Regarding effects, I like to see them whenever game simply allows me to see them without causing permafreeze or certain lagdeath, usually have to turn them off at keeps. I was too lazy to edit out the part where just before next keep fight I drop my graphics settings because I felt intense lag at hand, though first fight was still possible on "Balanced" without me lagging to death. (most likely has something to do with Keep Lord, but outer yard fighting is less demanding FPS-wise than inside keep fighting)
As for names, how would be know how to focus all the important people if we didn't see their names? Always gotta go for Hellokittyonline and so on.
Sure, it might not look "clean", but knowing to focus the actual warband players over random pugs who think they are helping, IMO quite important.