[Suggestion] Lock system

[Radnor.4185]

Less than 48 hours ago, I cleaned a character I wanted to delete, passed all my itens (two full ascended armor sets, 10 ascended trinkets, 4 ascended weapons, 12 superior runes and 4 superior sigils) to my main character. Since my human character look all alike and have similar names, I deleted my main character by mistake and realized only about 24 hours later.

 

I, then, completely freaked out, went to support, where I was informed they could not restore my character, which probably every player agrees that's bs. Regardless of that, the GM that helped me, managed to reduce my loss of about 900g to about 700~750g (work for which I'm grateful), not to mention the countless hours of gameplay and different kinds of farming.

 

So, for that this situation never occurs with another player, I suggest that a lock system gets implemented, just a big padlock in every character screen. When a player decides that he/she will never delete said character, he clicks on the lock, which prevents an accidental deletion. Most players probably don't care about this amount of gold, but I'm certain that for several player like myself, who have nothing but time to put in the game, this would be a grateful change.

Edited August 17, 2022 by Radnor.4185

[Linken.6345]

It is a good idea, kinda sad they discontinued the restore character option to be honest.

Lost a glyph in my permanent tool because of it and now never use them on key run characters anymore.

They can see the tools but not what glyph is inside them.

[Shena Fu.5792]

you have to type the char's name before deletion. how can you mix up their names if they were so important?

[Linken.6345]

1 hour ago, Shena Fu.5792 said:

you have to type the char's name before deletion. how can you mix up their names if they were so important?

They said in the OP both looked alike and had similar names.

[disco.9302]

5 hours ago, Radnor.4185 said:

Less than 48 hours ago, I cleaned a character I wanted to delete, passed all my itens (two full ascended armor sets, 10 ascended trinkets, 4 ascended weapons, 12 superior runes and 4 superior sigils) to my main character. Since my human character look all alike and have similar names, I deleted my main character by mistake and realized only about 24 hours later.

 

I, then, completely freaked out, went to support, where I was informed they could not restore my character, which probably every player agrees that's bs. Regardless of that, the GM that helped me, managed to reduce my loss of about 900g to about 700~750g (work for which I'm grateful), not to mention the countless hours of gameplay and different kinds of farming.

 

So, for that this situation never occurs with another player, I suggest that a lock system gets implemented, just a big padlock in every character screen. When a player decides that he/she will never delete said character, he clicks on the lock, which prevents an accidental deletion. Most players probably don't care about this amount of gold, but I'm certain that for several player like myself, who have nothing but time to put in the game, this would be a grateful change.

would adding a "lock" even do anything in the long run?

it's just another layer and if you managed to delete the wrong character once, a lock probably won't do much. 

it's the same as deleting items from inventory, a lot of the time people are quick to click the "are you sure?" prompt before reading it. One more prompt is unlikely to save you if the previous system was insufficient. 

in your case, I'm sure you won't need it anyway since your experience will be enough to make you sufficiently cautious.

[ugrakarma.9416]

if i was to delete a character, i will check even the bags, to if is the sellable 2g~5g bags.

Edited August 17, 2022 by ugrakarma.9416
*i will see if

[fatihso.7258]

Lock system may help as it's been a long time feature in some games and genres.

I would also include an automated trash bin system (as in BDO), where you can see a 'recent' list of valuable items and characters you deleted with a deadline to restore on will. Various limits and conditons apply per month to keep it fair and simple.

This could also ease the work of Support team.

Edited August 19, 2022 by fatihso.7258

[SuavePuppy.2809]

Isn't having to type the character's name out a lock system that already exists? 

[DD39C89C-1C46-4F28-BDB7-49]

On 8/17/2022 at 10:47 AM, disco.9302 said:

would adding a "lock" even do anything in the long run?

it's just another layer and if you managed to delete the wrong character once, a lock probably won't do much. 

it's the same as deleting items from inventory, a lot of the time people are quick to click the "are you sure?" prompt before reading it. One more prompt is unlikely to save you if the previous system was insufficient. 

in your case, I'm sure you won't need it anyway since your experience will be enough to make you sufficiently cautious.

It would be different.

Inventory requires confirmation for a lot of items, a lot of them is unimportant, making this confirmation to be ignored.

A pad-lock for a character would be personally chosen, so confirmation wouldn't be so common. When a warning about permanent character appears, you would re-check before switching lock off. A warning pop-up shouldn't allow to turn lock off, you would need to switch lock where you enabled it.

[Sobx.1758]

48 minutes ago, SuavePuppy.2809 said:

Isn't having to type the character's name out a lock system that already exists? 

Yup, seems that's exactly what it is. If OP had all characters locked by default (because he was playing them at the time), he might have as well just unlocked the one he mistakenly deleted -exactly the same way he did type out the name for a wrong character and still deleted it.

OP, next time make sure to remove outfit (because I assume you were wearing one) from the character you want to delete and only delete "naked" one. Seems like an easy check.

[Sinmir.6504]

I don't know if another layer would do much. I have a slot that I use to make a character every week to do the level 10 story and get a new BL key.

Other than that I start a character, thinking it sounds like a great concept at the time. No intention of deleting. A lot I never have deleted, others, I've thought, "Yeah... what was I thinking." Delete and make a new one. Still, I never intended to delete  them later when I made them. Maybe I'd have locked them in, then unlocked and deleted. The only ones I wouldn't considder locking would be the one I'm using to get a key that week.

If you had given your character two full sets of ascended armour then at the time there was a good chance you were intending to keep them. Maybe back then you would have locked them in. Then unlock them and delete when you changed your mind.

Though maybe they could give a warning after typing in the character's name if there is reason to believe it could be a mistake, just a yes or no option. I'd say this warning should pop up if the character has anything in inventory or equipped that you would need to type in the name of the item to destroy. "This character is carrying [list of items] Do you still wish to delete?" Yes or No. You see a full set of ascended equipment. Click No. Maybe also a warning if the character has the highest of any crafting stat. "This character has 500 Huntsman, this is the highest Huntsman crafting on this account. Do you wish to delete?"

[DD39C89C-1C46-4F28-BDB7-49]

5 hours ago, Sobx.1758 said:

If OP had all characters locked by default (because he was playing them at the time), he might have as well just unlocked the one he mistakenly deleted -exactly the same way he did type out the name for a wrong character and still deleted it.

OP, next time make sure to remove outfit (because I assume you were wearing one) from the character you want to delete and only delete "naked" one. Seems like an easy check.

Lock option could be edited after log-in as a character, so you would clearly see which one you switching. But removing armor seems to be a workaround for lack of it.

4 hours ago, Sinmir.6504 said:

I'd say this warning should pop up if the character has anything in inventory or equipped that you would need to type in the name of the item to destroy. "This character is carrying [list of items]

That's good idea and it was proposed before in some thread. Confirmations should provide additional info, so list of items or other statistics about a character.

[Ashen.2907]

First, OP I am sorry for you. I am sure it sucks. 

That said, there is a point where we have to acknowledge that we cant bubblewrap the world to prevent people from making mistakes. We already have layers of protection to reduce the chance of making mistakes with character and equipment deletion. What would be next, multipart phone verification if you decide to unlock a character? Then a dna test to submit for the phone verification? Then a court submitted legal document, to be approved by a judge, to be able to submit the dna test to be able to access phone authentication to unlock the account to be able to type in the character's full name, to click on yes? It would suck to have to take a week off work in order to delete an unwanted account bound minipet.

Edited August 19, 2022 by Ashen.2907

[Khisanth.2948]

On 8/17/2022 at 2:53 AM, Linken.6345 said:

They said in the OP both looked alike and had similar names.

On the one hand a locking feature is good.

On the other hand OP's situation sounds like someone scattering rakes into a room and then tried walking through it in the dark. 🤣

[Danikat.8537]

This is one reason I always remove everything a character is wearing before deleting them.

It's easier to make sure the hero panel and their inventory is empty than to check if anything that's still equipped is something I wanted to keep or could salvage/sell, working through the process of clearing everything off the character makes me think about what I'm doing and it's very obvious the naked character is definitely the one I wanted to delete.

[Elden Arnaas.4870]

When I delete key runners, I take everything out of their inventory, verify that their inventory is empty, put them in an outfit, and dye it bright red.
Then I pull up the inventory once again to verify.(make sure you check bags have been removed from bag slots, and gather tools have been removed form those slots) After the second verification I delete the character.

[Darkobra.6439]

PEBCAK.

[DD39C89C-1C46-4F28-BDB7-49]

15 hours ago, Ashen.2907 said:

there is a point where we have to acknowledge that we cant bubblewrap the world to prevent people from making mistakes.

Normally you could be right, but it needs to be compared broader.

There is a lot of unnecessary confirmations, for example for daily limited items, "you can buy 1 piece a day, are you sure to buy".

It should be constant, it's misleading to bubblewrap one thing and other not so much.

[Cyninja.2954]

On 8/17/2022 at 5:20 AM, Radnor.4185 said:

So, for that this situation never occurs with another player, I suggest that a lock system gets implemented, just a big padlock in every character screen.

How do you know that you would not have simply removed the lock before deleting the wrong character though? You are assuming that you would have had 1 of both characters locked and the other not.

The current system already expects the player to put in the exact name of the character which is supposed to get deleted and confirm.

I'm not opposed to having a lock system, it's after all another hurdle in the way of making a significant decision. I do not have that high faith though that this would prevent or solve the issue at hand significantly. The main reason for these mistakes is carelessness and while increasing the amount of hoops can have an effect, usually careless actions continue on until they are resolved.

On a more personal note some advice: it's been barely 2 weeks since you made a post about making another careless mistake: https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/topic/118943-suggestion-isnt-it-time-to-stop-having-things-block-behind-a-single-content/?tab=comments#comment-1721740

maybe you should slow down or double check more when you make significant decisions. That or expect to run into these situations a lot more often.

Sorry for your loss in character though, I know that can really suck. 😔 At least the GM was able to somewhat help.

Edited August 20, 2022 by Cyninja.2954

[Sinmir.6504]

2 hours ago, DD39C89C-1C46-4F28-BDB7-49 said:

Normally you could be right, but it needs to be compared broader.

There is a lot of unnecessary confirmations, for example for daily limited items, "you can buy 1 piece a day, are you sure to buy".

It should be constant, it's misleading to bubblewrap one thing and other not so much.

That is something I never understood, a lot of the time it is something you'd deposit to material storage, then all your characters will have access to it. So why would I save buying it till later in the day?

[Khisanth.2948]

5 hours ago, DD39C89C-1C46-4F28-BDB7-49 said:

Normally you could be right, but it needs to be compared broader.

There is a lot of unnecessary confirmations, for example for daily limited items, "you can buy 1 piece a day, are you sure to buy".

It should be constant, it's misleading to bubblewrap one thing and other not so much.

Even though I do agree about having a locking option that is still a terrible argument. The solution to making a mistake is not to make more mistakes. The general solution to stupid prompts is to get rid of them not add more prompts for the sake of consistency.

 

4 hours ago, Cyninja.2954 said:

How do you know that you would not have simply removed the lock before deleting the wrong character though?

Especially in the OP's situation who seems to have made it difficult to distinguish one character from another.

 

[ASP.8093]

The problem with this suggestion is that most people are gonna "lock" all their characters and then the procedure is just "press an extra button" but it doesn't actually provide any more of a nudge to double-check things.

From Anet's side, I think the thing they can do to help you avoid mistakes is to pop up a fuller character summary on the delete screen: your character's name, class, total hero points or map completion percentage, and some listing showing the exotic/ascended gear they still have in their inventory or equipped.

From the players' side, though, folks really need to get in the habit of stripping their characters of valuables before they delete them anyway. And the last stage of that process is leaving your characters in their underwear or a silly outfit instead of just their normal-looking styles. Much, much harder to make mistakes then.

Edited August 20, 2022 by ASP.8093

[Ashen.2907]

6 hours ago, DD39C89C-1C46-4F28-BDB7-49 said:

Normally you could be right, but it needs to be compared broader.

There is a lot of unnecessary confirmations, for example for daily limited items, "you can buy 1 piece a day, are you sure to buy".

It should be constant, it's misleading to bubblewrap one thing and other not so much.

Sure, but the example given by the OP does require a confirmation. One more involved than just a yes button.

[Danikat.8537]

In theory this could be useful for me because the big distinction between characters for me isn't a main and alts but which I intend to be permanent and which are temporary. Some characters I make planning to keep them forever, others I make knowing I'll delete them one day. So the obvious use is to lock the permanent ones and keep the temporary ones unlocked.

But in practice it's not that simple. Sometimes I've changed my mind and deleted a permanent character and some of my temporary ones stay around for years. For example right now I have a character for a 'perma-death' challenge. I assume one day I'll kitten it up and have to delete her, but I'd hate for her to be deleted prematurely and there's always the chance she'll be the one where I get it right. (I still have a survivor character on my GW1 account who completed all the main campaigns in normal mode, EotN and a bunch of other stuff with zero deaths, I played her for years with the rule that if she ever died I'd delete her.)

So I suspect in practice it would be like other people have said: I'd lock all my characters (except maybe key runners) when I create them and only unlock them when I'm about to delete them, and then it becomes just another step in the deletion process, like typing out their name.

In this case I think it would be the same for the OP, since it sounds like this character wasn't one they'd made with the intention of deleting them. The only way I could see a lock helping in the situation they described is if they'd remembered to unlock the character when logging in to remove all their stuff. If they unlocked them after then presumably they'd have unlocked the wrong character just like they typed the wrong name in when deleting them.

[Doggie.3184]

A while back I asked for a "Favorite" option for character selection. It'd be great if I could save my main ones off to the side as the menu likes to rotate them all over the place. It could act like a lock as well 🙂 I'd like that too.