Now that we've got a character name release policy, can we get the same for SG/VG names?

[SmokinIndo]

I believe SG/VG names were also horded at the start of Homecoming's career. I cannot find a single SG name that isn't taken on Everlasting. And yet, I've never seen a single character that exists with that SG name in use. There are likely HUNDREDS of SGs with only one level 10 character in them, who's been inactive for 5 years.

 

Can we get a working name release for this as well?

[Rudra]

I would rather we didn't add even more name releases. (Edit: Also, what would be the metric to measure SG inactivity for name release? Would it automatically be flagged as not available for name release if we just log in our member characters, which we already have to do to keep our character names; or would we need to do group tasks in SG mode to keep our names? Or something else?)

 

Edited November 3 by Rudra

[Super Atom]

1 hour ago, SmokinIndo said:

I believe SG/VG names were also horded at the start of Homecoming's career. I cannot find a single SG name that isn't taken on Everlasting. And yet, I've never seen a single character that exists with that SG name in use. There are likely HUNDREDS of SGs with only one level 10 character in them, who's been inactive for 5 years.

 

Can we get a working name release for this as well?

 

This might be true and I'd be for it overall maybe with some adjustment so nobody is losing an SG name in 30 days, but there is likely more work to this than the player name as I don't think you can even rename your SG currently like characters can be. So they'd have to basically add a rename your SG system to the game first that doesn't involve GM's doing it.

 

if you can already rename your SG idk about it because i just made the one 5 years ago lol

[lemming]

Pretty sure the only renames are via GM petition.

 

I'm not against the concept of this, but I think it would be a mess to implement.

 

Conditions involved:

• Bases, I'd say if there was nothing in place, easy decision.  If built up, more dodgy.
• Length of time last person of SG logged in would probably be the best metric beyond that.

[Rudra]

6 minutes ago, Super Atom said:

 

This might be true and I'd be for it overall maybe with some adjustment so nobody is losing an SG name in 30 days, but there is likely more work to this than the player name as I don't think you can even rename your SG currently like characters can be. So they'd have to basically add a rename your SG system to the game first that doesn't involve GM's doing it.

 

if you can already rename your SG idk about it because i just made the one 5 years ago lol

There are currently technically 2 ways to rename your SG. The 1st is by disbanding it and then re-registering it as a new name. (Which doesn't really count, but is technically a way to do so.) And the 2nd is to contact a GM and convince him/her/them to rename your SG to the desired name. (Which also may not count? I'm not sure?)

[Super Atom]

6 minutes ago, Rudra said:

There are currently technically 2 ways to rename your SG. The 1st is by disbanding it and then re-registering it as a new name. (Which doesn't really count, but is technically a way to do so.) And the 2nd is to contact a GM and convince him/her/them to rename your SG to the desired name. (Which also may not count? I'm not sure?)

 

Yeah those two are still the only way then, which would make a name release system not a good idea until being able to rename them in game is available first so as not to bother GM's with it.

 

7 minutes ago, lemming said:

Pretty sure the only renames are via GM petition.

 

I'm not against the concept of this, but I think it would be a mess to implement.

 

Conditions involved:

• Bases, I'd say if there was nothing in place, easy decision.  If built up, more dodgy.
• Length of time last person of SG logged in would probably be the best metric beyond that.

 

I think a single person SG with no base is an easy one

Items placed could also be a decent metric, oh this base has under 100 things put down and 1 person inactive for a year, release name.

This base has like 3000 items and multiple accounts in it, maybe much longer if at all.

[Luminara]

3 hours ago, SmokinIndo said:

I cannot find a single SG name that isn't taken on Everlasting.

 

 

There are ~171,500 in the English language, 29,412,250,000 possible two word names, and 5,044,200,875,000,000 possible three word names.

 

My gut says you didn't check them all.

 

[Techwright]

6 hours ago, Luminara said:

 

 

There are ~171,500 in the English language, 29,412,250,000 possible two word names, and 5,044,200,875,000,000 possible three word names.

 

My gut says you didn't check them all.

 

Not to mention, the OP is referencing Everlasting, not all the servers, so eliminate all those who stick to other servers.  Admittedly, it's the 2nd most populated, but still, how many people sit around writing up Super Group names per each of their 1000 characters, or even 25 of them?

 

 

[Greycat]

12 hours ago, SmokinIndo said:

I believe SG/VG names were also horded at the start of Homecoming's career. I cannot find a single SG name that isn't taken on Everlasting.

 

 

Strange that people can keep making SGs if "not a single SG name" is available on Everlasting. They're kind of required to make a SG. I wonder how they're naming them.

 

 

12 hours ago, SmokinIndo said:

And yet, I've never seen a single character that exists with that SG name in use.

 

And "I haven't seen" doesn't really mean anything. I've never seen YOU on Everlasting, and I primarily play there. Does that mean you're lying and you're not actually there?

 

12 hours ago, SmokinIndo said:

 There are likely HUNDREDS of SGs with only one level 10 character in them, who's been inactive for 5 years.

 

 

First, you do not have to be level 10 to make a SG. You can make them at level 1.

 

Second, yes, there probably ARE hundreds of SGs with just one character who's generally inactive, especially on Everlasting. I doubt, for instance, any of the several transport hubs have dozens of characters in them - they don't need them, barring other zones being added to add beacons to.

 

Everlasting also has many, many RP bases - pubs, chalets, housing and more. Guess what. Doesn't matter if the character that built those has been "inactive," the bases themselves would still be very active, seeing activity from other players. They get built, MAYBE updated when something gets added to base items that would be helpful or appropriate, but other than that, there's no reason necessarily that those would have "active" characters.

 

For instance, I have an SG base with one character that's designed as a bookstore. It hasn't needed to be updated in at least two years. I highly doubt you want or need the name of it. I have another that was initially meant to try to give a day/night cycle free, neutral lighting space for things like costume contests, and has evolved into a sometimes-use small-RP-set base and travel hub (mostly travel hub.) I have another under (slow) construction that'll be a temple, of sorts. Friend of mine likes building bases, they've probably built 15-20 of them for friends and for themselves for housing, social areas, etc. that don't need updating once finished.

 

Unlike characters or accounts that don't get logged into, the activity of these bases cannot be determined by "has the base builder been active in the last X days."

 

So, no. They do not need to be punished because you're being uncreative with SG names. SG bases are much different than players, when it comes to "activity."

 

The SG name issue is a you problem.

[Greycat]

11 hours ago, lemming said:

• Length of time last person of SG logged in would probably be the best metric beyond that.

 

Bases don't really lose usefulness if someone hasn't logged in, especially with passcodes. SO as a metric - this is pretty useless.

 

How many transport hub bases, for instance, do you think have an "active SG member" in them? Barring something breaking or needing updating, once they're built, there's no real reason for the builder to log in, and they can be the only person in the "SG."

[ZacKing]

9 hours ago, Luminara said:

There are ~171,500 in the English language, 29,412,250,000 possible two word names, and 5,044,200,875,000,000 possible three word names.

 

My gut says you didn't check them all.

 

43 minutes ago, Greycat said:

So, no. They do not need to be punished because you're being uncreative with SG names.

 

The SG name issue is a you problem.

 

Funny how these same things were said about the character name release policy, yet here we are.  I totally agree on both counts by the way.   With that said, I do think the SG rosters aon all server need to be reviewed for trademark violations.  There are tons of X-Men, X-Force, Justice League, Avengers, Teen Titans, you name it all over the place.  Those should get cleared out at some point.

[OEM61]

I play on Everlasting as well.

A few weeks ago I made a personal SG for my characters (right now the base is mainly for shared storage space and has transporters to all the zones (well, everything I had a beacon available for) and medical transporters, but I plan on building it up some more eventually).
I thought about a name, decided on one, and got it.  A one-word, real word name,  Some people might think it a horrible name, but it is a name and I got it and I seriously doubt that it was the last name available.

So...

1 - How great is the need?  The higher this is the higher the more work is worth putting into the system.

2 - If the need is great, then how much work is required?  This is to get an automated name change system in place as well as the tracking of SG activity.  Note that forced dismantling of an SG in this manner is no good.  They have to have a rename system where they can force a rename on an SG and give it some fill-in name before someone that can change the name logs in to do so.


While I wonder how many SGs there are, on Everlasting and every other server, I doubt that it comes anywhere near a point where they might need to start thinking about stripping SG names.

 

[Seed22]

22 hours ago, SmokinIndo said:

I believe SG/VG names were also horded at the start of Homecoming's career. I cannot find a single SG name that isn't taken on Everlasting. And yet, I've never seen a single character that exists with that SG name in use. There are likely HUNDREDS of SGs with only one level 10 character in them, who's been inactive for 5 years.

 

Can we get a working name release for this as well?

Thesaurus.
 

Use. A. Thesaurus. 

Why does no one do this? Does the thing scare you? I promise it doesn’t bite. Not finding a name is simply a lack of effort on your part, plain and simple. And a lack of creativity. Use a goddamn thesaurus. PLEASE. 
 

*This is a request for all in lieu of the recent name fiasco.

Edited November 4 by Seed22

[Ukase]

This is interesting to me for a different reason. I've made more than a few SGs. With a few folks, we did a themed team thing, where we just made a goofy looking base (well, I didn't, one of the others did.) The name was silly. The characters were silly. It was just a lark. 

So, I'm curious - if I delete every item in an SG base, remove every character from the base, and then finally have the last character quit the sg, with no other members in it - does the name get freed up? 

If so, I'll free up the name "Consortium of Raiders without Pants" on Everlasting.

[srmalloy]

21 hours ago, lemming said:

• Length of time last person of SG logged in would probably be the best metric beyond that.

Length of time since last person entered the base would be better; this would account for people who've built public bases as RP locations or transportation hubs, where there are non-SG characters using the base regularly for whatever purpose but the SG member(s) haven't logged in.

[lemming]

1 hour ago, srmalloy said:

Length of time since last person entered the base would be better; this would account for people who've built public bases as RP locations or transportation hubs, where there are non-SG characters using the base regularly for whatever purpose but the SG member(s) haven't logged in.

Yea, I didn't really account for that, but just spit balling.   I did a little more thinking and checking.

 

Probably the equivalent of a below level 6 character name, would be a Super Group name that still has a base with nothing added, one member, and they haven't logged in for a year.    Maybe also add, not publicly accessible?   I don't think it would be an easy check, though in game you can see when members were last on in the SG window, so maybe.

 

I don't feel like looking it up, but we could check on where the SG ID increment is on each server.   I know Everlasting is around 40k.

This might motivate me to shutdown a few bases on Excelsior since they're not really that used.  Get back to just the two main ones there.

[lemming]

1 hour ago, Ukase said:

does the name get freed up? 

Don't have to take apart the base.  Just have zero members in it and the base gets cleaned up.

[Greycat]

5 hours ago, lemming said:

Yea, I didn't really account for that, but just spit balling.   I did a little more thinking and checking.

 

Probably the equivalent of a below level 6 character name, would be a Super Group name that still has a base with nothing added, one member, and they haven't logged in for a year.    Maybe also add, not publicly accessible?   I don't think it would be an easy check, though in game you can see when members were last on in the SG window, so maybe.

 

I don't feel like looking it up, but we could check on where the SG ID increment is on each server.   I know Everlasting is around 40k.

This might motivate me to shutdown a few bases on Excelsior since they're not really that used.  Get back to just the two main ones there.

 

Which, if you think about it, still doesn't really scream "there's a need for this!" I mean, if Everlasting - typically second most populated, and I'd hazard with a *lot* more "non active" bases like I described (RP sets, etc. with a single character) is around 40,000... well, the name release thing they were saying they expected *1.6 million* names to be affected.  (Still curious to see how many actually were, plus new characters created in the first 24 hours.)

 

40,000? I'm *really* doubting a need.

[lemming]

1 hour ago, Greycat said:

 

Which, if you think about it, still doesn't really scream "there's a need for this!" I mean, if Everlasting - typically second most populated, and I'd hazard with a *lot* more "non active" bases like I described (RP sets, etc. with a single character) is around 40,000... well, the name release thing they were saying they expected *1.6 million* names to be affected.  (Still curious to see how many actually were, plus new characters created in the first 24 hours.)

 

40,000? I'm *really* doubting a need.

Yep.   I'm just treating this as an thought experiment.  There's probably quite a few "cool" names that are functionally unused.   We can hash out some details and maybe in a few years, something will be done.

[Owl Girl]

both my character name and sg name were readily available (neither are creative or original either), so i don't understand complaints about names.

 

but greyCat brings up a solid point about "inactive" SG's and how often their bases are used. for all i know the creator of ZONE-8888 died years ago, but i will cry if their base geta deleted just because they went inactive and thus "aren't using it".

[OEM61]

10 hours ago, srmalloy said:

Length of time since last person entered the base would be better; this would account for people who've built public bases as RP locations or transportation hubs, where there are non-SG characters using the base regularly for whatever purpose but the SG member(s) haven't logged in.

*IF* I were to do this, and the need is very dubious, but if we are doing a 'thought experiment'...

- I would create a rename system for SGs.
- Any SG with no member logging on for one year would have the name tagged for claiming.
- Any SG that had their name claimed by someone else would then be assigned a temporary name (JS7K93 or whatever).
- The leader could go to wherever they needed to go to rename the SG (City Hall for heroes, wherever for villains).

The SGs would not be dismantled, they would just be renamed.  Any base access codes would remain valid, just instead of entering the 'Fantastic Legion of Justice Avengers' base you would enter JS7K93's base.

But I do not know how much work that would require.

But I do have an overarching issue in that people can look up SG names.  If the group is so inactive that the name is claimable then maybe I shouldn't care, but it's different from the individual character name claim.  It just feels slimier to me, or at least opens things up to that behavior.

[Super Atom]

On 11/3/2024 at 10:00 PM, Greycat said:

For instance, I have an SG base with one character that's designed as a bookstore. It hasn't needed to be updated in at least two years. I highly doubt you want or need the name of it. I have another that was initially meant to try to give a day/night cycle free, neutral lighting space for things like costume contests, and has evolved into a sometimes-use small-RP-set base and travel hub (mostly travel hub.) I have another under (slow) construction that'll be a temple, of sorts. Friend of mine likes building bases, they've probably built 15-20 of them for friends and for themselves for housing, social areas, etc. that don't need updating once finished.

 

What exactly changes about those bases if the name is different, because your own position seems odd with the fact that the passcode has nothing to do with the name but also you contributed to the problem by implying those empty-no person bases are using 20+ names creating a name problem (if there is one)

 

 

 

I assure you, my SG is not called ADDUTILITYBELT.

 

But also, people are right. This isn't making 300 toons on day 1 and then never logging in again. IT is likely less of an issue than the name system by far.

 

Edited November 5 by Super Atom
made my post less hostile

[tidge]

I have had *one* player hint that they wanted my SG name since the (second) go-live Homecoming day. That happened in the first three months.

[Greycat]

18 hours ago, OEM61 said:

But I do have an overarching issue in that people can look up SG names.  If the group is so inactive that the name is claimable then maybe I shouldn't care, but it's different from the individual character name claim.  It just feels slimier to me, or at least opens things up to that behavior.

 

... which again brings up the "How do we consider an SG "inactive?"  which I don't think I need to go into detail about again. (And yes, I know, you mentioned "as a thought experiment.")

 

Followed by "How would HC notify the players?" We've had *literal years* to learn about the character rename, and a month of warning that "Hey, this is going live." Logging in to the game, you could see flags on the "at risk" characters. Do we add *another* warning symbol to the login screen - for something which, currently, we can't see on (and I don't think data is passed to) the login screen? Obviously a warning when a character from the SG logs in would be useless... as the character would have logged in and the SG would then be "active" at the most basic (and not necessarily relevant) sort of flag.

[OEM61]

1 hour ago, Greycat said:

 

... which again brings up the "How do we consider an SG "inactive?"  which I don't think I need to go into detail about again. (And yes, I know, you mentioned "as a thought experiment.")

 

Followed by "How would HC notify the players?" We've had *literal years* to learn about the character rename, and a month of warning that "Hey, this is going live." Logging in to the game, you could see flags on the "at risk" characters. Do we add *another* warning symbol to the login screen - for something which, currently, we can't see on (and I don't think data is passed to) the login screen? Obviously a warning when a character from the SG logs in would be useless... as the character would have logged in and the SG would then be "active" at the most basic (and not necessarily relevant) sort of flag.

And that is just all the more work needed to do this, and why it becomes less and less practical on any front.

They could re-program the character select screen to include SGs (another idea that appeared somewhere else) and so now they could pass a warning on to the leader of that SG that the name was in danger of being lost due to inactivity (however that would end up being defined), but this isn't an MMO with a large team and a lot of money behind it.

Some things, no matter how important some segment of the player base may believe it to be, are just too much work to make happen.


Edit:  And in my "how I think it should work" thing, I said one year of no member logging on for a SG to be considered inactive.  But it's just my idea, not the only possibility by any means.  I just don't think that in a world of "free base-building" that a base should be a factor in determining inactivity.
Are people from the SG logging in?  The SG is active.  No?  It is not.

Since my plan isn't deleting bases then it would have no impact beyond renaming the SG.

But again, this is not something I feel is an urgency and may not be practically possible anyway.

Edited November 5 by OEM61