Name Changes & Role-playing Implications

[Sarva]

Note that any policy that is decided on is going to be open to all players equally. There is not going to be any GN desecration about which players are "worthy" or a name change and which aren't. To many people can't take no for an answer so if there was any desecration  involved then to much GM time is going to be taken up arguing with players who get turned down or having those players run around shopping their request to every single GM trying to play off one GM against another.



As for the abuse issue what we don't want to see is people very casually deciding that they are bored with their current character and they want to start over and thus do the permadeath and ask for a name change.

We are talking about having a min skill level that we wouldn't lower existing skills below, currently looking at like level 20 so any skill higher than 20 wouldn't be reduced lower than 20 and skill below 20 would be left alone. Note also that if a name change is granted the old first name will be banned so that there will not be the chance of someone changing their mind and recreating their old character.

[Jacula]

...GN desecration about which players are "worthy" or a name change and which aren't..."

It is not a question of being worthy, more so than simply being viable. Viable implying that a player has a good reason, which I'd personally find to be requesting the service due to realistic role playing circumstances.

Why would a generic power leveler be in need of a name change for example, or even apply if the cost defeats the purpose?
If the player is viable in turn, it is ultimately up to a GM of high enough tier to decide. I am using the word tier as I suppose that certain GMs might be able to change names, where as others can not.

As for the abuse issue what we don't want to see is people very casually deciding that they are bored with their current character and they want to start over and thus do the permadeath and ask for a name change. -

If you decide to only grant this service once per player, for one character only. Clearly stipulating it in official policy that it is a one time offer, I'd find it extremely unlikely that players would request it casually. More so, let's assume one is asking for a name change to preserve a series of hard aquired skills. This wishing to assume the role of a baker, craftsman or what have you.

Inducing such an unresonable debuff to skills would leave the inevitable grinding that follows, more or less defeating requesting it in the first place. True, it would be worse to start anew entirely. Yet the price still appears unbalanced in my mind.

Maybe letting the player choose a skill or two to keep intact would be a good solution, as if choosing a class, only to let them play out their new role without having to mine, gain progression points, and the time consumtion that entails.

With that said, it is good to hear that discussion on the matter is upheld rather than negated. Surely, it can come to benefit all of us once coined as policy.

[bilbous]

Hey I have an idea, he said somewhat spuriously, how about instead if reducing skill levels you just randomize them so that that max skill in sword suddenly become Argan or body development or something else currently useless or not. Put your name in a hat and out comes someone completely different. Would provide a challenge to the role players it would.

[Rigwyn]

Hey I have an idea, he said somewhat spuriously, how about instead if reducing skill levels you just randomize them so that that max skill in sword suddenly become Argan or body development or something else currently useless or not. Put your name in a hat and out comes someone completely different. Would provide a challenge to the role players it would.

  

Another way to side step the issue of people just casually changing their name might be to grant this only after X hours of use ( if its possible to see that )... ie. only if player for a year or more...

[Bonifarzia]

As a player reasoning about game mechanics, I clearly dislike the compromise of reducing skills and stats by half. This feels much like a generic tool for "buying" a new character with some discount (~25% ) for the grinding put into an abandoned  character. That distracts from the initial request to avoid the grind barrier when there are well documented reasons that a characters story has come to an end. Either it is justified or not to see the progression of a character in terms of a) game mechanics and b) roleplay background as two distinct aspects, which can and will be treated independently in this context. In the past, there have been GM events where player participation was rewarded with special items or other things. Why shouldn't it be possible to award extensive player events with such a simple thing as a name change? Again, one can argue that this has less impact on game mechanics than unique items, given that the existing, trained actor is simply put into a different roleplay context. I think the trigger should come from the side of the GM team, which should be allowed to promote selected storylines by offering the name reset in retrospect. Of course, there should be no guarantee to obtain this sort of commendation, and it should be obvious that GM harassment will be a very counterproductive method to exert influence.

These are just a few thoughts. Maybe they will stimulate some more discussion.

[bilbous]

Boni, I kind of agree with the separation of player effort and character nomenclature. It takes so long to develop one character that I do not know many who develop more to a significant margin. Sure not all people are like me and develop everything into one character, some train one thing with one and others with secondary character.

Let me suggest a radical idea. Add a function to the character creation page whereby any new character designed starts with all the progression of all existing characters. In other words you would need to set up a pool to which any progression points earned by any character on the account were copied. The new character would then be able to spend these points to develop their new character any way they want.

Under this system the base character would start with 0 in all stats and skills and progression points would then be deducted from the total for each advance alloted. The point pool itself would not be depleted so that additional characters would be possible but the amount available for that particular new character would reduce as points were allotted to it.

This would serve the dual purposes of encouraging players to engage with the mechanics and allowing for more fleshed out temporary role play characters to be present as needed.

[tman]

I see where you're going with that, but it seems a poor way to implement it.  For example, training one character to max stats shouldn't mean that you can then create an infinite army of god-like characters.

Maybe if the boost was less extreme: you get 1/3 or 1/4 the pps of your highest character to train each new character.  This is enough to give people a boost while making a new character but not so much that making additional super powerful characters isn't easy.  It still should require some work on the player's part.

[bilbous]

well there are only 4 characters on any one account so you exaggerate a bit but a lesser ratio than 1:1 is OK. Did you notice that it was any leveling done with the account that contributed to the points available to new characters? I think that is important as well you could certainly cap the amount available for character generation but if a player wanted to have two or three semi-permanent characters they could all focus on different things and not waste efforts.

[novacadian]

Let me suggest a radical idea.

This is not only way off topic yet has been covered on countless other threads. To paraphrase the other threads: Ain't goin to happen.

- Nova

[bilbous]

Funny thing. You could use that same paraphrase for this whole name change discussion but it seems to be being reconsidered. This thread is as much about retaining skills and stats as it is about changing your name. If there was no need to retain the skills and stats then just delete the unwanted character and start over. Sure my post comes at it from a different angle, and one I don't recall exactly seeing before, but it works to the same goal.

Sorry you didn't like it and even sorrier I felt the need to make this reply.

[novacadian]

Sorry you didn't like it and even sorrier I felt the need to make this reply.

Did not mean it was not appreciated. Just that they are two very different issues. For example the name change ability has my full support while creating alternate character types does not. For that reason it was my feeling that presenting the opposing views on the same thread are bound to muddy the OP's intent.

One thread that has support for your idea would be this one.

No harm meant, Bilbous and it is my sincere hope that none was taken.

- Nova

[Jacula]

Presuming, or more so, hoping there to be a GM meeting today [Sunday], let's hope a decision on the matter is made.

[Tessra]

I'm chiming in a bit late here, but I would like to say: I agree with this proposal.  I like to have leveled characters.  I currently have 3 or 4 with winch access, and my main has a decent level of skills/stats, all that I find important for *my* experience as a player in RP.  I can think of a few situations that would cause me to want to permanently kill her off, and in that case, I wouldn't want to have to start from scratch to get another character up to those levels.  That leveling issue is one of the things that has stopped me from killing Tesh off in the past.  It's hard enough to level now, and I *know* the tricks of how to grind as fast as possible.  I don't have the unlimited time I had when I started playing, and at no more than I can play now, it's not likely I could get another character that high in a year, much less the few months it took me to get Tesh up to an RP-able skill.  Ah well, just my little tidbit of support. 

And incidentally, Sarva... even starting over with 20 in axe would make me cry.

[tman]

Agreed.  For how much time it takes to level a character, a 50% drop is too much.  Especially because, for example, if you have a skill at 100 and it gets cut to 50, it takes much much more time to raise a skill from 50 to 100 than from 1 to 50.  So even if you're cutting the skill in half, you're only cutting like one fifth of the time out of training.  In my opinion a more reasonable penalty would be a 15-25% drop to all skills.  This might seem pretty small, but if your skills are high getting that last 15-25% back would take quite a while.

[novacadian]

In my opinion a more reasonable penalty would be a 15-25% drop to all skills. 

My vote would be no penalty at all just a darn good rp reason. To place a grind penalty on someone that wishes the change for RP reasons seems so contrary to the declared goals of this game that it puts said goals in question.

- Nova