Guild Wars 2

It won’t alter the balance of the game, nor disrupt anyone’s current playstyle nor the developer’s views about the ranger and the pet mechanic: let players name specific pets PERMANENTLY, so we don’t ever have to rename them unless we want to. As minor as that change may seem, it doesn’t seem to me as something particularly hard to achieve-especially considering that armor sets get to “memorize” their dye patterns, which to me seems like a more complicated programming code(though perhaps I am wrong).

IMHO, the reason most players have their pets named “Juvenile Whatever” is not that they don’t want to name them, BUT that it’s convenient to not name them at all if the name is easily deleted just by choosing another pet. I refuse to move along with “Juvenile Whatever”, though, which personally makes pet switching a chore, which is a shame (not to mention, we may forget specific names we came up for our pets, and possibly have to come up with another.)

Honestly, not just a spiteful/“whiny” complaint, but it does make the game appear lacking in polish, and I say it with all due respect for all of you who work so hard in this game’s development and mechanics. And no offense to anyone on these forums either-I just feel it would be a VERY welcome change that feels like a priority for me, especially since it wouldn’t bother those who don’t care about their pet’s name, and would also make game-life easier for everyone else who does.

This! A thousand times, this!

Something no one could disagree with

Please ArenaNet, put this on your list

Star Ace.5207:

It won’t alter the balance of the game, nor disrupt anyone’s current playstyle nor the developer’s views about the ranger and the pet mechanic: let players name specific pets PERMANENTLY, so we don’t ever have to rename them unless we want to. As minor as that change may seem, it doesn’t seem to me as something particularly hard to achieve-especially considering that armor sets get to “memorize” their dye patterns, which to me seems like a more complicated programming code(though perhaps I am wrong).

IMHO, the reason most players have their pets named “Juvenile Whatever” is not that they don’t want to name them, BUT that it’s convenient to not name them at all if the name is easily deleted just by choosing another pet. I refuse to move along with “Juvenile Whatever”, though, which personally makes pet switching a chore, which is a shame (not to mention, we may forget specific names we came up for our pets, and possibly have to come up with another.)

Honestly, not just a spiteful/“whiny” complaint, but it does make the game appear lacking in polish, and I say it with all due respect for all of you who work so hard in this game’s development and mechanics. And no offense to anyone on these forums either-I just feel it would be a VERY welcome change that feels like a priority for me, especially since it wouldn’t bother those who don’t care about their pet’s name, and would also make game-life easier for everyone else who does.

man, you are perfectly right… but is this a so big problem? i think there are more important things to do… and remember that devs are doing that for free… give them time and everything will be done

I think Anet’s answer to this a while back is having a bunch of rangers naming their pets and storing the names (data) on the server creates lag? shrugs

Paz Shadow.9715:

I think Anet’s answer to this a while back is having a bunch of rangers naming their pets and storing the names (data) on the server creates lag? shrugs

I can somewhat see their point for a different name for every individual pet for all rangers … however ….

If this is the case, I would settle for them just letting us have one name that stays for all pets. We could change (overwrite) it whenever we want but the name is assigned to all pets. This wouldn’t take up too much space.

At least this way we get one name that stays between all the pets.

This can be done client side with ease. Anet simply needs to make a list of pets and then a stored name value. Something simple like:

Juvenile Wolf [Petname]
Juvenile Krytan Drakehound [Next Petname]

Every time a player chooses a pet, the game will search the client’s storage file to grab a name (if one exists). The biggest issue with something like this is the amount of time it will take to program. The devs probably have more important things to do.

i made a thread about it too.

At least remove the word Juvenile from it when it is tamed, so awful looking

man, you are perfectly right… but is this a so big problem? i think there are more important things to do… and remember that devs are doing that for free… give them time and everything will be done

You having a laugh? You mean like they will balance the game in time? Don’t count on it.

Little quality of life changes make a huge difference.

I woule be happy even if we could just save ONE name that Went for all pets until we change it… Even that would make a huge diffrence compared to what is now.

Horse. Beaten. To. Death.

They’ve mentioned before they can’t. Due to the way their system is setup the info wouldhave to be kept server side, which means a lot of extra data storage for negligible benefits.

And yes, they are negligible benefits. Takes 10 extra seconds to rename your pet when you switch.

ProxyDamage.9826:

Horse. Beaten. To. Death.

They’ve mentioned before they can’t. Due to the way their system is setup the info wouldhave to be kept server side, which means a lot of extra data storage for negligible benefits.

And yes, they are negligible benefits. Takes 10 extra seconds to rename your pet when you switch.

I have never played another game where pet names aren’t stored in some fashion. Stop defending lazy design choices. It’s 2013, figuring out how to store simple text data shouldn’t be even remotely impossible.

It really has been beaten to death. Truth is, there is an argument for both sides, and no matter how many people want to be able to save names, there are just as many players that are fine with the current system, or that just don’t care.

Ultimately, if doing the change impedes the dev team from providing other updates that would actually affect gameplay and not just be aesthetic (name saves are aesthetic and don’t affect how the game plays at all), then it should be a last priority item.

However, if it would be a different team (a content team versus a balance or design team) that took over the job so that the balance team could continue to roll out more important changes, then it can’t hurt the class.

Really though, there isn’t an issue, because you can already change the name of the current pets you’re using, which should be enough for now.

jcbroe.4329:

It really has been beaten to death. Truth is, there is an argument for both sides, and no matter how many people want to be able to save names, there are just as many players that are fine with the current system, or that just don’t care.

Ultimately, if doing the change impedes the dev team from providing other updates that would actually affect gameplay and not just be aesthetic (name saves are aesthetic and don’t affect how the game plays at all), then it should be a last priority item.

However, if it would be a different team (a content team versus a balance or design team) that took over the job so that the balance team could continue to roll out more important changes, then it can’t hurt the class.

Really though, there isn’t an issue, because you can already change the name of the current pets you’re using, which should be enough for now.

Then the naming system is flawed and should be rightly removed (especially since many players don’t care about naming pets, as you say), because there’s no point in it. I am not trying to be mean to developers, but if the pet name is going to be deleted as soon as you switch a pet, it’s rather pointless. In fact, this wouldn’t be an issue if there wasn’t a way to name them in the first place, which was probably the better design decision given the supposed limitations in the current naming system (to be honest, I don’t believe it will “produce lag” at all if properly fixed/redone.)

Also, the logical conclusion about balance in this game is that it would be a perennial work in progress-meaning that the flaws in the pet naming system will NEVER be addressed, because there will ALWAYS be higher priority issues in the game.

At least the generic names for our pets on GW1 were better than in here (and no, I am not a “GW1 always did it better!” player.) Hearty Pet (for instance) sounds much better than Juvenile Pet, especially since it probably is no longer a Juvenile as it travels with you.

WvW has options to show even your own team members in generic colors with generic animations, and opposing team pets are shown with the tag “Enemy World Beast”, so I don’t think it would be a problem there, or else where. Which shows that it’s a fixable problem, but thanks to many players who don’t care enough-as proven on this thread-they will never pay someone to (which is as many team members as it would probably require) to try and fix it for game polish’s sake.

Of course, I don’t mean any offense to those who don’t care about naming pets at all, but it IS selfish to say that because it’s an “aesthetic” choice that doesn’t affect gameplay, that the issue should be set aside and accepted as a perfectly working system, because it isn’t, and they know it. Many players do take way more than ten seconds to name their pets (I often do a quick research online to find out a proper name for it, according to the nature of the pet and its role with my ranger.) So don’t personally care about it, but it’s an issue that deserves merit, and claiming that there are “better things to fix” just means that it will never be addressed, as it should.

Star Ace.5207:

jcbroe.4329:

It really has been beaten to death. Truth is, there is an argument for both sides, and no matter how many people want to be able to save names, there are just as many players that are fine with the current system, or that just don’t care.

Ultimately, if doing the change impedes the dev team from providing other updates that would actually affect gameplay and not just be aesthetic (name saves are aesthetic and don’t affect how the game plays at all), then it should be a last priority item.

However, if it would be a different team (a content team versus a balance or design team) that took over the job so that the balance team could continue to roll out more important changes, then it can’t hurt the class.

Really though, there isn’t an issue, because you can already change the name of the current pets you’re using, which should be enough for now.

Then the naming system is flawed and should be rightly removed (especially since many players don’t care about naming pets, as you say), because there’s no point in it. I am not trying to be mean to developers, but if the pet name is going to be deleted as soon as you switch a pet, it’s rather pointless. In fact, this wouldn’t be an issue if there wasn’t a way to name them in the first place, which was probably the better design decision given the supposed limitations in the current naming system (to be honest, I don’t believe it will “produce lag” at all if properly fixed/redone.)

Also, the logical conclusion about balance in this game is that it would be a perennial work in progress-meaning that the flaws in the pet naming system will NEVER be addressed, because there will ALWAYS be higher priority issues in the game.

At least the generic names for our pets on GW1 were better than in here (and no, I am not a “GW1 always did it better!” player.) Hearty Pet (for instance) sounds much better than Juvenile Pet, especially since it probably is no longer a Juvenile as it travels with you.

WvW has options to show even your own team members in generic colors with generic animations, and opposing team pets are shown with the tag “Enemy World Beast”, so I don’t think it would be a problem there, or else where. Which shows that it’s a fixable problem, but thanks to many players who don’t care enough-as proven on this thread-they will never pay someone to (which is as many team members as it would probably require) to try and fix it for game polish’s sake.

Of course, I don’t mean any offense to those who don’t care about naming pets at all, but it IS selfish to say that because it’s an “aesthetic” choice that doesn’t affect gameplay, that the issue should be set aside and accepted as a perfectly working system, because it isn’t, and they know it. Many players do take way more than ten seconds to name their pets (I often do a quick research online to find out a proper name for it, according to the nature of the pet and its role with my ranger.) So don’t personally care about it, but it’s an issue that deserves merit, and claiming that there are “better things to fix” just means that it will never be addressed, as it should.

I didn’t mean it as an issue that doesn’t deserve merit. I guess I wasn’t clear. I mean that it doesn’t deserve any priority if it is being handled by the balance team.

If another team that isn’t in charge of improving gameplay mechanics and balance mechanics is in charge of it, then nobody should be against the change at all.

More so, the only issue where I think players should take issue is how ANet would choose to use their allocation of resources to take care of the issue, because there is a way the would clearly provide the most benefits for rolling out changes for the ranger class, if the resources allow.

I’m in total agreement that the current system isn’t a well thought out system. But I’m also not going to demand that it be changed immediately because I don’t know what resources the dev team has to handle the issue. Also, before it is said, I do also agree that the game should not have launched with problematic or poorly instituted systems and mechanics, but I wouldn’t know the business details about why that decision was made, so I’m personally choosing to deal with and and salvage the amount of enjoyment I can get out my gaming experience, in hopes that improvements come in the future.

i give my pets extremely stupid names that will get me banned if anet could track them so lol i like it how it is currently

I only had to name the Reef Drake once.

So yes, this was something they were/are obviously working towards.
You should probably edit that info into your first post…

jcbroe.4329:

I didn’t mean it as an issue that doesn’t deserve merit. I guess I wasn’t clear. I mean that it doesn’t deserve any priority if it is being handled by the balance team.

If another team that isn’t in charge of improving gameplay mechanics and balance mechanics is in charge of it, then nobody should be against the change at all.

More so, the only issue where I think players should take issue is how ANet would choose to use their allocation of resources to take care of the issue, because there is a way the would clearly provide the most benefits for rolling out changes for the ranger class, if the resources allow.

I’m in total agreement that the current system isn’t a well thought out system. But I’m also not going to demand that it be changed immediately because I don’t know what resources the dev team has to handle the issue. Also, before it is said, I do also agree that the game should not have launched with problematic or poorly instituted systems and mechanics, but I wouldn’t know the business details about why that decision was made, so I’m personally choosing to deal with and and salvage the amount of enjoyment I can get out my gaming experience, in hopes that improvements come in the future.

That’s my thing, I don’t think they want to pay even one person to redo it, and I highly doubt the balance team even was responsible for the current naming system. It’s not a balance issue, so it has nothing to do with the “more important” game issues (much like I doubt the balance in team is in charge of Quaggan/Charr backpacks.) This should be addressed by the proper personnel at some point, because the issue is it makes the pet naming system look careless and unpolished, which you probably would agree with.

(To be fair, this may be on their list somewhere, but it doesn’t seem like a priority-I am not privy to any developer’s logs or plans after all.)

Nobody would lose with this change-not those who never name their pets and couldn’t care less, nor people who would carefully name their pets-because it’s “aesthetic” as you say, and it wouldn’t ever involve game mechanics. The solution they should find is one that doesn’t interfere with gameplay, if that’s their current obstacle (seeing as it supposedly would slow things down, which again is so hard to believe-especially since not every player names their pets-but may be true with the way it now works).

^Totally agree. The game is in need of polishing.

Noone says it should have been fixed immediately, noone says it’s top-priority. What most “Don’t care, it’s fine”-posters fail to see, is that we’ve been waiting on this for almost a year by now. Certainly, in that time it would have been possible to come up with a solution, if you only they cared. This is not an issue of ressources or technical implementation, but an issue of motivation and laziness.

I wish Arenanet would stop releasing new bugs on a bi-weekly basis for a while and actually take some time to fix a few things in their game. Of course, such cosmetic issues will never be addressed, when they have a positive netto input of gameplay relevant bugs.

Every ranger has asked this question.

I’m pretty sure there’s a lot of effort to make this work compared to the value of the result, thus making it a low priority fix. For example, if the code base isn’t there, they can’t “just make it client side”. That might involve changing many things under the hood that deals with the pet management window.

It sucks, but sometimes things work out like that in engineering. Say, at your engineering job, you make a child’s toy and for various reason it comes off the production line with something (maybe a loose screw) that rattles inside. Yes, it sucks, but are you really going to remake the entire production run over it? You’ll fix it next time around, when you’re doing new tooling and a re-design.

So, in short, my belief is that until ANET decides to overhaul the GUI in general (like how they overhauled the Hero Panel), we won’t see this feature.

Chopps.5047:

Every ranger has asked this question.

I’m pretty sure there’s a lot of effort to make this work compared to the value of the result, thus making it a low priority fix. For example, if the code base isn’t there, they can’t “just make it client side”. That might involve changing many things under the hood that deals with the pet management window.

It sucks, but sometimes things work out like that in engineering. Say, at your engineering job, you make a child’s toy and for various reason it comes off the production line with something (maybe a loose screw) that rattles inside. Yes, it sucks, but are you really going to remake the entire production run over it? You’ll fix it next time around, when you’re doing new tooling and a re-design.

So, in short, my belief is that until ANET decides to overhaul the GUI in general (like how they overhauled the Hero Panel), we won’t see this feature.

actually, it took a random bloke from New Zealand 3 hours to make such a system work on a 12 year old, fully hardcoded game. If it takes 3 hours to make a plugin to a game not designed to be altered the slightest without the sourcecode. then this should be doable.

anyhow, it is a reasonable request to make. Why shouldnt pet names be memorized?

Prysin.8542:

Chopps.5047:

Every ranger has asked this question.

I’m pretty sure there’s a lot of effort to make this work compared to the value of the result, thus making it a low priority fix. For example, if the code base isn’t there, they can’t “just make it client side”. That might involve changing many things under the hood that deals with the pet management window.

It sucks, but sometimes things work out like that in engineering. Say, at your engineering job, you make a child’s toy and for various reason it comes off the production line with something (maybe a loose screw) that rattles inside. Yes, it sucks, but are you really going to remake the entire production run over it? You’ll fix it next time around, when you’re doing new tooling and a re-design.

So, in short, my belief is that until ANET decides to overhaul the GUI in general (like how they overhauled the Hero Panel), we won’t see this feature.

actually, it took a random bloke from New Zealand 3 hours to make such a system work on a 12 year old, fully hardcoded game. If it takes 3 hours to make a plugin to a game not designed to be altered the slightest without the sourcecode. then this should be doable.

anyhow, it is a reasonable request to make. Why shouldnt pet names be memorized?

Ask ANET, at the end of the day, I’m assuming it’s hard enough that it ends up being a low priority issue (which, based on the responses from devs seems reasonable).

You are assuming that because some genius could fix an issue in 3 hours for a 12 year old game, the same should be done here.

I don’t know the reality of the situation, Prysin. The fact is that this question has been asked by everyone and reported many times with no fix from ANET. Of course everyone wants to name their pets. I’m sure there’s a perfectly rational reason why it isn’t fixed yet.

Here’s another theory: Maybe ANET doesn’t like the pet interface and wants to overhaul the whole thing instead of just doing a little QoL band aid like people are asking?

I don’t work at ANET, I don’t know.

Chopps.5047:

Here’s another theory: Maybe ANET doesn’t like the pet interface and wants to overhaul the whole thing instead of just doing a little QoL band aid like people are asking?

I don’t work at ANET, I don’t know.

I’m hoping that’s the case. There’s a lot of things to be done to the interface to make it more user friendly. Like consolidating attack/retreat into a toggle, making pets able to fire F2 when ranger is moving, making pet combo slots so you can swap pets in pairs, pet buffs appearing on top of the pet health bar, etc.

Am I understanding this correctly? If you switch pets the name is reset to juvenile …..
They should let you save name!