Hi there.
My name is Hope and I've been lurking pretty much since the beginning.
Missed the first Kickstarter because my card had been maxed out on something frivolous I am sure :(
Second Chance is coming and I look forward to my pledge.
My question of the hour is do we know how many characters we will be allowed for avatar names?
"Jose and the Puddy Tats" stuck me as a fun name for something with an imp like pet.
I look forward to making a teddy bear samurai named "Mr Pumpkin Swirl Swirl"
Any word yet? Should I be looking for shorter versions like "JoseAndPudTat" and "Pumpkin Swirl Two Times"?
—
Hi. I'm Hope.
Not set yet. Honestly, never thought to see what the system can handle, as it always seemed a trivial matter to address later on.
How many do you want?
Technical Director
Read enough Facebook and you have to make Sanity Checks. I guess FB is the Great Old One of the interent these days... - Beamrider
I guess that all depends on what can be displayed over the characters head, or how is it going to be handled? Will the players names be visible at all times? Or will you have to hover over the person to see their name?
If you allow say 100 characters for the name, will it be cut off after 20 and all other people see is the first 20 unless they go into their ID card? Or if the cutoff of showing is 20 will it scroll through the rest?
I would suggest putting a character in the game world with a few different options and have us provide feedback on what looks the best. Else we will just be using stuff from other games which might be fine for other games, but may not be right in CoT.
Edit: Which may be a pretty fun thing to do via Twitch Stream. And you could set up a voting poll for which one people like the best
The Carnival of Light in the Phoenix Rising
"We never lose our demons, we only learn to live above them." - The Ancient One
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At least, i hope we can put some space in the name ^^
For length, i think 40 is enought
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25
It seems to be enough for Negasonic Teenage Warhead, so should be enough for everyone else.
I don't remember how many Champions Online had but if I remember correctly you could have quite the long name.
For my personal use I don't need a lot of space for names, most of mine being shorter names. Though I do have "Tagatha the Graffiti Witch" as a character I want to create, and it'd be nice to have their whole name out to show.
So I dunno, like 30 characters? But yeah, I guess whatever ends up not looking excessive.
"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."
This gives me an idea. Tagatha would be the name, the Graffiti Which is her title, so I wonder if we could have a "create-your-own" title. So long as it wasn't an achievable title, it would be a good idea for customization without having 25 character names. Because, remember, the names are how people will send messages to you, send mail to you, etc. So If you could use just "Tagatha" for all those purposes, but still display "the Graffiti Witch" wouldn't that really be best?
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
Considering that we'll need to include the account name for "direct" communication with other players then going with just @account-name should be enough and thus get around the long-name "problem".
Don't think there is any best case/scenario here since some people will want to have such a thing as part of their name while others will want it as a title so it's better to just leave it up to the player.
Here's a better question. For the purposes of database storage sanity, I would presume that the storage of name@account in the database will have particular "storage efficiency" at particular breakpoints depending on how many characters are allowed before and after the @ symbol. Use that consideration to create a menu of options governing the length of names in a Look Before You Leap exercise that will guide decisions towards a reasonable compromise answer.
This is one of those things where computers like to store information in Powers of 2 due to the way binary works, where a bit is a single 1 or 0, and a byte is a string of 8 bits. So due to "packing efficiency" stuff tends to be conveniently stuffed into multiples of 8 ... like 16 or 32 or 64. That's why we have things like 32-bit and 64-bit operating systems for our computers.
So the structure of the database ought to inform this decision ... because the longer the character limit, the larger the database to hold character data will have to be, simply due to packing efficiency.
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Possibly. And that certainly would work for my purposes, for this specific character. Though others it might not if they want a name like "A tribe called quest" where you have to say the whole thing. So while having the ability to make your own titles would be welcomed I'd still like to have the option of having a longer name.
Being able to have names like Negasonic Teenage Warhead or Klarion the Witch Boy without having to delegate any part of said name to a title, while having the option to delegate part of the name to a unique/customizable title, would, I think, be best.
"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."
Yeah, I think you missed the point entirely.
If someone wanted to be Gorlitrax the Alien Auctioneer. Giving them the ability to create their own title gives them the option of making "the Alien Auctioneer" a title, and thus all the system knows him as is Gorlitrax. Like you said, once you add the account suffix it would even get longer.
I don't want to have to send a message to "Gorlitrax the alien auctionaeer@blacke4dawn" when I can just send it to "gorlitrax@blacke4dawn:. But because a make-your-own title is optional, you could always have it be the former rather than the latter if you so choose.
Edit: I was going to correct my spelling there, but then I realized what a great example I just made for myself of the problems with misspelling longer names.
I imagine there will be prefix titles like "The incredible __" and suffix titles like "___, destroyer of mailboxes" and I think the option should be there for both.
Edit Edit: What Project Hero said.
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
I think their point was you could just PM "@blacke4dawn" and it would end up the same.
So instead of longname@global you just direct the PM to @global and it'd get to them.
You could do such in Champions Online.
Come to think of it I don't know how often you'd even need to type out the whole thing. Most PMs I ever sent were to people I could see, were on my friends list, or had recently said something. There were very few times I ever needed to send one to someone who didn't fall into those categories. I mean maybe for team invites, but that only ever came up when someone was like "invite my friend name@global" then you have it right there in front of you.
Would be neat if saying someone's name in the correct format allowed that name to be clicked on, much like how most games handle people's names when they chat.
"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."
I think you would still need a discriminator to know which character on that person's account the message is being sent to, especially if there are attached items or money associated with it; or if the account was multi-boxing.
I agree. I would really like to right click a name in the chat window and bring up a few options like: [list][*]Invite to party[*]open a private conversation[*]ignore[*]invite to trade[/list]
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
It didn't require that in Champions. Especially if it was just a PM or mail, they'd just get it regardless of character. But then the champions mail system was more or less just an inbox for PMs and I don't remember if you could send money or gear through it.
If there was an account mail (can't send money/items) and a character mail (can send money/items) that would help that, even if one of the mail's ended up being "I couldn't remember how to spell your character's name, can you PM it to me or mail it to me then I can send you item."
But again if you're mailing people they're probably on your friends list.
"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."
I see no problem with being able to send to a specific character though at the same time I see no reason why we must send only to specific characters. I see no real reason to send it to a specific toon since if sent to the account it can be picked by any toon it, which means you don't need to reveal the name of the toon that will pick it up. For PM/IM/tell just use the currently logged in character.
As for multi-boxing if I understand it correctly then we will have a similar account setup as NCSoft did, one master account used on the website and one or more game accounts tied to it for gameplay. I seriously doubt that we will be able to simultaneously logg in several characters from the same game account and pretty sure that the @global would be on a per game account basis I see no additional issues.
CO and Neverwinter has this and I see no real issues with it.
Cobalt Azurean is 14 characters, so I need at least that many.
Now that I've been thinking about a create-your-own title for half a day, another thought occurred to me:
I think it would be a great Kickstarter perk to allow someone to create their own unique title that is theirs to use, and only theirs, for the first year of the game or 4 updates; whichever is longer. It would take negligible developer time, just enough to approve it and assign the permissions; so the profit margin would be nearly 100%.
I'm sure there would be a lot of takers for it.
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
In GW2, when you start typing the Name your Mail is going to, the system auto-suggests names from your Friends list. I only have to type 'sle' to get @Sleepy-Kitty when I want to send over my excess Egg Nog. I'm hoping that CoT will also have an intelligently designed mail system.
Be Well!
Fireheart
[u]Jose and the Puddy Tats,[/u] sounds more like a Commander (Mastermind) to me.
I can just envision Deadly Catgirls wearing leopard print,,,with guns.
[img]https://s15.postimg.cc/z9bk1znkb/Black_Falcon_Sig_in_Progess.jpg[/img]
iirc, people (not so long ago) really did not like the idea of user generated titles.
"Just, well, update your kickstarter email addresses, okay? Make sure they're current?" - warcabbit
Also to consider:
1.) What font is going to be used and can it be changed to something else
2.) What character set(s) is going to be used
3.) What restrictions are you going to have on special characters, if any
4.) How is the string going to be stored (as mentioned by others)
5.) What mechanism(s) are you going to use to verify names for eligibility (obscenity, trademark, etc)
6.) What are the configurations for displaying the name in conjunction with Title, Super Team, League
7.) What accessibility options will be available to make names readable to those with visual impairments (color blindness, font size, text to speech, high contrast, etc)
"Just, well, update your kickstarter email addresses, okay? Make sure they're current?" - warcabbit
The main issue I had in CoH was the ability to have enough room to use spaces and punctuation marks like a period and an apostrophe with a couple spaces in the same name. Probably 20 or 25 would do for most names if we had that sort of flexibility.
(insert pithy comment here)
That brings up another good point, how many non-letter characters will we be able to use?
I had this idea for an out of control robot... wanted to call it --RAMPAGE-- (creative, I know). Would I be able to do so?
[url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_HUdf89hI8]Send out your signal, call in your hero
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Global names and character names are in different tables to remove redundancy. The @ is not stored. There are lots of places you just want the character name, such as when NPCs are talking to you.
(Reminds me: gotta ask the writing staff how pronouns will be handled, and also internationalization. Could get complicated.)
Bad news for you: variable-character-length encodings like UTF-8, which can use 1 to 4 bytes per character, pretty much blow all those optimizations out of the water. Good news is it won't matter.
And yes, internally all strings will be Unicode, and import/export file formats will be UTF-8 unless otherwise specified. None of that oddball UTF-16LE like Windows and USB use. Doesn't mean we'll allow the whole character plane initially (we might not support emoji, and the font we use might not have all the various symbols and such in Unicode) but it does mean we're going to avoid dealing with the plethora of national character sets.
Anyway, on the database side of the fence, we're perfectly happy with names up to 100-200 or so characters. The limit is the social communications package (i.e. the thing that provides local, team, zone, guild, global, etc. chat channels) we're using.
Do we need per-character mailboxes instead of one game-account-wide mailbox?
Also, multi-boxing will have different game account (global) names.
Well, at least that's how it is [i]right now.[/i] If it should work differently, maybe we should hash out some requirements now.
Umm, no, that's not a good estimate of development effort. To do that, we've got to add a flag or token store that indicates you have that permission, add a UI for you to manage that title (humans make typos), add a table with reserved titles, add a check against that table that runs every time someone changes their title, test all of these things and make sure they don't crash the game (or worse, corrupt the database), and in the end someone's just going to change a letter and use a title that looks almost exactly like yours.
We are [i]not[/i] hard-coding things like that either.
That's assuming we even implement arbitrary titles [i]at all.[/i] Which itself is a PITA because there [i]will[/i] be people running around with titles that offend, denigrate, and/or harass other players, or worse, and we're trying to run a T game here, you know? Just because we put up a disclaimer that in-game interactions aren't covered by the rating doesn't mean we're OK with player griefing and abuse to run rampant.
[i]Has anyone seen my mind? It was right here...[/i]
You make that sound a lot worse than it is. You make it seem like all that non-recurring engineering cost is done on a recurring basis for each title. If it is, then there's no wonder it is taking you guys seven years to build the game.
Besides, since you are going to have titles anyway, most of that NRE is already done for them. So all you would be doing is adding some titles to the existing table of titles. And since there are already flags that determine whether or not someone is eligible for a title, you wouldn't be doing anything that isn't already being performed as part of your existing NRE for titles. So don't blow it out of proportion.
The NRE for custom purchased titles is minimal when compared to custom anything else; and the recurring cost is even less, since all you would have to do is add the title to the existing table of titles and then send a token to the player that they activate in-game to get access to it the same way players get access to any other title.
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
In that case, go for a 16@16 limit. 16 characters before the @ symbol and 16 characters after it, all in UTF-8 format (which I think I can safely presume will allow the inclusion of the spacebar character). Put in a limitation that not all characters used can be exactly the same (so you don't wind up with 16 spaces @ 16 spaces for a name that is difficult to identify visually when spamming) and you're off to the races. By including a spacebar character in the acceptable dataset you eliminate the workaround of using an underscore character.
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I always felt I was 6 characters away from epic names so I would like to suggest whatever COX had +6.
Hi. I'm Hope.
So a big "NO" to:
Johann Gambolputty de von Ausfern-schplenden-schlitter-crasscrenbon-fried-digger-dingle-dangle-dongle-dungle-burstein-von-knacker-thrasher-apple-banger-horowitz-ticolensic-grander-knotty-spelltinkle-grandlich-grumble-meyer-spelterwasser-kurstlich-himbleeisen-bahnwagen-gutenabend-bitte-ein-nürnburger-bratwustle-gerspurten-mitzweimache-luber-hundsfut-gumberaber-shönendanker-kalbsfleisch-mittler-aucher von Hautkopft of Ulm
Personally, I would like at least 16. Offers flexibility in creating fun names without making it overtly difficult play alongside someone or msg. Plus a /r (reply) will go a long way once a conversation gets started. The details of how a name displays seem far off to reliably estimate at this point though.
SWTOR seems to do ok and they have around 16+ characters available for the first name (including a spacebar).
I think sixteen is too few. Princess Powerful doesn't even fit within 16 (unless spaces aren't counted for some reason) and that's not even that long of a name. Werewolf by Night also doesn't fit within that. And I know we can't use those names (maybe princess powerful, I don't know if that was ever trademarked by marvel) but still.
20 at minimum I think. That would get most long ish names without going overboard.
"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."
Well, if that doesn’t fit, there’s no way I could pull off Malcolm Peter Brian Telescope Adrian Umbrella-Stand Jasper Wednesday *pop* *pop* Stoatgobbler John Raw Vegetable *whinny* Arthur Norman Michael *party horn* Featherstone Smith *referee’s whistle* Northgot Edwards Harris *whoop* Mason *chuff* *chuff* *chuff* Frampton Jones Fruitbat Gilbert ????We'll keep a welcome in the???? *blaow* *blaow* *blaow* Williams If-I-Could-Walk-That-Way Jenkins *squeek* Tiger-Drawers Pratt Thompson ????Raindrops keep falling on my head???? Darcy Carter *bicycle horn* Pussycat ????Don't sleep in the subway???? Barton Mannering *hoot* *whoop* Smith.
Can we at least have enough for Tarquin Fin-tim-lin-bin-whin-bim-lin-bus-stop-f'tang-f'tang-olé Biscuitbarrel?
Twitter: @SisterSilicon
Clearly, we need names long enough that characters end up getting called [s]Mount[/s] Nevermind.
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The tradeoff is that in order to be invited to a team or raid group they would have to spell out the full name. Sound good? :)
(insert pithy comment here)
I hope special characters will not be allowed so as to avoid names like ~xx°|mTh3Best3ver°xx~
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16 spaces is too few - I'd go for at least 24. And at least some special characters are needed - at the very least hyphens and colons, maybe even semicolons, ampersands or brackets.
Rumplestiltskin = 15.
Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious = 34. a bit more intriguing.
Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis = 45. this is a real word by the way. The Official term for, wait for it: Silicosis.
Looks like we need at least 34 spaces. 50 should be about perfect.
Our collective dreams are crushed.
;-(
I imagine we'll have access to a character description / backstory with significantly more room...hopefully more than we had in CoH. That might help us handle some of the longer names, if we're willing to use nicknames or abbreviations in the name field.
I suggested the 16@16 limit because it keeps things within the realm of avoiding carpal tunnel syndrome when needing to type out people's names. I can see going to a 20@20 limit, just for nice round numbers, but seriously, at that length you're really just begging for typos on a regular basis for the longer names getting typed in manually.
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I don't see they typing the name argument for a shorter name. Most people's names will be in the chat box (probably allowing you to click them), in sight, or on a friend's list.
When would you ever realistically need to type someone's name out where you could not just use their @global?
"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."
Anticonstitutionnellement = 25 letters, that's the longuest word in french :)
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While that USUALLY might be the case, it won't ALWAYS be the case ... and you need (as a developer) to worry about the edge cases as well as the typical ones. There are going to be times when you need to just type in a name. Easiest example of this that I can think of comes from World of Warcraft.
Say you're trying to form a group and you're "advertising" that you're LFM in channels ... but other members of your party are in other zones, advertising in different channels. Someone responds to the Not The Leader asking for an invite. The Not The Leader refers the request to The Leader so the The Leader can do the invite. This will require typing in the name to be invited TWICE ... once by Not The Leader (in the Team channel), and again by The Leader (to do the /invite Name action). I've seen these kinds of referrals crop up A LOT ... particularly when someone is sending queries out to their Guild and need to refer respondents to whoever The Leader is for the issuing of an invite.
So yes, there are going to be a LOT of situations where a Right Click on the chat box or the Target Detail window will suffice ... but that isn't going to encompass ALL situations, including needing to use a Report function to flag a PC for a GM.
What do you do when you spot a bot [i]that isn't sending anything to text boxes to click on for an easy report[/i]? Well, you're probably going to have to type their name in somewhere at some point. So although it's possible to largely automate these kinds of processes, you want to keep the "just type in the name" option as the ultimate workaround/backup for use when those "just Right Click and get on with it" situations aren't going to work. At that point, it then becomes a point in the abusers/violators favor to have excessively long "flood the field" names that are difficult to transcribe as additional protection against being (accurately) reported or whatever.
So this is something of a double edged sword. Granted, most people aren't going to "fumble" and nick themselves on the dirty steel of it ... but some people will, and you don't want to make life any easier for the exploiters that every game will inevitably attract than absolutely necessary.
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[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
You would likely to be able to invite by the player's @global so their name is irrelevant. Or if you can't and their name is super long you tell your team mate to get their friend to send you (party leader) a PM. Which at least in Champions you can send an @global PM which in turn will give you the name to click on.
If you spot a bot... You click on their character to send a report. The only time you wouldn't is if it's a silent bot that you haven't seen in which case how do you know about them?
Again if you can just use @global for invites, PMs, mail, etc then the length of their name only matters when it comes to being messy in the chat box which a quick click and ignore will fix.
"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."
That's be nice to have, ample room in the Bio / Background field. On my namesake's Bio block, I had a running tally of other Cobalt names on the server that I wasn't. Apparently they got asked A LOT if they were an alt of mine.
Role players will be refering to characters by mame, nit global. And not always a character in their vicinity.
Text length for certain windows will matter where the system will reference character name and if is too long, the text might not fit.
Red is right (I swear that hurt XD) You always have to plan for a worse case scenario.
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My personal name is 24 characters (2 spaces) I think 25 is appropriate. If name length is a concern then I would restrict globals to 16 characters. The idea of a global is to be a quick and easy communication handle. Thus a quick and easy handle and a more descriptive and flowery name.
my two cents.
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Roleplayers will be, yes. But if someone's name is long they'll likely shorten it, heck even Captain America (something that barely fits within 16 characters) is usually called either Cap or Steve. So this isn't really an issue.
I did say in my post that a long name can cause a problem with the chat box.
I'm not advocating for exceedingly long names just something a bit more than 16 characters long. Possibly in the 20 something range of not closer to 30 characters long.
Edit: also someone with a super long name just to have a super long name probably isn't going to be interacting with RPers all that much anyway. It's like bringing up RPers in a conversation about a font choice because of the I's as lower case L's thing, or people with names that are like IlIlIlIlIl. People with names like that probably won't be RPing and RPers usually won't have anything to do with folks with names like that other than for PUGs of which such things are generally not roleplayed in.
"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."
COH allowed for 20 characters (I think – I couldn't confirm it with Paragon Wiki, but I did have names that long, so it was at least that many). So COT needs at least 20 characters, too. Returning players who can't recreate their toons without having to change their names would not be pleased.
Nothing is so annoying as being one character short of the perfect name. On the other hand, I've never heard anyone complain that there was too much room to type a name in.
On the other hand, I also dislike it when the system tells me a name is too short. If I wanted a single letter or a 2-letter name, why not let me choose it?
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
/em snerk
You'll get over your disappointment, I'm sure. ^_~
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[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
All these folks complaining about long names make me want to check the social communication package we've got lined up to see if it can support tab completions (e.g. [code]superca[/code][b][TAB][/b] gets you [code]supercalifragilisticexpialidocious[/code]) or user abbreviations (e.g. [code]\scflxad[/code] expands to [code]supercalifragilisticexpialidocious[/code] because you previously used [code]/alias scflxad "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious"[/code]).
Is that you, [url=http://log-horizon.wikia.com/wiki/Krusty]Krusty[/url]? Seriously, though, since names will be name@global anywhere disambiguation matters, I don't see a need for a minimum. They'll have to be unique within the global, though.
Not sure if we'll need a minimum on supergroup names of, say, [url=http://log-horizon.wikia.com/wiki/D.D.D]three characters[/url].
[i]Has anyone seen my mind? It was right here...[/i]
I don't know why but your answer Lin, makes me think about the gold sellers (or banned players). If a gold sellers is banned due to mass reporting actions from players, is the global will be available since this is the account (e-mail) which will be banned or the global name will still unavailable because that the global name which is banned ?
But, i'm interesting to have your answer about if the social com pack supports tab completion :)
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The question of having global names "liberated" via punishment would probably depend on the situation. If a player was given say a month's suspension from the game then his/her global name should be preserved. The only way a global name should ever be "fully released" by the GMs for re-use would be if a given player did something to warrant a permanent removal from the game.
But even then I'm not sure a global name of a person permanently kicked from the game should be automatically "released for re-use". Only when part of what the person did to get kicked from the game centered around him/her being publicly "infamous" and instantly recognizable would the name be up for permanent lockdown on a case by case basis. For instance you might have a small time gold farmer named George kicked from the game; probably no need to lock the name "George" from being reused in that case. But if George found a universally game-shattering exploit that becomes so famous that everyone calls it "George's Exploit" then yeah the GMs might decide to lock the name "George" from ever being used again because it brings up too many bad memories.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
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right. i didn't thought that way ^^
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i suggest 42 21@21 a little bit longer but not to overwhelming and its the answer to everything
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34, enough for "Super Saiyan God Super Saiyan Goku" ;)
Okay 32
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Avatar by MikeNovember
When I started CoH we only had 15. I was so mad! One of my characters needed 16 characters for his name. Later, they changed it to 20 and I was able to get him properly named. I don't recall having name-length problems from then on, so 20, 24, or 25 seems like a good length to me.
Be Well!
Fireheart
No problems if there is a system where one can request to be invited to a group by right-clicking the announcers name, regardless of if they are the team leader or not, and the team leader will get the request to accept or deny, again regardless of who was originally clicked one.
Not sure how easy that will be with MWM's existing systems but don't think it will be that hard. Could have a number of features/modes, like auto-deny (or disable, making the option grayed out for others) mode when you don't want to deal with such things or accept new members. Auto-accept mode when you just want to fill up the group and don't care about who joins. And of course the manual/review mode when you want to be a bit selective, could include an inspect button for the one requesting the invite. With time it could also expand to include black/white-lists where you could add not only individuals but also using other "groups" like friends-list SG and League.
You already answered it, right-click target frame.
Honestly, right-clicking target frame and right-clicking name in chat should have the same options for PC's.
How about you can send anyone a team request, and if that person is not the leader, it auto-forwards to the team leader. Cut out the middle man
The Carnival of Light in the Phoenix Rising
"We never lose our demons, we only learn to live above them." - The Ancient One
Avatar by lilshironeko
5+1+6+1+3 @ 5+1+6+1+4
16 @ 17
Super Saiyan God@Super Saiyan Goku
Fits within 20@20.
[center][img=44x100]https://i.imgur.com/sMUQ928.gif[/img]
[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
But then their character name wont be Goku. Their global would be, and I dunno if spaces would be allowed with a global name.
A short hand of it would be SSGSS Goku, like it tends to be in the games that use it (which will probably just switch to Super Saiyan Blue Goku, another thing that won't fit with 16 characters).
Not that I'm advocating anyone making Goku clones (even if possible). If they do I hope they put some effort into it. On Xenoverse 2 I see a bunch of Goku's and Gohan's and the like who look nothing like the characters who's name they use even when there are tools within the game to make an almost perfect copy! Rant over.
Having 20-30 character names is probably best as you can fit most reasonable names into it (with the SSGSS even the characters of the show thought it was a mouthful and shortened it to Super Saiyan Blue)
"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."
I have a question about the global part. In GW2 they assign you your global, and they do so by asking you to type a global you want, then adding like 4 numerals on the end of it, which numerals are I think pseudorandomly generated. Is there a really good reason for doing this? And will CoT work the same way?
R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising
I would hope that CoT will decide that having to add random numbers to our global names will [b]not[/b] be necessary, but I can at least understand the rationale for that scheme. For what it's worth adding numbers like that would almost completely eliminate the possibility of anyone choosing the same exact identical global name that anyone else was using.
Personally I'd rather have to choose another (completely unique) global name than to be stuck with a name that had semi-silly random numbers attached to it. For example let's say I wanted my global name to be "Xander". If Xander was already taken I'd rather choose another name than to be stuck with "Xander4683". Now if you're a person who doesn't care about being saddled with numbers attached to your name there shouldn't be any reason why you couldn't manually select "Xander4683" if "Xander" was already taken - in that case it would be your choice to select that name. I just wouldn't want to be forced to have numbers attached to my name if I didn't want that.
The exact spelling of global names should always be a player's choice no matter if it was their first choice or their fourteenth choice.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
If @Fireheart isn't available, I will be upset. I'll be forced to @Fireheart5150 on everyone.
Be Well!
Fireheart
"forcing" people to have a global name like @name1234 would, to my opinion, be really against the philosophy of customization provide by the game ^^
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Global names aren't really part of the customization. You get one, it doesn't change. It just facilitates the ability to get most any character name you want.
That said, I'd prefer not having numbers after the name unless it was needed for something to make the game work/handle things better. And in that case I'd hope they were hidden from the players so that you'd still be @global to you and everyone else even if to the system you're @global5926
"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."
I suppose one could argue that the spelling of global names don't need to be under the full control of the players who choose them. On the other hand why should we suffer a system that would attach random numbers to your name that are beyond your control if there's a reasonable alternative to that?
It would be easy enough for CoT to let players choose their own global names and allow them to re-choose another name if their choice was already taken. If you wanted XYZ and XYZ was already taken there should be nothing stopping you from selecting XYZ5926 as a second choice. My point is that I'd want to be able to have the CHOICE to accept XYZ5926 as my alternative instead of having that automatically assigned to me. There's really nothing impossible about allowing players to keep this choice for themselves.
The only thing the "automatic number assignment" scheme is good for is to save a given player a few seconds of time having to think of another choice for a ONE-TIME naming situation. Frankly I consider my global name (that I might be stuck with for years) important enough to give it a few seconds of considered thought - I don't need to save a few seconds for something so relatively important.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
If the system or game works better with a random number assignment (for whatever reason) I'd suffer it if it means a better game. But if it does I would want the number to be hidden for most extents and purposes.
Kinda like on steam or the Blizzard launcher, you can have any name you want but it's followed by a string of numbers that are in most cases hidden. Likely we won't need such a system with the name@global set up. But again, if we do I would want those numbers to be hidden.
I have no idea what kind of benefits having random numbers assigned to a name could give. Possibly it allows the systems to use the number rather than the name to make things quicker. But I have no idea.
Again, if needed (for whatever reason) would prefer them to be hidden. Would prefer none, but if said numbers are hidden from the player in most cases it shouldn't matter.
"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."
One good outcome of the "add 4 random numbers, but keep them hidden from everybody but the user" system is that it makes it harder for someone to hack into your account by guessing your password. I mean, Let's say my villain character is:
"ProfessorServo@Radiac"
Publicly, nobody else even knows that my global login is "@radiac1234", they just see it as "@Radiac", so it makes it harder to try to get into my account and steal my stuff, etc that way.
R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising
There will be no stuff in CoT :D (just kidding To bother you xD)
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My argument is that the "random numbers assigned to global names" feature serves no useful purpose other than to allow players to skip having to think of an alternative when their first choice is already taken. Frankly I'd rather spend a few seconds having to think of an alternative of my own choosing than to have the game randomly assign me a number to attach to my name.
Also the idea that these additional random numbers could somehow be "hidden" from view runs counter to the whole point of global names. If other players could not see your entire name what purpose would it have in terms of uniquely identifying you? You can be virtually guaranteed that if CoT forced everyone to have a random sequence of numbers attached to your name that those numbers would always be visible in any context.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
It might be harder to steal from you specifically. But assuming the game automatically assigned everyone 4 hidden digits all a hacker like that would do is enter ANY 4 numbers and potentially steal from anyone with those 4 digits. Ultimately somebody would have stuff stolen from their account so the "security" advantage you speak of is pointless.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
Completely agree with you here.
A better option would be having completely different account/login name and global handle, like CoH allowed.
So your argument is based on if those numbers serve no other purpose than to make alternative names easier to choose when the first name is taken?
So essentially this thing is useless if it's useless?
I was talking about if it made things easier on a technical standpoint to have a string of numbers following a name. Not in any way to make choosing or getting a name easier. In what technical way would these numbers make anything easier? I have no idea. I am not a programmer. I know both steam and Blizzard's launcher has such a thing though I am not sure why. Possibly just so people can have the names they want but again I don't know, I'm not a programmer.
As for hiding the things? Champions allows you to hide people's global names in the chat box at least meaning you'd have to go into their profile to see it, if you set it up that way.
As for a security thing, no. They'd have to have that person's global name and the numbers following as the system would know them as name1234 and not as just either name or 1234. As otherwise it would be pointless to have it.
Both your arguments seem to be "yeah but if this thing was pointless it'd be pointless." Not exactly a revelation not an argument against it.
Edit: Yeah someone could try and guess the numbers for the security thing but they'd need the global name (minus the numbers) and the password and THEN have to guess at what those four numbers are. So they'd get like maybe 5 chances before it locks them out for trying to login and getting it wrong so many times. Sending an email to the global holder saying someone tried to access the account. They can't just enter in 4 random numbers and get into anyone's because they'd need that person's password also. It's like saying the mobile authenticators don't work because anyone can just enter in random numbers. You can, but your chances to guess the username, password, and then these random numbers are rather slim.
"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."
I happen to be a software engineer. Having four random numbers assigned to our global names would serve absolutely no useful "technical" purpose in this context other than to make it easier for players to not have to make a second choice when picking their global names. It would not make it any easier for the game to process our names in any kind of database or anything else of that nature. Please trust me on this point.
As far as the security idea goes you yourself pointed out why having four additional random numbers would not likely make anyone that much "more" secure. It's already going to be relatively hard to hack any given person's account as long as they don't choose a stupid password like "12345" and frankly if anyone's dumb enough to use something like "12345" for an account password in 2018 they almost deserve to be hacked. *shrugs*
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
The existence of the username "@radiac" would presumably tell the potential hacker that the user's global is "@radiac####" but you'd have to guess at the digits many many times before you hit my account, or for that matter, anyone else's. The fact that the numbers are random means that "@radiac" could be "@radiac0001" but that number has no more likelihood of being a real account than "@radiac6789" or any other number combo. So your hacker now has to use a script to try to log into accounts with random "@radiac####" names AND has to have or be able to guess the actual password. That's harder than JUST having to guess or know the password, isn't it?
R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising
Also, does anyone actually know why GW2 does it that way? My gues is so that everyone get's the name they want, with a number they didn't ask for tacked onto the end, which is less than ideal, but fair.
R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising
Yes it is harder, but having different ones that may have no connection at all with each other is even much much harder.
Yes it would definitely be harder for any one single hacker to specifically target your individual account. But so would requiring that all account passwords in CoT be at least 14 characters long and require at least one capital, one number and one special character (like a '$'). The "problem" you're trying to solve with these four random digits doesn't (and frankly shouldn't) be tied to this idea of "random numbers attached to your global name".
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
Software engineer or not, I think you don't understand security very well.
First of all, most accounts are hacked because their passwords are were taken from some other place, not because they were guessed. The propensity of people to re-use passwords is rivaled only by their propensity to re-use usernames. So putting four random digits at the end of a global handle does increase security by adding 256 more possible permutations. Hopefully the server authentication systems have been written so as to flag unsuccessful attempts to log in and send alerts when that number reaches a threshhold.
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
Again I very strongly suspect this is the only reason a game would do this. In such a game where the specific spelling for names is not that important it's a viable way to handle name conflicts.
But I would argue that in a game like CoT where people's names and costumes are highly important that any system that would force you to have a global name with random numbers tacked on would NOT and should NOT be acceptable. All this game needs to be able to do is keep asking you for a different name every time you type one in that's already taken - it really almost could not be simpler than that. If you [b]choose[/b] to be @Radiac4792 just because you like it and it's not currently taken then have fun with that.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
And it's clear you don't understand the premise of over-engineering. Tacking on additional random numbers to a person's name might "technically" make them more secure but will CoT actually need that? I clearly see doing that for CoT would be far more trouble than it's worth. You can't hand-hold everyone who chooses to be stupid with their account passwords.
P.S. I've been working with classified systems for decades so I understand the concepts of IA and password security all too well. A "game" like this simply does not need the degree of security you're alluding to here.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
I have a sheet of paper in my filing cabinet by my desk (at home, for work it is a small cheat sheet I carry with me) with a list of 16 character passwords for all my websites. I use a Java Script generator to generate random passwords from all the keys available on my keyboard.
The annoying part of it all?
Having to read character by character and hunt and peck at the keyboard to enter them.
The result?
Hopefully accounts that are [b]virtually[/b] unhackable by someone who wants to hack a relative no-one on the internet.
You may call it over-engineering, but apparently other professionals in the industry call it necessary engineering.
Continuing to throw your CV at us does not make your points any more valid. In fact, it calls into question the veracity of that experience to begin with. Let the logic of your points speak for themselves and they won't need to be backed by your claims of experience.
Besides, hacked accounts are bad for the game. Taking a [i]caveat emptor[/i] attitude towards irresponsible people does not fix the damage their ineptitude causes the game. This is why game companies now provide in-game rewards to players who use token key encryption.
And, by the way, I also would not like the 4 random numbers thing. But whether I like it or not was not what was being discussed; the reason for it was. I would much prefer the token key authentication method, also known as a third-party authenticator for those who are following this conversation who don't know what token key encryption is. They are also known as one-time passwords, depending on the company you're working with. GW2 actually uses the Google Authenticator, as does Secret World and Wildstar. World of Warcraft and Final Fantasy XIV both use hardware key tokens and there they sit in front of my monitor as I write this. Ankama uses its own authenticator app for their games Dofus and Wakfu.
In short, the 4 random digits at the end of the account name do certainly make the game more secure, but I would rather rely on a third party authenticator for my account security. The problem is that they can't make such a device or app a requirement without also requiring players have the wherewithal to use one.
Will MWM require all players to get a hardware token? Can they justifiably require their players to own and use a smartphone app in order to play? If they did, they would be the first as far as I know.
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
1 - Why not just have 2 part/step verification if you log in from a location not designated BY YOURSELF as your safe/home location? This would have been established when you created your account. For travelers, instead of a "safe" IP address(es), why not use a "Safe" MAC address(es)?
2- Then there is always the dreaded "Security Question" if you incorrectly enter your password more than 3 times.
My understanding is that GW2 tacked a random number on the end of our account names so that everyone could be assured of having the basic name that they wanted, without conflicts. It had nothing to do with security since those globals are readily available in-game. Our Log-in names are completely different, generally speaking, it's the account email address. Our Passwords are, again, completely different - I'm currently using a several-word passphrase, with punctuation and spaces.
Yep, this is how GW2 does it.
In the broad scope of things, I don't feel that my CoT account will contain anything 'valuable' to anyone. There might be an automatic linkage Available between my store account and my credit card, like in GW2, but I'm not silly enough to use it! Having to input my data each time provides me with a chance to overcome the impulse to buy. *grin*
Be Well!
Fireheart
That wouldn't surprise me either. The 4 digits were used from the very beginning for beta forums before the game was even out. So the decision had been made by then, and maybe it really was just so people wouldn't have to worry about their forum display name being anything other than what they wanted it to be. Sometimes the simplest solution is the most likely. There was a Franciscan Friar by the name of Occam who said something about that once.
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
OK I'll keep this response super simple and the points I'll make here won't even require any of my so-called "questionable" professional experience. Here's my "layman logical" position on this in a nutshell: [b]What's the actual problem you're trying to solve here?[/b]
Are you concerned that a game like CoT would not be secure enough with the tried-n-true "account name" and "password" scheme? Did CoH have an overwhelming number account hacks using that method of account security? Sure you talk about token keys and whether CoT could/would require smartphone apps in order to play but unless you can PROVE to me those things are actually seriously needed for this situation then I will simply continue to call it out for what it is - complete and utter overkill on an epic scale.
You want this game to be secure? All you need to do is require game passwords to be:
[list]
[*]14 characters or longer
[*]require at least one capital letter
[*]require at least one numeric character
[*]require at least one 'special' character (like a '$' or '!')
[*]require these passwords to be reset every 45 days
[/list]
This scheme is good enough for the US Air Force (even in cases for systems that don't require CACs). Why wouldn't it be good enough for this game? The degree of security the game would have using this policy would be orders of magnitude greater than trying to shoehorn four random digits to our global names by themselves. Frankly arguing for those "four digits" on the basis that it would be a "useful" security feature is laughable considering all the other alternatives (both yours and mine).
Look, I fully understand that there are many viable security solutions available today. But just because a game CAN employ those solutions doesn't mean a game SHOULD employ them, even if you can conjure up a workable rationale for them. This game is being designed on a shoestring budget and doesn't need to be "fancy" in ways that don't provide a significantly huge value added. Stop proposing the need for a Cadillac when a generic pick-up truck would be perfectly adequate.
For what it's worth I wouldn't be surprised if most (if not all) games requiring authentication to access them will eventually mandate third party token keys of some form. But if doing that were to have to cost the Devs of CoT an extra penny or an extra minute of time to implement I would be the first to tell you to "screw that" and use something far simpler. You don't need a Barrett 50 caliber sniper rifle to hunt rabbits unless you just like to waste a lot of money for a "solution to a problem" that represents overkill on a truly monumental scale.
I agree. Why bother with a token-based security system when a simple password with a robust implementation policy is all this game really needs.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
Believe it or not, the time when passwords provided security is long past. It is behavior that provides security now. The players who played CoX did not have the same nature of threat that the player who will play CoT will have. Gone are the days when individual hackers tried to crack passwords. Here are the days where professional phishers plant malware on unsuspecting computers to create exhaustive lists of username-password combinations they can sell on the dark web. No amount of password complexity is going to stop someone from hacking your account if you use the same password on a system that has already been hacked.
As such, in your list below, the only one that has any hope of providing significant security is the last one: change your password often.
All the other are merely to prevent somoene from hopping on your machine while you're not there. Good security for a communal work environment, not really useful at all for the threats we expect to face protecting the online game servers.
If you think that is good enough for the Air Force, you need to go back and do your Cyber Awareness Challenge training again.
Any online financial transactions should have a minimum amount of security, regardless of the size or budget of the game. I suspect those will be outsourced. I [i]hope[/i] those will be outsourced. And if they are, that will pretty much dictate the rest of the security protocols MWM will use. Because I expect they will want to integrate account details including financial and non-financial transactions. It would be a whole lot easier if they don't have to cross reference a player's game account with a player's financial accounts manually across an air gap.
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
Best thing ive read all week.
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[color=#FF0000]Graphic Designer[/color]
Molehill, meet mountain. If you're seriously worried that the Evil-Doers of the Dark Web *laugh* are going to be actively trafficking in hacked accounts for this game you obviously don't have enough to worry about in the "real" world. If it makes you feel better I'm sure the game will let you change your password every 5 minutes as needed.
I've only retaken that "course" maybe 20+ times in my career. I currently use that approved scheme on a dozen different systems/networks. I imagine our OPSEC coordinator or Mission Commanders would have a good laugh at your expense about your overly-apocalyptic thoughts on this matter.
I'm sure MWM will use whatever methods are both effective and practical for their needs. I simply argue that you're continuing to propose they use a contrived Rube Goldberg-esque solution for something that does not strictly require it.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
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