Can We Talk About Name Availability For A Minute

[Teratus.2859]

@Danikat.8537 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Genesis.8572 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:Creativity only goes so far.. and some people like myself for example are significantly invested into giving our character natural sounding lore fitting names and honestly despise having to throw a name out entirely because it's taken or change a few letters around or spell them akwardly to the point they look and sound stupid.Which other people are capable of easily achieving even now, as I and others have experienced as well.

Not everyone has the same rules with thier names like I said.You may be fine with adding a double letter or changing something but others place more value in their names and are not willing to butcher them like that.

What do you do if there's another barrier to the name you want, other than someone else getting it first?

For example I really wanted to call my weaver Rinkhal Stormbringer, a name which ties heavily into the backstory I created for him and his personality. It's

perfect

for him. But I couldn't use it. Why? It's 20 characters long.

I suppose I could have begged Anet to change the rules, to let us use 20 characters, after all it's just 1 more letter so it shouldn't cause any problems right? (Cue someone explaining how 19 characters fits perfectly into X bits of data or some such thing.) But regardless of whether it's possible it would have left me waiting indefinitely for a change which may or may not happen before I could make my new character.

As Mew said.. extended the character limit is far more reasonable than stripping away dead names from dead accounts.. and probably easier too.I'd have no problem with increasing the cap to 25-30 characters in all honesty.

So, regardless of how attached I was to that name I went back to the drawing board (or more precisely a series of post-it notes) and went looking for another name. I stumbled across the Afrikaans word Akkedis (which means lizard) and...I don't know why but it stuck. I decided even if I didn't use it in his name that would be his real first name for RP purposes. But eventually I decided on Akkedis de Rinkhal, a name which I like at least as much as my original idea.

It's the same process when a name I want is taken. I understand being attached to a name (that's why some of us are so against this idea) but the only time I've gotten so attached to one that I wouldn't find something else instead is when I've had it for years. I've got 2 characters (not counting Akkedis) where the name I first wanted was taken (one going back to GW1) so I changed it slightly, and now I wouldn't change either of them even if I could, and I'd be extremely upset if someone else took them away from me. (Which is possible, under this proposed system since one is a lore appropriate asuran name and the other is a reference to a popular character with just 1 letter changed to make an equally meaningful name which regularly gets mistaken for the original.)

As I said i'm not arguing for taking names but for changing things so players can use dupicates of the same name.But in regards to taking names from dead accounts a lot of what i'm seeing as against that decision seems to stem from the assumption that names are going to be taken away from regular players who go on short breaks.. even though the OP stated that the duration required to loose a name would be years of never logging in.I honestly doubt many people who have not logged into the game in 2 years even think about coming back.. and if they did I doubt they would care about their old characters or their names all that much.Many who do come back tend to just start new characters anyway as they don't remember how to play their old ones nor are they familiar with any of the changes.

[robertthebard.8150]

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Danikat.8537 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Genesis.8572 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:Creativity only goes so far.. and some people like myself for example are significantly invested into giving our character natural sounding lore fitting names and honestly despise having to throw a name out entirely because it's taken or change a few letters around or spell them akwardly to the point they look and sound stupid.Which other people are capable of easily achieving even now, as I and others have experienced as well.

Not everyone has the same rules with thier names like I said.You may be fine with adding a double letter or changing something but others place more value in their names and are not willing to butcher them like that.

What do you do if there's another barrier to the name you want, other than someone else getting it first?

For example I really wanted to call my weaver Rinkhal Stormbringer, a name which ties heavily into the backstory I created for him and his personality. It's

perfect

for him. But I couldn't use it. Why? It's 20 characters long.

I suppose I could have begged Anet to change the rules, to let us use 20 characters, after all it's just 1 more letter so it shouldn't cause any problems right? (Cue someone explaining how 19 characters fits perfectly into X bits of data or some such thing.) But regardless of whether it's possible it would have left me waiting indefinitely for a change which may or may not happen before I could make my new character.

As Mew said.. extended the character limit is far more reasonable than stripping away dead names from dead accounts.. and probably easier too.I'd have no problem with increasing the cap to 25-30 characters in all honesty.

So, regardless of how attached I was to that name I went back to the drawing board (or more precisely a series of post-it notes) and went looking for another name. I stumbled across the Afrikaans word Akkedis (which means lizard) and...I don't know why but it stuck. I decided even if I didn't use it in his name that would be his real first name for RP purposes. But eventually I decided on Akkedis de Rinkhal, a name which I like at least as much as my original idea.

It's the same process when a name I want is taken. I understand being attached to a name (that's why some of us are so against this idea) but the only time I've gotten so attached to one that I wouldn't find something else instead is when I've had it for years. I've got 2 characters (not counting Akkedis) where the name I first wanted was taken (one going back to GW1) so I changed it slightly, and now I wouldn't change either of them even if I could, and I'd be extremely upset if someone else took them away from me. (Which is possible, under this proposed system since one is a lore appropriate asuran name and the other is a reference to a popular character with just 1 letter changed to make an equally meaningful name which regularly gets mistaken for the original.)

As I said i'm not arguing for taking names but for changing things so players can use dupicates of the same name.But in regards to taking names from dead accounts a lot of what i'm seeing as against that decision seems to stem from the assumption that names are going to be taken away from regular players who go on short breaks.. even though the OP stated that the duration required to loose a name would be years of never logging in.I honestly doubt many people who have not logged into the game in 2 years even think about coming back.. and if they did I doubt they would care about their old characters or their names all that much.Many who do come back tend to just start new characters anyway as they don't remember how to play their old ones nor are they familiar with any of the changes.

...and I'll draw your attention to my post, where I noted I was gone from a game for 8 years, and returned at the behest of a guildmate. Stranger things have happened.

[Teratus.2859]

@robertthebard.8150 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Danikat.8537 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Genesis.8572 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:Creativity only goes so far.. and some people like myself for example are significantly invested into giving our character natural sounding lore fitting names and honestly despise having to throw a name out entirely because it's taken or change a few letters around or spell them akwardly to the point they look and sound stupid.Which other people are capable of easily achieving even now, as I and others have experienced as well.

Not everyone has the same rules with thier names like I said.You may be fine with adding a double letter or changing something but others place more value in their names and are not willing to butcher them like that.

What do you do if there's another barrier to the name you want, other than someone else getting it first?

For example I really wanted to call my weaver Rinkhal Stormbringer, a name which ties heavily into the backstory I created for him and his personality. It's

perfect

for him. But I couldn't use it. Why? It's 20 characters long.

I suppose I could have begged Anet to change the rules, to let us use 20 characters, after all it's just 1 more letter so it shouldn't cause any problems right? (Cue someone explaining how 19 characters fits perfectly into X bits of data or some such thing.) But regardless of whether it's possible it would have left me waiting indefinitely for a change which may or may not happen before I could make my new character.

As Mew said.. extended the character limit is far more reasonable than stripping away dead names from dead accounts.. and probably easier too.I'd have no problem with increasing the cap to 25-30 characters in all honesty.

So, regardless of how attached I was to that name I went back to the drawing board (or more precisely a series of post-it notes) and went looking for another name. I stumbled across the Afrikaans word Akkedis (which means lizard) and...I don't know why but it stuck. I decided even if I didn't use it in his name that would be his real first name for RP purposes. But eventually I decided on Akkedis de Rinkhal, a name which I like at least as much as my original idea.

It's the same process when a name I want is taken. I understand being attached to a name (that's why some of us are so against this idea) but the only time I've gotten so attached to one that I wouldn't find something else instead is when I've had it for years. I've got 2 characters (not counting Akkedis) where the name I first wanted was taken (one going back to GW1) so I changed it slightly, and now I wouldn't change either of them even if I could, and I'd be extremely upset if someone else took them away from me. (Which is possible, under this proposed system since one is a lore appropriate asuran name and the other is a reference to a popular character with just 1 letter changed to make an equally meaningful name which regularly gets mistaken for the original.)

As I said i'm not arguing for taking names but for changing things so players can use dupicates of the same name.But in regards to taking names from dead accounts a lot of what i'm seeing as against that decision seems to stem from the assumption that names are going to be taken away from regular players who go on short breaks.. even though the OP stated that the duration required to loose a name would be years of never logging in.I honestly doubt many people who have not logged into the game in 2 years even think about coming back.. and if they did I doubt they would care about their old characters or their names all that much.Many who do come back tend to just start new characters anyway as they don't remember how to play their old ones nor are they familiar with any of the changes.

...and I'll draw your attention to my post, where I noted I was gone from a game for 8 years, and returned at the behest of a guildmate. Stranger things have happened.

I left another game for 4 years and recently came back to find my character names had been removed.I didn't care.. matter of fact I deleted those characters and started over as many others usually do since I'm no longer familiar with the game anyway.

If I left Gw2 for several years and came back to find my names gone I would consider it my own fault for not logging in every once in a while to secure them.

But.. as i've said multiple times already, that's not what i'm arguing for anyway.

[robertthebard.8150]

@Teratus.2859 said:

@robertthebard.8150 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Danikat.8537 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Genesis.8572 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:Creativity only goes so far.. and some people like myself for example are significantly invested into giving our character natural sounding lore fitting names and honestly despise having to throw a name out entirely because it's taken or change a few letters around or spell them akwardly to the point they look and sound stupid.Which other people are capable of easily achieving even now, as I and others have experienced as well.

Not everyone has the same rules with thier names like I said.You may be fine with adding a double letter or changing something but others place more value in their names and are not willing to butcher them like that.

What do you do if there's another barrier to the name you want, other than someone else getting it first?

For example I really wanted to call my weaver Rinkhal Stormbringer, a name which ties heavily into the backstory I created for him and his personality. It's

perfect

for him. But I couldn't use it. Why? It's 20 characters long.

I suppose I could have begged Anet to change the rules, to let us use 20 characters, after all it's just 1 more letter so it shouldn't cause any problems right? (Cue someone explaining how 19 characters fits perfectly into X bits of data or some such thing.) But regardless of whether it's possible it would have left me waiting indefinitely for a change which may or may not happen before I could make my new character.

As Mew said.. extended the character limit is far more reasonable than stripping away dead names from dead accounts.. and probably easier too.I'd have no problem with increasing the cap to 25-30 characters in all honesty.

So, regardless of how attached I was to that name I went back to the drawing board (or more precisely a series of post-it notes) and went looking for another name. I stumbled across the Afrikaans word Akkedis (which means lizard) and...I don't know why but it stuck. I decided even if I didn't use it in his name that would be his real first name for RP purposes. But eventually I decided on Akkedis de Rinkhal, a name which I like at least as much as my original idea.

It's the same process when a name I want is taken. I understand being attached to a name (that's why some of us are so against this idea) but the only time I've gotten so attached to one that I wouldn't find something else instead is when I've had it for years. I've got 2 characters (not counting Akkedis) where the name I first wanted was taken (one going back to GW1) so I changed it slightly, and now I wouldn't change either of them even if I could, and I'd be extremely upset if someone else took them away from me. (Which is possible, under this proposed system since one is a lore appropriate asuran name and the other is a reference to a popular character with just 1 letter changed to make an equally meaningful name which regularly gets mistaken for the original.)

As I said i'm not arguing for taking names but for changing things so players can use dupicates of the same name.But in regards to taking names from dead accounts a lot of what i'm seeing as against that decision seems to stem from the assumption that names are going to be taken away from regular players who go on short breaks.. even though the OP stated that the duration required to loose a name would be years of never logging in.I honestly doubt many people who have not logged into the game in 2 years even think about coming back.. and if they did I doubt they would care about their old characters or their names all that much.Many who do come back tend to just start new characters anyway as they don't remember how to play their old ones nor are they familiar with any of the changes.

...and I'll draw your attention to my post, where I noted I was gone from a game for 8 years, and returned at the behest of a guildmate. Stranger things have happened.

I left another game for 4 years and recently came back to find my character names had been removed.I didn't care.. matter of fact I deleted those characters and started over as many others usually do since I'm no longer familiar with the game anyway.

If I left Gw2 for several years and came back to find my names gone I would consider it my own fault for not logging in every once in a while to secure them.

But.. as i've said multiple times already, that's not what i'm arguing for anyway.

That's cool, but it is what this thread is about.

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

This list of some of Guild Wars 2 NPCs may help those that feel there are certain 'rules' about lore-appropriate names, and can't come up with a name.(For instance, Asura must have double letters in their names. Or, only 'Warden' is an appropriate title for Sylvari. Etc., etc.)

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Story_characters

Good luck.

[Teratus.2859]

@robertthebard.8150 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@robertthebard.8150 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Danikat.8537 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Genesis.8572 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:Creativity only goes so far.. and some people like myself for example are significantly invested into giving our character natural sounding lore fitting names and honestly despise having to throw a name out entirely because it's taken or change a few letters around or spell them akwardly to the point they look and sound stupid.Which other people are capable of easily achieving even now, as I and others have experienced as well.

Not everyone has the same rules with thier names like I said.You may be fine with adding a double letter or changing something but others place more value in their names and are not willing to butcher them like that.

What do you do if there's another barrier to the name you want, other than someone else getting it first?

For example I really wanted to call my weaver Rinkhal Stormbringer, a name which ties heavily into the backstory I created for him and his personality. It's

perfect

for him. But I couldn't use it. Why? It's 20 characters long.

I suppose I could have begged Anet to change the rules, to let us use 20 characters, after all it's just 1 more letter so it shouldn't cause any problems right? (Cue someone explaining how 19 characters fits perfectly into X bits of data or some such thing.) But regardless of whether it's possible it would have left me waiting indefinitely for a change which may or may not happen before I could make my new character.

As Mew said.. extended the character limit is far more reasonable than stripping away dead names from dead accounts.. and probably easier too.I'd have no problem with increasing the cap to 25-30 characters in all honesty.

So, regardless of how attached I was to that name I went back to the drawing board (or more precisely a series of post-it notes) and went looking for another name. I stumbled across the Afrikaans word Akkedis (which means lizard) and...I don't know why but it stuck. I decided even if I didn't use it in his name that would be his real first name for RP purposes. But eventually I decided on Akkedis de Rinkhal, a name which I like at least as much as my original idea.

It's the same process when a name I want is taken. I understand being attached to a name (that's why some of us are so against this idea) but the only time I've gotten so attached to one that I wouldn't find something else instead is when I've had it for years. I've got 2 characters (not counting Akkedis) where the name I first wanted was taken (one going back to GW1) so I changed it slightly, and now I wouldn't change either of them even if I could, and I'd be extremely upset if someone else took them away from me. (Which is possible, under this proposed system since one is a lore appropriate asuran name and the other is a reference to a popular character with just 1 letter changed to make an equally meaningful name which regularly gets mistaken for the original.)

As I said i'm not arguing for taking names but for changing things so players can use dupicates of the same name.But in regards to taking names from dead accounts a lot of what i'm seeing as against that decision seems to stem from the assumption that names are going to be taken away from regular players who go on short breaks.. even though the OP stated that the duration required to loose a name would be years of never logging in.I honestly doubt many people who have not logged into the game in 2 years even think about coming back.. and if they did I doubt they would care about their old characters or their names all that much.Many who do come back tend to just start new characters anyway as they don't remember how to play their old ones nor are they familiar with any of the changes.

...and I'll draw your attention to my post, where I noted I was gone from a game for 8 years, and returned at the behest of a guildmate. Stranger things have happened.

I left another game for 4 years and recently came back to find my character names had been removed.I didn't care.. matter of fact I deleted those characters and started over as many others usually do since I'm no longer familiar with the game anyway.

If I left Gw2 for several years and came back to find my names gone I would consider it my own fault for not logging in every once in a while to secure them.

But.. as i've said multiple times already, that's not what i'm arguing for anyway.

That's cool, but it is what this thread is about.

The points are related though, OP does have a point about innactive accounts and a lot of people can relate to the issue of not being able to use the name they wanted.

I agree with them that this is a discussion worth having, I just think there are better alternatives than removing names from inactive players.That's why I put forward my alternative solution about the account names to fix the same issue.These forums work on those names.. and I think some mails in game can be sent via account rather than character so I don't think this would be impossible for Anet to change.They'd just need to know that it's a QOL feature a lot of people want before they'd take it on.

[kettering.6823]

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Genesis.8572 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

The biggest problem for me I find is Sylvari and Asura characters as they specifically only have singular names unlike Humans and Norns which have both first and second naems, I do not enjoy incorporating titles into my character names that conflict with who that character is and where they came from either so it becomes increadibly difficult to find sigular fitting names for these characters.Scarlet

Briar

. Sylvari can have or make surnames for themselves, especially now as they encounter more races that use the equivalent of surnames. They too may opt to adopt them such that they can distinguish themselves from their fellow sylvari.

Scarlet Briar was not her real name, all Sylvari are born with singular names only.Scarlet reinvented herself and took a fake name when she betrayed the world to the Elder Dragons.The vast majority of Sylvari keep their birth names and since our PC's are neither race traitors or evil giving them second names neither makes sense nor works from a lore perspective.Not a big deal for most but if that matters to you then it matters to you.

Absolutely untrue. I have three Sylvari characters with 'surnames' - Saoirse Foxglove, Fionnlagh Celandine, and Caoimhe Larkspur. Each and every one of those are flowers, flowers that have meanings to their character. None of them are 'race traitors' nor evil; Saoirse loves foxgloves, so tacked one onto the end of her name for fun. Fionnlagh is a revenant who, according to his story, saw a man in his dream and in the mists who he knew he had to find. Celandine was a plant he saw in both his dream and the mists; it has a great meaning to him. Caoimhe really likes humans and wanted to mimic them, so she picked her favourite flower and made it her 'last name'. If you're a stickler for lore, there are plenty of reasons you could come up with for your Sylvari to have a last name, or even just a second name.

This again all comes down to not being creative enough. 'But lore!' is not really a valid reason when there are many ways you can work around the lore.

[tinymurder.5791]

@Wylf.2586 said:

@"MikeG.6389" said:

YOU DO NOT TOUCH ANOTHER PLAYER'S ACCOUNT!!!

This is the "Alpha and the Omega" on the subject. I can't be condescending enough if you can't comprehend something so utterly simple.

Comprehension problems appear to indeed be running rampant here, albeit not quite in the manner that you appear to be thinking about. Nobody's talking about "touching accounts". This would be purely on Arenanet, not players - no player would go and mingle with any accounts. The way this usually works in other MMOs is that an algorithm checks for two things - character level and account activity. Let's make a bunch of examples, shall we? Billy, Bobby and Hank bought Guild Wars 2 at launch. Billy played the game for a few hours, created a bunch of characters and never went higher than level ten on any of them before quitting, because the game simply wasn't for him. Bobby played a little longer on a single character, who reached max level, then he stopped playing as well. Hank kept playing and has multiple max level characters, as well as a bunch below level 10.

Now let's imagine an algorithm is implemented that frees up names of old characters, if two of the following are fulfilled: The account has not been in use for a prolonged period of time - let's say five years. And the character is below level ten. Looking at our examples above the only affected player would be billy - he hasn't played the game in a while and none of his characters made it over level 10, ergo the names will be freed up. Bobby hasn't played for a long time either, but his character is higher than level 10, so it won't be affected. Hank, on the other hand, has a bunch of characters under level 10, but due to him remaining active he'll be able to keep those names.

I fail to see the issue there.

The issue is getting inflamed by repeated baseless claim that all or most of the desirable names are locked up by launch accounts on level 2 characters. Unless all of the locked up names are sitting in a guild that has an active member, there is literally no way for players to know how long it's been since those accounts have logged in. There also isn't any way for us to know what the level of a given character is, when they aren't logged in on that specific character. All in all, this argument is nothing more than an appeal to emotion, masquerading as appeal to fairness.

[starhunter.6015]

27 characters on main account with a weekly Key farmer, 6 characters on secondary account. Still no issue coming up with names weekly.

[tinymurder.5791]

@Teratus.2859 said:

Nobody's presuming the names we want are sitting on long inactive accounts but it is a fact that there are a lot of dead Gw2 accounts which will never be used again and some of them may have claimed good names that someone else who does play the game regularly would get more use out of.

@Lunia.2736 has been presuming exactly that throughout this thread. In fact, given how consistent they've been with the specific details of their argument, I'm inclined to believe that they personally know somebody who:

1. Made a character at launch.
2. Leveled up once.
3. Stopped playing immediately afterward.And worst of all,
4. Locked up a name that @Lunia.2736 wanted for one of their characters.

I may be way off base, but it really does sound like sour grapes, instead of a reasoned argument.

[Cragga the Eighty Third.60]

@kettering.6823 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Genesis.8572 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

The biggest problem for me I find is Sylvari and Asura characters as they specifically only have singular names unlike Humans and Norns which have both first and second naems, I do not enjoy incorporating titles into my character names that conflict with who that character is and where they came from either so it becomes increadibly difficult to find sigular fitting names for these characters.Scarlet

Briar

. Sylvari can have or make surnames for themselves, especially now as they encounter more races that use the equivalent of surnames. They too may opt to adopt them such that they can distinguish themselves from their fellow sylvari.

Scarlet Briar was not her real name, all Sylvari are born with singular names only.Scarlet reinvented herself and took a fake name when she betrayed the world to the Elder Dragons.The vast majority of Sylvari keep their birth names and since our PC's are neither race traitors or evil giving them second names neither makes sense nor works from a lore perspective.Not a big deal for most but if that matters to you then it matters to you.

Absolutely untrue. I have three Sylvari characters with 'surnames' - Saoirse Foxglove, Fionnlagh Celandine, and Caoimhe Larkspur. Each and every one of those are flowers, flowers that have meanings to their character. None of them are 'race traitors' nor evil; Saoirse loves foxgloves, so tacked one onto the end of her name for fun. Fionnlagh is a revenant who, according to his story, saw a man in his dream and in the mists who he knew he had to find. Celandine was a plant he saw in both his dream and the mists; it has a great meaning to him. Caoimhe really likes humans and wanted to mimic them, so she picked her favourite flower and made it her 'last name'. If you're a stickler for lore, there are plenty of reasons you could come up with for your Sylvari to have a last name, or even just a second name.

This again all comes down to not being creative enough. 'But lore!' is not really a valid reason when there are many ways you can work around the lore.

My main Asura has a surname which she adopted for professional/marketing reasons. Having a back story for your character can make a lot of things reasonable. Here are more excuses for giving your Asura or Sylvari a surname:

Was made an honorary member of a Charr warband.Was adopted by Humans or Norns.Is attempting to assimilate into Human or Norn culture.Is rebelling against their own society.Identifies as a Dwarf and/or is trying to revive their culture.Feels that a single name does not serve to express their identity.Believes they are a reincarnation of an ancient hero named .

[kettering.6823]

@"Cragga the Eighty Third.6015" said:

@kettering.6823 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Genesis.8572 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

The biggest problem for me I find is Sylvari and Asura characters as they specifically only have singular names unlike Humans and Norns which have both first and second naems, I do not enjoy incorporating titles into my character names that conflict with who that character is and where they came from either so it becomes increadibly difficult to find sigular fitting names for these characters.Scarlet

Briar

. Sylvari can have or make surnames for themselves, especially now as they encounter more races that use the equivalent of surnames. They too may opt to adopt them such that they can distinguish themselves from their fellow sylvari.

Scarlet Briar was not her real name, all Sylvari are born with singular names only.Scarlet reinvented herself and took a fake name when she betrayed the world to the Elder Dragons.The vast majority of Sylvari keep their birth names and since our PC's are neither race traitors or evil giving them second names neither makes sense nor works from a lore perspective.Not a big deal for most but if that matters to you then it matters to you.

Absolutely untrue. I have three Sylvari characters with 'surnames' - Saoirse Foxglove, Fionnlagh Celandine, and Caoimhe Larkspur. Each and every one of those are flowers, flowers that have meanings to their character. None of them are 'race traitors' nor evil; Saoirse loves foxgloves, so tacked one onto the end of her name for fun. Fionnlagh is a revenant who, according to his story, saw a man in his dream and in the mists who he knew he had to find. Celandine was a plant he saw in both his dream and the mists; it has a great meaning to him. Caoimhe really likes humans and wanted to mimic them, so she picked her favourite flower and made it her 'last name'. If you're a stickler for lore, there are plenty of reasons you could come up with for your Sylvari to have a last name, or even just a second name.

This again all comes down to not being creative enough. 'But lore!' is not really a valid reason when there are many ways you can work around the lore.

My main Asura has a surname which she adopted for professional/marketing reasons. Having a back story for your character can make a lot of things reasonable. Here are more excuses for giving your Asura or Sylvari a surname:

Was made an honorary member of a Charr warband.Was adopted by Humans or Norns.Is attempting to assimilate into Human or Norn culture.Is rebelling against their own society.Identifies as a Dwarf and/or is trying to revive their culture.Feels that a single name does not serve to express their identity.Believes they are a reincarnation of an ancient hero named

.

Exactly! There are so many good, interesting reasons your character could have a non-typical name, it's crazy. I don't think 'but lore!' is a valid argument against it. And as I mentioned earlier in this thread, even if you want a single-word name, there are still plenty of those available. It takes a little longer to find a name that way, but it's certainly possible.

[Handsel.2891]

@tinymurder.5791 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

Nobody's presuming the names we want are sitting on long inactive accounts but it is a fact that there are a lot of dead Gw2 accounts which will never be used again and some of them may have claimed good names that someone else who does play the game regularly would get more use out of.

@Lunia.2736 has been presuming exactly that throughout this thread. In fact, given how consistent they've been with the specific details of their argument, I'm inclined to believe that they personally know somebody who:

1. Made a character at launch.
2. Leveled up once.
3. Stopped playing immediately afterward.And worst of all,
4. Locked up a name that @Lunia.2736 wanted for one of their characters.

I may be way off base, but it really does sound like sour grapes, instead of a reasoned argument.

I'm not sure if that is the case, but:

@Lunia.2736 said:

@Rasimir.6239 said:

@Lunia.2736 said:Loads of inactive accounts that will never ever touch this game again are hoarding interesting, fun and good names with level 2 characters.How do you know that?

Add them to your friendslist. They never log on, ever. In years.

This is from earlier in the thread but I still wonder how you'd go about finding out when another player logged in by adding that person to your friends. I mean, 'last online' time only appears on guild rosters so the friends list is useless in this regard. Unless, of course, you are in game 24/7, keep the friends tab open at all times and the person you are stalking at this point is always set to 'Online' status when playing.

...or, indeed, you know them.

[Neural.1824]

@Lunia.2736 said:

Loads of inactive accounts that will never ever touch this game again are hoarding interesting, fun and good names with level 2 characters.

Source of your information?

[Danikat.8537]

@kettering.6823 said:

@"Cragga the Eighty Third.6015" said:

@kettering.6823 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Genesis.8572 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

The biggest problem for me I find is Sylvari and Asura characters as they specifically only have singular names unlike Humans and Norns which have both first and second naems, I do not enjoy incorporating titles into my character names that conflict with who that character is and where they came from either so it becomes increadibly difficult to find sigular fitting names for these characters.Scarlet

Briar

. Sylvari can have or make surnames for themselves, especially now as they encounter more races that use the equivalent of surnames. They too may opt to adopt them such that they can distinguish themselves from their fellow sylvari.

Scarlet Briar was not her real name, all Sylvari are born with singular names only.Scarlet reinvented herself and took a fake name when she betrayed the world to the Elder Dragons.The vast majority of Sylvari keep their birth names and since our PC's are neither race traitors or evil giving them second names neither makes sense nor works from a lore perspective.Not a big deal for most but if that matters to you then it matters to you.

Absolutely untrue. I have three Sylvari characters with 'surnames' - Saoirse Foxglove, Fionnlagh Celandine, and Caoimhe Larkspur. Each and every one of those are flowers, flowers that have meanings to their character. None of them are 'race traitors' nor evil; Saoirse loves foxgloves, so tacked one onto the end of her name for fun. Fionnlagh is a revenant who, according to his story, saw a man in his dream and in the mists who he knew he had to find. Celandine was a plant he saw in both his dream and the mists; it has a great meaning to him. Caoimhe really likes humans and wanted to mimic them, so she picked her favourite flower and made it her 'last name'. If you're a stickler for lore, there are plenty of reasons you could come up with for your Sylvari to have a last name, or even just a second name.

This again all comes down to not being creative enough. 'But lore!' is not really a valid reason when there are many ways you can work around the lore.

My main Asura has a surname which she adopted for professional/marketing reasons. Having a back story for your character can make a lot of things reasonable. Here are more excuses for giving your Asura or Sylvari a surname:

Was made an honorary member of a Charr warband.Was adopted by Humans or Norns.Is attempting to assimilate into Human or Norn culture.Is rebelling against their own society.Identifies as a Dwarf and/or is trying to revive their culture.Feels that a single name does not serve to express their identity.Believes they are a reincarnation of an ancient hero named

.

Exactly! There are so many good, interesting reasons your character could have a non-typical name, it's crazy. I don't think 'but lore!' is a valid argument against it. And as I mentioned earlier in this thread, even if you want a single-word name, there are still plenty of those available. It takes a little longer to find a name that way, but it's certainly possible.

A bit like real life. I can't count how many times I've been told Katy is a nickname and cannot be a full, legal name but it didn't stop my parents putting it on my birth certificate. I've been told in British culture everyone only has 1 first name, but I've met women called Sarah Jane and Mary-Beth. I've met numerous people who have been told their name is not a real name (yes, people are that rude) but somehow it doesn't change the fact that it is their name. Lots of cultures have rules for names, but there's always exceptions.

[Tommo Chocolate.5870]

@mauried.5608 said:19 chars is plenty.How many possible names do you think can be made from 19 characters where any character can be any letter from a - z with spaces included?

I can't resist this type of combinatorics calculation, so I decided to work it out. Assuming that the first and last characters can't be spaces, and that you can't have consecutive spaces (since I think that's true), I make it 1,480,178,613,935,196,025,156,733,570. Since any good mathematician will show their working (we're like the opposite of stage magicians), I've put it in a spoiler below.

It's hard to make much sense of a number that big, but here's the best I can do: there are about 11 million GW2 accounts - if each of those accounts had made one character per second since the beginning of the universe, we wouldn't have run out of names yet.

I don't think this is the right question to answer though: many of those names are unpronouncable nonsense - things like 'Hjsrr S Zz Pn Nf K', that (I expect) no one would actually want.

! Since spaces have different rules to letters, they have to be treated separately. Write n for the number of letters in the name - my method was to choose the letters, then choose where to insert spaces. For n from 1 to 10, the calculation is straightforward, since you have n - 1 places that could accommodate a space (between each consecutive pair of letters), and 2 choices in each case: either there's a space there, or there isn't. So the number of names with n letters is (26^n)(2^(n-1)).! For n greater than or equal to 11, it's trickier. For n = 11, for example, there are 10 places where you can insert spaces, but you can only have a maximum of 8 spaces. To deal with this, I subtracted the number of disallowed choices of spaces. So for n = 11, and writing (mCk) for m choose k, the number of names is (26^11)(2^(10)-(10C10)-(10C9)). For n = 14 onwards, it's actually more efficient to add the numbers of allowed choices of spaces, rather than subtracted the number of disallowed choices from 2^(n-1), but otherwise the calculation is similar.! Finally, I added them all together in Wolfram Alpha, which - appropriately, given the calculation I was doing - was made somewhat awkward by its surprisingly restrictive character limit!

[Lunia.2736]

@Tommo Chocolate.5870 said:

@mauried.5608 said:19 chars is plenty.How many possible names do you think can be made from 19 characters where any character can be any letter from a - z with spaces included?

I can't resist this type of combinatorics calculation, so I decided to work it out. Assuming that the first and last characters can't be spaces, and that you can't have consecutive spaces (since I think that's true), I make it 1,480,178,613,935,196,025,156,733,570. Since any good mathematician will show their working (we're like the opposite of stage magicians), I've put it in a spoiler below.

That number shrinks by quite a lot when you start factoring in common naming conventions and what constitutes a reasonable name.

That number would include every form of: Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa, Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa A, Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa Aa, Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa Aaa, Aaaaaaaaaaaaaa Aaaa, Aaaaaaaaaaaaa Aaaaa, Aaaaaaaaaaaa Aaaaaa, Aaaaaaaaaaaa Aaaaaa, A Aa Aa Aaa Aa Aa A etc. with every single letter.

[Mewcifer.5198]

@Tommo Chocolate.5870 said:I don't think this is the right question to answer though: many of those names are unpronouncable nonsense - things like 'Hjsrr S Zz Pn Nf K', that (I expect) no one would actually want.

I CALL IT! No one steal that name while I go buy a character slot! >:(

[EdgarMTanaka.7291]

I stopped playing an MMO for about 4-5 years, my usual main character name is Gildis and when I got back my name had changed to Gildis-3 I got a rename token but honestly I just exit the game and never looked back.

In Gw2 my Character has the name Gildis Elfblossom and all my characters has a sir name. It's easy to find names that are not used if you use middle names and sir names. One character has the name Sila D Cyanid. I know we are all different, I have to come up with names for my partners characters but most of the times the names are not taken. If they are I usually change a sir name or add Orr change a middle name and then it works.

[mercury ranique.2170]

@Lunia.2736 said:While some even become really toxic about the mere notion of it here.

I would never condone toxic posts, but one should ask themself why people are so strong about it. Maybe because they feel that the entire proposal is morally wrong and they feel like it is thievery. I do not deny the practise in other games, but I would like to stress out that a strong opinion about a topic with morals involved says something. Specially if the majority of the people concerned enough to write here on the forum seems to be against the proposal at hand.

A respect for the consensus is also a token of respect, just like not reacting in a toxic way. The emotions are strong and denying someone the right to those emotions is just as bad as toxic conversations.

[kharmin.7683]

@"Teratus.2859" said:

I honestly doubt many people who have not logged into the game in 2 years even think about coming back.. and if they did I doubt they would care about their old characters or their names all that much.I'm not so sure about that. There have been plenty of returning player posts here and on reddit from players who have been gone for years. Also, with ANet's push to bring back those "lost" players, the number of returning players may increase.

[mauried.5608]

Theres no reason in the game for names to be pronouncible, because no one in the game actually talks, except the NPCs, and they dont refer to you by your characters name.So names like xxyyzzqa are just as good as John Smith.People seem obsessed with having real world names in a fantasy world.

[Danikat.8537]

@Tommo Chocolate.5870 said:

@mauried.5608 said:19 chars is plenty.How many possible names do you think can be made from 19 characters where any character can be any letter from a - z with spaces included?

I can't resist this type of combinatorics calculation, so I decided to work it out. Assuming that the first and last characters can't be spaces, and that you can't have consecutive spaces (since I think that's true), I make it 1,480,178,613,935,196,025,156,733,570. Since any good mathematician will show their working (we're like the opposite of stage magicians), I've put it in a spoiler below.

It's hard to make much sense of a number that big, but here's the best I can do: there are about 11 million GW2 accounts - if each of those accounts had made one character per second since the beginning of the universe, we wouldn't have run out of names yet.

I don't think this is the right question to answer though: many of those names are unpronouncable nonsense - things like 'Hjsrr S Zz Pn Nf K', that (I expect) no one would actually want.

! Since spaces have different rules to letters, they have to be treated separately. Write n for the number of letters in the name - my method was to choose the letters, then choose where to insert spaces. For n from 1 to 10, the calculation is straightforward, since you have n - 1 places that could accommodate a space (between each consecutive pair of letters), and 2 choices in each case: either there's a space there, or there isn't. So the number of names with n letters is (26^n)

(2^(n-1)).! For n greater than or equal to 11, it's trickier. For n = 11, for example, there are 10 places where you can insert spaces, but you can only have a maximum of 8 spaces. To deal with this, I subtracted the number of disallowed choices of spaces. So for n = 11, and writing (mCk) for m choose k, the number of names is (26^11)

(2^(10)-(10C10)-(10C9)). For n = 14 onwards, it's actually more efficient to add the numbers of allowed choices of spaces, rather than subtracted the number of disallowed choices from 2^(n-1), but otherwise the calculation is similar.! Finally, I added them all together in Wolfram Alpha, which - appropriately, given the calculation I was doing - was made somewhat awkward by its surprisingly restrictive character limit!

Thanks for working that out! I had wondered but didn't trust myself to work it out properly. :)

Also I wouldn't assume any name is totally out of the question. Earlier in this topic I discovered that Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa (19 As in a row) and Abcdefghijklmnopqrs were both taken. Shortly after that I decided to name my key runner Aaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh and had to modify it to Aaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhha to find a version which wasn't taken. (In retrospect that was a bad move, especially for me, as it made it really hard to type in again to delete them.)

Incidentally Aaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh was a real character I made in City of Heroes (admittedly a game I barely played) - she was a giant pink lizard from space who had been told your name is what people say when they see you...so she thought that was her name.

[Bloodstealer.5978]

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Danikat.8537 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Genesis.8572 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:Creativity only goes so far.. and some people like myself for example are significantly invested into giving our character natural sounding lore fitting names and honestly despise having to throw a name out entirely because it's taken or change a few letters around or spell them akwardly to the point they look and sound stupid.Which other people are capable of easily achieving even now, as I and others have experienced as well.

Not everyone has the same rules with thier names like I said.You may be fine with adding a double letter or changing something but others place more value in their names and are not willing to butcher them like that.

What do you do if there's another barrier to the name you want, other than someone else getting it first?

For example I really wanted to call my weaver Rinkhal Stormbringer, a name which ties heavily into the backstory I created for him and his personality. It's

perfect

for him. But I couldn't use it. Why? It's 20 characters long.

I suppose I could have begged Anet to change the rules, to let us use 20 characters, after all it's just 1 more letter so it shouldn't cause any problems right? (Cue someone explaining how 19 characters fits perfectly into X bits of data or some such thing.) But regardless of whether it's possible it would have left me waiting indefinitely for a change which may or may not happen before I could make my new character.

As Mew said.. extended the character limit is far more reasonable than stripping away dead names from dead accounts.. and probably easier too.I'd have no problem with increasing the cap to 25-30 characters in all honesty.

So, regardless of how attached I was to that name I went back to the drawing board (or more precisely a series of post-it notes) and went looking for another name. I stumbled across the Afrikaans word Akkedis (which means lizard) and...I don't know why but it stuck. I decided even if I didn't use it in his name that would be his real first name for RP purposes. But eventually I decided on Akkedis de Rinkhal, a name which I like at least as much as my original idea.

It's the same process when a name I want is taken. I understand being attached to a name (that's why some of us are so against this idea) but the only time I've gotten so attached to one that I wouldn't find something else instead is when I've had it for years. I've got 2 characters (not counting Akkedis) where the name I first wanted was taken (one going back to GW1) so I changed it slightly, and now I wouldn't change either of them even if I could, and I'd be extremely upset if someone else took them away from me. (Which is possible, under this proposed system since one is a lore appropriate asuran name and the other is a reference to a popular character with just 1 letter changed to make an equally meaningful name which regularly gets mistaken for the original.)

As I said i'm not arguing for taking names but for changing things so players can use dupicates of the same name.But in regards to taking names from dead accounts a lot of what i'm seeing as against that decision seems to stem from the assumption that names are going to be taken away from regular players who go on short breaks.. even though the OP stated that the duration required to loose a name would be years of never logging in.I honestly doubt many people who have not logged into the game in 2 years even think about coming back.. and if they did I doubt they would care about their old characters or their names all that much.Many who do come back tend to just start new characters anyway as they don't remember how to play their old ones nor are they familiar with any of the changes.

You would be surprised how many players take extended breaks in games then come back.. sometimes those break are unplanned but necessary, it's not just about players not liking GW2 enough to play it anymore.Whilst extending the number of character is as others say, a reasonable request, it would still not satisfy the "you got what I want, it's not fair, give it to me" attitude.Bottom line there is simply NO justification for trying to take other players character names other than " I want BoB and only BoB, GIVE ME BoB cos it's not fair someone else's character is called BoB!!"

[KossakHellraiser.5013]

@"ShiningSquirrel.3751" said:So what do you tell the players who where promised by the devs that their names from GW1 would be reserved for them and created new toons in GW2?What do you tell the players who where promised when they purchased GW2 that they could log in any time and their accounts would be just like they left them?Your asking Anet to go back on their word and change a fundamental rule they created right from the beginning for no reason other then you can't think up a name ?The only word I can think of to describe an attitude like this would be "entitlement".

Bottom line, the game was advertised and SOLD with this feature. Players purchased it with this feature. That should be enough to end this discussion right there.

Why has this comment gone completely ignored? One of GW1 player's biggest worries was loosing their names. Most of my names were names saved from my GW1 characters. Maybe that character that logged off 6 years ago after reaching lvl 2 still plays GW1 with the same name.