Can We Talk About Name Availability For A Minute

[mauried.5608]

Where are people getting the information from regarding the numbers of inactive accounts and the number of inactive names.?

Only ANet would know this, so please provide links which provide this information, otherwise its just wild guesswork.

 

 

[Jaggedrain.6923]

Honestly, GW2 is about a bazillion times better than every MMO I've ever tried wrt name availability.

 

I mean, SURNAMES! It's fantastic! All my characters bar one have the same surname, which makes naming them quite easy. Obviously, after six years, Severus Snape is going to be taken, but Severus Targaryen is...unlikely to be taken already. See what I mean?

 

Just use a bit of creativity and you should be fine.

[artharon.9276]

I've been searching forums for something else but ended up here. I understand the frustration, another guy holding my name for instance. the name I've been using since mIrc was a new thing. but it's ok. If devs can build a nice little account wide system to use a surname, client sided hidden/unhidden, this could end our problems. but also would create another problem. so many people would like name themselves like Cloud, Red, Ocean or pick names from Street fighter, MK, DC, Marvel characters. Name one...

So if they ever bring a system like this, imo they should block top 1000 most wanted nicknames and make them all unavailable for character naming diversity to stay healthy. Also, I see more people are using spaced names like C l o u d, or using special chars like Clóúd, or making 10yo kid names like xXxCloudXxX. This needs to end pronto.

[kharmin.7683]

Why stop at 1000? Who would be the arbiter of which 1000 names were most wanted?

[Game of Bones.8975]

It's my character regardless how often I play.

 

Next time you create a character, post the name for a period of time in the forums and we'll vote to see if you can use that name. I won't tell you what name you can use and we'll agree that no-one can say what names I can use.

[Achraf Hidouri.8029]

Also if character name is gone, so the character itself along with what it contains is gone too, that's how "removing a character name" can work

[slayerking.3581]

> @"Bloodstealer.5978" said:

 

> I have played through both those MMO's.. SWTOR name changes were due to forced server merges where name duplication became an issue, so BW enforced policy as to who got to keep and not.

I was a beta tester in swtor and had my name no problems. Game went live still had my name as I was on when it went live. Not long after yes they did a server merge and I had to change my name, That pissed me off. But after they went free to play I had to change it again as they gave out any name to a paid account. That pissed me right off and I can say without a doubt I will NEVER play swtor EVER again because of it.

 

 

[Vash.2386]

Time for you to be more creative with your character naming then. I have over 30 toons and have never had a problem finding a unique name that fits my Vash theme.

[artharon.9276]

> @"kharmin.7683" said:

> Why stop at 1000? Who would be the arbiter of which 1000 names were most wanted?

I said all this to explain how allowing people to give any names to their characters would give birth to another problem. copycat generic names on many characters.

To solve that problem, we could start with the 5 most famous character names from each and every top 100 famous IPs. simply locking them for us to reuse. plus super generic names like colour names and basic entity names like "wood" or "lamp" :) but who would work on it? nobody. it's probably too late to make it happen.

either way, stupid names like xXxinsertyourweirdnamexXX must gone.

[Westenev.5289]

Finding roleplay names can be hard, particularly if you're Asura. Asuran's don't have last names and have very specific naming conventions, though I suppose they can have titles...

 

My general rule of thumb in MMO's is to never get attached to a name that is less than 6 characters, a real life name or a reference to something, and if I do, I'll add a last name or change the spelling.