Free-Up Character Names

Varana · April 2020

Unless it's someone you personally know in the real world, you don't even know if the name you want, would be among those freed by such a purge.
Just stripping names for the chance of maybe having a name you want available, seems a very excessive measure for very little gain.

Recent · April 2020

I would get very frustrated in the past when I created alts and then the name I liked so much was taken ...but I just worked around it by either using surnames or adding a smaller name next the the initial name or by spelling it differently.

I do understand your point op and i do imagine that many characters out there on dead accounts have some great names but have never been leveled past 10 or will never be played again. I just dont know what the logistics of implementing the deletion of unused names would entail nor how they could make it so that it would work fairly.

Danikat · April 2020

I agree that it's not difficult to find available names. I do have two characters where my first choice was taken, but in both cases a very minor change got me an available name: Dawn-Star to Dawns-Star and Holds-All-Things to Holds-All-Stuff (both are argonians so the hyphens are lore appropriate.)

I also agree that it's not out of the question players could return to the game after a long absence and that it would be horrible to find your characters stripped of their names when you did. If that happened to me I'd uninstall the game and never look back because it's not worth considering playing one that would ruin my characters just because other things in my life took precedence for a while.

And if you're thinking "Well you could just pick a new name for your character! It's not a big deal!" then exactly the same is true for people making new characters, and IMO it's a lot easier to change their name at that point because there's no attachment yet and you can change the character to suit the name if necessary.

barney2525 wrote: »

Additionally, what makes you think that even if such a purge is done that whatever your preferred name with the accurate spelling would become available ?

This is the part I can never understand about these requests. How can anyone be sure that the name/s they want are taken by an account which meets their personal criteria for "inactive"? What would happen if all accounts which hadn't been logged into in X years had their names stripped away and the name the OP wanted still wasn't available? What if the OP admitted which name they're trying to get and someone on this forum said they've got it?

I can't find it now but I remember seeing an article about an MMO (I think it might have been City of Heroes?) which actually did try a name purge, then announced they wouldn't be doing it again because 6 months later something like 12% of the names it freed up had been used and players were still complaining that it was impossible to get the name they wanted. I suspect it would be similar in a lot of games, I doubt there's any correlation between players who pick popular names and players who quit very early on.

phaneub17_ESO wrote: »

Just add a Surname or a title. Oddly enough calling yourself Lady or Lord is not against naming rules, King or Queen is prohibited though. A well placed spacer punctuation does wonders.

I think it's only games where titles you earn are added into your characters name and are indistinguishable which prohibit you from using titles in the name, so you can't fake having earned it. In ESO it would be pretty obvious if it's a fake title which is part of the name, so that's not an issue.

TheValar85 · April 2020

No.

Tandor · April 2020

Every used character name is still readily available, all you have to do is add a surname.

AcadianPaladin · April 2020

I get the need for unique user names but I've never gotten the 'need' for exclusive rights over character names. Who cares if there are multiple characters named Buffy since each is associated with a unique user name? In a game this size, if there are 100 Buffys, I'd probably never know it. The only challenge I would see is that I probably wouldn't be able to name all my characters Buffy since they are all associated with the same user name.

Could I dream up some downsides? Yes. Do the downsides outweigh the enhanced flexibility/options? Perhaps not.

rexagamemnon · April 2020

Idk why zos has it that no to characters can have the same name in the game....🤷🏻‍♂️

Tommy_The_Gun · April 2020

Imagine an old veteran player, who quited due to game performance or jet-propelled sledge hammer nerfs, and now he/she returns to see what has changed in new chapter, only to find out that his/her main name is now:
AJNBT74HHCVSDFKBSD874XYKG

And he / she quits for good...

Elsonso · April 2020

Jakx wrote: »

I think the least of your concerns should be placating people who quit the game 6 years ago but helping those who want to play it in this decade. A lot of these posts are related to empathetic "how would I feel if my name was taken?" type responses. Again, do you expect to not login to ESO for 3+ years? Sorry there should be a statute and if you login 4-5 years later and your name is gone, you expect it.

Actually, I would like to see those people who played in 2014, and moved on, come back and play again.

Olauron · April 2020

Imagine a not so veteran player, who bought Morrowind because of Vvardenfell nostalgia and left the game after saving Vivec, and now returns to Greymoor to fulfill his Skyrim nostalgia. Like why does it even matter what the player preference is and why he left? It does not.

rpa · April 2020

If you must have special name like Snoflake but it's is taken by some other player you can use little creativity naming yourself Mr/Lord/Miss/Lady/Sir/The Snowflake, Snow Flake, Snow-Flake, Special-Snow-Flake, &cet. and be unique among Snowflakes.

oxygen_thief · April 2020

Elsonso wrote: »

oxygen_thief wrote: »

i dont understand why should names be unique if we have ids?

It avoids the awkward email-like names... Bob The Builder@oxygen_thief

why we should avoid this when everyone has multiple chars? names dont matter and i turned them off to see ids first.

Elsonso · April 2020

oxygen_thief wrote: »

Elsonso wrote: »

oxygen_thief wrote: »

i dont understand why should names be unique if we have ids?

It avoids the awkward email-like names... Bob The Builder@oxygen_thief

why we should avoid this when everyone has multiple chars? names dont matter and i turned them off to see ids first.

Names probably matter to a lot of people. I see all your names when you run around. I don't usually care about your @ name, to be honest. Not unless I am reporting you for something, and then I know how to find it.

Universe · April 2020

It's not WoW.
There are many different combinations to create character names.
Please be creative.
Also, it will be unfair to players who may come back from a break.
I know players who returned to play after 5 years break...

If their character names would been altered, this would have happened:

There are many decent character names still available to create...
In some cases the previous character name owner may have deleted their character at some point so the popular name is once again available.
Who knows ? maybe something extremely good is still available.
You can try your luck hundreds or even thousands of times until you hit something which is available.

Deciding the grace period for character names isn't an easy task(a player may return even after 10 years break) and it isn't necessary in ESO.

mikikatze · April 2020

Elsonso wrote: »

Actually, I would like to see those people who played in 2014, and moved on, come back and play again.

*raises hand*

(I played beta + 1 month, then couldn't afford it anymore. ESO never informed by e-mail that they changed their subscription model. I only found out last summer that you don't have to subscribe anymore to play and can enter any level from the start, because I'm only a casual gamer and don't follow game blogs or similar. Two friends I had played beta with also never realised they can now play as they want, until I told them.)

Have logged in nearly everyday since last June. ZOS did themselves a disservice by missing out on that simple notification to their early player base.)

oxygen_thief · April 2020

Elsonso wrote: »

oxygen_thief wrote: »

Elsonso wrote: »

oxygen_thief wrote: »

i dont understand why should names be unique if we have ids?

It avoids the awkward email-like names... Bob The Builder@oxygen_thief

why we should avoid this when everyone has multiple chars? names dont matter and i turned them off to see ids first.

Names probably matter to a lot of people. I see all your names when you run around. I don't usually care about your @ name, to be honest. Not unless I am reporting you for something, and then I know how to find it.

when you play with someone in ic and in a few moments later that person changes alliance and comes to kill and rob you id matters names dont. names are for fun i guess

andreasv · April 2020

OP is not willing to add strange letters to the name, but happy to wait 3 years for it to maybe become available. Hmm...

Ectheliontnacil · April 2020

Bradyfjord wrote: »

I also think it would be unnecessary to give up names. Due to being able to add a space and hyphen, you can work out a name of just about anything you might wish. I do empathize with people that have to alter their favorite name, but having names 'taken' is just something that comes with online gaming.

£ēt'$ b€ høñë$t thõùgh, thö$e ~`и'аmës löøk aшfûl.

VaranisArano · April 2020

Ectheliontnacil wrote: »

Bradyfjord wrote: »

I also think it would be unnecessary to give up names. Due to being able to add a space and hyphen, you can work out a name of just about anything you might wish. I do empathize with people that have to alter their favorite name, but having names 'taken' is just something that comes with online gaming.

£ēt'$ b€ høñë$t thõùgh, thö$e ~`и'аmës löøk aшfûl.

Its sad, but I honestly look at some of the more extreme examples in Cyrodiil and think "Were you just trying to make it harder for players to report you?"

StormeReigns · April 2020

Ectheliontnacil wrote: »

Bradyfjord wrote: »

I also think it would be unnecessary to give up names. Due to being able to add a space and hyphen, you can work out a name of just about anything you might wish. I do empathize with people that have to alter their favorite name, but having names 'taken' is just something that comes with online gaming.

£ēt'$ b€ høñë$t thõùgh, thö$e ~`и'аmës löøk aшfûl.

Mmm. Using extremes for a mildly minor/minimal inconvenience that a simple thesaurus can solve.

Tommy_The_Gun · April 2020

Ectheliontnacil wrote: »

Bradyfjord wrote: »

I also think it would be unnecessary to give up names. Due to being able to add a space and hyphen, you can work out a name of just about anything you might wish. I do empathize with people that have to alter their favorite name, but having names 'taken' is just something that comes with online gaming.

£ēt'$ b€ høñë$t thõùgh, thö$e ~`и'аmës löøk aшfûl.

Ąǧȑééƌ

mikikatze · April 2020

Ectheliontnacil wrote: »

Bradyfjord wrote: »

I also think it would be unnecessary to give up names. Due to being able to add a space and hyphen, you can work out a name of just about anything you might wish. I do empathize with people that have to alter their favorite name, but having names 'taken' is just something that comes with online gaming.

£ēt'$ b€ høñë$t thõùgh, thö$e ~`и'аmës löøk aшfûl.

No, looks almost German. 😂

Everest_Lionheart · April 2020

Not everyone can be Daenerys Targaryen or John Snow. Could you image if the game allowed that!

Of course I can see where “BigPimpin420” and “YOLOSWAG69” might be a little disappointing if those names were already taken!

Elsonso · April 2020

oxygen_thief wrote: »

Elsonso wrote: »

oxygen_thief wrote: »

Elsonso wrote: »

oxygen_thief wrote: »

i dont understand why should names be unique if we have ids?

It avoids the awkward email-like names... Bob The Builder@oxygen_thief

why we should avoid this when everyone has multiple chars? names dont matter and i turned them off to see ids first.

Names probably matter to a lot of people. I see all your names when you run around. I don't usually care about your @ name, to be honest. Not unless I am reporting you for something, and then I know how to find it.

when you play with someone in ic and few moments later that person changes alliance and comes to kill and rob you id matters names dont. names are for fun i guess

That is something entirely different. That is called "having fun" and "playing with your friends, no matter waht alliance they are on" Or some such thing like that.

In reference to my other comment about seeing people from 2014 come back to the game, I ran across this in another thread:

Seravi wrote: »

I played ESO from the release until late 2014. I was thinking of coming back and had a few questions. Are my old characters still available? My original download was digital from Amazon. If I purchase through Steam and download the game will I lose the connection with my existing account and my old characters?

Ragnork · April 2020

There might be a reason that I am Ragnork and not Ragnarok - but the eye and head fills in the gap. Making names is easy, 3 accounts, 2 servers, 44 alts.

peacenote · April 2020

Jakx wrote: »

Sorry, not interested in adding hyphens and awful looking names with accents: æÄÉôöòâäå

The irony in that all of you posting never meet these thresholds because you stay active in the game to a degree that would never see a name be freed up.

Literally we are speaking about YEARS here of inactivity.. day 1 type inactivity. Thats absurd. This game is also played on a mega server. Meaning literally every character ever played on NA or EU you must compete for names with even if somebody dropped this game week 1, trust me... A LOT of people dropped this buggy mess and never came back.

I think the least of your concerns should be placating people who quit the game 6 years ago but helping those who want to play it in this decade. A lot of these posts are related to empathetic "how would I feel if my name was taken?" type responses. Again, do you expect to not login to ESO for 3+ years? Sorry there should be a statute and if you login 4-5 years later and your name is gone, you expect it.

To be fair, you only sometimes need one special character and often it's barely noticeable. Like.... Legolâs

Shoot, now I'm giving away all of my secrets, haha.

Keeping your name for if you return is something that is prevalent in old school MMO culture. I support it. Fwiw, I still make alts even though I've been here since the beginning so it is something that impacts me.

That said, I am sure ZOS has data about how often people who leave come back (probably better data on that than most things) and could calculate a name release algorithm that would only release the least-likely-to-return folks. They could even send e-mails out so those individuals could be warned and have a chance to log in. However it's not just the "folks that might return" who could be irritated by this. People who made names because the ones they wanted were taken might also have an issue. If ZOS were to release names on, say, the first of May, people would probably want the option for free name changes if they've created a character within six months or so. Some people would likely want the option no matter when they created their character. I will admit that while I wouldn't whine and moan on the forums about it, a little part of me would be sad if I suddenly saw the real versions of my slightly altered names start running around without being able to get first crack at them, when my characters have been the only version of themselves for years.

It's much easier to let sleeping dogs lie in this case.

AhPook_Is_Here · April 2020

Ya this is a really bad idea, 8 years ago I thought of playing that Old Republic mmo again, logged in to see I had a temp name and a new server, and just logged out right there.

I wouldn't mind it if account name stayed unique and a character name was not, nor would I mind special characters and nubmers so you could finally be V1V19K+1, but changing other character's names, no.

Nanfoodle · April 2020

I dont agree with this thread. I have returned to an MMO I have not played in a few years. Seen my names were taken away and logged off not to return. I build backstories on my chars, who they are, where they have come from and taking away that name in my mind, kills that character.

TX12001rwb17_ESO · April 2020

Here is the thing, people are saying to just add hyphens and what not but that just makes it harder to whisper them.

Elsonso · April 2020

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

Here is the thing, people are saying to just add hyphens and what not but that just makes it harder to whisper them.

Yeah, but after you whisper to them, all they are going to do is respond in kind, then block you.