1d100 Oblique place names

Back in November, the redoubtable noisms of Monsters and Manuals posted about "oblique" place names. I thought the examples listed were delightful--it was a good little read! Every campaign world should have a "Howly Winter"

He also claimed that "a human author or game designer doesn't have a hope in hell of emulating this - there is not a DM in the world who would think to call a village 'Howly Winter'" 

Now, I'm not sure what he meant by this exactly, and this isn't a call out post! But I thought, surely that's pretty demonstrably false. I mean of course, given the examples to build a vibe off of, we can come up with "Howly Winter" type names. 

And in fact, as soon as I read the list, my mind began adding onto it--and everyone I've mentioned it to has contributed at least one or two ideas off the top of their heads, spontaneously! Maybe this is a me thing, and I exude a kind of aura of weird place names inspiration, or surround myself exclusively with that exact type of person. In which case fair, this isn't exactly supposed to be a rigorous proof, just one hundred plus anecdotes. 

Perhaps the list will keep growing. At what point does anecdote become data? Or does it become history first?

Some caveats: I've checked exactly none of these to make sure they're not already existing real or fictional places. I'm sure some of them are, and just popped out of my brain soup as "new ideas" because they were already familiar. I'm also not a true student of linguistics, so this is based on vibes only, what "feels" like weird mish-mash british isles-ish place name. No Tolkien level scholarly efforts here!

With that said, here's the list, presented as a table for that extra gameable flair!

1d100 weird place names (+4 cuz I couldn't stop)

1. - Frowshire

2. - Prax-upon-Slough

3. - Drayfor

4. - Crowspocket

5. - Grosmarket

6. - Tendedd

7. - Falxire 

8. - Beaughon

9. - Ossfide 

10. - Tentickit

11. - Walfside 

12. - Hundseight

13. - Devhook

14. - Egg Knact

15. - Rocken Plow

16. - Sunmind

17. - Holarbor

18. - Falls Down

19. - Chalk-to-Clowd

20. - Benchmill

21. - Wocksitte

22. - Fuwlan

23. - Toothy Heath

24. - Dogs Biscuit

25. - Tea-and-Wander

26. - Lode Sill

27. - Nakkerwood

28. - Tore-Down

29. - Barnhouse

30. - Snailersannan

31. - Averewoter 

32. - Wereightshide

33. - Rox-in

34. - Doggsfurow 

35. - Mulch

36. - Graygrows

37. - Heightpoll

38. - Headpike

39. - Cloverchide

40. - Autumn As

41. - Flerchilde

42. - Killer

43. - Sowsfoot

44. - Foolship 

45. - Dyesoon 

46. - Hat-for-Lord

47. - Twos Beckon

48. - Cheesely

49. - Icecrik 

50. - Drumpsly

51. - Redwin Tick

52. - Nonnsberg

53. - Hindsight

54. - Wicket Through

55. - Stick-in-Wheel

56. - Weaping

57. - Bowt

58. - Foot Still

59. - Eastwest

60. - Dontnow 

61. - Hockstree 

62. - Harthsune

63. - Hardbawl

64. - Shout Shot 

65. - Fox Treacle

66. - Throaty 

67. - Raven Trough 

68. - Burgerdhop 

69. - Quiet-til-Cock

70. - Spoils-the-Milk

71. - Roughbedding

72. - Ariving

73. - Gettwater

74. - Waketrice

75. - Flocks-a-Mor

76. - Barcrow

77. - Fiddlers Fault

78. - Past-Lasthill 

79. - Wonday Wood

80. - Notroltor

81. - Woods-beyond-Gown

82. - Mockston

83. - Sumthingberg

84. - Lambshade

85. - Ittshire 

86. - Shaggy Bog

87. - Wolfcre Heath

88. - Rown Hol 

89. - Fly-at-Awl

90. - Ting Ting

91. - Leechtide

92. - Gibbering

93. - Tallyhowe 

94. - Worm Bellows

95. - Thicket-Upon-Thicket

96. - Milken Dunk

97. - Nillyhoggy Top

98. - Fog Bottle

99. - Hole-in-Head

100. - Little WeWeh

101. - Wot Wot

102. - Ticklesberry

103. - Newton Dipper

104. - Bobbins Lee

Confession, I actually wrote nearly all of these in the day or two after I read the original post. They've just been sitting in a Google doc for several months because I couldn't be arsed to write the preamble and drop in the link to Noisms blog.

I guess my thesis here, if I have one, is that the real world may be extremely complex, varied, exceptional, oblique. Buy we've got a pretty oblique stew cooking up in each of our heads too. It's not a matter of mimicry (although that's how it could start), it's a matter of synthesis.

And that's a big reason roleplaying games are compelling to me: it seems easier to pluck exceptions out and add them to the game. Most campaigns are already comprised of snippets from different sources, modules, setting, pieces of a book or show recently encountered. All creative works are like this, but with games its more immediate, and often more direct.

That might be a worldbuilding tactic: build for exceptions, whether foreseen or unexpected. It's so common to see settings where it's all "and the elves live over here in elfland, and this empire did this and this thing and then fell" and so on. And of course, real history is often summarized in very broad terms too. But the player characters aren't encountering history, they're encountering a world, with all its contradictions, idiosyncrasies, puzzles. How DID this group of Greeks end up dying at the top of a mountain pass in India in the early 1800s?

The history books don't always tell what you need to know, the maps can be misleading, and place names can be bizarrely oblique. And that's a good thing--it's all gameable content!

Three Tablets of Law

Long ago, the Wind Dukes of Aaqa codified many elements of the universe, what today would be known as physics or natural law. Some if these were inscribed on the very atoms of existence, or used to calculate the patterns of the celestial spheres and define on plane of existence from the next. Other, lesser laws were encoded into portable items, so they might aid the Vaati in their journeys and undertakings. The greatest weapon of this kind was the Rod of Law, known today as the Rod of Seven Parts, but many other tools were likewise created.

Today, many have been lost, or their use and meaning has been so obscured as to render them useless. But a few continue to carry a shard of their purpose, like a gear that keeps spinning after the machine itself breaks. One such set is a trio of items, called "tablets" for lack of a better understanding of their design. Each on its own is powerful, but working together they can be used to exert considerable influence over the threads of causality.

Tablet of Hours

Wonderous Item, Rare, Requires attunement

This brass disc is inscribed with concentric runes and geometric patterns. Fused mechanisms and gears protrude from the sides, broken off and covered in verdigris and calcified stone growing out of the cracks in the edges and face of the tablet.

The tablet has 4 charges. These charges replenish at dawn every day. The Tablet of Hours can share spell slots with the Tablet of Fate and the Tablet of Reflection, and the three tablets can all use the same attunement slot. You may only use the abilities of the tablet if you are holding it, or if you are carrying the tablet and holding one of the other two tablets.

Untethered Timeline. At the start of your turn you may expend a charge from the tablet and roll a d20 (no action required). On an 11-20, you slow down time, acting as if under the effect of a Haste spell until the beginning of your next turn. On a 1-10, you slow yourself down, acting as if under the effect of a Slow spell until the beginning of your next turn unless you succeed on a DC 13 Charisma saving throw.

Spells. You can use an action to expend 2 or more of its charges to cast one of the following spells from it, using your spell save DC: immovable object (2 charges), or temporal shunt (5 charges). You may also cast Mending as an action without expending any charges.

Tablet of Fate

Wonderous Item, Rare, Requires attunement

A bulky bronze cylinder with glyphs inscribed in a looping pattern on the drum. The top and bottom of the cylinder and open, and filled with intricately carved wooden circuits and wires, tangled like a broken nest.

The tablet has 4 charges. These charges replenish at dawn every day. The Tablet of Fate can share spell slots with the Tablet of Hours and the Tablet of reflection, and the three tablets can all use the same attunement slot. You may only use the abilities of the tablet if you are holding it, or if you are carrying the tablet and holding one of the other two tablets.

Rewrite Probability. When you roll a d20, you may spend a charge from the tablet to magically alter probability. When you do so, reroll that d20 and take the new result.

Spells. You can use an action to expend 2 or more of its charges to cast one of the following spells from it, using your spell save DC: augury (2 charges), or Geas (5 charges). You may also cast Guidance as an action without expending any charges.

Tablet of Reflection

Wonderous Item, Rare, Requires attunement

The face of this oblong plaque was once polished black obsidian, but now is scuffed and discoloured by scratches and stains. Rimmed with tarnished and peeling copper hammered into coiling and leaf-like motifs. A shallow half-broken black knob protrudes from the back, where once a ring or handle or other attachment may have been set.

The tablet has 4 charges. These charges replenish at dawn every day. The Tablet of Reflection can share spell slots with the Tablet of Fate and the Tablet of Hours, and the three tablets can all use the same attunement slot. You may only use the abilities of the tablet if you are holding it, or if you are carrying the tablet and holding one of the other two tablets.

Mirrored Destiny. When you succeed at a saving throw against a spell or other magic that affects only you, you may spend a charge from the tablet as a reaction and can choose a new creature within 60 feet to be the target of that magic. 

Spells. You can use an action to expend 2 or more of its charges to cast one of the following spells from it, using your spell save DC: mirror image (2 charges), or Mislead (5 charges). You may also cast minor illusion as an action without expending any charges.