For several months I hadn't been playing this game for various personal reasons, and my subscription was cancelled due to a billing error or something. During that time, I had planned to resubscribe and start playing again around now, the former of which I did.

I checked here and learned about the server merge that had occured about two weeks prior, which immediately made me very worried about any sort of naming conflicts as names are something that I value greatly in a game like this, as you can probably tell.

While I was extremely relieved to discover that the developers had chosen to make legacy names no longer exclusive, an excellent decision on their part, I still frantically resubscribed, worried about the rest of my names.

To my despair, all seven of the characters I created on Sanctum of the Exalted on December 13, day one of early access, had lost their names. Including my beloved and creatively named Imperial Agent, "Andy".

Call me unhealthily obsessed, but I have memories of frantically preordering to insure I got in early access, more or less to make sure I could get the names I wanted, and of the week early access began, when I spent all of the time I had playing through chapter one with my aforementioned Imperial Agent, hoping to get my legacy name "Starborn", a quest I succeeded in. Pretty much every day I check if any of the holders of my old names decided to delete their characters on Ebon Hawk.

The developers have always said how this game would allow you to create characters that you could truly become attached and bonded to, and personally I find a character's name to be an integral part of this. With this server merge and the apparent titanic influx of players coming when the game becomes free to play, I think only so many players could bond with XxLukeCrapFartxX Skywalker. It seems that pretty much every name with less than five syllables is taken anyway with just the recent merge.

My suggestion is absolutely anything that would make names unexclusive (I don't know if that is a word, but bear with me). What seems to be the most widely proposed idea is to use some sort of @accountname system or something so people can identify you, as identification seems to be the most logical reason the keep names exclusive. It wouldn't even have to be displayed in the game world or in chat, you could just check the character's profile, and have it displayed somewhere there.

While not as ideal, each combination of name and legacy name could be made exclusive. For example, there could be John Smith, Bob Smith, and John Fisher, but only one John Smith.

Lastly, this would probably be the least favorable possibility, but immediately prior to the switch to free to play, every name could be wiped, giving current subscribers a shot at getting names they want before the predicted flood.

I'd also like to note that if the first two of these ideas were to be implemented, it would probably be a good idea to give every character that has had to have a name change at any point a free opportunity to change it back.

I'm very fond of this game, and hope for nothing more than it to succeed. If Bioware were to do something about this issue, it pretty much restore any lost faith from me.

Thanks for reading my ramble, and please respond if you agree so any devs that might see this know you exist.

TL;DR

The naming system should be changed so that names are no longer exclusive, just like the legacy names now are, because it is a good idea.

The complaint is entirely valid, don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Names are an integral part of a character. I felt my legacy got tainted by all the name changes I was forced to with the transfers so I quit until around now where I have rerolled on another server and my 8 original characters have been left to rot because I just can't get myself to play on them.

I would say the best fix, that would require the least work, would probably be a system like in SC2 where you have a name-tag and a number associated with it.

No. I like having a unique name.

Yes, I had to rename some characters. No, I didn't need to use apostrophes or funny diacritics to do so. I just sounded them out, and hunted for something close that wasn't taken.

Just like I have done in every other MMO I have ever played.

I think we all agree name changes are a pain. However, unexclusive names are not the way to go and would cause more harm than good. Names are more than just for yourself, they define your identity on the server.

Names influence who you group with, there are some people I would never join because I know they're trolls, loot ninjas, useless etc. There are also people I will happily stop what I'm doing to help because I know and respect them as players. Make names non-unique, and this stops.

An account name or identification number is also the wrong way to go. If the concern is imersion, do you seriously think being called Seikier-99321987 helps? And who expects people to remember that I'm Seikier-99321987 instead of Seikier-99321988?

Names are the key way to identify others, changing this will only lead to more problems.

Instead of assigning players a serial number, what about a user-made handle? Every time I see the issue with character first names brought up, nobody every seems to mention it when it works so well elsewhere. I hardly see people complaining about it over on CO or STO, and it allows for non-unique character names while still being able to identity who is who.

User handle is a good idea.

The complaint is entirely valid, don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Names are an integral part of a character. I felt my legacy got tainted by all the name changes I was forced to with the transfers so I quit until around now where I have rerolled on another server and my 8 original characters have been left to rot because I just can't get myself to play on them.

 

I would say the best fix, that would require the least work, would probably be a system like in SC2 where you have a name-tag and a number associated with it.

Thanks, good to know I'm not the only one.

No. I like having a unique name.

 

Yes, I had to rename some characters. No, I didn't need to use apostrophes or funny diacritics to do so. I just sounded them out, and hunted for something close that wasn't taken.

 

Just like I have done in every other MMO I have ever played.

What would you think about resetting names before the game goes free to play? It would take care of any inactive and abandoned accounts.

I think we all agree name changes are a pain. However, unexclusive names are not the way to go and would cause more harm than good. Names are more than just for yourself, they define your identity on the server.

 

Names influence who you group with, there are some people I would never join because I know they're trolls, loot ninjas, useless etc. There are also people I will happily stop what I'm doing to help because I know and respect them as players. Make names non-unique, and this stops.

 

An account name or identification number is also the wrong way to go. If the concern is imersion, do you seriously think being called Seikier-99321987 helps? And who expects people to remember that I'm Seikier-99321987 instead of Seikier-99321988?

 

Names are the key way to identify others, changing this will only lead to more problems.

If this were to be implemented, it would probably be seen as Seikier-Vacarius, not a random chain of numbers. If anything, wouldn't this actually help identify others? It would prevent people from making characters just to be jerks, and let you recognize friendly players on different characters.

I've always liked this idea. And it is completely doable. The game just have to remove any internal reference to names and go to character numbers and other unique identifiable. There's no reason for it not to. And first names being unique regardless of it being the only identifier at early lvs is unrealistic. The only hassle it would add is figuring if you are talking to the same Todd. Well friends lists solves that partly and besides that it simply adds a realistic element to the game. You don't know people that simply. As is they should not have viewable names.

I don't like name resets though. It shouldn't be necessary. They could easily switch internal references to an existing number on your character and leave the names. Then they could sell name changes give one free or let you keep it. It shouldn't be automatically done.

I've always liked this idea. And it is completely doable. The game just have to remove any internal reference to names and go to character numbers and other unique identifiable. There's no reason for it not to. And first names being unique regardless of it being the only identifier at early lvs is unrealistic. The only hassle it would add is figuring if you are talking to the same Todd. Well friends lists solves that partly and besides that it simply adds a realistic element to the game. You don't know people that simply. As is they should not have viewable names.

 

I don't like name resets though. It shouldn't be necessary. They could easily switch internal references to an existing number on your character and leave the names. Then they could sell name changes give one free or let you keep it. It shouldn't be automatically done.

If legacy names were to become a key element in identification, I imagine they would be chosen earlier on.

I agree.

I made a post like this a few weeks ago to suggest that player names should be tied to their forum names or a "log in" name, and that the actual name of the character would not be unique.

Similiar to how Blizzard Real ID works, if someone were to add you, it would show your fourm name in bigger letters, and beside it what character you were on.

I think we all agree name changes are a pain. However, unexclusive names are not the way to go and would cause more harm than good. Names are more than just for yourself, they define your identity on the server.

 

Names influence who you group with, there are some people I would never join because I know they're trolls, loot ninjas, useless etc. There are also people I will happily stop what I'm doing to help because I know and respect them as players. Make names non-unique, and this stops.

 

An account name or identification number is also the wrong way to go. If the concern is imersion, do you seriously think being called Seikier-99321987 helps? And who expects people to remember that I'm Seikier-99321987 instead of Seikier-99321988?

 

Names are the key way to identify others, changing this will only lead to more problems.

A customer service nightmare

One thing that would help is for Bioware to simply clear out all the level 1 "name squatters" and other people who are no longer playing the game. Just make anyone inactive for over 60+ days get an email warning them they better log in or they'll have to re-roll a new name if they ever came back. Whenever I search for most names they're usually reserved on a very low-level alt that's never played anymore. Reset those people's names and that would free up a TON of names.

^ this ^

As nice as it would be It would screw up ingame mailing to player, mainly mailing to your alts.

I honestly fail to see how this would interfere with ingame mail. Just put the @tag or legacy name in along with the character.

I wish I'd seen this before posting my suggestion.

The easiest way to fix the naming issue is to make Legacy names unique and first names not and changing the mail system so that mail sent to a Legacy name is available to all characters of that Legacy and mail sent to a specific name and Legacy can only be opened by that one character.

Everyone will eventually get a Legacy anyway so forcing a Legacy surname at account creation wouldn't be that big of a deal even with F2P coming up.

Naming is becoming an hour long effort trying to find something a player can live with but hasn't already been taken. Even names someone believes to be a unique creation have quite probably already been taken.

If this were to be implemented, it would probably be seen as Seikier-Vacarius, not a random chain of numbers. If anything, wouldn't this actually help identify others? It would prevent people from making characters just to be jerks, and let you recognize friendly players on different characters.

That sounds just like a legacy name, too bad Bioware got rid of those too

"I got screwed over because I was unoriginal...now everyone should suffer!"

Man OP grow up and deal with it honestly, one of my newer alts that I was too lazy to think of a name (so I used the random name generator) had to change his name..guess what? I didn't make a huge QQ thread aboout it because I had a quick "Oh, whatever" reaction..and made a new name in a second...

Keep the system the way it is, nothing wrong with it.

For several months I hadn't been playing this game for various personal reasons, and my subscription was cancelled due to a billing error or something. During that time, I had planned to resubscribe and start playing again around now, the former of which I did.

 

I checked here and learned about the server merge that had occured about two weeks prior, which immediately made me very worried about any sort of naming conflicts as names are something that I value greatly in a game like this, as you can probably tell.

 

While I was extremely relieved to discover that the developers had chosen to make legacy names no longer exclusive, an excellent decision on their part, I still frantically resubscribed, worried about the rest of my names.

 

To my despair, all seven of the characters I created on Sanctum of the Exalted on December 13, day one of early access, had lost their names. Including my beloved and creatively named Imperial Agent, "Andy".

 

Call me unhealthily obsessed, but I have memories of frantically preordering to insure I got in early access, more or less to make sure I could get the names I wanted, and of the week early access began, when I spent all of the time I had playing through chapter one with my aforementioned Imperial Agent, hoping to get my legacy name "Starborn", a quest I succeeded in. Pretty much every day I check if any of the holders of my old names decided to delete their characters on Ebon Hawk.

 

The developers have always said how this game would allow you to create characters that you could truly become attached and bonded to, and personally I find a character's name to be an integral part of this. With this server merge and the apparent titanic influx of players coming when the game becomes free to play, I think only so many players could bond with XxLukeCrapFartxX Skywalker. It seems that pretty much every name with less than five syllables is taken anyway with just the recent merge.

 

My suggestion is absolutely anything that would make names unexclusive (I don't know if that is a word, but bear with me). What seems to be the most widely proposed idea is to use some sort of @accountname system or something so people can identify you, as identification seems to be the most logical reason the keep names exclusive. It wouldn't even have to be displayed in the game world or in chat, you could just check the character's profile, and have it displayed somewhere there.

 

While not as ideal, each combination of name and legacy name could be made exclusive. For example, there could be John Smith, Bob Smith, and John Fisher, but only one John Smith.

 

Lastly, this would probably be the least favorable possibility, but immediately prior to the switch to free to play, every name could be wiped, giving current subscribers a shot at getting names they want before the predicted flood.

 

I'd also like to note that if the first two of these ideas were to be implemented, it would probably be a good idea to give every character that has had to have a name change at any point a free opportunity to change it back.

 

I'm very fond of this game, and hope for nothing more than it to succeed. If Bioware were to do something about this issue, it pretty much restore any lost faith from me.

 

Thanks for reading my ramble, and please respond if you agree so any devs that might see this know you exist.

 

TL;DR

The naming system should be changed so that names are no longer exclusive, just like the legacy names now are, because it is a good idea.

I think this would be a great idea. However, it may be a complex change that the developers might not be willing to undertake due to ROI and it would require a significant change in the database data model for starters. Still, it would be ideal prior to F2P.

As nice as it would be It would screw up ingame mailing to player, mainly mailing to your alts.

Not necessarily. In City of Heroes, when I wanted to email something to an alt, I just emailed it to my account name. The mailbox there is an account wide mailbox.

Personally, I would only be OK with this if it used the "accountname" identifier method. Anything else is unacceptable IMO.

That sounds just like a legacy name, too bad Bioware got rid of those too

Yes, like a legacy name that has absolutely no aesthetic purpose and exists solely for identification.