I play on an RP server and I don't think we need any special policing on them.

And it always amazes me how many think there are no naming rules in the game.

There are.

These are the rules in case someone (apparantly everyone) missed them:

Those rules apply to all servers, not just RP servers.

But the thing is that there is nobody actively policing these rules (ie. going around in-game looking for names that break the rules).

If you see a name that breaks the rules, report it.

It might take a while for anything to happen (if it happens at all, just because you don't like a name doesn't mean it violates the rules) since this isn't exactly at the top of the list when it comes to CS reports.

I have reported a number of names that violated the rules and I know for a fact that some of them have been adressed by biowares staff. (especially since I actually told one of the ones I reported and he later whispered to me that I was an ******* and they had made him change his name, which was so rude that I can't even write it here without it being censored by the forum).

So you have to be the one policing the naming policy. If you see a name that breaks the rules, feel free to report it.

Oh and for all of you who are going to respond to this saying "what do you care if someone breaks the rules, let people play the way they want", all I can say is; I would report someone pickpocketing or shoplifting as well, despite them not directly hurting me in any way.

EDIT: Oh and nowadays I just play with names turned off... That way I won't be taken right out of the games immersion when "xXxStarkillaxXx" walks infront of me.

I still report names that break the rules when I see them in chat tho.

So... that was a wall of whine OP. And it seems to me way off the mark. I have a few toons on an RP server just to RP and everything is just fine. In fact better than fine, I'm having a blast RP. But here are a few things that make the RP experience work well.

First, I don't go around analyzing names and trying to decided if they break immersion. I don't care about the names because frankly, if it is not someone I interact with it doesn't matter. And on that rare occasion that I do interact with someone named "Toothpaste" (and it is rare as most players names are RP worthy), it doesn't matter at all because that player is not part of my story. So get over it OP. Names are non-issue on an RP server because most names are perfectly acceptable.

Second, And this is what I don't get... why do you need RP areas? Any area is an RP instance if you choose to make it one. I am in a great guild. We have RP events all over the place and there various ways to do it. There are rooms in buildings on various different planets waiting to be used. All you have to do is use them. But you have to RP. Yup... sorry you have to actually RP when you use them.

And btw, using /say and /me works just fine. I don't need a speech bubble to RP. A speech bubble breaks immersion btw. I don't usually see speech bubbles in real life. Lol.

Bottom line, it seems to me you need to police yourself. That will go a long way in improving your RP experience.

I partially agree...i think that offensive names should be policed but that goes for RP and regular servers. Some of my RP names though border on the edge of 'breaks immersion'. But i could just as easily say that those names are what my frat buddies used to call me in Jedi college or that it was my stage name or gladiator name. If you see a Lord Herp'Derp just say to yourself that maybe it was a nickname given to him by his Sith Academy instructor since that player was such an idiot. Nicknames arent just self given, they can be given by other people too and they arent always good nicknames. Watch the first sequence of Full Metal Jacket where they meet their drill instructor for the first time: Joker, Cowboy, Snowball, Gomer Pyle? In case you've been living in a cave and have never seen that movie...Joker and Cowboy arent exactly bad nicknames, but in the movie a black guy was nicknamed Snowball and a dumb guy was nicknamed Gomer Pyle. That's all i do when i see a terrible name fly by me. I dont bother wasting a second of my time to put them on ignore, i just think to myself...yah back on Hutta that guy must have been the village idiot, then i continue on with my questing.

OR

Somebody a few posts up actually brought up a really good suggestion. If seeing that name above their head is immersion breaking, why not turn off ALL nameplates. You get rid of having to see silly names just while passing people by AND maybe you also add a little bit more to your RP immersion. You want to find out who that person is? then you interact with them by clicking on them and then talking to them. If i walk around and i see somebody familiar i would be all hey isnt that Jedi John from my guild? it looks like him because he's got on that outfit, let me go talk to him **clicks Jedi John and confirms that it is him**. See you guys could give that a try...or do you guys that like to RP only limit your RP interactions to sitting in a cantina and doing emotes?

I have to agree with the poster of this thread. There are plenty of PvE and PvP servers to roll on, if you have 0 interest in roleplaying please do NOT make a character there!!!!

I have 0 interest in roleplaying (in MMO's) but I still roll on RP servers because I find that they usually have a better quality of players than regular servers (or, I should say, better mannered players).

Telling everyone who doesn't roleplay to stay off RP servers is pretty short-sighted.

this is rich. The OP wants to get rid of people with his version of "stupid names" which are really names from other stuff that people are role-playing as ( on an RP server)

You can't honestly tell me that those people are 'roleplaying' as Spiderman, Sirfapsalot and Hulk Hogan. And if you, in fact, are telling me that, allow me to laugh in your face: Ahahahahahaha.

You can't honestly tell me that those people are 'roleplaying' as ... Sirfapsalot

In my experience, about 75% of pugs are roleplaying as that one.

In my experience, about 75% of pugs are roleplaying as that one.

Touché.

Oh please. That argument you're bringing there? Utterly worthless. There are many things one could argue are wrong about the OPs post, but the names he mentioned are all more or less unfitting, with the exception of maybe "Sithborn" which would work as a nickname.

 

You can't honestly tell me that those people are 'roleplaying' as Spiderman, Sirfapsalot and Hulk Hogan. And if you, in fact, are telling me that, allow me to laugh in your face: Ahahahahahaha.

I have seen a hulk Hogan actually, true that guys character looked hideous and was pretty much wearing only the bottoms of the cartel market male stripper stuff but it still counts....

and don't tell me that its not possible for a guy to create a character name and kind of imitate that name of whoever they choose

I have seen a hulk Hogan actually, true that guys character looked hideous and was pretty much wearing only the bottoms of the cartel market male stripper stuff but it still counts....

That makes him an elaborate joke character, but not a roleplayer. Do I honestly need to explain why?

You can't honestly tell me that those people are 'roleplaying' as Sirfapsalot

Challenge accepted...

I mentioned in post #29 that not all nicknames are good and they arent all self given. Again using the movie Full Metal Jacket as an example, one of the guys in the movie was nicknamed "Hand Job". Below is a quote from the movie which copied and pasted from IMDB.

Private Cowboy: Tough break for Hand Job. He was all set to get shipped out on a medical.

Private Joker: What was the matter with him?

Private Cowboy: He was jerkin' off ten times a day.

Private Eightball: No s***. At least ten times a day.

Private Cowboy: Last week he was sent down to Da Nang to see the Navy head shrinker, and the crazy f***** starts jerking off in the waiting room. Instant Section Eight. He was just waiting for his papers to clear division.

Now that doesnt mean that i approve of somebody rolling an SWTOR toon named 'sirfapsalot'. But i could easily explain it away using something similar to the above. That's what his all the other Padawan called him on Tython because he liked to **** a lot, or because of the way he handled his lightsaber i dunno. It's pretty easy to cry foul when somebody does something immersion breaking, but instead of QQing why not take it as a challenge and use it in your RP build your story around it? How would i explain away a Jedi or a Trooper named Hulk Hogan? his family name is Hogan and one time on Tython/Ord Mantell he was seen lifting a huge tree trunk that had fallen on a comrade, hence his new nickname 'Hulk Hogan'. Spiderman? he's a jedi/sith/trooper/whatever that likes to keep spiders as pets.

Of course those names are reportable anyways since one is mildly offensive and the other two are trademarked. But if you ignore the real world references and try to make up an explanation that fits within your RP session you could try to make it work. It's pretty obvious what people are trying to do when they pick names like those. But if you can take what they've done and turn it around or make it backfire now i think thats pretty funny. It doesnt matter if they intended to RP with that name or not, it's what you can do with their name to make it fit your RP.

There are no specific rules for RP servers. This isn't LotRO.

 

Only difference is that on non-RP servers people openly lol@RPers, while on RP servers the RPers have a retort "So why are you on a RP server?"

 

You can also report names like Spider-man (trademark violation), Sirfapsalot (offensive/vulgar), "Hulk Hogan" (trademark violation), on any server.

Using names such as spiderman or hulk hogan as a personal character name in a game DOES NOT amount to trademark infringement.

It might be against swtor's T&Cs though.

You misunderstood my argument. I wasn't saying that the name "Sirfapsalot" couldn't be explained, I was saying that it's unlikely that the guy playing the character created it with roleplay in mind. Therefore the argument "you are anti RP because you say that Sirfapsalot is a bad name" is a silly argument.

Ohh that...hmm yah i dont know if i would call it anti-rp to say that sirfapsalot is a bad name....more like pro-ToS

Trust me, it wouldn't. WoW has a naming policy for their RP servers and all that does is cause great anger amongst the RP community because, surprise, non-RPers are paying subscribers too, so Blizzard rather wouldn't alienate them. Meaning that the RP policies don't get enforced there either.

Non rping folks, whether they pay a sub or not, have pvp, and pve servers to choose from. They don't need to roll on a rp server, and if they go there with no regard to whether or not they're ruining others fun, then they're essentially trolls. They can quite easily roll on a pve or pvp server, and troll people with their names all they want. I don't care about what they do on WoW. I don't, and have never played WoW, so what they do is completely irrelevant to me.

Non rping folks, whether they pay a sub or not, have pvp, and pve servers to choose from. They don't need to roll on a rp server, and if they go there with no regard to whether or not they're ruining others fun, then they're essentially trolls. They can quite easily roll on a pve or pvp server, and troll people with their names all they want. I don't care about what they do on WoW. I don't, and have never played WoW, so what they do is completely irrelevant to me.

I completely agree with you there. However, that wasn't the point of my post. You said that a naming convention would help greatly - and my point was that, based on my experience in games that have exactly that, it wouldn't help. The problem isn't that such rules don't exist, but that there would be no interest in enforcing them.

Yes, it would be nice to have those rules. Yes, it would be nice to have Bioware policing RP Servers and enforcing said rules.

But realistically that won't happen.

Another nostalgia moment here but, naming does have significance with trolls. Everquest 1 would flash a gamewide system message when someone dueled someone, you would be minding your business then "Soandso has defeated Sooandso in a duel to the death!" Flashed your chat. So trolls being trolls, a guy named himself "Muthafurka" and yep, you guessed it, dueled as much as he possibly could.

The servers lead GM renamed him Daisy eventually which was funny, but still it took a while for him to be nabbed.

I completely agree with you there. However, that wasn't the point of my post. You said that a naming convention would help greatly - and my point was that, based on my experience in games that have exactly that, it wouldn't help. The problem isn't that such rules don't exist, but that there would be no interest in enforcing them.

Yes, it would be nice to have those rules. Yes, it would be nice to have Bioware policing RP Servers and enforcing said rules.

But realistically that won't happen.

Well we agree on the fundamental things, that's whats important. I still think it couldn't hurt though to put in a naming convention so that stupid/silly/troll names don't interfere with the immersion of people who are dedicated rp'ers of star wars.

Like you say, rules and enforcement would be nice, but not likely to happen. It's just unfortunate that some people lack basic human consideration for what other people might enjoy. The way I see it, there are plenty of server types to accommodate what people like to do, and no need to interfere with or bother those who prefer other modes of play.

I switched from RP server to a regular server back before there was transfers because of the horrid names and conditions on the RP server I was on.

Actually found there to be less anti RP players on the normal server.

EAs lack of enforcement seemed to open the door for every anti RP troll to roll up oin the RP server, just so they could complain about people RPing.

Now a days I just put stupid names on ignore

Dont speak to them

Dont interact with them

Dont play with them

I figure they know their name is stupid and that tells me more then enough about their personality that there is no need to move forward beyond that stage.

And thanks to the in game rule set that you never get grouped through group finder with someone on your ignore list. I never have to listen or put up with them.

Stupid naming isn't so much a RP issue as a indication of how low they set the bar for themselves.

I know I'm far far far from only one that does that to.

You got to wonder if those people understand the reason they sit in GF queues for hours is because they set themselves up from the get go to be ignored by players.

I am a hardcore roleplayer in every mmorpg that I play. Especially this one. I agree with lots of the points you made, especially about the names. Be the bigger and better person when you say those names. Be the "unofficial" forum patrol and do your part to make the server a better place. That's what I do on Ebon Hawk. It is frustrating to see those names though.

Be the change you wish to see in the world.

There are no specific rules for RP servers. This isn't LotRO.

 

Only difference is that on non-RP servers people openly lol@RPers, while on RP servers the RPers have a retort "So why are you on a RP server?"

 

You can also report names like Spider-man (trademark violation), Sirfapsalot (offensive/vulgar), "Hulk Hogan" (trademark violation), on any server.

And yet there are morons running around called Gandalf, Elros, Noldor etc.

EAs lack of enforcement seemed to open the door for every anti RP troll to roll up oin the RP server, just so they could complain about people RPing.

Trust me, those guys will find their way onto RP Servers even if RP rules are existing. The only way to keep that from happening would be manual unlocking, like some Neverwinter Nights shards to, where you need to file an application, with character backstory and all, before they allow you to play on their server.

There seem to be quite a lot of people who actively target RP Servers, while harboring an intense hatred or disgust for roleplayers. I don't think I'll ever understand that mindset.