Character Name Policy -- Thirty Day Notice!
By
0zymandous,
Posted on: 2007-07-31 15:59 in News, Events and Announcement Discussion
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And it doesn't answer my question.
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Lighthouse did answer your question, just not in the way you want. He specifically said they haven't (and possibly might not) announced the schedule for performing the purge, and that customers should presume they could happen at any time after the deadline.
This means you can guess when it might happen, but you should not be surprised if your guess is wrong. Basically, the answer is "they aren't saying."
I am reasonably certain that the process could run with the servers up, and with the servers down, and they could decide to go either way for any one of a number of reasons.
I am even more certain that Lighthouse did not specifically intend to say "on August 29th the names will be freed after a server downtime." I'm pretty certain he's saying that you shouldn't even presume it will necessarily run *on* the 29th: that's only the first day its allowed to run by policy. Because its a manual process, they could decide to run it on the 30th. Or not at all until just before the Character Name Check goes online. They seem to not want to lock themselves into a specific announced implementation strategy for something they probably wish to do at their own discretion.
In their place, I would probably act similarly.
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They are IMHO unlikely to aever nnounce when they run the script to stop people trying to rush a test/camp names at a particular moment.
And as Arcanaville said, Ultimus that sentance does answer your question.
@Catwhoorg "Rule of Three - Finale" Arc# 1984
@Mr Falkland Islands"A Nation Goes Rogue" Arc# 2369 "Toasters and Pop Tarts" Arc#116617
I'm so taking catwhoorg from you on multiple servers 
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and then Arcanaville and Evil Geko 
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I'm so taking catwhoorg from you on multiple servers
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Try it.
Catwhoorg exists everywhere
Heck on at least one server there is already a "Catwhoorg."
Some are level 1, most are in the 5-10 range, obviously 1 is 50
@Catwhoorg "Rule of Three - Finale" Arc# 1984
@Mr Falkland Islands"A Nation Goes Rogue" Arc# 2369 "Toasters and Pop Tarts" Arc#116617
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I'm so taking catwhoorg from you on multiple servers
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Try it.
Catwhoorg exists everywhere
Heck on at least one server there is already a "Catwhoorg."
Some are level 1, most are in the 5-10 range, obviously 1 is 50
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you'll slip up one of these days cat! you'll let one of your lowbie cat's be left alone for 30 days then *BAM* name gone!
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I'm so taking catwhoorg from you on multiple servers
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Try it.
Catwhoorg exists everywhere
Heck on at least one server there is already a "Catwhoorg."
Some are level 1, most are in the 5-10 range, obviously 1 is 50
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you'll slip up one of these days cat! you'll let one of your lowbie cat's be left alone for 30 days then *BAM* name gone!
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That would be 90 days... and only if Catwhoorg stopped paying for his account for that long ...
Just trying to forstall any misunderstanding of the policy 
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@Catwhoorg "Rule of Three - Finale" Arc# 1984
@Mr Falkland Islands"A Nation Goes Rogue" Arc# 2369 "Toasters and Pop Tarts" Arc#116617
well I need to steal someone's, my handle is so apparantly common, that it's been taken on all servers last time I checked 
Is this policy the reason why the characters I haven't played as for a long time were deleted from my account yesterday? I just got back to the game after a long, long hiatus and didn't log into all of the old characters I rolled up and was a little surprised to find them all missing when I logged on last night.
Characters are never deleted. The name may become unreserved, but the character still exists.
"Null is as much an argument "for removing the cottage rule" as the moon being round is for buying tennis shoes." -Memphis Bill
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Characters are never deleted. The name may become unreserved, but the character still exists.
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That's what I thought, but after the last patch the ones I haven't used since I returned are gone.
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Characters are never deleted. The name may become unreserved, but the character still exists.
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That's what I thought, but after the last patch the ones I haven't used since I returned are gone.
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Then that's something you may want to /petition about.
I am assuming, of course, that you're the only one who knows your account information, and this isn't a case of a little sibling logging in and deleting characters.
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or that you just forgot what server they were on.
"Null is as much an argument "for removing the cottage rule" as the moon being round is for buying tennis shoes." -Memphis Bill
No, I live alone and just came back to the game after a very long break. No one has my account information other than myself unless they obtained it through illegal means. And I only play on two servers so that's where all my characters are.
The thing that made me think it was a policy change and, now, think it's a glitch is that there are 3 characters on both servers that I have logged in under since I've returned; they all stayed. The ones I haven't got around to yet are all gone.
I've submitted a question on the support website but is there any place specifically I should go to report this?
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No, I live alone and just came back to the game after a very long break. No one has my account information other than myself unless they obtained it through illegal means. And I only play on two servers so that's where all my characters are.
The thing that made me think it was a policy change and, now, think it's a glitch is that there are 3 characters on both servers that I have logged in under since I've returned; they all stayed. The ones I haven't got around to yet are all gone.
I've submitted a question on the support website but is there any place specifically I should go to report this?
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Support is the best bet - unfortunately, what you describe sounds like something that will have to wait until Monday
Orc&Pie No.53230 There is an orc, and somehow, he got a pie. And you are hungry.
www.repeat-offenders.net
Negaduck: I see you found the crumb. I knew you'd never notice the huge flag.
I just convinced my friend to come back to the game since we both started and quit at the same time when the game was initially released. He, too, has found that his characters are gone. This time it's all of them. I told him that perhaps it was due to the same glitch or whatever that happened to me last week. Hopefully he can get them recovered.
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I just convinced my friend to come back to the game since we both started and quit at the same time when the game was initially released. He, too, has found that his characters are gone. This time it's all of them. I told him that perhaps it was due to the same glitch or whatever that happened to me last week. Hopefully he can get them recovered.
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Either make a (new) character - preferably on a server you know you didn't use before - and petition, or use the support website.
Ex mentioned something about having to take the storage DB offline for Character Transfer prepwork, but I am not sure how long that was/is supposed to last (and this is apparently why the characters have disappeared).
Orc&Pie No.53230 There is an orc, and somehow, he got a pie. And you are hungry.
www.repeat-offenders.net
Negaduck: I see you found the crumb. I knew you'd never notice the huge flag.
I did use the support website. They said they could run the recovery tool to try to return the characters. The only problem is I don't remember the names of all the ones that are lost. In the end, it's not a big problem for me. I'll just write off those characters as lost for good, but I'm more concerned about my friend now who lost everything from his initial run of the game and he certainly doesn't remember all the names after how long he's been away.
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I did use the support website. They said they could run the recovery tool to try to return the characters. The only problem is I don't remember the names of all the ones that are lost. In the end, it's not a big problem for me. I'll just write off those characters as lost for good, but I'm more concerned about my friend now who lost everything from his initial run of the game and he certainly doesn't remember all the names after how long he's been away.
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They shouldn't need the names - they would have your account name on them, I would think.
*shrug*
Wish you luck.
Orc&Pie No.53230 There is an orc, and somehow, he got a pie. And you are hungry.
www.repeat-offenders.net
Negaduck: I see you found the crumb. I knew you'd never notice the huge flag.
I don't know. They asked me for the names of my lost characters, account name, the server, and approximate date of loss.
no, not yet...servers havent even gone down for maintenance yet 
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Usually by this time, they've done maintenance and everyone's back to kicking hero/villain butt. What's the big hold up?
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dunno, but I know as soon as I leave to get lunch, they are gonna activate it
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Justice Server
Global: @Abraxxus
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And it doesn't answer my question. He said it is a manual process. Does that mean the servers have to go down for it to go into effect? If it does, that means it will go into effect August 29th after the servers go down.
If it doesn't, (And they can do it with servers up) I'd expect it sometime that evening.
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If their database is working even remotely like any other database, it is something that will be done over a period of time, most likely while the servers are up. He stated very clearly that it would be a manual process, in other words, it is not something that is over in a few seconds or even minutes. It could be something that takes as long as a day or maybe even longer (I hope not, for their sake). So, in other words: The process BEGINS on the 29th, and they will not release the exact time, or they would have done so by now. So, if it is because you wish to grab certain names, your only real option is to begin trying after midnight, and keep at it until either you succumb to fatigue or you get the name. AND still there is no guarantee you will get it.
If it was an automated process it would most like be done during maintenance.
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