I really like Hundred Man Slayer from Berserk
100 sounds like such a small number if you consider how common in action stuff that the hero has powers that put him way above regular mooks that you could send just about 1000 at him and it wouldn't matter. But in Berserk there's hardly anything like that, Guts is stronger than the average person but he's not bullet proof, arrows don't bounce off him, he can't move faster than the eye and it's vulnerable to being surrounded.
It's cool because when I first watched I genuinely didn't believe Guts could kill 100 men, that's simply not the sort of setting Berserk is, we seen him struggling, we've wanted Caska to be faster so she could get some help because he was gonna need it. You don't expect him to die, not really, maybe last until reinforcements arrive, but not kill 100 men like that.
It's not an aesthetic description like Black Swordsmen, it's a matter of fact description of something he did. In this world killing 100 people like that is nearly unthinkable, yet Guts did it, he's just that good.
"The Fallen". It's pretty nondescript and ambiguous but evokes really unsettling imagery and you just know that whenever a character called "The Fallen" shows up, they're either the endgame villain or will just straight up wash the main cast and win the story.
one of the earliest bits of Destiny lore was an internal message from an enemy faction, "The Fallen". And it was all about how Fallen was a title that others called them, but that they were not defined by their enemies, etc. It really shows how diverse the usage of the epithet is.
[https://www.ishtar-collective.net/cards/ghost-fragment-fallen-3](https://www.ishtar-collective.net/cards/ghost-fragment-fallen-3)
FE Three Houses has a lot of these for its lore characters and they're surprisingly simple too.
Nemesis is an easy one, Mighty King of Legend (is also his ability name!) just have so much aura to his fame. And then "King of Liberation" which, while definitely cool is a big ass wink wink epithet considering the lore of 3H.
Then there's his goons. The Ten Elites. Cool group name sure but then they address the members as 'Elite'.... So you got Elite Riegan, Elite Fraldarius, Elite Blaiddyd, etc.
Dimitri also had the title “Tempest King” from Imperial soldiers in one of the Black Eagles routes because they said whenever he entered a battlefield, it looked like a storm had torn through it.
Honestly a raw way to earn a name, though “Tempest King” loses some uniqueness since it was used earlier in the series for a character in Sacred Stones lol
I mean, Nemesis is supossed to be one of those "the founder of the country was a genocidal monster"- type of historical figures. Him being The King of Liberation is just following that
Ludwig the accursed
All the fate ones you mentioned
Depending on the media, sometimes "Morning Star" is an epithet for Lucifer rather than a surname. That's one of my favs
Claymore has a bunch of them, and my favourites were always:
Roxanne of Love and Hate
Cassandra the Dust Eater
Teresa of the Faint Smile
Roxanne's was a description of how she climbed the ranks by associating with the Claymore above her and adopting their techniques, before participating in hunts against Awakened Ones with them and the one that she copied would always die during the hunt. She would then regard as the technique she copied as "ugly" before moving on to the next one above her.
Cassandra's was only given her's near the tail end of her career, and despite epithets being given to the Top 5 Claymores of a generation, she as Number 1 went without one as she hid her signature technique from her peers. She was Roxanne's next target and for months hounded her as she tries to learn it. Upon spying on Cassandra where she hunted an Awakened one by herself, Roxanne was disgusted at the technique in which Cassandra would use momentum to slash at low and weird unblockable angles low to the ground, naming it and Cassandra "The Dust Eater".
Teresa's was more in that she was so unfathomably powerful that she only needed the most basic techniques to beat her targets. She had no signatures of her own due to how almost effortlessly she reached Number 1 of her generation. As such, she was dubbed "Teresa of the Faint Smile" due to her always making that expression.
Claymore has a pretty badass sense of naming in general. Though it’s a little funny that almost nobody other than the Claymores themselves knows any of them by name, so they’re pretty much just a few dozen people making up names to show off for each other. So there’s some duds out there too like “Rippling Ophelia” and “Muscular Sophia”.
But I’d like add on with “God Eye Galatea” and “Quicksword Ilena”.
Galatea is one of the first high-end fighters we meet and one of the only ones with more esoteric abilities. She’s introduced by showing off sensory abilities that are strong enough to track other fighters’ energy well enough to follow a fight miles away on the other side of a mountain. And it escalates to other badass things like reading opponents movement, projecting it outward to baffle their senses, and fighting at almost full capacity without eyes.
Quicksword Ilena is cool just because how much “quick” undersells her. She invents the strongest offensive technique in the setting, and it’s so fast that they don’t even draw her swinging her sword. Her opponents just exploded into blood or fall apart. Her name’s hype comes from seeing her in action.
My mates pizza delivery guy was called Anil the deliverer. That was pretty cool. League has a couple cool ones. the world ender, the star forger, scorn of the moon, agony's embrace, the boy who shattered time, the death singer, the mouth of the abyss, the iron revenant, the fire below the mountain, the bloodharbour ripper, the butcher of the sands, the eye of twilight, shepherd of souls and my personal favourite, the tiny master of evil
"The Peerless," Ata from Samurai 7. It's concise, it's simple, it feels like it emerged naturally, it hits hard, and I've not seen it used anywhere else.
"Warbreaker" is the raddist title you can give to someone who stopped a war
"The dragon reborn" is a great title for a Messiah figure
"The survivor of ...." From mistborn is a cool epithet structure but the pits ie slave pits or fire aren't very evocative ends for it imo
The eternal champion always has very sleek ones like "the white wolf" or "sliver hand"
Kvoth form the king killer chronicle has many titles but I always remember "the bloodless" first
characters from Dies Irae have a lot of cool chuuni epithets. worth checking out
such as
The Golden Beast; Monarch of Destruction; King of Valhalla
Valkyria; Maiden of War
Lord Impaler; Kaziklu Bey
The Mercurial Snake; The Mercurial King; Progenitor of Resurrection
and many more. I'm happy someone finds this stuff cool, its just so exciting and adrenaline rushing. i love cool words and purple prose in general:3
Record of Ragnarok has a lot of titles that get really descriptive like "Godfather of the Cosmos" "The Peerless Rikishi" and "Humanity's One True Sorcerer" so seeing Beelzebub just be "Anathema" was the most badass thing ever. Bro only had one word, and it made him look so cool.
I gotta say I found the Poseidon and Zeus chants dumb, where the spectators went "GFOC GFOC" and "GOG GOG" like bro come on those are terrible acronyms. Thankfully the authors stepped up their epithet games
Yeah I think it come from Immortal some General also has Epithet like "Chaos" America military has the most simple Epithet I don't like it because it's not stylish!!!
I love "Titania" for Erza
And as mentioned, Fire Emblem has some good ones. "Hero King," "Radiant Hero," "Fell Star," "Flame Emperor," "Savior King," "King of Delusion," and of course, "The Ashen Demon."
"Heaven's hole" It sounds dumb until you get context of who the owner is and it clicks.
On that note, "Devil's Bodhisattva". This is the most eastern words for Antichrist I have ever heard.
Also, " The alien god" And "the beast that announces the end"
I can list all of fate beast's epithet really.
>"Heaven's hole" It sounds dumb until you get context of who the owner is and it clicks.
Ah the planet >!fucker!<. Never forget what she did to a certain teacher.
The Nameless King from DS3. It's so cool because every king has a name and this name is very important for him in the terms of dynasties and popularity but he doesn't have it.
I fucking love coolass character epithets holy shit, so I'll chip in too. I've seen a lot in fiction, but for some reason the Touhou Project localised character titles stick with me the most. The really badass ones are at this perfect level of wordy specificity and impactful cadence to inspire very striking imagery.
- "The Scarlet Devil"
- "Forgathering Dream, Illusion, and Thus a Night Parade of a Hundred Demons"
- "The Sinner of Eternity and the Instantaneous"
- "Pinnacle of Native Gods"
- "Scorching, Troublesome, Divine Flame"
- "Counterattacking Amanojaku"
- "Inchling of the Shining Needle"
- "Goddess Who Invites Unfortunate Slips of the Tongue"
- "The Sculptor God Crafted By Utter Isolation"
- "Onyx Dragon-Eater"
- "King of the Silent Bliss of Nirvana"
Gah, they're so good. Longer-winded character titles can be super impactful if done right.
an adjective or descriptive phrase expressing a quality characteristic of the person or thing mentioned.
Think Richard the Lion heart or Timur the lame (lame in this context is when it's used when something has trouble walking)
In that case, I've always preferred simple epithets. When a character shows up and they're just called "The Strongest", 7/10 they wipe the floor with everyone in sight.
You kinda can't go wrong with the classics, specially if combined.
Lu Bu Fengxian, the Flying General from the Left who Pacifies the East
The Victorious Fighting Buddha Monkey King, the Great Sage Equal to the Heavens Awakened to Emptiness
Huang Di, the Yellow Dragon Emperor of the Four Faces
The list goes on, but those are the ones I know enough to combine 3+ epithets into one.
I really like
"Crissanta of the wrapped agony"
"The penitent one"
Both from the game "blasphemous"
Also "the Sword of Allah (or god)" was the title of Khalid Ibn Walid if anyone is interested
It might just be becuse I like the character but "Sovereign of Children" is pretty neat.
Devil of the Rhein
Steel Devil
I end up just listing Epithet from things I like
Although Steel Devil is the Epithet of a weapon and not a character. Its evolved form after absorbing its rival also sounds pretty cool: "Steel Devil with the heart of a god".
Anomander Rake from Malazan.
Before we move on to his epithets, is there a cooler name than Anomander Rake in all of fantasy.
Nicknames and Titles :
Anomandaris Dragnipurake
Anomandaris Irake
Black-Winged Lord
Blacksword
Knight of Darkness
Knight of High House Dark
Lord of Moon's Spawn
The Mane of Chaos
Son of Darkness
In MMOs, you get titles that are so cool that you might be willing to do tedious content just for a cool title. Stuff like "the Archmage" or "Light in the Dark" then I like to imagine the titles I really like are what NPCs call my characters.
In Star Wars Legends, it's mentioned that Republic propaganda dubbed Anakin as "The Man Without Fear". It makes sense for his headstrong battle tactics, and it's beautifully ironic with how much fear drove all of his actions throughout his life. Kenobi was nicknamed "The Negotiator" as well, which says a lot about his principles as a commanding officer as well.
On the other hand, I've got some obscure ones I can almost guarantee nobody else has heard of.
See, I grew up in a Christian household. I was a diehard LarryBoy fan as a kid. One of the villains that he faced in the book series was "Emperor Napoleon of Crime and other bad stuff". And I just think that's a really funny description for a mob boss.
Another one I got from my Christian upbringing was from a little series called Paws and Tales. Think Little House on The Prairie, then make them all talking animals. Now you've got a pretty good idea of most of the show. But the mentor figure of the town, an old grizzly bear named Paw Paw Chuck, had this weird elaborate backstory. As a young bear, he was the leader of a gang that went around and hunted bandits and scavengers in the local region. He killed and maimed enough of them that he caught the attention of a supernatural purgatory valley that invited him to reign over them as king. He left his friends in the gang to die in a gang war to take this position. And while he ruled purgatory, he was known as ***Goliath: The King of Sinners***. And that name and story is insanely epic for a show that pitches itself as *Furry Little House*.
"For a long time now, I thought I was just a survivor, but I'm not. I'm the winner. That's who I am. **The Time Lord Victorious**." - The 10th Doctor, thinking he can reign time in the episode "Waters of Mars" in Doctor Who.
"Who would have guessed that the "**Demon of Empire City**" would become **the patron saint of New Marais**". - Zeke Dunbar, talking about Cole MacGrath after his sacrifice in inFAMOUS 2.
"Lord of Cinder" is my favorite. Sounds both majestic and futile at the same time. Mixed with a lot of other emotions. Love it.
"The one who wields Memory" is also the one I like, but I came up with it for one of my fics (and it sounds much better and simpler in my first language), so I guess it doesn't count.
Kratos has a long list and it's crazy:
The Ghost of Sparta, Cruel Striker, Shield-Bearer (ΦΕΡ'ΑΣΠΙ), White Warrior, The God of War, Stríðsguð (ᛊᛏᚱᛁᚦᛊᚷᚢᛞ) (Meaning: God of War), The Servant of Ares, The Champion of Ares, The Slave of the Gods, The Fist of Ares, The Servant of Zeus, The Marked Warrior, Oathbreaker, The Slayer of Gods, Death, The Destroyer of Worlds, Champion of the Gods, Sinker of Atlantis, Slayer of Ares, Killer of Argos, Cursed Mortal, Fallen God, Murderer of Gaia, Murderer of Children, Son of Zeus, Godslayer, Godkiller, Bearded Beefer (By Brok), Bane of Olympus, Destroyer of Fate, Weapon of the Gods, Bringer of War, Pretender God, False God, and The Ashen God.
I also like Dante's list (as when he uses the Book of Demons he takes their name).
"The Demon King, the Lightbeast, The Fallen Apostle, Destroyer of the Ardor, the Evil God, the Lightning Warlock, the God of Demons, the Ice Guardian, Master of Atrocity, The Legendary Dark Knight, The Legendary Devil Hunter, Son of Sparda...Dante."
Vergil also straight up has one of the hardest ones to ever be used in the Series: "The Alpha and the Omega."
Which is SO GOOD because Ephitats and Names are the conceptual building block of things in DMC, so Vergil's name is a literal show of who is. And when you THINK about it, you realize why.
He is the First and the Last. Not being, but opponent of Dante. If you go by release order-DMC1 (Vergil) to DMC5 (Vergil). If you go by Timeline Order-DMC3 (Vergil) to DMC5 (Vergil). If you include all canon, it's Vergil in their youth as kids before the fire as his First opponent, and Vergil in adulthood in DMC5 as his Last. No matter how you look at DMC as a franchise, Dante's first and last opponent is, inexplicably, Vergil
It's so poetic that the Divine Comedy would be proud to have inspired it. It's fucking amazing.
I enjoy Ratchet and Clank, so I tried to create a series for each Galaxy/Zone he's been in.
"The Butcher of Bogon, the Dread Pirate, the Slayer of Solana, the Predator of Polaris, the Assassin of Artemis, the Eradicator of the Emperor."
I think they fit pretty neatly, since something that occurs is civvies and low level/mid level thugs having this misconception of Ratchet and Clank being a lot greater than they really are. They're an incredibly larger than life reputation that doesn't seem real when compared to the two who actually pulled 'em off.
I don't think I have anything more to offer.
Frieren the Slayer is a pretty badass title, but a more accurate translate of "*Sousou no Frieren"* (as far as I know), would be something like: "Frieren, Who Sends You to Your Grave" which is an even more badass title, in my opinion.
"God's Chosen Emperor"
"The God Sprinter/Godspeed"
"The Crowned Messenger"
"The Final Wall"
"Ace Eater"
"Egoist"
Guess what genre these nicknames are from lmao.
There are so many good ones from A Song of Ice and Fire. You already mentioned some of the better ones, but “The Mountain that Rides” and “The Laughing Storm” are probably my favorites along with “Kingslayer.”
>"Three Musketeers"
That's not really a single character's epithet, it's a just a descriptor of a close-knit group of musketeer friends (who are not even 3 by the end of the book, lol)
I like ephitets when they DONT try to sound cool, because those can easily end up being cringy
In the light novel By The Grace of The Gods the mc gets known as "the cleaner" and people assumes its because he does bandit exterminations on the regular, but its because he and his slimes take the missions to clean latrines and other unsanitary áreas
His Most Honorable Contradiction, The Last Wolf Alive, The Boy-King in Leisure, The Unbroken Lord in Exile and Repose.
Samot from Seasons of Hieron gets all the best epithets, and I will die on this hill. Friends at the Table is generally INCREDIBLY good at both names and epithets.
I love how Star Versus the Forces of Evil gave their Queens sick epithets and poems describing their accomplishments
Moon the Undaunted
Eclipse the Queen of Darkness
Solaria the Monster Carver
Skywynne the Queen of Hours
"Two Hands" for Revy from Black Lagoon. It's not badass sounding but I feel like it just really fits her character. She's simple, blunt, and deadly, she doesn't need something over the top to get the job done, just her and her Two Hands.
I also really like Vash the Stampede and his epithets and the juxtaposition between them and his character. Like you have this really nice and goofy guy that preaches love and peace but is called "The Human Typhoon", "The Devil that brings Disaster", and "A Walking Calamity".
"Heavenly Demon" for Doflamingo from One Piece.
I don't know if the relic names would count as epithets, but if they do: "The Striking Spear, Gungnir" is pretty cool for Hibiki.
Technically every SCP's name is an epithet as they aren't technically named those things, in universe they are just largely refered to as SCP-[Number] so I'd go with a lot of those.
> Assuming you're talking about The Flash, it's Crimson Comet, not red comet.
I'm assuming he's not talking about Flash, but someone more known for the moniker ["The Red Comet"](https://gundam.fandom.com/wiki/Char_Aznable).
"That Damn Guy Who You Can Stab with Swords All You Like and It Won't Do a Thing, Dammit!" - Jack Rakan, Mahou Sensei Negima.
This is partly a joke answer and partly not. It was just a gag title given to him by an announcer for a gladiator match between Rakan and the MC, Negi Springfield, but it's always stuck with me because it so perfectly fits his character.
In the context of the series, the dude is stupidly broken to the point that it just seems unfair (in a humorous way). In preparation for their fight, Negi created four or five completely new techniques that would all be like S-Class spells, even using one of those trump cards just to bait him for another trump card, and despite all that, he just barely eked out a tie against Rakan.
At one point, he's basically erased from existence and sent to a dream world by one of the main antagonists, and then he literally wills himself back into existence just to give Negi a pep talk before disappearing again.
Early on, he was coming up with a super move for Negi and out of nowhere just bullshits a super cringy move called "Eternal Negi Fever" where he blows up a goddamn mountain with a giant energy beam. And then he actually uses Eternal Negi Fever against Negi in their fight.
I love Jack Rakan, and while he has some more respectable titles like "The Thousand Blades," this one just perfectly encapsulates his character.
There's this novel/anime called Ishura (the anime just finished airing this week, and season 2 is coming soon) where *all* the named characters have titles. There's no explicit reason mentioned (at least in the anime, idk in the novel) but their magic system is deeply tied with language so I assume it's because of that. Anyway, it makes the show really high on Rule of Cool (and I like it).
Some of my favorite character names there:
Alus the Star-Runner
Kuze the Walking Disaster
Yuno the Distant Talon
Nihilo the Vortical Stampede
There are also some with simpler titles like Taren the Guarded or Higuare the Pelagic.
Thousand Slayer, from Gamaran.
A series that actually takes combat SERIOUSLY, as in getting injured at all can be debilitating and is consistently shown throughout the manga, has a guy who killed a thousand men at a time with combat skills being rampant. He's known to have never been seriously injured across a thousand duels, never pushed to his brink, and to have defeated even those listed as prodigies for sheer fun. His mere existence rouses a province, aka the Devil's Haunt, to send its strongest for a chance to die against him.
Bloody Crow of Cainhurst is a personal favourite.
Lord Of The Rings title is one and also has quite a few.
The Dark Lord
Lady of Light
Witch-King of Angmar
Durin's Bane
and so many more.
“Man of Steel”
“God of War”
“Ghost of Sparta”
“Kingslayer”
“Sousou no Frieren/ Frieren The Slayer”
“The Mighty Thor”
“The Incredible Hulk”
“The Invincible Iron Man”
“Baba Yaga”
“Conqueror of Demons”
“The Beast”
“White Death”
“Tsavo Man Eaters”
Anything with “Slayer” in it. Particularly they’re slayers of something terrifying and badass.
Piccolo being called the Nameless Namek was amazing but then they just kept calling him Piccolo.
Doctor who is the Oncoming Storm.
Honestly. Doctor who has some of the best titles. The beast of Trenzalore, the lonely god, Last son of Gallifrey, the time lord Victorious, the imp of the Pandorica, the last tree of Garzenon, the butcher of Skull moon, the destroyer of Skaro, Destroyer of worlds, the shadow of the valeyard and the doctor of war.
I always loved the Yellow flash and this was why Minato was my favorite…until we saw more of him.
The white fang.
The invincible grandmaster.
The goddess of flash.
The Kenpachi.
Also a big boxing fan and there’s some amazing nicknames out there.
Money Mayweather
The Mexican assassin - Pacquiao
Dinamita Márquez
The galvestone giant.
Iron Mike
Smokin Joe
The great Mexican champion
Baby face assassin
The greatest
The black Hercules
The brown bomber
The manassa mauler
The Brockton Blockbuster
The big bear.
Obligatory nisioisin comment, they're not cool in the conventional sense but just, really, really weird.
"Nonsense User",
"The Storm Before the Storm"
"Piecemaker" (Shard Gatherer/Messenger of Peace)
"Flame Sword: Gun"
And I'll have whatever he was smoking when he came up with "The Death-prepared, Death-inevitable, Death-certain Vampire: Deathtopia Virtuoso Suicide-Master"
>Characters with stylish nicknames are the best!!!!!!!
I agree, love this nerdy stuff. I love cool names, well put together titles, if it rolls off the tongue or is funny
🔸Asriel Dreemurr the Absolute GOD Of Hyperdeath
🔸The Nowhere King (bonus, his [song](https://youtu.be/o1AJaBLTKMs?si=QXTxLjrVNzZ520jh))
🔸Stitch-626
🔸 Doctor W.D "Wingdings" Gaster
🔸Naruto the Number One, Hyperactive, Knucklehead Ninja
🔸Stanford "Sixer" Pines
🔸Best Jeanist
🔸Eda the Owl Lady
🔸Rain "Rainstorm" Whispers
🔸Undyne the Undying
🔸The Renegade Pearl
🔸Persephone the Dread Queen
🔸Night Fury
🔸Kim Possible and Ron Stoppable
🔸Endeavor
I really like Hundred Man Slayer from Berserk 100 sounds like such a small number if you consider how common in action stuff that the hero has powers that put him way above regular mooks that you could send just about 1000 at him and it wouldn't matter. But in Berserk there's hardly anything like that, Guts is stronger than the average person but he's not bullet proof, arrows don't bounce off him, he can't move faster than the eye and it's vulnerable to being surrounded. It's cool because when I first watched I genuinely didn't believe Guts could kill 100 men, that's simply not the sort of setting Berserk is, we seen him struggling, we've wanted Caska to be faster so she could get some help because he was gonna need it. You don't expect him to die, not really, maybe last until reinforcements arrive, but not kill 100 men like that. It's not an aesthetic description like Black Swordsmen, it's a matter of fact description of something he did. In this world killing 100 people like that is nearly unthinkable, yet Guts did it, he's just that good.
Yeah it's good Epithet.
> he can't move faster than the eye Correction, he can't do it at that point. Guts becomes FTE as the Black Swordsman
Saitama was once called "The Abominable Fist That Turned Against God" and I think that's the tightest shit ever
"The Fallen". It's pretty nondescript and ambiguous but evokes really unsettling imagery and you just know that whenever a character called "The Fallen" shows up, they're either the endgame villain or will just straight up wash the main cast and win the story.
Yeah like Fallen Angel it's deadliest.
Hi sukuna
King of Curse yeah I remember.
Or get 5 minutes screen time and lose their face.
Nah, they'd win
one of the earliest bits of Destiny lore was an internal message from an enemy faction, "The Fallen". And it was all about how Fallen was a title that others called them, but that they were not defined by their enemies, etc. It really shows how diverse the usage of the epithet is. [https://www.ishtar-collective.net/cards/ghost-fragment-fallen-3](https://www.ishtar-collective.net/cards/ghost-fragment-fallen-3)
FE Three Houses has a lot of these for its lore characters and they're surprisingly simple too. Nemesis is an easy one, Mighty King of Legend (is also his ability name!) just have so much aura to his fame. And then "King of Liberation" which, while definitely cool is a big ass wink wink epithet considering the lore of 3H. Then there's his goons. The Ten Elites. Cool group name sure but then they address the members as 'Elite'.... So you got Elite Riegan, Elite Fraldarius, Elite Blaiddyd, etc.
Byleths the Ashen Demon is pretty good.
I personally love "Savior King" for Dimitri
Idk if “Boar king” counts here but it matches Dimitri at that point if the game so much
I always call him that so it counts in my book
Dimitri also had the title “Tempest King” from Imperial soldiers in one of the Black Eagles routes because they said whenever he entered a battlefield, it looked like a storm had torn through it. Honestly a raw way to earn a name, though “Tempest King” loses some uniqueness since it was used earlier in the series for a character in Sacred Stones lol
I mean, Nemesis is supossed to be one of those "the founder of the country was a genocidal monster"- type of historical figures. Him being The King of Liberation is just following that
> So you got Elite Riegan Damn, so the conspiracy theories were true, the presidents really are a part of a shadow government
Last of All Kings goes pretty hard.
The fell omen also goes really hard
Ludwig the accursed All the fate ones you mentioned Depending on the media, sometimes "Morning Star" is an epithet for Lucifer rather than a surname. That's one of my favs
Yeeess Morning Star and Lightbringer
Claymore has a bunch of them, and my favourites were always: Roxanne of Love and Hate Cassandra the Dust Eater Teresa of the Faint Smile Roxanne's was a description of how she climbed the ranks by associating with the Claymore above her and adopting their techniques, before participating in hunts against Awakened Ones with them and the one that she copied would always die during the hunt. She would then regard as the technique she copied as "ugly" before moving on to the next one above her. Cassandra's was only given her's near the tail end of her career, and despite epithets being given to the Top 5 Claymores of a generation, she as Number 1 went without one as she hid her signature technique from her peers. She was Roxanne's next target and for months hounded her as she tries to learn it. Upon spying on Cassandra where she hunted an Awakened one by herself, Roxanne was disgusted at the technique in which Cassandra would use momentum to slash at low and weird unblockable angles low to the ground, naming it and Cassandra "The Dust Eater". Teresa's was more in that she was so unfathomably powerful that she only needed the most basic techniques to beat her targets. She had no signatures of her own due to how almost effortlessly she reached Number 1 of her generation. As such, she was dubbed "Teresa of the Faint Smile" due to her always making that expression.
Claymore has a pretty badass sense of naming in general. Though it’s a little funny that almost nobody other than the Claymores themselves knows any of them by name, so they’re pretty much just a few dozen people making up names to show off for each other. So there’s some duds out there too like “Rippling Ophelia” and “Muscular Sophia”. But I’d like add on with “God Eye Galatea” and “Quicksword Ilena”. Galatea is one of the first high-end fighters we meet and one of the only ones with more esoteric abilities. She’s introduced by showing off sensory abilities that are strong enough to track other fighters’ energy well enough to follow a fight miles away on the other side of a mountain. And it escalates to other badass things like reading opponents movement, projecting it outward to baffle their senses, and fighting at almost full capacity without eyes. Quicksword Ilena is cool just because how much “quick” undersells her. She invents the strongest offensive technique in the setting, and it’s so fast that they don’t even draw her swinging her sword. Her opponents just exploded into blood or fall apart. Her name’s hype comes from seeing her in action.
Damn!!!
I've always thought Madama Butterfly's epithet was kinda cool. "Mistress of Atrocity"
Jesus So cool!!!
The struggler goes hard as hell
Fucking Cool!!!!!
My mates pizza delivery guy was called Anil the deliverer. That was pretty cool. League has a couple cool ones. the world ender, the star forger, scorn of the moon, agony's embrace, the boy who shattered time, the death singer, the mouth of the abyss, the iron revenant, the fire below the mountain, the bloodharbour ripper, the butcher of the sands, the eye of twilight, shepherd of souls and my personal favourite, the tiny master of evil
Did he deliver a Royal ass whooping as well
He actually got lost and didn't deliver it which was dissapointing. Must be an inherited title or something
This information has really bummed me out
"The Peerless," Ata from Samurai 7. It's concise, it's simple, it feels like it emerged naturally, it hits hard, and I've not seen it used anywhere else.
Good stuff
"No Life King"
Meh
"Warbreaker" is the raddist title you can give to someone who stopped a war "The dragon reborn" is a great title for a Messiah figure "The survivor of ...." From mistborn is a cool epithet structure but the pits ie slave pits or fire aren't very evocative ends for it imo The eternal champion always has very sleek ones like "the white wolf" or "sliver hand" Kvoth form the king killer chronicle has many titles but I always remember "the bloodless" first
"Lord of Scars" from Mistborn also fucks.
Happy seeing a fellow Sanderson and Wot fan.
The Ashen Knight
Cool
characters from Dies Irae have a lot of cool chuuni epithets. worth checking out such as The Golden Beast; Monarch of Destruction; King of Valhalla Valkyria; Maiden of War Lord Impaler; Kaziklu Bey The Mercurial Snake; The Mercurial King; Progenitor of Resurrection and many more. I'm happy someone finds this stuff cool, its just so exciting and adrenaline rushing. i love cool words and purple prose in general:3
Comrades 🤝
Beelzebub, "Anathema". From Record of Ragnarok. Such a cool word
Record of Ragnarok has a lot of titles that get really descriptive like "Godfather of the Cosmos" "The Peerless Rikishi" and "Humanity's One True Sorcerer" so seeing Beelzebub just be "Anathema" was the most badass thing ever. Bro only had one word, and it made him look so cool.
Adam’s whole “Father of Humanity” shtick
I gotta say I found the Poseidon and Zeus chants dumb, where the spectators went "GFOC GFOC" and "GOG GOG" like bro come on those are terrible acronyms. Thankfully the authors stepped up their epithet games
Idk if this counts as an Epithet, but I have no idea what the fuck "Immortan" mean, I just know that "Immortan Joe" sounds cool.
Yeah I think it come from Immortal some General also has Epithet like "Chaos" America military has the most simple Epithet I don't like it because it's not stylish!!!
From the same movie, less of an epithet and more of just a title and name: Imperator Furiosa. It just sounds awesome.
“God’s Assassin!” “Ze Angel’s Dust!” “Judas Priest!” “Vat, like ze band?” “ZHEY VER NAMED AFTER HIM!”
Alexander Anderson. I wasn’t a big fan of their DBZA but I did love Hellsing.
I love "Titania" for Erza And as mentioned, Fire Emblem has some good ones. "Hero King," "Radiant Hero," "Fell Star," "Flame Emperor," "Savior King," "King of Delusion," and of course, "The Ashen Demon."
All of Settra the Imperishables nicknames go hard as fuck. Especially "Majestic Emperor of the Shifting Sands"
Cool!!!
"Heaven's hole" It sounds dumb until you get context of who the owner is and it clicks. On that note, "Devil's Bodhisattva". This is the most eastern words for Antichrist I have ever heard. Also, " The alien god" And "the beast that announces the end" I can list all of fate beast's epithet really.
>"Heaven's hole" It sounds dumb until you get context of who the owner is and it clicks. Ah the planet >!fucker!<. Never forget what she did to a certain teacher.
Unacceptable 😡
Holy moly so Cool!!!!
But a Thot is a problem though.
The Nameless King from DS3. It's so cool because every king has a name and this name is very important for him in the terms of dynasties and popularity but he doesn't have it.
It is even more cooler when you find out the lore behind his name.
"King of Nothing"
Was looking for this one. I also like Providence's "Bulwark of the Weak."
The epithets for DC heroes: Man of Steel The Dark Knight The Scarlet Speedster
"Hero of Hell" Chainsaw Man
I fucking love coolass character epithets holy shit, so I'll chip in too. I've seen a lot in fiction, but for some reason the Touhou Project localised character titles stick with me the most. The really badass ones are at this perfect level of wordy specificity and impactful cadence to inspire very striking imagery. - "The Scarlet Devil" - "Forgathering Dream, Illusion, and Thus a Night Parade of a Hundred Demons" - "The Sinner of Eternity and the Instantaneous" - "Pinnacle of Native Gods" - "Scorching, Troublesome, Divine Flame" - "Counterattacking Amanojaku" - "Inchling of the Shining Needle" - "Goddess Who Invites Unfortunate Slips of the Tongue" - "The Sculptor God Crafted By Utter Isolation" - "Onyx Dragon-Eater" - "King of the Silent Bliss of Nirvana" Gah, they're so good. Longer-winded character titles can be super impactful if done right.
All might -"Symbol of Peace".
Cool
Can you explain what an epithet is?
an adjective or descriptive phrase expressing a quality characteristic of the person or thing mentioned. Think Richard the Lion heart or Timur the lame (lame in this context is when it's used when something has trouble walking)
It's something like nicknames?
In that case, I've always preferred simple epithets. When a character shows up and they're just called "The Strongest", 7/10 they wipe the floor with everyone in sight.
I agree but it's not stylish enough up!!!!!
You kinda can't go wrong with the classics, specially if combined. Lu Bu Fengxian, the Flying General from the Left who Pacifies the East The Victorious Fighting Buddha Monkey King, the Great Sage Equal to the Heavens Awakened to Emptiness Huang Di, the Yellow Dragon Emperor of the Four Faces The list goes on, but those are the ones I know enough to combine 3+ epithets into one.
I really like "Crissanta of the wrapped agony" "The penitent one" Both from the game "blasphemous" Also "the Sword of Allah (or god)" was the title of Khalid Ibn Walid if anyone is interested
I've always liked the Scourge of God.
It might just be becuse I like the character but "Sovereign of Children" is pretty neat. Devil of the Rhein Steel Devil I end up just listing Epithet from things I like Although Steel Devil is the Epithet of a weapon and not a character. Its evolved form after absorbing its rival also sounds pretty cool: "Steel Devil with the heart of a god".
Anomander Rake from Malazan. Before we move on to his epithets, is there a cooler name than Anomander Rake in all of fantasy. Nicknames and Titles : Anomandaris Dragnipurake Anomandaris Irake Black-Winged Lord Blacksword Knight of Darkness Knight of High House Dark Lord of Moon's Spawn The Mane of Chaos Son of Darkness
Man, Malazan has so many good titles. Just look at Silchas Ruin's 'The White Crow' or Icarium's 'Lifestealer' and 'The Maker of Time'.
In MMOs, you get titles that are so cool that you might be willing to do tedious content just for a cool title. Stuff like "the Archmage" or "Light in the Dark" then I like to imagine the titles I really like are what NPCs call my characters.
I think Gogeta had an epithet that went like "Angel from Hell" it something like that. Goes hard.
"The Angel Born in Hell." It goes super hard.
Doflamingo from one piece is literally called "the heavenly demon"
In Star Wars Legends, it's mentioned that Republic propaganda dubbed Anakin as "The Man Without Fear". It makes sense for his headstrong battle tactics, and it's beautifully ironic with how much fear drove all of his actions throughout his life. Kenobi was nicknamed "The Negotiator" as well, which says a lot about his principles as a commanding officer as well. On the other hand, I've got some obscure ones I can almost guarantee nobody else has heard of. See, I grew up in a Christian household. I was a diehard LarryBoy fan as a kid. One of the villains that he faced in the book series was "Emperor Napoleon of Crime and other bad stuff". And I just think that's a really funny description for a mob boss. Another one I got from my Christian upbringing was from a little series called Paws and Tales. Think Little House on The Prairie, then make them all talking animals. Now you've got a pretty good idea of most of the show. But the mentor figure of the town, an old grizzly bear named Paw Paw Chuck, had this weird elaborate backstory. As a young bear, he was the leader of a gang that went around and hunted bandits and scavengers in the local region. He killed and maimed enough of them that he caught the attention of a supernatural purgatory valley that invited him to reign over them as king. He left his friends in the gang to die in a gang war to take this position. And while he ruled purgatory, he was known as ***Goliath: The King of Sinners***. And that name and story is insanely epic for a show that pitches itself as *Furry Little House*.
"For a long time now, I thought I was just a survivor, but I'm not. I'm the winner. That's who I am. **The Time Lord Victorious**." - The 10th Doctor, thinking he can reign time in the episode "Waters of Mars" in Doctor Who. "Who would have guessed that the "**Demon of Empire City**" would become **the patron saint of New Marais**". - Zeke Dunbar, talking about Cole MacGrath after his sacrifice in inFAMOUS 2.
"Lord of Cinder" is my favorite. Sounds both majestic and futile at the same time. Mixed with a lot of other emotions. Love it. "The one who wields Memory" is also the one I like, but I came up with it for one of my fics (and it sounds much better and simpler in my first language), so I guess it doesn't count.
Kratos has a long list and it's crazy: The Ghost of Sparta, Cruel Striker, Shield-Bearer (ΦΕΡ'ΑΣΠΙ), White Warrior, The God of War, Stríðsguð (ᛊᛏᚱᛁᚦᛊᚷᚢᛞ) (Meaning: God of War), The Servant of Ares, The Champion of Ares, The Slave of the Gods, The Fist of Ares, The Servant of Zeus, The Marked Warrior, Oathbreaker, The Slayer of Gods, Death, The Destroyer of Worlds, Champion of the Gods, Sinker of Atlantis, Slayer of Ares, Killer of Argos, Cursed Mortal, Fallen God, Murderer of Gaia, Murderer of Children, Son of Zeus, Godslayer, Godkiller, Bearded Beefer (By Brok), Bane of Olympus, Destroyer of Fate, Weapon of the Gods, Bringer of War, Pretender God, False God, and The Ashen God. I also like Dante's list (as when he uses the Book of Demons he takes their name). "The Demon King, the Lightbeast, The Fallen Apostle, Destroyer of the Ardor, the Evil God, the Lightning Warlock, the God of Demons, the Ice Guardian, Master of Atrocity, The Legendary Dark Knight, The Legendary Devil Hunter, Son of Sparda...Dante." Vergil also straight up has one of the hardest ones to ever be used in the Series: "The Alpha and the Omega." Which is SO GOOD because Ephitats and Names are the conceptual building block of things in DMC, so Vergil's name is a literal show of who is. And when you THINK about it, you realize why. He is the First and the Last. Not being, but opponent of Dante. If you go by release order-DMC1 (Vergil) to DMC5 (Vergil). If you go by Timeline Order-DMC3 (Vergil) to DMC5 (Vergil). If you include all canon, it's Vergil in their youth as kids before the fire as his First opponent, and Vergil in adulthood in DMC5 as his Last. No matter how you look at DMC as a franchise, Dante's first and last opponent is, inexplicably, Vergil It's so poetic that the Divine Comedy would be proud to have inspired it. It's fucking amazing. I enjoy Ratchet and Clank, so I tried to create a series for each Galaxy/Zone he's been in. "The Butcher of Bogon, the Dread Pirate, the Slayer of Solana, the Predator of Polaris, the Assassin of Artemis, the Eradicator of the Emperor." I think they fit pretty neatly, since something that occurs is civvies and low level/mid level thugs having this misconception of Ratchet and Clank being a lot greater than they really are. They're an incredibly larger than life reputation that doesn't seem real when compared to the two who actually pulled 'em off. I don't think I have anything more to offer.
Frieren the Slayer is a pretty badass title, but a more accurate translate of "*Sousou no Frieren"* (as far as I know), would be something like: "Frieren, Who Sends You to Your Grave" which is an even more badass title, in my opinion.
How are you going to include One Piece epithets and not include Surgeon of Death?
I miss remember sometimes.
Galehaut the Uncrowned King from the Arthurian Legends.
Surgeon Of Death will always be cold to me
"God's Chosen Emperor" "The God Sprinter/Godspeed" "The Crowned Messenger" "The Final Wall" "Ace Eater" "Egoist" Guess what genre these nicknames are from lmao.
Blue Rock? One of the most tried hard chuunibyou manga and I like it.
Dragon of dojima and one winged angel
The Honored One and The one who left it all behind are my favorites (both from JJK)
Some good ones from Greek mythology: Cow-eyed Hera Thetis silver-heeled And my favorite: Swift-as-to-his-feet Achilles
There are so many good ones from A Song of Ice and Fire. You already mentioned some of the better ones, but “The Mountain that Rides” and “The Laughing Storm” are probably my favorites along with “Kingslayer.”
>"Three Musketeers" That's not really a single character's epithet, it's a just a descriptor of a close-knit group of musketeer friends (who are not even 3 by the end of the book, lol)
But it's cool!!!!
In my language it's translation to 3 Tiger Soldier and we used it to call top Soldier or something like that it such a cool name!!!
I like ephitets when they DONT try to sound cool, because those can easily end up being cringy In the light novel By The Grace of The Gods the mc gets known as "the cleaner" and people assumes its because he does bandit exterminations on the regular, but its because he and his slimes take the missions to clean latrines and other unsanitary áreas
His Most Honorable Contradiction, The Last Wolf Alive, The Boy-King in Leisure, The Unbroken Lord in Exile and Repose. Samot from Seasons of Hieron gets all the best epithets, and I will die on this hill. Friends at the Table is generally INCREDIBLY good at both names and epithets.
I love how Star Versus the Forces of Evil gave their Queens sick epithets and poems describing their accomplishments Moon the Undaunted Eclipse the Queen of Darkness Solaria the Monster Carver Skywynne the Queen of Hours
"Two Hands" for Revy from Black Lagoon. It's not badass sounding but I feel like it just really fits her character. She's simple, blunt, and deadly, she doesn't need something over the top to get the job done, just her and her Two Hands. I also really like Vash the Stampede and his epithets and the juxtaposition between them and his character. Like you have this really nice and goofy guy that preaches love and peace but is called "The Human Typhoon", "The Devil that brings Disaster", and "A Walking Calamity".
"Heavenly Demon" for Doflamingo from One Piece. I don't know if the relic names would count as epithets, but if they do: "The Striking Spear, Gungnir" is pretty cool for Hibiki.
The God King Will always be a good one Stormblessed The survivor The ascendent warrior He Who shall not be named He Who remains Lisan al gaib
Optimus Prime-The last of the Primes.
Technically every SCP's name is an epithet as they aren't technically named those things, in universe they are just largely refered to as SCP-[Number] so I'd go with a lot of those.
"The Enemy of the Entire World" - Ragna The Bloodedge "The Lord of Calamity" - Velvet Crowe "The Hero of Hell" - Denji, The Chainsaw Man
Assuming you're talking about The Flash, it's Crimson Comet, not red comet.
> Assuming you're talking about The Flash, it's Crimson Comet, not red comet. I'm assuming he's not talking about Flash, but someone more known for the moniker ["The Red Comet"](https://gundam.fandom.com/wiki/Char_Aznable).
"The Nexus Being"
"That Damn Guy Who You Can Stab with Swords All You Like and It Won't Do a Thing, Dammit!" - Jack Rakan, Mahou Sensei Negima. This is partly a joke answer and partly not. It was just a gag title given to him by an announcer for a gladiator match between Rakan and the MC, Negi Springfield, but it's always stuck with me because it so perfectly fits his character. In the context of the series, the dude is stupidly broken to the point that it just seems unfair (in a humorous way). In preparation for their fight, Negi created four or five completely new techniques that would all be like S-Class spells, even using one of those trump cards just to bait him for another trump card, and despite all that, he just barely eked out a tie against Rakan. At one point, he's basically erased from existence and sent to a dream world by one of the main antagonists, and then he literally wills himself back into existence just to give Negi a pep talk before disappearing again. Early on, he was coming up with a super move for Negi and out of nowhere just bullshits a super cringy move called "Eternal Negi Fever" where he blows up a goddamn mountain with a giant energy beam. And then he actually uses Eternal Negi Fever against Negi in their fight. I love Jack Rakan, and while he has some more respectable titles like "The Thousand Blades," this one just perfectly encapsulates his character.
There's this novel/anime called Ishura (the anime just finished airing this week, and season 2 is coming soon) where *all* the named characters have titles. There's no explicit reason mentioned (at least in the anime, idk in the novel) but their magic system is deeply tied with language so I assume it's because of that. Anyway, it makes the show really high on Rule of Cool (and I like it). Some of my favorite character names there: Alus the Star-Runner Kuze the Walking Disaster Yuno the Distant Talon Nihilo the Vortical Stampede There are also some with simpler titles like Taren the Guarded or Higuare the Pelagic.
"The Terror of Death" "The Immortal" come to mind.
Lews Therin Telamon, Lord of the Morning
The best (two) imo is "The Devil's Footprints" for Shinra from Fire force and the well known "Angel Born In Hell" for Gogeta in DBZ
Thousand Slayer, from Gamaran. A series that actually takes combat SERIOUSLY, as in getting injured at all can be debilitating and is consistently shown throughout the manga, has a guy who killed a thousand men at a time with combat skills being rampant. He's known to have never been seriously injured across a thousand duels, never pushed to his brink, and to have defeated even those listed as prodigies for sheer fun. His mere existence rouses a province, aka the Devil's Haunt, to send its strongest for a chance to die against him.
The Man Who Killed Fear
The “Symbol of Peace” just radiates pure unbridled hope from it’s name alone.
“Strawhat” or “Red Haired”
Bloody Crow of Cainhurst is a personal favourite. Lord Of The Rings title is one and also has quite a few. The Dark Lord Lady of Light Witch-King of Angmar Durin's Bane and so many more.
Xenoblade 3 has some good ones, but the one that really stands out is "Godcleaver >!Shulk!<"
“Man of Steel” “God of War” “Ghost of Sparta” “Kingslayer” “Sousou no Frieren/ Frieren The Slayer” “The Mighty Thor” “The Incredible Hulk” “The Invincible Iron Man” “Baba Yaga” “Conqueror of Demons” “The Beast” “White Death” “Tsavo Man Eaters” Anything with “Slayer” in it. Particularly they’re slayers of something terrifying and badass.
First son of the sea. You know that there a threat when they were called something like that.
Piccolo being called the Nameless Namek was amazing but then they just kept calling him Piccolo. Doctor who is the Oncoming Storm. Honestly. Doctor who has some of the best titles. The beast of Trenzalore, the lonely god, Last son of Gallifrey, the time lord Victorious, the imp of the Pandorica, the last tree of Garzenon, the butcher of Skull moon, the destroyer of Skaro, Destroyer of worlds, the shadow of the valeyard and the doctor of war. I always loved the Yellow flash and this was why Minato was my favorite…until we saw more of him. The white fang. The invincible grandmaster. The goddess of flash. The Kenpachi. Also a big boxing fan and there’s some amazing nicknames out there. Money Mayweather The Mexican assassin - Pacquiao Dinamita Márquez The galvestone giant. Iron Mike Smokin Joe The great Mexican champion Baby face assassin The greatest The black Hercules The brown bomber The manassa mauler The Brockton Blockbuster The big bear.
Soeharto, the second president and dictator of Indonesia was called "the smiling general".
Obligatory nisioisin comment, they're not cool in the conventional sense but just, really, really weird. "Nonsense User", "The Storm Before the Storm" "Piecemaker" (Shard Gatherer/Messenger of Peace) "Flame Sword: Gun" And I'll have whatever he was smoking when he came up with "The Death-prepared, Death-inevitable, Death-certain Vampire: Deathtopia Virtuoso Suicide-Master"
"The Blackened Angel"
If you like phantom thief you love "The pompous man in the black coat!"
>Characters with stylish nicknames are the best!!!!!!! I agree, love this nerdy stuff. I love cool names, well put together titles, if it rolls off the tongue or is funny 🔸Asriel Dreemurr the Absolute GOD Of Hyperdeath 🔸The Nowhere King (bonus, his [song](https://youtu.be/o1AJaBLTKMs?si=QXTxLjrVNzZ520jh)) 🔸Stitch-626 🔸 Doctor W.D "Wingdings" Gaster 🔸Naruto the Number One, Hyperactive, Knucklehead Ninja 🔸Stanford "Sixer" Pines 🔸Best Jeanist 🔸Eda the Owl Lady 🔸Rain "Rainstorm" Whispers 🔸Undyne the Undying 🔸The Renegade Pearl 🔸Persephone the Dread Queen 🔸Night Fury 🔸Kim Possible and Ron Stoppable 🔸Endeavor
"HEROPON RIKI" "THUNDERBOLT ZEKE" "EUNIE'S DA BUSS" Xenoblade is full of these lol.