Naming policies

I saw this thread on the SWTOR boards and thought I'd reply there, but then I got to thinking - would it be wise?
What if I lose my forum handle? And even worse; what if BW haven't included "Selven" on their no-no-list and I make them aware of it? Am I being silly for wanting to use this name in game? Disrespectful? Honestly I never thought about the BH when creating this handle.

Here's the thread and here's my answer (that I never posted)

Quote :

I agree with the OP, but suspect I'm gonna sound like I have suspicios motives for saying so. Years ago, I played a fantasy game with elfs/elven characters. I liked the ring of "elven" and thought I'd make a character with a similar sound to it. I know, not very imaginative in that setting, but it turned out to be a name I carried with me to SWG, EQ2 and lots of other games - sometimes it turned out to be Zelven, sometimes Selven.

When I bought the game KOTOR, I was surprised to find a BH with that name. I never liked her - killed her every time I rolled a new character!

So, should I have made another name on a TOR forum? Possibly.
Will I be able to use it in-game? No idea, but I'm hoping I can. And seeing as she is merely a side quest with a name few remembers, I think it's not a big deal. Maybe Bioware sees it differently. I'm probably asking for it just pointing it out.

Honestly it got me thinking ...

Selven wrote:

I saw this thread on the SWTOR boards and thought I'd reply there, but then I got to thinking - would it be wise?
What if I lose my forum handle? And even worse; what if BW haven't included "Selven" on their no-no-list and I make them aware of it? Am I being silly for wanting to use this name in game? Disrespectful? Honestly I never thought about the BH when creating this handle.

Here's the thread and here's my answer (that I never posted)

Quote :

I agree with the OP, but suspect I'm gonna sound like I have suspicios motives for saying so. Years ago, I played a fantasy game with elfs/elven characters. I liked the ring of "elven" and thought I'd make a character with a similar sound to it. I know, not very imaginative in that setting, but it turned out to be a name I carried with me to SWG, EQ2 and lots of other games - sometimes it turned out to be Zelven, sometimes Selven.

When I bought the game KOTOR, I was surprised to find a BH with that name. I never liked her - killed her every time I rolled a new character!

So, should I have made another name on a TOR forum? Possibly.
Will I be able to use it in-game? No idea, but I'm hoping I can. And seeing as she is merely a side quest with a name few remembers, I think it's not a big deal. Maybe Bioware sees it differently. I'm probably asking for it just pointing it out.

Honestly it got me thinking ...

I think it's perfectly reasonable for you to want to use that name. If Bioware doesn't have some kind of automatic exclusion of names that have been used in previous games, you will most likely be able to use it.

I've always been very neurotic about the names I use for my characters and even pets in WoW. I always google the name I come up with, and if I get any hits, I will most likely think of another name. This of course means I sometimes make up very complex and stupid sounding names, or at least other people seem to think so.

In a way you can't "blacklist" all the names, because people won't be able to use anything. Luke is a pretty common name. Skywalker is just a surname. Luke Skywalker on the other hand is "unique" and well known.

The way I see it, SWTOR naming policies should only "refuse" names that are well known in the Star Wars Universe and stop people from adding title like Darth or Master and they could do like SOE with Clone Wars Adventures: have a human review the name (they give you a temporary one until it is accepted).



I never realized that your Selven was that Selven. I too killed her every times.

I honestly didn't pick up on it.

I'd think they'd be fine with names like Selven that may be more common then Revan or Vader.

Long as I can have my Jeff, the God of Biscuits.

They'll probably make it so you can't be Malgus, and other big NPC names. Other then that, I don't see them enforcing naming policies like that.

I like having unique names, even on forums. I dropped my old nickname after seeing it repeated on several other forums and wherenot. Not sure how long I've had this one, but it's been a while, maybe 10 years. But it's very durable as I don't see it popping up everywhere I go.

Don't know if I'd use it as a character name, but I don't expect it to be used as an NPC name. You never know though, maybe a dev sees my account and conciously or subconciously uses the name for an NPC. Would be nice as a tribute.

New EA slogan? "If you're in the game, you're in the game".

Not sure how I'd feel if the name was then made unavailable. I'd probably still want to have the option to use it, but also not have to worry someone takes it and hurts my reputation.

But I don't think they should be disallowing names just because a certain character has the same one. That is unless we're talking about full names here. It would increase the chance of people picking stupid names because they can't find any good ones (never really have that problem, but there are those that have a hard time creating names).

Thus, Qui-Gone Schwinn..hehe...its actually not a SW name, but, anyone save maybe "Jeff-God of Biscuits",
can easily figure out who that name is inspired by...

*Checks biscuits in oven...yup, they're still there*

Id be surprised if they had a heavy restriction on what can and cant be used, the common things like names of SW characters is easy enough,
Build an idiot proof name filter and they build a better idiot

Schwendo wrote:

Thus, Qui-Gone Schwinn..hehe...its actually not a SW name, but, anyone save maybe "Jeff-God of Biscuits",
can easily figure out who that name is inspired by...

You must love bikes, it's that bike company right?

Do I get a cookie?

Naming policies are tricky.

I seem to recall the devs saying that they would filter out the most obvious cases (Luke Skywalker etc).

Also, if I'm not mistaken, they've stated in an interview that they were considering the "Darth" title and that it would be a cool and somewhat easy feature to implement.

That said, I've already called dibs on the name "Boba Fettucini".

Cheers

SE

Yup...one of Sylly's "pre-crumbs" Ms. Fields ones at that!!

Selven, the story of your name makes me think of the old D&D character who became famous for creating a spell and naming it after themselves. Anyone remember Melf, the obvious contraction of Magic-user ELF.

On topic I should say I hope they avoid allowing things like xxxdarthmaulxxx and Luc Skywalckerr. I would like to like to see the ability to have first and last names. I want to name my consular after the judge who is the most quoted by the US Supreme Court, Learned Hand.

Thanks all for giving me your thoughts on the subject. I hope BW will have a good filter in place for the big names. And as much as I hope there won't be a way to make a character named xxxdarthmaulxxx or Luc Skywalckerr, I don't think we'll avoid seeing some of those running around.

Honestly, I tend to think those are kids wanting attention and I don't give it to them.

Selven wrote:

Thanks all for giving me your thoughts on the subject. I hope BW will have a good filter in place for the big names. And as much as I hope there won't be a way to make a character named xxxdarthmaulxxx or Luc Skywalckerr, I don't think we'll avoid seeing some of those running around.

Honestly, I tend to think those are kids wanting attention and I don't give it to them.

I've made my fair share of goofy names, but I usually only make them on pve server types that aren't as strict or won't mess with people. It's mostly gag names like my priest in Aion, he was max height, had a large brown hair affro, and was named BobRoss. I hate the stupid names like "lolumadbro" or it's ilk....

Or the 50 million people running around as Arthas or the many variations. We get it, you are unoriginal and probably one of the 14,000 blood elfs.

Sometimes I think a few people just want something they believe is "flashy" to attract attention.

I know SWG's was actually quite strict.....They seemed to take names even from the extended universe and banned them....

Luke, Leia, Chewy, anything like that was blocked, as were some of the more obscure ones from the books....

It just depends, personally I would prefer 100 Luke Solo's or Lando Skywalkers running around than the U83RPAWN3ROFN3WBS type names we may well end up seeing....

I really hope you can keep that name Selven. Even anyone nicks mine I would go mental, been my name for over a decade now..

Guess who's going to need a new name after 6 years?

Yup...i don't have any hope i can use mine.....* Cries *

I read somewhere a while ago that TOR would block specific Star Wars character names, so it would have to be full names e.g. Han Solo, for it to be disallowed. And Aurabesh I can't see your name being a problem either, it's different to Aurebesh the writing system in SW, so it should be allowed!

Whelp...(Gurk)...


I'm rolling with "Qui-Gone Schwinn" as my Jerdi Knight alt ...I think it will sneeeeakk past the SW filters (I cleverly made it that way)...

For you role-players...I'm not deliberatley ripping off ole' Qui Gon...

The back story is from my SWG character....Schwendo Guderian...his great great great great great great great great great great great great great grampa is Qui-"gone" Schwinn........get it?...yeah, its funny

Anyways, I digress...great topic! And, I felt my alt added some credence to the whole topic, beings its a direct play on a known SW character..

Schwendo wrote:

The back story is from my SWG character....Schwendo Guderian...his great great great great great great great great great great great great great grampa is Qui-"gone" Schwinn........get it?...yeah, its funny

Wait.....isnt he related to Gozer the Guderian? bit of a marshmallow though i hear

Yesterday in FFXIV I ran into someone named "The Legend"... That probably qualifies as too flashy... and boy, what a name to live up to...

You might even say, it's a legendary name... eh?

I had a friend on FFXI named Legendary Dragoon. We all just called him Leg. I don't know if folks made fun of him or not. He actually was a kick azz Dragoon. He sucked at every other job... but hey, who cares.

I name most of my toon in games either Da'Star or some same with Lyth in it. (Lythorn, Lythos, Lyth) Now if I am in a silly mood like in WoW I named my toons SomePally, SomeMage, SomeLock, SomeRogue, NoBody, SomeThing. In Warhammer I had a CE account due to working for EA. so my darves with Kegs in their beards were all called Drunkintank. DrunkinHeals, DrunkinAxe. my Elves who had a headband over their eyes were all named Blindfold, Blindlilith, Blindheals. Da'Star is the name my brother used to call me growing up. well actually he would call me Bar Da'Star. So I just used Da'Star in SWG and a few other games. I am hopeing I can still use Da'Star as my Sith Warrior. If not then I will use something on the lines of Trebar Zar. I do have a back story for that name as well. so we will See.

I liked "Ole' Timer" the best....I am planning on making an alt in TOR, "Poop Deck Pappay Schwen"...as a "homage" to your silly alt from SWG! (and a rodian named "Dil'Doe Bag'Schwens" if I can find an ancestral name for him) You gotta find a way to make a distant ancestor to Da'Star...hehe...

< Meditate on this......I will....


Mongo! Nice!

(Rick M): I'm Vince Klortho...keymaster of Gozer!

(Egon): Do you want some coffee?

(Rick M): Do I?

(Egon): Yes, have some...

(Rick M): Yes, have some!