Irrelevant Hot Take

[firedragon.8953]

Given that first and last name combinations are allowed, and even some special characters to help with single name characters (sylvari, asura), I've rarely ever run into an issue that I couldn't claim a name I just thought up or tweaked a bit. Thinking of creative names is one of my favorite things to do, and I don't feel like I'm extremely limited. I think I've made 5 new named characters within the past year or so. 

That's just me I guess.

[Fleabite.7528]

A guildie of ours just returned after several years' absence. What right would someone have had to take his name and identity in the meantime?

 

There are infinite combinations available for those making new names.  No need to change. 

 

 

[codedbykush.2019]

I'm a HUGE no-no for this proposal and the first comment.

 

No to any proposal of "name decay".

 

Pick your original names.

[Danikat.8537]

10 hours ago, Zavijah.2695 said:

In FFXIV, if you don't even enter your house and interact with an item within a 30-45 day window, the house you paid millions for returns to the available cycle. So for perspectives sake, if you really value your identity, you'd bare minimum log in to the launcher that doesn't even require you to enter log in details. Get your daily login reward, then go on with your life.

Things like that (and subscription fees) are why until I found GW1 I thought MMOs weren't for me and I'd never be able to play them. Crazy as it might seem I have a life outside the game and sometimes that includes responsibilities which make it impractical or impossible to play on the schedule the developers have decided they want from me. I know I'm not the only one who sees the freedom to come and go as it suits you as one of the selling points of GW2 and I doubt I'm the only player they'd lose entirely if they implimented requirements like that.

 

10 hours ago, Kalocin.5982 said:

Only thing I agree with is free accounts that have been abandoned, other than that I like the luxury of taking a break for as long as I dang feel like. That's the primary reason why I can even fit GW2 in with other games to be honest

While that sounds fair in theory how do you distinguish between an account that's been abandoned and somene who is taking a break? Should players have to pay for the right to take a break without losing their character names?

 

9 hours ago, ASP.8093 said:

Seems much more productive to raise the name length cap by 5-6 letters than to set up this whole elaborate system for punishing people who don't log on enough.

 

(And between the pandemic and the expansion, there have been a *lot* of lapsed players returning after *multiple years away* — they deserve respect and consideration, too.)

This one I would support, if it's possible. I wanted to call a character Rinkhal Stormbringer and couldn't, because it's 20 letters long. That was far more frustrating to me than finding out a name has already been taken.

 

2 hours ago, Teratus.2859 said:

So I have to strongly disagree with you on both those points.. using your imagination isn't very useful advise for those who are struggling with names.
Speaking as someone with 23 characters I know personally how annoying and difficult it can be to get fitting names.

Would you be interested in some advice from someone who has made hundreds of characters over the years and very rarely has trouble finding available names? (Today's was a white, mushroom headed sylvari necromancer called Amainita.)

 

If my first choice is taken I'd try one or more of these:

• Change the spelling - This probably works best with real names (which often have variant spellings) or names that don't include real words, but it could work with anything.
• Add an accent - Using é or è instead of e can give you a lot of options (and there's a lot of other accents available). People famililar with languages other than English may pronounce the name differently because of the accent, but if that's a concern you can probably pick one which fits the pronounciation you want anyway (so it actually makes it clearer).
• Use a synonym - if the name means something use a different word to get the same meaning. e.g. Elias Windstrider to Elias Windwalker.
• Use a different language - Again this probably works best with meaningful names, look up the same words or meanings in other languages and pick one which looks good or seems appropriate.
• Add a last name - If you're strict about the lore all charr should have warband names and humans and norn can have family names.
• Add a title - This could be one you know the character will get during the story like Valiant or Agent, one which fits their backstory, one you'd like them to have, or a 'nickname' style title like 'The Brave' or 'Deadly'. Job titles are used by all the races, nickname titles are common among norn (commemorating their achievements) but are used by all races - for example there's an asura called Klakka the Brain. (There's also an asura called Kryzz Fizzleban, I'm not sure if that's a nickname, a last name or a title, but he's working with charr in Ascalon so it could even be that he's joined a warband.)
• Make their entire name a nickname or title - This is a new one to my list, inspired by finding the asura Sharky Longears. It would work for any race though and would be particularly good for characters with a backstory or who you intend to RP. Maybe they've stopped using their birth name all together and go by something else now, in which case it doesn't have to follow any of the races naming conventions and could be a fun conversation starter. It also works for joke character names.

 

Finally you could combine one or more of the above. I've rarely found that necessary to get an available name but it can help get to one you really like.

Edited August 14, 2021 by Danikat.8537

[Tyncale.1629]

I say no. I have a lot of Alt accounts and many characters spread out over them and I have all named them fitting for a Fantasy world without any problems.  Well, some are named after  the cats I have had in life, but that is what you get when there is a Charr race in the game.  I guess some people really identify themselves with a certain name, and are not really willing to change a single syllable but I do not think such entitlement to a name will fly in a MMO.  

 

Also the combinations are endless, go check one of those (fantasy) name generators, they are great.  

 

As to the many characters: I play pretty much all of them from time to time.  Once I hit my personal cap on my Main account, I was missing the character- and more so, the account-progress(Masteries).  So all accounts have already hit over 1000 AP,  some of them already past 3k. I just love playing in the open world and do various tasks, collections and Events so this does not feel like a grind or repetition at all to me.  However, I do not consider grinding gold to get all the Black Lion Collections to be progress. If that were so then my Main account would have been good to go for the next 1734 years. 

Edited August 14, 2021 by Tyncale.1629

[Teratus.2859]

1 hour ago, Danikat.8537 said:

If my first choice is taken I'd try one or more of these:

• Change the spelling - This probably works best with real names (which often have variant spellings) or names that don't include real words, but it could work with anything.
• Add an accent - Using é or è instead of e can give you a lot of options (and there's a lot of other accents available). People famililar with languages other than English may pronounce the name differently because of the accent, but if that's a concern you can probably pick one which fits the pronounciation you want anyway (so it actually makes it clearer).
• Use a synonym - if the name means something use a different word to get the same meaning. e.g. Elias Windstrider to Elias Windwalker.
• Use a different language - Again this probably works best with meaningful names, look up the same words or meanings in other languages and pick one which looks good or seems appropriate.
• Add a last name - If you're strict about the lore all charr should have warband names and humans and norn can have family names.
• Add a title - This could be one you know the character will get during the story like Valiant or Agent, one which fits their backstory, one you'd like them to have, or a 'nickname' style title like 'The Brave' or 'Deadly'. Job titles are used by all the races, nickname titles are common among norn (commemorating their achievements) but are used by all races - for example there's an asura called Klakka the Brain. (There's also an asura called Kryzz Fizzleban, I'm not sure if that's a nickname, a last name or a title, but he's working with charr in Ascalon so it could even be that he's joined a warband.)
• Make their entire name a nickname or title - This is a new one to my list, inspired by finding the asura Sharky Longears. It would work for any race though and would be particularly good for characters with a backstory or who you intend to RP. Maybe they've stopped using their birth name all together and go by something else now, in which case it doesn't have to follow any of the races naming conventions and could be a fun conversation starter. It also works for joke character names.

 

Finally you could combine one or more of the above. I've rarely found that necessary to get an available name but it can help get to one you really like.

Heard it all before dude.

It doesn't change the fact that it's still unnecessary and unrealistic to limit names like this.
There's a million people out there that share my real name, should I start an online campaign to force them to change their names so that I can be the only one with my name?
Should Doctors be telling the parents of newborns that they can't name their kid that because it's someone elses name?
It's an absurd notion lol.

It all simply comes down to needlessly restricting peoples freedom of choice, there just isn't a good reason why multiple people can't have/use the same name.
The mechanical restrictions can be fixed/changed as a big quality of life change, and with so many dead/inactive accounts plus new people coming from other games etc (specially with a new expansion coming and certain others games that I won't name suffering colossal player losses right now) it's a benefit that I believe is worth doing so that people don't have to deal with such pointless annoyances and can use whatever names they wish.

I see this kind of change as an everyone wins scenario.
The only people I guess who won't win though are people who are extremely hung up on the idea that they and only they can have their name.. nobody else is allowed to.
I honestly can't understand such attitudes though..

Edited August 14, 2021 by Teratus.2859

[Sobx.1758]

7 hours ago, Teratus.2859 said:

It wouldn't rule it out, but it would certainly discourage it.

Huh. No, it's not that "it wouldn't rule it out", but it would spawn more of the same repeated ones. For some reason you think those names are because people can't pick anything else, but that's just false.

 

 

[Chichimec.9364]

3 hours ago, Teratus.2859 said:

Heard it all before dude...It all simply comes down to needlessly restricting peoples freedom of choice, there just isn't a good reason why multiple people can't have/use the same name...
 

There's an old libertarian saying that I don't hear much anymore but that I still really like. "Your freedom ends where my nose begins." You are saying that it is a restriction of your freedom because you can't take something that under the current rules of the game belongs to someone else. In real life you don't have the "freedom" to take something that belongs to somebody else, (unless you are the government of course). So I don't see this as a restriction of your "freedom", just a rule that you can't take other people's stuff.

And I can think of a couple of reasons why multiple people shouldn't use the same name. For one, I play WvW a lot and when I jump into that game mode, I'll look for a tag that I'm familiar with, a commander I know is good. It takes time to become recognized as a good commander there. If anyone could use that commander's name, the opportunities for confusion and/or mischief are obvious. On a related note, if I ticked off someone ingame and they could use my name, the trolling opportunities are also obvious. Personally, I haven't heard anything yet that persuades me the current system needs to be changed.
 

[Chichimec.9364]

5 hours ago, Danikat.8537 said:

If my first choice is taken I'd try one or more of these:

• Change the spelling - This probably works best with real names (which often have variant spellings) or names that don't include real words, but it could work with anything.
• Add an accent - Using é or è instead of e can give you a lot of options (and there's a lot of other accents available). People famililar with languages other than English may pronounce the name differently because of the accent, but if that's a concern you can probably pick one which fits the pronounciation you want anyway (so it actually makes it clearer).
• Use a synonym - if the name means something use a different word to get the same meaning. e.g. Elias Windstrider to Elias Windwalker.
• Use a different language - Again this probably works best with meaningful names, look up the same words or meanings in other languages and pick one which looks good or seems appropriate.
• Add a last name - If you're strict about the lore all charr should have warband names and humans and norn can have family names.
• Add a title - This could be one you know the character will get during the story like Valiant or Agent, one which fits their backstory, one you'd like them to have, or a 'nickname' style title like 'The Brave' or 'Deadly'. Job titles are used by all the races, nickname titles are common among norn (commemorating their achievements) but are used by all races - for example there's an asura called Klakka the Brain. (There's also an asura called Kryzz Fizzleban, I'm not sure if that's a nickname, a last name or a title, but he's working with charr in Ascalon so it could even be that he's joined a warband.)
• Make their entire name a nickname or title - This is a new one to my list, inspired by finding the asura Sharky Longears. It would work for any race though and would be particularly good for characters with a backstory or who you intend to RP. Maybe they've stopped using their birth name all together and go by something else now, in which case it doesn't have to follow any of the races naming conventions and could be a fun conversation starter. It also works for joke character names.

 

Finally you could combine one or more of the above. I've rarely found that necessary to get an available name but it can help get to one you really like.

Thank you for some very practical suggestions on how to come up with a unique name. I honestly can't understand the attitude of people who refuse to use some creativity but instead demand the freedom to take other people's names.

[Cyninja.2954]

The problem with change is:

any decision or change will always upset someone.

 

As such, any change or diverging from an established situation should bring more benefit than detriment.

 

Opening up names, or even making names not unique and tied to account, are only of use to:

- new characters made

which by its self is a very niche group. Even among this group, there will be those which have no issues with making coming up with a name within the 19 characters provided, thus not gaining any added benefit, reducing the benefiting group even more.

 

Affected are all the players though, no matter if they care or not.

 

Seems a very small beneficiary group of players at the cost of a very large mandatory benefactor group.

 

TL;DR:

If you can't come up with a name you like with 19 characters allowed, that is a you issue.

[Cyninja.2954]

 

4 hours ago, Teratus.2859 said:

I see this kind of change as an everyone wins scenario.

It's a deviation from a status quo state. As such by definition it is unlikely to be an everyone wins scenario.

 

In fact the only players "winning" anything here are the, and let me quote you:

Quote

are people who are extremely hung up on the idea that they

absolutely need a specific name.

 

Quote

The only people I guess who won't win though are people who are extremely hung up on the idea that they and only they can have their name.. nobody else is allowed to.
I honestly can't understand such attitudes though..

 

I have 35 characters. The latest 2 were created not even 1 month ago. I had absolutely no issue coming up with names for them, without accents or weird spelling, given the 19 characters I had available. Then again, I was creative enough and not hung up on having to have a specific name, rather only one which fit the character I was making.

Edited August 14, 2021 by Cyninja.2954

[Teratus.2859]

7 minutes ago, Chichimec.9364 said:

There's an old libertarian saying that I don't hear much anymore but that I still really like. "Your freedom ends where my nose begins." You are saying that it is a restriction of your freedom because you can't take something that under the current rules of the game belongs to someone else. In real life you don't have the "freedom" to take something that belongs to somebody else, (unless you are the government of course). So I don't see this as a restriction of your "freedom", just a rule that you can't take other people's stuff.

And I can think of a couple of reasons why multiple people shouldn't use the same name. For one, I play WvW a lot and when I jump into that game mode, I'll look for a tag that I'm familiar with, a commander I know is good. It takes time to become recognized as a good commander there. If anyone could use that commander's name, the opportunities for confusion and/or mischief are obvious. On a related note, if I ticked off someone ingame and they could use my name, the trolling opportunities are also obvious. Personally, I haven't heard anything yet that persuades me the current system needs to be changed.
 

Names are hardly the same as personal property 😛 (and no I don't believe a government has any right to take anything from anybody, those be fighting words to me lol)

There's more to an identity than just a name though, even in games you'd have the display name.
A troll maybe able to copy your character name, even your looks but they cannot take your display name, all reports they get will be against their account not yours.

Sure I'll admit that there would be a little room for some to mess around with people but I don't think it would be as bad as you may think it would.

[Teratus.2859]

1 hour ago, Sobx.1758 said:

Huh. No, it's not that "it wouldn't rule it out", but it would spawn more of the same repeated ones. For some reason you think those names are because people can't pick anything else, but that's just false.

 

 

It's not so much they can't pick anything else, it's that they shouldn't have to skip over a name they really want or pick a name they don't want just because of some silly restriction that doesn't need to exist.

[Chichimec.9364]

28 minutes ago, Teratus.2859 said:

(and no I don't believe a government has any right to take anything from anybody, those be fighting words to me lol)

Now there we would be in complete agreement.  🙂

On a different note, one of the things GW2's name guidelines has done was turning me into something of a minor name collector. For example, I love hammer swinging revenants. So here's a few of the possibilities from my name notebook:

• War Hammer (Latin): Bellum Malleo
• Warhammer (Latin): Imperium
• Hammer of God (Latin): Dei Malleo
• Hammer of Light (Latin): Luminis Malleo
  
  For elementalists, some of the possibilities in that notebook include:
  Ignis Dei (Latin) - Fire of God
• Deorum Ignis (Latin) - Fire of the Gods
• Igneus (Latin) - fiery, of fire, burning, igneous, flammeous, ardent
• Flamma Deorum (Latin) - Flame of the Gods
• Numen Procellas (Latin) - Goddess of Storms
  
  I prefer Latin because if I use a modern language, someone in map chat inevitably starts talking to me in that language and I have to explain that no, I really don't speak Spanish, French, or whatever.  🙂

Edited August 14, 2021 by Chichimec.9364

[Teratus.2859]

4 minutes ago, Cyninja.2954 said:

 

It's a deviation from a status quo state. As such by definition it is unlikely to be a everyone wins scenario.

 

In fact the only players "winning" anything here are the, and let me quote you:

absolutely need a specific name.

 

 

I have 35 characters. The latest 2 were created not even 1 month ago. I had absolutely no issue coming up with names for them, without accents or weird spelling, given the 19 characters I had available. Then again, I was creative enough and not hung up on having to have a specific name, rather only one which fit the character I was making.

How much value do you put into those names though?

For me the name matters more than anything when I create a character.
In fact almost all of my characters are designed around a name before I even enter the character creation.
I've had many characters (always Sylvari and Asura) completely scrapped as a result due to a taken name and the inability to find an alternative that fits the specific character I have in mind.

The name quite literally defines the personality and traits (build/appearance) of some of my characters.. 

Sure you can easily argue that it's my own fault, my own restrictions that are the problem, I won't disagree with that.
But it doesn't matter, I value names a lot more than most do.. it's important to how I enjoy games, especially RPG's and it matters to how much value and attachment I place in my characters.
If the name doesn't fit the character is destined for a delete so why even bother making it unless it's exactly what I want?

You may be comfortable using symbols, titles and accents in your names but i'm not, it annoys me when such things are forced and it quite literally spoils the RPG experience for me.
That's why I delete such characters and think up a whole new one instead, if anything that takes more imagination on my part than just settling with an undesirable name.

[Teratus.2859]

3 minutes ago, Chichimec.9364 said:

Now there we would be in complete agreement.  🙂

On a different note, one of the things GW2's name guidelines has done was turning me into something of a minor name collector. For example, I love hammer swinging revenants. So here's a few of the possibilities from my name notebook:

• - War Hammer (Latin): Bellum Malleo
• - Warhammer (Latin): Imperium
• - Hammer of God (Latin): Dei Malleo
• - Hammer of Light (Latin): Luminis Malleo
  
  For elementalists, some of the possibilities in that notebook include:
  - Ignis Dei (Latin) - Fire of God
• - Deorum Ignis (Latin) - Fire of the Gods
• - Igneus (Latin) - fiery, of fire, burning, igneous, flammeous, ardent
• - Flamma Deorum (Latin) - Flame of the Gods
• - Numen Procellas (Latin) - Goddess of Storms
  
  I prefer Latin because if I use a modern language, someone in map chat inevitably starts talking to me in that language and I have to explain that no, I really don't speak Spanish, French, or whatever.  🙂

Haha can certainly say i've had a few foreign whispers due to one of my characters having a name that sounds like something in their native language XD
Can be a bit awkward when they don't understand English too good.

I do tend to shy away from using too many foreign influences though in part for that reason but also due to verbal harmony.. aka my inability as a purely English speaker to pronounce them accurately, adequately and elegantly XD
I'm severely aware of this flaw due to having been trying to adopt a second language and oh boy do I butcher it horrendously lmao

[Astralporing.1957]

16 hours ago, Zavijah.2695 said:

In FFXIV, if you don't even enter your house and interact with an item within a 30-45 day window, the house you paid millions for returns to the available cycle.

First, it's a game with subscription, so of course it would want people to keep those subs up. Second, the abovementioned restriction is a result of a very limited house availability. Most people that want a house and can afford it cannot even get one, because there's none available. So, the game does have an incentive to introduce a decay system here - at least until they'll eventually manage to solve the limited availability issue, which they are thinking about.

[notebene.3190]

Legolas Ignatowski

Legolas From Sales

Dr Legolas

Lego My Egolas

Legolasland

Trip Mcneely

Richard Ironnodes

Herb Clusters

[nosleepdemon.1368]

It's a bit tricky because while people can have the same name IRL, it's not something that's easy to change for the sake of trolling. In GW2 you need only make a new character to use someone else's name who you don't like and cause all sorts of confusion. Name decay won't work either, since players of those old accounts might come back. No doubt there are throwaway accounts taking up some names, but honestly how many of those do you suppose have names that anyone would want? It'd be easier to allow the use of special characters or numbers tbh.

[hudisgreat.8492]

Just in case there are not enough no's in this thread, here's mine. No.

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

3 hours ago, Teratus.2859 said:

How much value do you put into those names though?

For me the name matters more than anything when I create a character.
In fact almost all of my characters are designed around a name before I even enter the character creation.
I've had many characters (always Sylvari and Asura) completely scrapped as a result due to a taken name and the inability to find an alternative that fits the specific character I have in mind.

The name quite literally defines the personality and traits (build/appearance) of some of my characters.. 

Sure you can easily argue that it's my own fault, my own restrictions that are the problem, I won't disagree with that.
But it doesn't matter, I value names a lot more than most do.. it's important to how I enjoy games, especially RPG's and it matters to how much value and attachment I place in my characters.
If the name doesn't fit the character is destined for a delete so why even bother making it unless it's exactly what I want?

You may be comfortable using symbols, titles and accents in your names but i'm not, it annoys me when such things are forced and it quite literally spoils the RPG experience for me.
That's why I delete such characters and think up a whole new one instead, if anything that takes more imagination on my part than just settling with an undesirable name.

You might consider checking if the name already exists (in-game) before making a character you will ultimately delete.  Save yourself some time.

[Linken.6345]

11 minutes ago, Inculpatus cedo.9234 said:

You might consider checking if the name already exists (in-game) before making a character you will ultimately delete.  Save yourself some time.

True since after creation then deletion they have 24 hours to come up with a character for it, if I remember right

[Dante.1763]

1 minute ago, Linken.6345 said:

True since after creation then deletion they have 24 hours to come up with a character for it, if I remember right

Its exactly 24 hours 🙂

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

5 minutes ago, Linken.6345 said:

True since after creation then deletion they have 24 hours to come up with a character for it, if I remember right

Not sure what this has to do with anything.

If the person (quoted) spent a lot of time 'creating' the character, and then had to scrap (delete) it because the name they had wanted wasn't available (and could not come up with another name they liked), there would be no name 'saved for 24 hours'.

 

My suggestion was to check for the name, in-game, before spending time 'creating' the character.

[Westenev.5289]

If you want help making a lore friendly or themed name, plenty of people are willing to help with that. You'd really be surprised what names are still free.

 

I just wish there was an easier way to check usernames avalability before I "create" the character.

Edited August 14, 2021 by Westenev.5289