NAME PURGE, its about time...

[ugrakarma.9416]

I have luck these days and created a Conan themed name, Jhebbal Sag for my soulbeast was availiable!My Engineer is name Tannhauser Engineer, from Blade Runer quote.

[Game of Bones.8975]

Imagine you joined GW because of the F2P function, you get bored (or are in school, or have a family, or get deployed, or ... ) and step away for a while. When you are finally able to log in, half your character names are blank and you have multiple messages telling you "We told you we were going to erase your character names..."How would YOU feel?!? You can't tell me you would be happy and thrilled to be back to playing where you left off. You have a tie with that name and character. It is yours.

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

@Egrimm Van Horstmann.7921 said:There is a name solution, it's what should happen. If you pick a name already taken, there shouldn't be a problem for Anet to add a .number to the nameplate. So if there are two Laura Croft for instance one would have a .1 at the end of their name. Meaning Laura Croft and Laura Croft.1 would be easily separate. Now instead of the interface saying the name is already taken asking you if you're OK with .# added to name? If not then you'll have to rename the toon.

How is that materially different from modifying it yourself? Lara Croft, Laura Croft, Lauren Croft, Laren Croft, etc. Those names seem far better to me than Lara Croft.42 Plus, adding the .## makes it much harder to invite friends to your squad, because you have to remember the numbers as well as the name for /invite or /join to work. Imagine having three friends who are fans of Tomb Raider, each with two characters named Lara Croft.

In effect, this suggestion expects ANet to do more work (to create a new system and retrofit existing names into it) and it requires everyone else in the game to do more work (if only a modest amount), all because some people aren't willing to work to modify their restrictions on naming their own characters.

There are plenty of available names, even though there are plenty of claimed ones, too.

[Chickenooble.5014]

I never had an issue coming up with names. You guys need to be more creative or get in the game earlier.

[xikira.3264]

I never have issues coming up with names. I pretty much created a broad theme for myself and go with that theme. For example my main chracter is Potion Sella so all my alts are potion related names all my friends have nicknamed me potion. If you create themes it will help with making names for yourself.

[AstralDusk.1670]

Strange discussion.GW2 is one of the few games that let you use spaces in your name. Single-word names seem like such a painful limitation now.Embrace the space!

[Weindrasi.3805]

You say that all normal, non-pretentious names are taken and that the only options are fancy crap like "Marigoth Elentviel". I disagree, and I am curious what your definition of a "normal name" is. All this debate is pretty well pointless unless you define what you mean when you say normal name. I guess, if you're trying to name your character Bob, or Mary, or Carol... you're going to have an issue, yes. I concur with other people who suggest using a last name. You may have to search around a bit, but there are so many "normal" first names and "normal" last names that you're sure to find a combo that isn't taken. Go down a list of last names in the phone book... you're bound to find an un-taken "Joe Smith" name equivalent for your character

[STIHL.2489]

@Weindrasi.3805 said:You say that all normal, non-pretentious names are taken and that the only options are fancy crap like "Marigoth Elentviel". I disagree, and I am curious what your definition of a "normal name" is. All this debate is pretty well pointless unless you define what you mean when you say normal name. I guess, if you're trying to name your character Bob, or Mary, or Carol... you're going to have an issue, yes. I concur with other people who suggest using a last name. You may have to search around a bit, but there are so many "normal" first names and "normal" last names that you're sure to find a combo that isn't taken. Go down a list of last names in the phone book... you're bound to find an un-taken "Joe Smith" name equivalent for your characterGonna bet if they tried Bob, they would bounce on an NPC's name, as opposed to another players.

[Raolin Soulherder.3195]

@Corvus.2831 said:

@Kheldorn.5123 said:Well yes, as more characters are created, more names are taken. This is natural way of game getting older. You are not entitled to any name in the game.Exaclty why they should be released from inactive accounts. "YOU ARE NOT ENTITLED TO ANY NAME IN THE GAME." i win you loose can we do this then? since you agreed.

And mounts will never happen either right!?

They never said there will ever be mounts in game so your example is absolutely irrelevant. However, they clearly stated they are not going to purge "inactive" names and you are well aware of it and their reasoning. Your whining is going to change nothing, especially that you are getting more agressive with every post here.

I specificly remember they did say no mount becasue itll interfere with the events appearing etc. I am aware of their incorrect faulty reasoning. I dismantled it in the opening post. People who didnt play for 5 years are not active players. You cant argue that.

For someone that is worried about their character names sounding pretentious, your forum posts certainly sound pretentious.

[Elefym.2643]

@Willowfalls.9814 said:Unlock Instead of Purge:Maybe instead of a purge, just unlock the name for use after a period of say 5 years. At that point, if someone tries to use it, just add an "_X" or something to the old character's name and allow the new character to use the original name. That way, the original holder of the name would only lose it if someone else wants to use it.

The original user should never have the name appended with anything, it is after the original name recorded. A new user should have to append the name

[Egrimm Van Horstmann.7921]

Illconceived Was Na.9781

Right now naming isn't a problem for the most part, that acknowledged, I've also played WOW which with such a large player base this is a constant problem. People end up using special character if they know about the alt letters or they just come up with another name. The real problem many players find is that in creating the character they were aiming for a particular look to go with name and so name being last step means a lot of backtracking in character creation. For many this is a non issue, but for RP players this isn't that simple. So my suggestion is a solution open up a name if must have it with the .# addition vs making multiple attempts coming up empty. Which depending on your character can happen a lot. For some of my toons it took days to get the right name a look.

[Danikat.8537]

@Egrimm Van Horstmann.7921 said:

Illconceived Was Na.9781

Right now naming isn't a problem for the most part, that acknowledged, I've also played WOW which with such a large player base this is a constant problem. People end up using special character if they know about the alt letters or they just come up with another name. The real problem many players find is that in creating the character they were aiming for a particular look to go with name and so name being last step means a lot of backtracking in character creation. For many this is a non issue, but for RP players this isn't that simple. So my suggestion is a solution open up a name if must have it with the .# addition vs making multiple attempts coming up empty. Which depending on your character can happen a lot. For some of my toons it took days to get the right name a look.

I think it will take much longer for GW2 to reach a point where there are genuinely no acceptable names available. I just had a quick look and WoW's naming policies are much more restrictive. You cannot use spaces in a character name and you're not allowed to include titles like Lord or Professor, anything that can be read as a sentence, anything that looks too much like gibberish or any references to real-life (even on non-RP servers). They also only allow 12 characters rather than 19.

Right away that eliminates the two most common suggestions in this topic - add a title and add a surname.

I'd also be concerned about the 'no gibberish' policy. The guideline is that it should have an obvious pronunciation but that seems highly subjective, especially in an international game. (But then I've never played WoW so I don't know how strict they actually are with that.)

[Egrimm Van Horstmann.7921]

Initially with GW2 special characters aka alt characters were forbidden. When they opened that up it allowed a bit more names. I already use first and last a lot, sometimes even titles. The biggest problem I find is that many of the names with special characters are still taken. I can't make a Death character, my favorite character from discworld because special character or not all are taken. I get not wanting every character named the same, but characters such as this that don't have titles or surnames really restricts access to first come first serve, which isn't how an MMO should feel for players. I get there may be other Death's and it may be a common name, but the limit can be a tough one even with all of the avenues that one has.

[Holykitten.3064]

@"Egrimm Van Horstmann.7921" said:Initially with GW2 special characters aka alt characters were forbidden. When they opened that up it allowed a bit more names. I already use first and last a lot, sometimes even titles. The biggest problem I find is that many of the names with special characters are still taken. I can't make a Death character, my favorite character from discworld because special character or not all are taken. I get not wanting every character named the same, but characters such as this that don't have titles or surnames really restricts access to first come first serve, which isn't how an MMO should feel for players. I get there may be other Death's and it may be a common name, but the limit can be a tough one even with all of the avenues that one has.

The Discworld series sold 80 MILLION books. Chances are Death is hundreds and hundreds of thousands of fans favourite character. It still does not mean we need to change the naming situation since there are ways to get the name you want. Using your own methods, you'd use "Death One", or is your own method not good enough for you?

This restriction is purely the person themselves placing that restriction there.

[notebene.3190]

@Weindrasi.3805 said:You say that all normal, non-pretentious names are taken and that the only options are fancy crap like "Marigoth Elentviel". I disagree, and I am curious what your definition of a "normal name" is. All this debate is pretty well pointless unless you define what you mean when you say normal name. I guess, if you're trying to name your character Bob, or Mary, or Carol... you're going to have an issue, yes. I concur with other people who suggest using a last name. You may have to search around a bit, but there are so many "normal" first names and "normal" last names that you're sure to find a combo that isn't taken. Go down a list of last names in the phone book... you're bound to find an un-taken "Joe Smith" name equivalent for your character

I just think they meant that everyone who has a character with a first and last name obviously tried just the first name, and it was taken, so they put a last name on as a consolation prize. Marigoth Elentviel is not the 'real' Marigoth. The person who named their character Marigoth is the real one.

In my case, I realized in beta we could name characters with two names, and was pretty excited about it, as it was something I always wanted in a naming system for a game to be able to purposefully add a surname to my 'family' of characters so I just wouldn't have to deal with having taken names. Which ... is exactly what I did on launch day way back when. I never tried to name any of my characters without their family name.

I think it's weird to assume anyone with a last name was some sort of loser in a 'name off'. I think it's weird to think of naming a character as a competition. I guess that's Free Market NASCAR, or something.

[Holykitten.3064]

I think it's weird to assume anyone with a last name was some sort of loser in a 'name off'.

Agreed, I loved that I could have a space in the names, it sparked some creative names for my characters. I have two characters that are singular named, for my Sylvari, Valhearya. For my engineer Holokitty.

[Ghostt.1293]

xxxreaperxxx

[Endless Soul.5178]

I notice OP hasn't come back to this thread, maybe they were purged. ;)

[Danikat.8537]

@Haleydawn.3764 said:

@"Egrimm Van Horstmann.7921" said:Initially with GW2 special characters aka alt characters were forbidden. When they opened that up it allowed a bit more names. I already use first and last a lot, sometimes even titles. The biggest problem I find is that many of the names with special characters are still taken. I can't make a Death character, my favorite character from discworld because special character or not all are taken. I get not wanting every character named the same, but characters such as this that don't have titles or surnames really restricts access to first come first serve, which isn't how an MMO should feel for players. I get there may be other Death's and it may be a common name, but the limit can be a tough one even with all of the avenues that one has.

The Discworld series sold 80 MILLION books. Chances are Death is hundreds and hundreds of thousands of fans favourite character. It still does not mean we need to change the naming situation since there are ways to get the name you want. Using your own methods, you'd use "Death One", or is your own method not good enough for you?

This restriction is purely the person themselves placing that restriction there.

There's also Neil Gaiman's Sandman series where Death is a major character, that one is very popular with cosplayers (possibly because she just looks like a goth, making it and easy one to do) which I've found tends to indicate the character will be popular in MMOs too.

But there are numerous stories where Death is a character, plus mythology and folklore of course. Then there's people who simply want to call their character death because they think it sounds cool and/or appropriate.

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

@"Egrimm Van Horstmann.7921" said:

Illconceived Was Na.9781

Right now naming isn't a problem for the most part, that acknowledged, I've also played WOW which with such a large player base this is a constant problem. People end up using special character if they know about the alt letters or they just come up with another name. The real problem many players find is that in creating the character they were aiming for a particular look to go with name and so name being last step means a lot of backtracking in character creation. For many this is a non issue, but for RP players this isn't that simple. So my suggestion is a solution open up a name if must have it with the .# addition vs making multiple attempts coming up empty. Which depending on your character can happen a lot. For some of my toons it took days to get the right name a look.

The problem is that some folks have trouble finding available names because they have voluntarily restricted their creativity. Your suggestion requires ANet to do a lot of work and every player in the game to suffer some inconvenience to accommodate those who have chosen to limit their choice of names. This isn't an "RP vs non-RP" issue; this is a personal preference problem and it's not at all obvious that ANet should be the one to address rather than those who have that preference.

In particular, there are all sorts of Welsh & Gaelic names available to Sylvari, Scandanvian names available to Norn, misspelled portmanteaus available to Asura. It's hard to imagine having true difficulty naming humans & charr, both of whom enjoy combinations surname and forename in lore.

You mention the issue of naming being the last step in the biography. If that's a big issue for an individual, there is already an easy work-around: whisper the name before starting to design the character. If it's a big issue for the community, that's probably the least-effort adjustment ANet can make (simply changing the order of steps in the biography — I'm sure it's not as easy as it seems, but it is just primarily changing when the name reservation takes place).

In short, this isn't an issue unless individuals have limited their creativity. That suggests it is best solved by those imposing restrictions on themselves, rather than by requiring ANet or other players to go out of their way to accommodate those personal preferences.

PS off-topic, you can type @ and then begin to type an account name; that offers you a list of potential names as you type, and you can select the right one using up|down arrow keys and then [tab] to insert it. That counts as a 'mention' in the forum's notification process, in case you're interested in increasing the chance that the named person will see a particular response. (If you aren't, then perhaps it's best not to include the account name.)

[Zionka.6897]

The only part that bothers me with names, are characters I deleted... name no longer exists, right? Wrong.. deleted characters I wanted to use the names again for are unavailable. Messed up bad when they had the demo characters out. I thought of a name I loved, but couldn't make the real version of the demo one (which I also deleted). I totally agree inactive accounts should never lose anything. But cmon, a deleted character?

[Egrimm Van Horstmann.7921]

Haleydawn.3764

To me the name is as important as the character design, I'm going to be playing this game a lot. And the more I can immerse myself in the character the more fun it is.

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

@Zionka.6897 said:The only part that bothers me with names, are characters I deleted... name no longer exists, right? Wrong.. deleted characters I wanted to use the names again for are unavailable. Messed up bad when they had the demo characters out. I thought of a name I loved, but couldn't make the real version of the demo one (which I also deleted). I totally agree inactive accounts should never lose anything. But cmon, a deleted character?

Deleted characters are made available within 24 hours. ANet seem to have messed up recently with character names used during the demo. It's possible that someone else is using that name. An easy way to test this is to ask a friend to email the "character name" — if it goes to you, then it's still part of your account somehow (and worth a support ticket); if it doesn't, well, someone else grabbed your perfect name :(

[Just a flesh wound.3589]

@Zionka.6897 said:The only part that bothers me with names, are characters I deleted... name no longer exists, right? Wrong.. deleted characters I wanted to use the names again for are unavailable. Messed up bad when they had the demo characters out. I thought of a name I loved, but couldn't make the real version of the demo one (which I also deleted). I totally agree inactive accounts should never lose anything. But cmon, a deleted character?

If you’re talking about the last set of beta chars, they’re not deleted. They’re still there. You can see the names still on your char list on gw2efficiency. If you still want to use that name you can contact support and ask if they can either rename the char or delete it. If it’s not that, deleted char names are saved to your account for 24 hours. After that they are released for anybody to use. So you should not be getting a message, unless someone else took that name after the hold was up.

[Grimheart.2853]

@SlateSloan.3654 said:i see no problem anet allowing names of characters to exist more than once ingame. we have unique display names so every player is able to be identified anyways. if it was to avoid scamming on pvp trades, we trade through the tradingpost in gw2. the ingame mail system could be designed to work with the display names to ensure delivery to receiver. its up to the sender to decide and ensure to choose the right receiver. it ever was and is still that way today.

There used to be a lovely game once, called Neverwinter Online, which did pretty much that.

It allowed players to give their characters names that were in posession of other characters. You only had to come up with a unique account name and it was used as the primary player identificator, even shown in the chat.

That system allowed players to give their characters more or less generic names that could fit the setting and not force them to become somexT69xxx-'Markus'-'Faust'_-_xxx96Tx abomination just because their name is not "unique" enough. That had the potential of allowing the world to be filled with more organically named characters.

However for each organically or even just generically named character there was at least a dozen of Legolases, Drizzt Do Urdens and Kiritos. Needless to say a system that had such good intentions, managed to make it even worse from a certain perspective.

So, in the end, having such a system would give a bit more freedom to having to come up with an organic name for a character to some people, and then also unleash the plague of unispired stupidity.

The question is can the obscure positive aspect really outweight the obvious negative?