Free the names! (please)
I know that this is not a bug per say, but it is (in many peoples opinions) broken game play.
Please remove the names of deleted characters from the database of taken names.
One of the hardest parts of playing this game is coming up with a name that has not already been taken.
-Neurosinth, Beurocrat RK2
Just checked once more. Yes people I played with in the first month are still in the data base. I'd like to know on what basis some characters do get removed after the three months they give you when you cancel your account and some don't.
blah blah etc
I check a certain batch of names every few weeks or so. Some I actually know the people who had them parked, and they are loooooooooong gone. 6 months+ after cancellation for sure.
Whats funny is I park some decent names myself...catch22, its hard to find good names (at least ones that are spelled correctly) so you park the few you can get for later.
Frankly, if a char is under level 10 (or whatever) and hasn't been logged into for 3 months...delete it or rename it to inactive0001. It would force people who still play to log in their mules 4 times a year, BFD. Or spend half an hour to pull them above whatever level limit.
mercatura -ae f. [trade, traffic; merchandise]
Moved off-world and found real tradeskills...along with many other things
I think that's a bit harsh, but I agree that the names on canceled acounts should get freed.Originally posted by Mercatura
Frankly, if a char is under level 10 (or whatever) and hasn't been logged into for 3 months...delete it or rename it to inactive0001. It would force people who still play to log in their mules 4 times a year, BFD. Or spend half an hour to pull them above whatever level limit.
/G13
pirates. with lasers.
Are you having an argument on the internet, again?
Gene13 - on a space odyssey since 2001
XXX - N
Some day your ship will come in, but you will be at the airport.
yes freeing the name imo is a good idea..
Level 200 Eng
My name was nerfed if you wish to contact me ingame please use superslang
These are great days we're living, bros! We are jolly green giants, walking the earth with guns. These people we wasted here today are the finest human beings we will ever know. After we rotate back to the world, we're gonna miss not having anyone around that's worth shooting.
bump.
1) Players that have inactive accounts
2) Toons that have been level 1 for the last 20 years =P
Just for fun, I grabbed some screen caps of people I played with in my first few weeks. Typed their names into the search...and, lo and behold, they are still there. (Same level as the last time I played with them, mind you.)
These are people who I know were on the 7-day trial and never renewed...but they're still kicking around the DB.
Gotta say, though...stuff like this:
http://www.anarchy-online.com/charac...d/1/name/jayde
Rather annoys me...that toon has been level 1 even since I started playing, and is still sitting there camping on my desired name. =P
-Jayde
Bump
(V)@¢|-| \/
*| /\
bump
It's time to get rid of these people who probably never plan on returning to the game!! Clean the database out
free the name of:
all characters on permanently banned accounts
all characters on accounts that haven't been paid on in the last 6 months
all characters < lvl 5 that have not been played in last 3 months
I too find that the most difficult part of starting AO is making a name... it's the one item that keeps me from rerolling characters, because every normal combination of letters results in a name that is taken
Even on active accounts? BBBBZZZTTTTT! Wrong Choice!Originally posted by Thoughtless
all characters < lvl 5 that have not been played in last 3 months
Martek
why do you have a bunch of characters that you don't play who are all below lvl 5? I know I wouldn't care if they deleted one of the worthless characters I never intend to play again... 3 months is a long time to not touch a character.. I log in almost all my characters at least within every 3-4 weeks.Originally posted by Martek-SLAG
Even on active accounts? BBBBZZZTTTTT! Wrong Choice!
Martek
Yes
Free the sla... I mean the names!!!!
Not likely to happen...
Think about it. How many of us canceled shortly after retail due to massively excessive suckage? I did, as did several other friends.
Nine months later, I have returned. And it is good.
My chars were sitting there waiting for me. This pleases me.
How many people would come back if they knew their chars would all have been deleted? Less, I suspect.
Thus said, I agree that it's REALLY frustrating to try and pick a name. Just look at the names of my chars, some of them are awfully stupid. Best I could come up with, given the absurdly restrictive naming filter.
I would vote in favor of purging any char under level 5 on canceled accounts over six months.
I would very much vote in favor of deleting all chars on perma-banned accounts. It's sheer stupidity to not do this. On the other hand, how would you feel if you're a new player running around getting tells from people accusing you of being one of the biggest exploiters/hackers in the game ever? People refusing to trade or group with you, etc. You'd be a little confused, and perhaps disallusioned with the game.
The simple solution is to open up spacing in names. Let me name myself "Wen Ho lee" instead "Wenholee" and stuff. The char server and clients would have to be modified to accept quotation marks or something, but it would free up a very large bank of available names, I'd think.
The only thing worse than the whiners, are the whiners who whine about the whiners. And then there's the whiners who whine about how the whiners whines managed to get something changed, but now the whiners don't like that the other whiners were able to have something changed. And so the whiners whine about the whiners whining and get the change un-done, which causes the whiners to whine even more about how the whiners whines about the whiners whines ruined an otherwise good thing. So now you have whiners whining about whiners, whining about the whiners who are whining, and general whiners who whine about whines in general. And this doesn't even take into account the whiners, or the whiners-about-whiners, or the whiners with whiners-about-whiners in their mouth, and when they whine, they shoot whiners.
"It's difficult to imagine a world in which people voluntarily choose to listen to liberals. There is no evidence that it has ever happened. " - Ann Coulter
Ok. Everyone has room for 8 chars on their account, right?
Now, one person may not be able to, or willing to play all eight chars all the time. And some alts has been made for roleplaying purposes only. They may be even more active than any of you, even if they don't lvl up. leveling up isn't the only sign of that char beeing played.
I bet the right lvl 5 char has way more time under /played than, let's say, a lvl 150 char.
Just because you don't powerlvl, doesn't mean you're not using that character.
So, NO! Don't delete chars to free up names. That would severely kill a big part of the roleplaying community IMHO.
...and what's wrong with beeing innovative with names?
If you're out of ideas, spend 5 minutes on the net, typing 'random name generator' into a search engine. I typed that into www.google.com, and ended up with numerous of places with name suggestions/generators.
I'll give you one example:http://rinkworks.com/namegen/. Lots more where that one came from.
First of all, it is effectively just a simply hassle to make me log in every char every so oftern so as they don't get deleted. It doesn't change anything. So that right there is enough of a reason not to do it - it is effectively inneffectual.Originally posted by Thoughtless
why do you have a bunch of characters that you don't play who are all below lvl 5? I know I wouldn't care if they deleted one of the worthless characters I never intend to play again... 3 months is a long time to not touch a character.. I log in almost all my characters at least within every 3-4 weeks.
Second, why can't YOU delete those characters you never intend on playing again? You too lazy or something? You're basically saying that FC can determine my interntions (or, well, yours at least). Well they can't! But I can determine my own intentions. And if I am not sure, then forcing the simple act of merely logging them in every so often is, again, inneffectual. A series of actions with no meaning other than to go through them every so often. May as well not have them at all.
Cheers,
Martek
hey i freed up some names ages ago but when i log into chat i can still access the names .i deleted them like 3 months ago
Out of all the level 5 chars that havent leveled in 8 months or whatever, maybe 1 in 100 is on an active account.
They don't have to level them.
They don't have to keep them logged in.
They wouldn't have to get deleted, just renamed to inactive#### or something.
60 people have to spend 3 minutes to log in maybe 1-3 chars for 30 seconds IF they want to continue to park those names, and 6000 names are freed up.
Small price, big dividend.
mercatura -ae f. [trade, traffic; merchandise]
Moved off-world and found real tradeskills...along with many other things
http://www.anarchy-online.com/charac...d/1/name/danor
Level 5, has been level 5 for more than one year now. the reason I know? "danor" was the character name I used for three months during the late phases of beta 4.
The reason I don't have it now? Apparently someone beat me to it on day one. And hasn't played it since.
Posting Permissions
