City of Heroes: Live Forum Archive

Trial account name purge?

Absolut_

By Absolut_,
Posted on: 2011-11-04 11:15 in CoH and CoV General Discussions

 

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Originally Posted by CactusBrawler View Post
It could be argued that those who have had real issue with the well... issue have already left.
Funny, I've never heard anyone complain that the reason they quit any MMO was over their naming policy.

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Of course the Dev defense force will leap to the defense of the status quo even if the game starts to hemorage customers again.
Oh you must mean Champions which was forced to go F2P just 2 years after it launched from the loss of subscribers. CoH was never hemorrhaging customers. Sure we had a slow decline over the years but nothing that put the game in any jeopardy. NCSoft is notorious for cutting it's losses on games that can't retain it's customers. Just look at what happened to Dungeon Runners, Exteel, Tabula Rossa, Auto Assault, and Lineage.

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Since going Free to play, the need to merge servers should of fallen, however the issue of 'super hero/villain' names running out, will only rise.
And yet none of the other MMO's in the industry that also have unique naming policies harsher than our own, and have signifacantly more customers than we have, have had any trouble with their players coming up with unique 1 word names.

 

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Originally Posted by Adeon Hawkwood View Post
As a side note, I have no objection to people who want more traditional names, I just object to the assertion that going with the random syllable type cannot work in CoX. Personally I find that the idea of secret-identity style names in a city where 50% of the population have super powers strains my ability to suspend disbelief so my characters have character names which are either their real names or a title that supersedes their name (but with the assumption that their real name is public knowledge) but to each their own.
Most of my heroes (and all of my villains) have a pretty simple solution to this. While they all have given birth names separate from their costumed identity, they don't actually have a meaningful civilian identity. They don't hang out that much with normal people. Most who live like this either have no immediate living ancestors or siblings, or have severed ties with such. If they have a significant other, it's usually another metahuman.

The Rikti War is a convenient excuse for a lot of people with no non-super families, let alone the dozens of unfortunate ways one can meet their end to more terrestrial villain groups. (If you live on the Rogue Isles, god only knows what might have befallen your family.) So mostly only the heroes with family ties and/or a non-metahuman family really need a secret identity.

Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA

 

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Originally Posted by CactusBrawler View Post
Of course the Dev defense force will leap to the defense of the status quo even if the game starts to hemorage customers again.
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Originally Posted by Forbin_Project View Post
Oh you must mean Champions which was forced to go F2P just 2 years after it launched from the loss of subscribers. CoH was never hemorrhaging customers. Sure we had a slow decline over the years but nothing that put the game in any jeopardy. NCSoft is notorious for cutting it's losses on games that can't retain it's customers. Just look at what happened to Dungeon Runners, Exteel, Tabula Rossa, Auto Assault, and Lineage.
hmm.... You must be one of them dev apologists, daring to try to forestall a rant by using facts.

Paragon City Search And Rescue
The Mentor Project

 

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Originally Posted by UberGuy View Post
Most of my heroes (and all of my villains) have a pretty simple solution to this. While they all have given birth names separate from their costumed identity, they don't actually have a meaningful civilian identity. They don't hang out that much with normal people. Most who live like this either have no immediate living ancestors or siblings, or have severed ties with such. If they have a significant other, it's usually another metahuman.

The Rikti War is a convenient excuse for a lot of people with no non-super families, let alone the dozens of unfortunate ways one can meet their end to more terrestrial villain groups. (If you live on the Rogue Isles, god only knows what might have befallen your family.) So mostly only the heroes with family ties and/or a non-metahuman family really need a secret identity.
The solution I take is that there is no point to a secret identity. When heroes are a dime a dozen kidnapping friends and family becomes much less useful as a tactic. Kidnapping Lois Lane to keep Superman busy while you rob a bank makes sense if Superman is the only one who can stop you. But if Batman, Spiderman, Wonder Woman and Aquaman are all in town for a convention then kidnapping Lois Lane to keep Superman busy while you rob a bank doesn't really help much, they'll foil the robbery while Superman rescues Lois Lane.

 

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Originally Posted by Adeon Hawkwood View Post
The solution I take is that there is no point to a secret identity. When heroes are a dime a dozen kidnapping friends and family becomes much less useful as a tactic. Kidnapping Lois Lane to keep Superman busy while you rob a bank makes sense if Superman is the only one who can stop you. But if Batman, Spiderman, Wonder Woman and Aquaman are all in town for a convention then kidnapping Lois Lane to keep Superman busy while you rob a bank doesn't really help much, they'll foil the robbery while Superman rescues Lois Lane.
As a self proclaimed 'comic book nerd' I feel the need to point out that in the list of heroes you said, 1 of them shouldn't be on that list. It's plausible to see Batman or Wonder Woman in the same town as Superman, but, really, you want me to believe that Aquaman would be useful?

Thanks to everyone that helped make me a welcomed part of the community, and for giving me over 3 years of some of the best gaming I've been able to take part in. May the next game bring many friendships and maybe reconnect to some old CoH friends.

 

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Originally Posted by Hulkman View Post
As a self proclaimed 'comic book nerd' I feel the need to point out that in the list of heroes you said, 1 of them shouldn't be on that list. It's plausible to see Batman or Wonder Woman in the same town as Superman, but, really, you want me to believe that Aquaman would be useful?
I can see some valid uses for controlling creatures of the deep:


Honestly, I was expecting people to complain about the fact that Spiderman is from the wrong universe.

 

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I can't believe no one has done this part yet! There are good names out there if you try. I created an Illusion controller named Ms. Perception on Virtue last night. I think we've now covered all the bases for the issue. I personally don't mind the unique naming at all. I doubt that many of my names would be in high demand so I don't really care if we have unique names or not. It doesn't impact my characters I generally come up with unique names pretty quickly. If the devs changed it tomorrow to non-unique names my characters would still most likely retain their uniqueness. I would be concerned that making such a huge change could break things horribly and result in some serious bugs.

 

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Originally Posted by Adeon Hawkwood View Post
I can see some valid uses for controlling creatures of the deep
Sharktopus.

Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA

 

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Originally Posted by Ironblade View Post
hmm.... You must be one of them dev apologists, daring to try to forestall a rant by using facts.
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Originally Posted by Nalrok_AthZim View Post
And you must be one of them doomsayers who's constantly stating how poor the game's health is without being able to prove it.
I have eyes! Do I have to 'prove' that bananas are yellow (or green) when we can all plainly see it?
BTW, my first post was sarcasm also.

Paragon City Search And Rescue
The Mentor Project

 

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People who have been paying their subs all along should have preference over people gone for several years. Yes! I dared to say it!

If someone has been gone for years, the name should be up for grabs now. Think of it as yet another VIP privilege.

 

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Originally Posted by Adeon Hawkwood View Post
I can see some valid uses for controlling creatures of the deep:
I shoot sharks at people. It's awesome.

 

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As someone who's been playing for a long time, and even has some names that might be attractive to other people, I don't mind in the least if they decide to change to a non-unique naming system in the future. If I run into someone using the same name, hell I'll /em salute them and tell them I appreciate their taste. I honestly don't feel any need to hold a monopoly on the names I have. My friends know me by my global name anyway, so I don't expect them to be confused.