# Creating drug names



## Lexi_Banner (Nov 6, 2017)

Hi all!  I am terrible at choosing names for things in general, and I have two different drugs I need to create out of thin air.  I know what they do, but picking a name has been impossible.

I know there are naming conventions followed when creating drugs in the real world, and I want to stick close to those.  However, I really don't understand the convention, mostly because I don't really understand chemistry enough to grasp it.

For context, this is for an Urban Fantasy that is set in "our" world, plus or minus a few differences - magic, elves, and giants exist alongside humans.  As such, I try to keep within close bounds of reality, unless it's just not logical to do so.

If anyone here is willing to help, I'd love the assistance!

*Drug One:*  a synthetic opiate that is going to make "fentanyl look like Advil".  It's a super drug that was being created to be less harmful/addictive than the current opiate choices, but a naughty scientist involved in the development decided to make it far more powerful and then steal the formula for his own nefarious purposes.

*Drug Two: * a drug that will assist in the recovery of my character when he is given human blood instead of giant blood (giant's have thinner blood in my universe).  It's intended as a "miracle" that saves him when he's on his deathbed, with minor side effects once the drug has been metabolized.

Anyhow, thanks to anyone who reads this!


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## Ban (Nov 6, 2017)

(Hello I just noticed you are the person from reddit. Welcome to the forum!) 

Instead of thinking about what the technical name for these substances would be, why don't you imagine what name its users would give to it? Extacy for example or crystal meth are named for their most noticable empirical elements. Now admittedly in real-life most drugs are born in the lab and only later arrive on the street when some entrepeneurial thugs decide to but that doesn't have to be the case here. You can start with the street name and if the substance is only recently made you don't have to even bother with the technical name because the chemists would not have had enough time to determine it's official name. With drug 2 you could go this approach, but it seems you have decided that drug 1 is lab-born so some other helpful chemistry-minded soul here will hopefully help there.

Onto names! For drug 2 why not capitalize on the "saving" element? Some biblical terms like "Good Samaritan" or "Messiah" are always fun to use if your world includes christianity. Otherwise you can still go for something like "resurrection".
Drug 1 is basically opioids on steroids it seems. So what do opioids do? They make you euphoric, so let's work from that. Here's a few quick suggestion "Dreamscape" "rapture" "Celestial Embrace" "Cloud" "Rhapsody" and "Elation".

Hopefully you can work off of that


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## Lexi_Banner (Nov 6, 2017)

Thanks Banten!  That gave me some ideas, for sure,  Part of the problem I'm having is that Drug One is not a street drug yet, so there isn't some colloquial term I could apply to it.  No one outside of a few people know it even exists at this point.  So I feel "forced" to choose something more technical.


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## TheKillerBs (Nov 6, 2017)

I would use some sort of codename. An actual chemical name would throw off anyone with any background in chemistry.


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## ChasingSuns (Nov 10, 2017)

I would stick to street names as well. Drug number 2 made me think of snake oil, so maybe look into the history of cure-alls for some inspiration for that one.

Perhaps drug number 1 is some new, lab-grown derivative of Fentanyl. If it isn't on the market yet, perhaps they just have some lab title for it? Like Fentanyl-X or something like that. Once it hit the streets, the users could refer to it as Faint.


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