"A Character with this name already exists."

"

dornal wrote:

Just like in real life, you cannot have the same name as someone else. Why is it so hard to understand this?

dude....seriously? Do you think there is only one bob smith in the entire WORLD? SERIOUSLY?

"

DuckYourHead321 wrote:

"

dornal wrote:

Just like in real life, you cannot have the same name as someone else. Why is it so hard to understand this?

dude....seriously? Do you think there is only one bob smith in the entire WORLD? SERIOUSLY?

Do you seriously not recognize sarcasm? At all?

"

Diablo 3 got this one right: character names are totally meaningless, there's no reason whatsoever to bother with them.

Well then maybe you should go play that then; there you can throw a tantrum when you don't get what you want and they'll honor whatever ridiculous request you have.

More on point though: if character names are so meaningless (as you claim) then why are you so concerned about the naming policy?

This topic reminds me of the glory days of Battle.net where-in exotic Starcraft usernames could fetch upwards of $200USD.

"

Chongo666 wrote:

Why not pick name u like and add and underscore at the end.

Samuel_jackson

Samuel_jackson_

Stop being so fckin picky. It won't break any of your nerdy solo RPing immersion and really the only time YOU see your name is when u type in chat or have character screen up. And your the only one that cares.

Let's follow this thought to a logical conclusion. I know this might be hard for you, but I'm sure someone else can help you out if you can't keep up.

The premise is that you type in a name for a character and you get the prompt that it's already taken. From here, there are a number of possible outcomes:

1) You give zero shits about your name. At this point, the "name already exists" prompt is just an unwelcome, annoying obstacle and we're better off without.

2) You want name X and don't really care if you have to mutilate it a little to have that name. At this point, the "name already exists" prompt is just forcing you to waste time slowly mutating your name into something similar to what you want it to be. At this point, it's an unwelcome, annoying obstacle and we're better off without.

3) You spent some amount of time (maybe a minute if you're good, 10-15 if not) coming up with a really cool name for your character. Now you either have to default to 2, or you have to re-start your naming process, and in either case your previous time is mostly wasted. Not even necessarily because you're uncreative, either. There are over 18k people playing PoE as I am posting this, and all it takes is for one of them to have one character with that name you wanted. Maybe not even that, it could also be one of the thousands of players who aren't online right now. It might not be their main characters, either, but rather the alt they made 20 alts ago and haven't played in a month. It's also possible that they haven't played the character for a month because they just haven't played for a month.

In any case, it's just one guy that came up with the idea some arbitrary amount of time before you did, which doesn't necessarily mean the name is crap because it's not unique. If you put forward the effort to make an interesting name for your character, then why is that somehow de-valued if one other guy thought of it first? In this case, the only purpose served by the "name already exists" prompt is to satisfy the egos of the name hipsters that get a cool name for their character

As I stated in my OP, there shouldn't be any sort of technical issue behind this, either. A University Sophomore could come up with a better in-game chat system than this, and putting such a system together might barely qualify as a semester project for a programming class of that level. If you can make Path of Exile, I cannot comprehend why you wouldn't be able to make a better chat interface.

"

Emjayen wrote:

"

Diablo 3 got this one right: character names are totally meaningless, there's no reason whatsoever to bother with them.

Well then maybe you should go play that then; there you can throw a tantrum when you don't get what you want and they'll honor whatever ridiculous request you have.

More on point though: if character names are so meaningless (as you claim) then why are you so concerned about the naming policy?

This topic reminds me of the glory days of Battle.net where-in exotic Starcraft usernames could fetch upwards of $200USD.

Because as meaningless as character names are, I still have to attribute SOME name to them, and if my first choice is taken then I'm being forced to play some kind of absurd guessing game with a computer instead of smashing zombie faces in.

In other words, character names are meaningless, but the code of the game treats them as something special, and the conflict is somewhere between annoying and frustrating.

Thank god they don't allow multiples of the same name.... or else half the population would be named Sephiroth.

"

NebulousFury wrote:

Thank god they don't allow multiples of the same name.... or else half the population would be named Sephiroth.

No, they wouldn't be named Sephiroth, they'd be named PenisMuncher. Sephiroth is too high-brow a name for this community.

"

XCodes wrote:

Let's follow this thought to a logical conclusion. I know this might be hard for you, but I'm sure someone else can help you out if you can't keep up.

It's cute how people try to "act tough and big" over the internet. Just know it doesn't work; has quite the opposite effect really ;)

I feel the unique name policy should remain the way it is.

Is upset over losing a little bit of time on having to rename his character due to it being taken.

Spends hours arguing about it on the forum.

I like the unique names system. It means that I AM TheGoddamnBatman. And no one can take that away from me.
Also, this thread seems to be one or two people arguing really loudly about something that has been like this since I started, at least, (back in 0.9.2). I really hope GGG o not review their policy on this as one of the worst things to see on entering town is a mass list of the same boring name.
The current method forces either originality, which is well received in the wider community as an example of cleverness, or laziness. By laziness, I mean, TheGoddamnBatman22 kinda jazz.

So, instead of complaining, embrace some originality and creativeness in your online gaming. I NEVER (A little bit of exaggeration, I've seen it once or twice) see this screen unless I'm trying to remake a character and forgot to delete it first.

I'm glad names are required to be unique. You can only stand to see so many Sephiroth's mucking about before it starts to wear on you.