4 more times
M. Claudius Marcellus, 208 trib mil, 204 trib pleb, 200 Cur aedile, 198 praetor, 196 consul, 189 censor, d 177
M. Claudius Marcellus, c. 166 and 2 more times
M. Claudius Marcellus, (no office)
M. Claudius Marcellus, curule aedile 91
M. Claudius Marcellus, c. 51

(M. is the abbreviation for Marcus.)

**||Lz3||** · 12-21-2008, 05:02

They must have really loved their name...

**Cbvani** · 12-21-2008, 05:17

Originally Posted by ||Lz3||

They must have really loved their name...

Its how the Romans worked. In some cases, the firstborn got a certain name, and the second got a specific different one. Caius Iulius Caesar Pontifex Maximus was the third with that name that I know anything about - his grandfather was Caius Marius' father in law. Yeah, that Marius. The one who reformed everything.