Guild Wars 2

For me, a character name matters. I have played a lot of MMOs and GW2 is by far the hardest to get a name I am happy with, simply because they are all taken. Across six characters, none of them have a name I am completely happy with.

I think that Anet needs to start a process very soon that frees up the names that are taken by inactive accounts, or implement a feature that allows the same names to exist on different servers. I know that Guesting creates some conflicts here, but it’s certainly not impossible.

Anyone else have the same problem? Any other ideas?

Never had issues, but I use surnames for all my characters.
Tosha Daydreamer
Fiona Daydreamer
Kiara Dreamwalker
Farrah Dreamslayer
Flipe Daydreamer

I never have to worry about a first name

Never had the issue at all . It’s all about originality

I’ve had some problems getting the names I wanted, but there’s always a solution if you add a surname or change the spelling a bit.

Two+ part names are part of the Guild Wars lore.

It would not be strange to give your Human or Charr character a first and a last name.

When I created a Charr, I used this page to see if I could find a good combination of names that I liked:
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Category:Charr

My 2 Charr characters are named Blaine Burntfur and Garfazz Grimgear.

Asura on the other hand usually had one word names with double letters (Hixx, Vekk, Tixx, Hudd, Xapp, etc.)

Even if you can’t seem to find an Asura name in one word using that format…. you CAN always use non english characters….. so if you want an Asura Thief…. instead of calling him Trikk, call him Tríkk.

Norn, you can get away with adding prefixes or suffixes:
Magni The Bison, Bjorn The Bear, Olaf Olafson, etc.

Sylvari… whatever you like…. they are a new race!

I had some issues with my Sylvari, as they only use a first name (often of a Gaelic origin)
However, adding a ‘title’ to the name can do wonders.

Warden Ciana is my main character at the moment, as Ciana itself was taken.

Maybe that helps a bit?

It’s inevitable for names to get used up as time passes. Unless you come up with weird sounding names. At best you can replace letters with ones that sound alike or add surnames.

Asura and Sylvari are a little tough, other than that it’s not too bad.

I made a new Charr character last week – Ultimate Cat Gif. Couldn’t believe nobody had thought of that one.

Most of the obvious names are already taken so it can be a challenge to find a good new one.

I understand you don’t like being stuck with misspelled names like Uzzuumakki Naruku or Jamezzz Bond

Midnightjade.3520:

I made a new Charr character last week – Ultimate Cat Gif. Couldn’t believe nobody had thought of that one.

It probably was too daft for everybody else.

Why should someone who is inactive lose their name? Yeah they could have quit, or they could be taking a break or is overseas on business or on deployment.

You can’t get your desired name – tough luck

Vol.5241:

Why should someone who is inactive lose their name? Yeah they could have quit, or they could be taking a break or is overseas on business or on deployment.

You can’t get your desired name – tough luck

While I agree with you for general inactivity…. perhaps Anet will one day release all of the names reserved on permanently banned accounts.

Especially since GW2 is designed to be a game where you can stop playing and return anytime later.

I sincerely hope you are wrong, for I will need to make a new character within a month. This far I have not had any trouble finding a name though, so I hope I can think of something once more.

Are you trying to use famous names, by any chance? I am not surprised if those are taken. Try to imagine up something that you’ve never seen/heard before, at least not in combination. If nothing else works go for anagrams. You’ll get interesting looking names that way and can, of course, add or remove letters to polish them off.

TheBlackLeech.9360:

Vol.5241:

Why should someone who is inactive lose their name? Yeah they could have quit, or they could be taking a break or is overseas on business or on deployment.

You can’t get your desired name – tough luck

While I agree with you for general inactivity…. perhaps Anet will one day release all of the names reserved on permanently banned accounts.

I don’t think it’s worth the effort or time to design such a system that would allow that – let alone test it. The people who simply want such a feature is such a minority that they’re better off investing efforts in improving the game.

Just look at the #’s.
-How many % of the total population in the game has been perma banned?
-How many of those were bots and probably have meaningless names, like zyrcxx or beherhe?
-How many of those non-bots had generic names that would most likely be in demand

All in all, very, very few.

A few other games allow for CharacterName@AccountName, and it seems to work well. However, it maybe too late at this point in GW2’s design to allow for that kind of feature.

Sylvari can be rough if you are sticking to the lore rules for names, but one way is to go with adjectives before the name. For example, I made my Sylvari Warror with a dark skin color. Dark Wood is known as Ebony. So, I combined it with a Celtic name to get, Ebon Durst . . .or Dark Riot. . .I doubt it works out that cleanly to someone who is really a student of language or Onomastics, but it’s good enough for a video game.

Having two words as a name is not always the same as having a last name. You could also go with the age old: Name the Descriptor.

TheBlackLeech.9360:

Two+ part names are part of the Guild Wars lore.

It would not be strange to give your Human or Charr character a first and a last name.

When I created a Charr, I used this page to see if I could find a good combination of names that I liked:
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Category:Charr

My 2 Charr characters are named Blaine Burntfur and Garfazz Grimgear.

Asura on the other hand usually had one word names with double letters (Hixx, Vekk, Tixx, Hudd, Xapp, etc.)

Even if you can’t seem to find an Asura name in one word using that format…. you CAN always use non english characters….. so if you want an Asura Thief…. instead of calling him Trikk, call him Tríkk.

Norn, you can get away with adding prefixes or suffixes:
Magni The Bison, Bjorn The Bear, Olaf Olafson, etc.

Sylvari… whatever you like…. they are a new race!

If you want to stay within the lore, Sylvari and Asura can be the more problematic since they don’t use surnames, but you can still get away with a lot by using them.

For example, for asura, if Tixx is taken, you could become Tixx of Rata Rum, Tixx of Hydrodinamic College, Tixx of the Element Control Krewe, Tixx the Golemancer, and so on.

Same with sylvari, they tend to use gaelic sounding 1 word names, let’s say you want a sylvari names Raibeart but it’s taken, you could be Raibeart of the grove, Raibeart of the night cycle, Raibeart the Guardian, Guardian Raibeart, Raibeart the dreamer, and so on

I rolled a couple alts in the past couple weeks. I got the names I wanted for both on the first try. Just be creative and use surnames, it isn’t too bad.

Also, this reminded me of something from The Boondocks

=====

Granddad: Hold on there, Slickback.
A Pimp Named Slickback: No, it’s A Pimp Named Slickback.
Granddad: That’s what I said. Slickback.
A Pimp Named Slickback: No, it’s “A Pimp Named Slickback.” Like A Tribe Called Quest; you say the whole thing: “A Pimp Named Slickback”!
Granddad: Can’t I just call you “Slickback” for short?
A Pimp Named Slickback: No, kitten! It’s “A Pimp Named Slickback!”

Omen.1879:

For me, a character name matters. I have played a lot of MMOs and GW2 is by far the hardest to get a name I am happy with, simply because they are all taken. Across six characters, none of them have a name I am completely happy with.

I think that Anet needs to start a process very soon that frees up the names that are taken by inactive accounts, or implement a feature that allows the same names to exist on different servers. I know that Guesting creates some conflicts here, but it’s certainly not impossible.

Anyone else have the same problem? Any other ideas?

I only have this problem with Sylvari or Asura. I’m huge on a name fitting the game lore. Most Asurans don’t have surnames so i don’t use one. For Female Asuran they seem to end in “a” or “i” and the males tend to have two hard sounding letters in their names, like “nn” “xx” “dd”. Sylvari are very tough. I tried latin words for different plants mixed with Elven type names.

Here are a couple of naming sites that might give you an Idea on how to build one or an actual name:

http://dragonwatch.net/charrname/
http://www.porfl.de/guildwars-namegenerator,en.html

These are some names I have come up with, two of them are taken:

Adrien
Savish Salacious
Kayethious – Female Name
Trixitious – Male Name
Elixityetious – Male Name

Yes, all the names are taken. All 797125955808376000000000000 of them (that’s just names without spaces, and the precision of my spreadsheet gave out).

Some female Asura and Charr use short Asian names usually of Japanese origin (I blame an old GW 1 staff member that may be still with us who loves making obscure references to certain anime he likes), at least what I seen on heart npcs and event npcs. Like a female char named Mia + some charr last name and an Asura named Suki.

Canthan humans usually have some sort of Asian name of Korean, Japanese or Chinese origin. Until we know otherwise when Cantha makes a return, this is the naming scheme for humans of Canthan heritage and is correct to lore.

marnick.4305:

I understand you don’t like being stuck with misspelled names like Uzzuumakki Naruku or Jamezzz Bond

I honestly wish they would ban the use of names like that, triples letters especially. If you want the name of a certain character and you get it first, good for you. But if somebody else got it first, it’s just plain petty doctor the name to get your way. I’m sick of seeing crap like XxXLegolasXxX.

Ya it doesn’t really make sense why all the names are on one big server when we have account names/numbers. Why wouldn’t they stick your character name on a server and then make it so when a player guests with the same name as someone on the server their guesting it just switches to their account name/number for the day.

Conncept.7638:

marnick.4305:

I understand you don’t like being stuck with misspelled names like Uzzuumakki Naruku or Jamezzz Bond

I honestly wish they would ban the use of names like that, triples letters especially. If you want the name of a certain character and you get it first, good for you. But if somebody else got it first, it’s just plain petty doctor the name to get your way. I’m sick of seeing crap like XxXLegolasXxX.

You never bash someone for wanting a name another person wants jeez they want what they want not like they are hurting people by making those names. 3 million people bought the game I’m sure some of them will have similar interests and their fore want similar names.

Conncept.7638:

marnick.4305:

I understand you don’t like being stuck with misspelled names like Uzzuumakki Naruku or Jamezzz Bond

I honestly wish they would ban the use of names like that, triples letters especially. If you want the name of a certain character and you get it first, good for you. But if somebody else got it first, it’s just plain petty doctor the name to get your way. I’m sick of seeing crap like XxXLegolasXxX.

What, you don’t like my char named XxX420AlLYoUrL00tSBeloNgtOmE#YOLOSWAG?

Sorry but not everyone is an RP’er

A lot of my names were taken too, but mostly the single names I wanted to use. When I added a last name of sentimental value, I was able to make more characters and get past that.

Not all names are taken… All names in a limited pool of your desires are taken. I don’t mean to be harsh but yes that is expected and happens in all games. No matter the game, the longer it is out the less names that are available. However my son wanted to name a character of mine so I let him think of a name and he picked a one word name and it was available.

In the end you could always offer to buy the name off the owner

LegatusLeaf.5934:

Also, this reminded me of something from The Boondocks

=====

Granddad: Hold on there, Slickback.
A Pimp Named Slickback: No, it’s A Pimp Named Slickback.
Granddad: That’s what I said. Slickback.
A Pimp Named Slickback: No, it’s “A Pimp Named Slickback.” Like A Tribe Called Quest; you say the whole thing: “A Pimp Named Slickback”!
Granddad: Can’t I just call you “Slickback” for short?
A Pimp Named Slickback: No, kitten! It’s “A Pimp Named Slickback!”

I don’t recall every saying that, o wait sorry wrong Boondock.

Seriously though, you just have to work on something more original. Also, GW2 will never begin erasing user names that are inactive.

Omen.1879:

I think that Anet needs to start a process very soon that frees up the names that are taken by inactive accounts

Such a bad idea. Do you realize the kind of kitten storm that would be created? I can see the headlines now: “ANet threatening to confiscate character names if players don’t login at least once a month”. It would make ANet look like they’re only doing it to keep their players on-at-one-time numbers up. I recommend just being more creative with your names. This happens in MMOs a lot. Not sure if this was your first MMO, but i’d get used to it lol.

Emmet.2943:

Ya it doesn’t really make sense why all the names are on one big server when we have account names/numbers. Why wouldn’t they stick your character name on a server and then make it so when a player guests with the same name as someone on the server their guesting it just switches to their account name/number for the day.

Conncept.7638:

marnick.4305:

I understand you don’t like being stuck with misspelled names like Uzzuumakki Naruku or Jamezzz Bond

I honestly wish they would ban the use of names like that, triples letters especially. If you want the name of a certain character and you get it first, good for you. But if somebody else got it first, it’s just plain petty doctor the name to get your way. I’m sick of seeing crap like XxXLegolasXxX.

You never bash someone for wanting a name another person wants jeez they want what they want not like they are hurting people by making those names. 3 million people bought the game I’m sure some of them will have similar interests and their fore want similar names.

This game is rated Teen, if you’re here, you should be well over five years old. If you are more than five years old, you should be mature enough to deal with not getting what you want all the time. Making names like this only makes you look juvenile and petty.

Character names are important to me too. When I started playing I decide to play Asura and looked at the Asura naming conventions. The names needed to be short and contain a double letter pair. Take a guess where my handle came from. My character names are “Alloy Prime”, “Alloy Deux”, “Alloy The Third”, and “Alloy Four”. They are all Asura. I want to try Sylvari next so I will need to do some thinking.

Since GW2 is not a subscription game, the concept of an inactive account is problematic. As long as a player does not delete their characters, they should get to keep the names.