111868-megaserver-feedback-thread-page-12

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Hmm... I agree with you on the naming fiasco. However, I attended Guild Wars 2's development QA panel a couple of years before its launch. From what ArenaNet developers mentioned, it's quite the opposite. They said they were given complete creative control with only revenue acquisition under NCSoft's watch. But, even then, they only had to prove how and whether their revenue model works. What Guild Wars 2 was, and still is, is a complete construct of ArenaNet's vision.

As opposed to having the option to do either two names or one if you choose? Even with a surname, it's still "first come first serve." Why not give us the option to choose? It's been done in other MMO before. To be honest, MMOs that implement mandatory surnames tend to be nameplate eyesores, e.g. Guild Wars and FFXIV:ARR.

I agree. WoW and its first two expansions were lightning in the bottle. They came out at the right time under the right circumstances to the right audience with the right attitude. Many young gamers of that generation in college or high school, including myself, were willing to play MMOs, explore a new frontier in an unfamiliar genre; while the older gamers came off from their experiences with EQ searching for a new MMO. WoW emerged to fill that void for us. Traditional MMORPGs have contracted and normalized since WoW's bubble deflated. However, many genres now carry MMO and RPG elements, e.g. persistent worlds, multi-party shared space, RNG, and both stat-based and narrative-based character development. Maybe MMOs will rise again, but not in a traditional MMORPG container. Until then, traditional MMORPGs are perfectly fine being niche. From what I hear SWTOR and LotRO are producing healthy revenue. And, WoW is still swimming in a sea of gold coins inside a giant money bin.


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I guess because it's not treated by the system like a separate first and last name, but a single field with a space somewhere in it, so they can't hide a portion of it.


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Because people want to play on a server with a decent size population rather than sitting in a queue waiting for others to group with until the megaservers come.


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No it doesn't work THAT way. Every character will be able to change their name to whatever 2 word name they want. They can keep their current name and add a surname (ie. Mae Mean). They can keep their current name and add a title (ie. The Mae). Or they can come up with a whole new name that doesn't include their current name (Super Meanie)... So, hiding surnames won't work, because the game doesn't know if the second name in the word is the surname, the actual name, or the second half of the whole name.


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So F*cupcake*k the people that pre-order the game and spend an entire day trying to reserve the name, that was the ONLY reason why some of us pre-purchase, and went a bit extra for the deluxe version, to support the game, just f*cupcake*k them all.

Edited September 14, 2014 by PIP0


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For everyone else who hasn't skimmed the dev posts and are too lazy to do so here are a couple of my favorites. https://forums.wildstar-online.com/forums/index.php?/topic/111868-megaserver-feedback-thread/page-36&do=findComment&comment=1161790 https://forums.wildstar-online.com/forums/index.php?/topic/111868-megaserver-feedback-thread/page-51&do=findComment&comment=1162947 And about name reservation, that could still be kept, the people reserved a name would be the person with the oldest character of that name. And they have a right to that name no matter how many people have used it after the reservation period expired. I was joking about going to every server and making a character with that name, because I had the right to, seems maybe I should have. It's not that the name is such a big deal to me, it is to others, and it was something we paid for, even if it was part of a package. To take that away a few short months later will understandable upset a lot of people. And I personally still don't thing the explanation for limiting people to 2 name combinations is a good one. They should go for please the most people as the first priority. What is easier for whispering shouldn't really be part of the conversation. They could work on aliases for friends and guildies later.


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Way to insult people without understanding the argument. The argument isn't against surnames. We welcome it. The argument is against mandatory surnames; people would rather have a choice. The given reasons behind making it mandatory have been inadequate and rather arbitrary since there are other MMOs that offer the choice to have one or two names without any issue or compromise in communication. Second, criticism imposed on this game is a great thing. Carbine did an great job with the game -- at its core I consider it the best MMO I have played in the last few years -- but there are many technical issues that linger. It takes community criticism to bring to light these issues and to get them fixed. Ask anybody in beta and they will tell you how much this game has improved through constant feedback, complaints, and dissatisfaction. Criticism isn't what Carbine should worry about. They should worry when there are none -- that is when people stop caring enough to even criticize.

If they made surnames optional rather than mandatory, it doesn't change the fact that all names must be unique. Therefore, only one person can be called "John" without a surname on a single megaserver. Likewise, there can only be one "John Smith" on a single megaserver. But, both "John" and "John Smith" can exist on a single megaserver. Also, making surname optional rather than mandatory yields the most naming permutations, hence yields the most options.


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Optional surnames would be great. Nonunique names without character limitations and with hidden, user selected identifiers would be ideal (and would actually provide the most options). Neither met Carbine's requirements. Two word names did. I am as frustrated with their decision as anyone else here, but that doesn't mean they don't have a good reason for it.


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You don't create a new naming system that would only annoy the very same people who you granted a name reservation benefit to for pre-ordering.


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I think the one with the names attached to ID numbers is better. As long as you could choose to hide or show all ID numbers (as oppose to simply hide or show your own) the "army of Bobs causing trouble" problem would disappear. Just click a button and the "Bob" that is harassing you is now Bob@12345. Report away. Problem solved. Click the button off and go back to enjoying the game. Or even better, have the number show up automatically when you click and report the player, so you don't even have to bother with fiddling around with settings at all. Nobody would have to change their names (unless a player had more than one character with the same name that wound up on the same megaserver). Granted, there are people who want to be the only "Raven" on the server, but IMHO allowing everyone to have the names they want - and keep the names they already have - trumps mollifying people who get bent out of shape over the very thought of someone else having "their" name.


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It's not that hard of a concept to understand. Across all servers most names are repeated several times, even on a single server a lot of people end up forced to use intentional misspellings because competition for a single name Once merge happens who gets to keep their name and who get's screwed? It's pretty horribly unfair to a ton of people if single name is kept If you do allow single name still. Again, the first few people sitting around for hours waiting for the first second of server up to grab it first will get it and everyone else that lost the chance will be pissed as well. it's not hard to have the syntax simply require quotes like /w "name" but it presents an unfair situation where the single word names will be seen as more prized If you just allow spaces as a usable character in names you get crap like "Bob Jones" "BobJones" "Bob  Jones" "Bob Jones " which just adds extra confusion and enables people to troll others with a similar name that just has a space in a different spot. In a real sense there exist people with the same given name and they get differentiated by a family name. If i go from being "Lunaria" to "Lunaria Miku" it doesn't make me not Lunaria any more. If anything it gives my character more depth while also not screwing over the "Lunaria Bobjones" from a different server or becoming the prime Lunaria that receives everything meant for any Lunaria when the sender forgets the opening quote From a programming perspective /w name1 name2 is no more difficult to accomplish than /w "any name you want" but it's more of a communal thing than a programming limitation thing. As megaserver models become more and more common for future games a required surname will likely be commonplace simply due to player density so you may as well get used to it now


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A comma to end the name portion of a command is certainly a good idea, but I feel like you aren't factoring in several issues with it. First of all, it isn't immediately intuitive. This can be fixed by changing the error message when it can't find the person you are whispering, to remind you about the comma, but it will be frustrating until it becomes ingrained. Second, is the likelihood of commands being used in the background for a lot of GUI functions. These will all have to be replaced to use the comma, as well as incredibly extensive testing to ensure it all still works. And that is just for Carbine. Imagine how many user created add-ons would break and need updated. Third, your analysis for how easy of a change this would be, replacing a check for the second space with a check for the first comma, is based on an assumption about how they are parsing commands. It isn't an unreasonable one, but its futile to make bold proclamations based on hidden implementation details.

And finally, regardless of the merits of your suggestion, it is probably best to not insult the targets of your suggestion. This one is more of a general rule than anything specific to this case.


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Good luck on the deployment, and thank you for your service. It's appreciated! As a Navy wife, I know just what kind of sacrifices you make.


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