30 months is completely ridiculous. That is about a third of the lifetime of this game, just to put it into perspective...

One thing I do not understand is why are you so against this idea when you are SO sure your names are good enough that you won't lose them? This doesn't make sense. You are illogical as are your posts.

Please, renaming a character is not deleting any progress of that character. Nobody would remove characters for inactivity. Also, if you can really remember a name of your virtual character after a year out of the game, nice, you have some memory. Most likely you would even be happy that you can choose a new name that suits your mood at the moment. This system works in WoW and there is no reason it shouldn't work in SWTOR, if that is what you fear. And people who are famous? If they care about the name of the character they can always login once per year to save the name even tough they are inactive. No need to pay or anything, just login. If they don't care to do that, well, famous or not, your name should be back in the pool.

Ratajack and MajikMyst, you still have not understood what Suggestion Box is about. You are flaming in a discussion about a suggestion. Yes, you can say you disagree. Yes, you can post why you think it's wrong. No, you cannot spam the thread with useless posts repeating the same stuff over and over again. If you do that, well, I could find a few swear words that would describe you nicely, but I am not here to insult anyone, I only wanted to discuss a suggestion. There is enough justification for this and it would be fair. As MajikMyst already said on the first page, it's a game, get over it. You have lost and you do not have any arguments against that.

I won't even ask you to stop with that stealing thing, as you apparently have no grasp of reality. Honestly, if you worry your name will get stolen you are an active player. No inactive player worries about their name in a game they don't play. If you do I'm sorry for you.

It actually is quite routine, I have read an AMA with a GM who said it's one of the most common services and that some people even ask for checks on 10+ names at once. And it did not sound like the character in question was under a lot of scrutiny as well, probably just an activity check on the account. Sadly, I cannot find a link *sigh*. True, WoW is subscription only and there is a vast difference between sub and F2P based games. But if once-subscribers in WoW can lose names, why shouldn't F2P players? It is actually quite a benefit for this game to be F2P, as if a player wants to save his name but is out of money for sub he simply logs in and "the timer" resets. WoW players (like myself) don't have this luxury.

Seriously? What are you doing on a board called Suggestion Box when you do not understand the concept of a suggestion? I'm not begging anyone, I'm suggesting for this system to get implemented. The thing I meant is we do not know whether they decided or not, and we won't, we only know that a system like this is not yet implemented. I am suggesting BioWare implements one.

Oh god, yeah, I did not go with the trouble of quoting another post - sorry. I am actually reading all the posts, but whatever, think what you will. Of course this would require BioWare to let people know a change like this was coming and it would need a change of TOS. Yes, you are also right this is not the first (not even the tenth) topic on the matter, but I do not really see anything bad about that. If BioWare reads these forums, they will get reminded of this suggestion, and perhaps they will make (or change) their decision on the matter. Why did I made this thread? I felt like this suggestion would be a) well received (as it was on reddit for example, but for a few trolls), b) it would make the game a little better. I think I am not the only one who takes 15 minutes creating a name as most options are already taken, with the knowledge that the perfect name is hold by a not played character. I did not even consider something like this before reading it is routine service in WoW. Sadly, what I have observed so far in this thread is that some of the most vocal people are also those who do not wish to discuss anything and are spamming this thread with the same statement again and again. Disagreeing is one thing, but it doesn't have to be repeated ad infinitum. But of course, what could one hope of multi player game forums. Fortunately, you are at least trying to post logical argument not based entirely on feelings (the subjective), for that I am grateful. Honestly, I have not anticipated such a backlash against a service that would be only beneficial to active players and at least in my eyes the game as a whole.

I have actually read every post in this thread. And if you have read my last post you would see I summarized some points people made. So yeah, we can agree on something - this should not be automated and should be on demand, highly scrutinized by BioWare. The person who is derailing this thread is you, friend. You keep talking about what is right and wrong and what is fair and unfair. This is not a philosophical debate and I don't want to go even deeper into that. What is right and what is wrong is ultimately subjective. I don't see anything wrong with what I am proposing, you see it as (nearly) entirely wrong. Those are our points of view. Stop arguing with subjective arguments and try something exact and objective. I have also had enough responses for your points, but you are too blind to see that, or you don't want to. Actually the same arguments apply to you - "You are not a special snowflake" and "It's not up to you to determine who should and should not have a character name.". To reply to those arguments: "You are not a special snowflake." - Actually, everyone of us is a "special snowflake". Everyone is unique. But I see what you mean. Yeah, I'm not special in any relevant kind of way. But it's not only about me. There are lots of players who want and would use a service like this. "You don't deserve something someone else has just because you want it." - What each player deserves is for BioWare to decide. It is their world and their rules. Yes I want a certain name. Yes someone else has it. Does he use it? No. Does it make me deserve the name more? No. But I still believe that an active player, who would actually play a character with the name in question, bring more value to the game than a player who is inactive for years and most likely won't come back, and even if he does, I doubt he would even remember the name of some level 1 or 2 character he made years ago. Do I think it's right to take a name from someone else? No. But do I think it's theft? No, and neither do I see it as entirely wrong like you do. I feel like the reasons I have already provided are enough of a justification why this system would be beneficial to the game as a whole. I'm not saying my proposition is perfect, far from it actually. But we have to deal with limits of BioWare's world. And ultimately, it is their decision that matters. "It's not up to you to determine who should and should not have a character name." - Again, this is BioWare's and only BioWare's decision. I am proposing a system to do this. If you have a better idea, please, go on and post it! In the end, Suggestion Box is about things players think would improve the game. You keep bashing my proposition, with morals and what not. You keep attacking my person as well. Try to answer this: Why do you think this would not be beneficial to the game? I do not want to presume anything, but still, part of me is saying it's only about you and your names, and the fear of losing them - it would be a rule that would be clearly targeted both for and against the players, and people ultimately don't like what could be detrimental for them. Leaving morals aside for a minute I sure hope you have better reasons.

I'm getting tired of your comments. Who are you that gives you a supreme ability in deciding what is fair and what is not? What makes you the moral authority to dictate what is right and wrong, fair and unfair? What does fair really mean? Okay, lets ask a dictionary: adjective in accordance with the rules or standards; legitimate. adverb without cheating or trying to achieve unjust advantage. the rest are not connected to this at all. So, if we define a set of rules, which would be the same for everyone, it would be fair. At least that is what fair means. If you have a personal definition, please provide it, as I cannot comment on something I do not know. Yes, I see what you are saying. It is wrong to steal something in the moral system we live in. I agree with that and I wouldn't like getting my things stolen. But in real life, there can be thousands of people with the same name. You can rename yourself and have the same name as your neighbor without problems. In SWTOR your name is unique, sadly. But SWTOR is a virtual world. It has a limited lifetime in terms of years, not decades. One year is probably about 10% of the game lifetime! If a person doesn't login once during one year, frankly, I think it is enough time in terms of the lifetime of the game to consider his character for rename. As was said multiple times, everything in the game is owned by BioWare. The characters are on their servers, and the names with them. If BioWare ever decides to enable a service like this, they will be free to do as they wish, and it would not be theft. And would you please stop accusing me of, hmm, too many things to list actually. It is not only about me, there are lots of people who would use this service. Yes, I say we make it on demand only and let BioWare scrutinize whether or not to free that particular name. You say I demand something, no, I don't - the whole time I'm trying to suggest a new game system, service, for everyone to use. Yes, the motivation behind this post was selfish - I want a certain name, on a totally unused character on level 2, but the system would work for everyone and as evident from some posts in the thread more people want a similar thing. And if you stopped arguing with a single sentence that this is wrong and instead provided suggestions and critique on what you really find so unfair, we could stop arguing like kids and create a system that would hopefully suit the majority and feel as fair as we can get. That is why I wanted you to leave this discussion, you don't discuss anything, you only throw the same sentence on everyone that agrees with me. I want to repeat this point - I'm looking for suggestions for this suggestion. Instead of calling everyone else names, why not try to work something out. You find the rules unfair - fine, post what you feel is wrong about them. You don't like this system at all? I see, well there is no need to call us "thieves". Try to find a better alternative or just say that you oppose this idea. Just to summarize, so far, some nice suggestions were: Add spaces to the naming system. Unique IDs connected with a name in a non intrusive way (Name#ID, ID only needed in cases of ambiguity). Only affect totally inactive accounts at least for a year, with a level limit. Two points that most agree with: On demand service, scrutinized by BioWare. Warn inactive users so they can save their names.

Thanks for the input. It works in other games and there is no reason it shouldn't work here. There are logical reasons why it would be beneficial to the game as a whole as well. If you do not have anything to add to the discussion, please don't post. If you have some arguments, please, we would love to hear them.

Interesting points have developed since I logged off. First of all, I would like to say that there is certainly no need to know if a player is gone for good - WoW doesn't do that either. It would be enough to contact the player before he could lose his name to make him aware of it, so he has time to act and keep the name. Second point, about in game identities, whatever you do with your own is your business, I was talking strictly about the identity of the other player. If he is really away for some time, his identity is close to nothing - taking the name won't hurt his character or reputation in any significant way (of course, there are some examples where name can be remembered for a long time, but this is not the case for SWTOR, but mainly EVE). Majik, I have provided enough reasons why a player should lose their name, and why it would be fair. It would be fair because the rules would be the same for everyone - that is the definition of fairness. What we as players can do is bring this problem to BioWare and try to came up with the best rule set so we can all (or at least most of us) agree that it would be fair and reasonable. You are also talking about people that "have a life", or "fight for your freedom" (certainly not mine, I am an European). Yeah, this is a problem. We cannot truly ensure that a person won't ever come back to the game, or know the exact date of deployments of every unit in the Army. What we can do is make a rule set that is generous to both parties. An email (or two), warning a user of his name (or account) being inactive for a long time would be enough for the group of players who don't play very actively - if they care about their name, they will login to save it for another time period. There is nothing hard about that, and it certainly is not about dictating to anyone how he should play his character, neither it is only about a single individual that has a name that someone else wants - the rules would be the same for everyone. The second group, the army, that is more problematic. What we could do is make the rules generous enough, so the time you have to "save" your characters name is long enough. I do not really know about how long the average troop deployment is in the US, but we would have to design it around that, most probably. As I said before, this system wouldn't have to be automatic, but on demand - original names would still most likely stay with their creators, but of course that is a point to discuss. At the very least, I think the system Darth_Victus proposed should be implemented. If a certain account is inactive for an extended period of time, any character that is below some threshold would lose his name. I think this would be very generous to most players, ensuring their mains and other high level characters would keep their name.

Having the insolence to admit you don't even read my posts is why you should leave the forums for good. The only thing you are doing is clogging threads up with useless posts. Your posts bring no value at all. Please leave this thread.

Of course I cannot guarantee that, but do you think a player who hasn't logged a single time in a year time will really care if he lost a name he probably doesn't even remember? The life of this game is limited as well, we are talking years, not lifetimes here. A year is probably about 10% lifetime of the game, even tough it can be hard to accept. Also, it's entirely different then taking an item of a character to give it someone else. Name creates your in game identity and it's what most players see of you (as I already said). A player who doesn't play for a year has nearly NO ingame identity at all, nobody knows him (but a few friends, if they play, that is). If you take the name from him, you don't hurt his character as you would if you took his weapon or mount or level or stuff like that. I bet you didn't read my post again, so there is no point in arguing with you. Justification is a subjective thing, and you clearly don't care about anything I write, that is why I want you to leave this discussion. I have provided enough (subjective) justification, if you really cared for a discussion you would react to that, not only write the SAME thing for the fourth time *sigh*.

I do realize that, and do you? You act like you represent the majority, so far, tough, I haven't seen anyone as clearly opposed to the idea as you. Okay, so far I have responded to every single one of your posts and "arguments" you have provided. The only thing you are saying again and again is how this is wrong, and there is no justification. I don't think you have even read anything I have posted so far, but for the sake of discussion I will reply once again. I will provide a brief analysis of both of your points: How this could be wrong: 1) Yes, we are talking about taking a name from someone else's character. 2) Yes, that person could be unable to play at the given moment, but 1 year is time enough to log in. Why I think it's not: 1) Taking the name means nothing in real life, it's only a game, as you have already said. But I am here, and we are talking about a player that has not log on during the whole year. You ask why I think it's justified? The player most likely won't ever log in to the game again. The name is lost to other players. As the time goes on, more and more players will lose interest and the amount of unusable names will rise, as will the amount of BS names ruining the game for everyone else. Also, once the player who got the name stops playing, the name will be available after some time again. Everyone would have the same fair rights about their names. 2) As I said, to address this point, the only thing necessary would be an email after for example 9 months telling you that you did not log in for the last 9 months and that if you want to keep your name, the only thing you have to do is login once and the name will be saved for another year, for example. If you don't have enough interest to log in to save your name, then I see no reason why you should keep the name. I have already tried to provide lots of different points of view of how I think this would be justified, but as I do not know if you read anything I write, and it seems you don't, I will try to repeat some of them. If you really want to provide some arguments to discussion, reply individually to my arguments, and stop posting the same thing over and over again. Names in MMO games, as in real life, are a defining part of your character. But in real life, your name is not unique. You have a surname as well, but not even your name AND surname are a unique combination. How do we solve this problem? Well, every country has some kind of an ID card, with a number attached to it, giving you a unique identity. Then of course every person is quite different, and to the "club" of your friends you are usually the only Name Surname, if another Name Surname doesn't come along, which is not often. In multiplayer games, names have several main purposes. First of all, the name is the thing most other can into contact with (in the Who list, guild charter, etc.). The second purpose, closely connected with the first one, is the prestige or reputation connected with certain names ("Name? Oh that guy, he is a great pvp marauder" kind of stuff). The third purpose is for the roleplayers among us, but I think it creates immersion for everyone as well, is the feeling of being a part of the world, which is just impossible with a name like XXVaderxx, or Hawtkiller, or stuff like that. I am not saying names like this should be "purged" or anything, I'm only saying that some people would rather have lore friendly names fitting into the universe. But that is getting nearly impossible, even more so on larger servers. Most of the nice names are already taken for the last 2 years (from launch really), even by players who no longer play. Random names from the generator are often taken as well, and seriously, most of them are pretty bad. This leaves us in a situation where we have to improvise with using special symbols or resorting to weird names like above. Yeah, this is possible, but even with stuff like this, the pool of free names is getting slimmer. Why is this situation bad, you might ask? You can use random name generator, it will give you a nice name, get creative, etc. are your "arguments". Well, it is bad for several reasons. New players get discouraged to play, as they cannot properly name their character, but I have yet to provide an adequate fix for this. Another reason, for example, closely connected to the first one, new roleplayers, or new characters of roleplayers, have it harder and harder to find a lore friendly name which sounds good and fits the character. Just another reason is the trouble of writing some special characters. Most of the players, myself included, do not know how to write most of the ALT-code characters, and then when we are to write a whisper, invite a player to a guild, etc. we are in a bad situation. What about players that lost their name in one of the mergers, like me, and your wife, and lots of others, who want their name back and know that the "owner" (which is really BioWare) of the name does not use it at all? Maybe you and your wife don't care, but I and many others do. Sadly, justification is a subjective thing and what I see as justification you clearly don't. I feel like there is no point in discussing this with you further. If you don't bring more arguments or target single points of the text I have just written we would only be repeating the same stuff over and over again. Also, this is not about me, or anyone else, deserving a name more than anyone else. This is a pragmatic discussion on how to fix a problem that is currently present in the game. So far, your only comments have been based on emotions and your feelings of taking someone else's name. This discussion was not meant to be about feelings or even morals, even tough I think this is justified enough. It is meant to be about fixing stuff. I feel like the criteria I have given in the first post are generous enough for F2P and sub players, so that if they really want their name, they will have enough opportunities to keep it. But they would also increase the name pool for other, active, players and could even bring BioWare some more money. I don't really see a reason why this would be a bad thing.