Concerns About New Nickname Policy

[Hazmy]

Yeah, pretty much this. Whether these rules were in the live version or not, GMs will use it and point at it whenever they want to get rid of someone.

People that are around for a while know how that works. Basically like this: Someone of the enemy realm logs over and uses the right click option to report someone they don't like, saying it is against the Rules and GMs will punish with the argument that it is "clearly written in the CoC". With that broad set of rules they can ban everyone whenever they feel like.

I can directly answer this to reassure you and stop those rumors, that is not how this process works and there is a very careful investigation behind each individual moderation - that can be reviewed by appropriate staff members- and now will get even stricter as we work on improving our communication with the playerbase.

We are also players and we carefully monitor each report to make sure there is no malicious intent behind it. But we might also have more information on each case, than what is available to players, and that helps us come to the right decisions.

If anything, we always want to avoid moderation if possible, as we also prefer having a healthy playerbase!

[lumpi33]

Yeah, pretty much this. Whether these rules were in the live version or not, GMs will use it and point at it whenever they want to get rid of someone.

People that are around for a while know how that works. Basically like this: Someone of the enemy realm logs over and uses the right click option to report someone they don't like, saying it is against the Rules and GMs will punish with the argument that it is "clearly written in the CoC". With that broad set of rules they can ban everyone whenever they feel like.

I can directly answer this to reassure you and stop those rumors, that is not how this process works and there is a very careful investigation behind each individual moderation - that can be reviewed by appropriate staff members- and now will get even stricter as we work on improving our communication with the playerbase.

We are also players and we carefully monitor each report to make sure there is no malicious intent behind it. But we might also have more information on each case, than what is available to players, and that helps us come to the right decisions.

That's clearly not how GMs have acted in the past. I've seen a lot of people getting bans for literally nothing because they got reported and GMs just said it is against the rules, it's their job to act on that, no further discussion. And sometimes the reported players were just targetted by a player that just didn't like them. Warband leaders that are shouting a lot of stuff in the public channel are always in danger. I have seen warband leaders getting muted for spamming in public channel, which was really not the case. Yeah, that's how they act when you guys are not looking.

Again, there are probably 50% of all characters somehow in conflict with these naming rules. Some of them 10 years old. We all have to rename them now? You can't even do that. It would take over a year to rename all characters when you can do only one rename per month. Please explain.

[Hazmy]

Again, there are probably 50% of all characters somehow in conflict with these naming rules. Some of them 10 years old. We all have to rename them now? You can't even do that. It would take over a year to rename all characters when you can do only one rename per month. Please explain.

We have explained in more detail in this very thread everything you are asking, especially regarding name-changes that I recommend reading back

Like we already mentioned, if your characters were fine until now, likely nothing will change - these are simply guidelines for the playerbase to know how to be 100% safe.

[Rotgut]

Yeah, pretty much this. Whether these rules were in the live version or not, GMs will use it and point at it whenever they want to get rid of someone.

People that are around for a while know how that works. Basically like this: Someone of the enemy realm logs over and uses the right click option to report someone they don't like, saying it is against the Rules and GMs will punish with the argument that it is "clearly written in the CoC". With that broad set of rules they can ban everyone whenever they feel like.

I can directly answer this to reassure you and stop those rumors, that is not how this process works and there is a very careful investigation behind each individual moderation - that can be reviewed by appropriate staff members- and now will get even stricter as we work on improving our communication with the playerbase.

We are also players and we carefully monitor each report to make sure there is no malicious intent behind it. But we might also have more information on each case, than what is available to players, and that helps us come to the right decisions.

That's clearly not how GMs have acted in the past. I've seen a lot of people getting bans for literally nothing because they got reported and GMs just said it is against the rules, it's their job to act on that, no further discussion. And sometimes the reported players were just targetted by a player that just didn't like them. Warband leaders that are shouting a lot of stuff in the public channel are always in danger. I have seen warband leaders getting muted for spamming in public channel, which was really not the case. Yeah, that's how they act when you guys are not looking.

Would the Devs be willing to implement an accountability system? Maybe make all mutes and bans public, in an easy to access list, where it shows which GM banned/muted which player and for what reason.

[Thaodan]

1.

You may not use names of copyrighted or trademarked characters, materials or products.

Max, to defend this rule, you said the following ...

If someone who has a claim on a trademark thinks a character name is infringing, they are welcome to contact us. This rule is common on a lot of video games or MMOs. Additionally, trademark claims usually have different classes.

The principle behind trademark protection is to prevent confusion in the marketplace. If two businesses operate in different industries or offer unrelated products or services, they can both register the same or similar trademarks without infringing on each other's rights.

... and cited an article on LinkedIn about a trademark dispute between two businesses. Why is any of this relevant to the names of characters or guilds on an MMORPG private server? Why do we need such a rule today, on this server? Surely, player names are not equivalent to the brand names of private businesses?

Also a trade mark violation isn't present when the trade mark comes from an unrelated are i.e. not gaming.
E.g. I can't make a IT company named `Apple` but I can name my apple farm `Apple`, even then there are if and buts to not conflict with the current trade mark. Also some companies copyright common names such as Brodda even thou they already in use in other elsewhere, the rule I mentioned above applies

2.

You may not use names from popular culture or media.

I also don't quite understand the need for this rule. What does it matter if someone names their character 'Gimli' or 'Legolas'? This rule in conjunction with the last one

You may not use misspellings or alternative spellings of names that violate any of the above rules.

leads to heaps of names that qualify for forced renames. Why is this necessary?


3.

You may not use names that are religiously or historically significant.
You may not use proper names of areas within the game for character names. Guild names MAY use the proper names of specific areas, to help promote role-playing and realm pride.
You may not use proper names of NPCs within the game.
You may not use names containing titles or ranks within them.
You may not use names that contain a phrase, sentence or any fragment of a sentence.

For the sake of brevity, I'll just bundle all the other weird naming rules together. Again, none of these make sense to me. What does it matter if a name is religiously or historically significant? Peter, Thomas, Joshua - all religiously significant names. Richard Lionheart, Xerxes, Nero, ... what is the issue with any of these names? I understand that there are certain historical figures you wouldn't want to see used as names in game. But then instead of "historically significant" maybe something along the lines of "no names of controversial real-world individuals or organizations or referring to sensitive events, both current and historical" would be better. This is basically the phrasing that you used a few lines earlier in the CoC and I think it fits the intended purpose far better as it is less broad and more specific in what it covers.

The same goes for using the proper names of areas/NPCs in game or names containing titles or ranks - why is any of this problematic? For example, there are many different dwarf NPCs in game that have last names derived from one of the many dawi clans. If a player would like to 'join' one of these clans by taking the clan's name as their surname - what would be the issue with that?

You keep saying that these naming rules were part of Mythic's Code of Conduct. That's great, but this alone does not justify their continued existence. Why do we need them today?


Edit: Also, you mention that intent matters. But this is not directly stated in the section on the character and guild naming policy. It just says that

The guidelines listed below outline the types of names that you can NOT use

This makes me think that those rules have to be applied as written, no? In which case, they seem way too broad to me.

I agree with that very much. Warhammer is full of religious or real life references. E.g. names of city Praag -> Prag.
Religion is an important topic in some lore such as Empire Which hunters or Sigmar Priests, it's fictional but has all the elements seemed problematic by the new rules e.g. cleansing of heretics.

It's very easy to have names related or associated with real life events. For example I have a character with a last name related to the German resistance fighters against the Nazis.

[Thaodan]

What I found more concerning is the rule against "controversial" topics. It is a very vague definition, it allows some to claim that a topic such as "homosexuality" is controversial because they offended by it for example.

So far the enforcing of those against that make slurs where lax. E.g. I have seen trans quite a few times in public channels without anyone saying something.

[Fey]

People are incredibly invested in this issue and I get it. Domoarigobbo is a name I hope to keep, and while technically violating the letter of the law, names like these are fun and largely harmless.

However my witchelf is named, Amygoodman, and for those who don't know she is a real person, a journalist that I respect. I can totally accept a name like that being in fact unacceptable as breaking immersion or bringing unwanted attention to her specifically.

While I think there is some undue overreaction on this thread it is understandable. Some people will leave because their name is changed.

[Aisha]

I have been using a biblical name more than 8 years in RoR, Aisha. I have never had any warnings or ban neither mutes in my long history playing. After the rework made in the CoC, am i force to change my char’s name?

[Hazmy]

I have been using a biblical name more than 8 years in RoR, Aisha. I have never had any warnings or ban neither mutes in my long history playing. After the rework made in the CoC, am i force to change my char’s name?

We still recommend to read through this thread for official clarification and replies on the subject.

No, no one is forced to rename their characters as a result of the Code of Conduct update directly, and you can keep on playing normally.

[Aisha]

I have been using a biblical name more than 8 years in RoR, Aisha. I have never had any warnings or ban neither mutes in my long history playing. After the rework made in the CoC, am i force to change my char’s name?

We still recommend to read through this thread for official clarification and replies on the subject.

No, no one is forced to rename their characters as a result of the Code of Conduct update directly, and you can keep on playing normally.

Thanks for the quick response