Get Rid of Name Exclusivity

[aegagrusScholarship]

6 hours ago, MissK. said:

Agreed. It still blows my mind how many simple or fandom names I've managed to get over time, I even have a group with a bunch of them. But it does feel unfair that nobody else can name their dragon for example Frog, or that another Harry Potter fan can't also use the name Hedwig if they want to.

 

I've been playing on and off since 2008, and the current system is definitely biased towards those who were here early enough to nab most of the good names, a bias which the site has been steadily moving away from (re-release of CB event dragons, now also the older Trick or Treats). I think this suggestion is in line with these changes. 

Yeah. I'm definitely sure that as the site gets older, more and more names are going to get taken, and I really think it's more a question of accessibility. I bring up my original experience with the site again and how I was deterred from making an account for a long time. 

 

Also, to Fuzzbucket, I've seen some of your other posts in here too! Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that InvaderAlexis was the first one who was against. Also, maybe the /n/ function could send to a separate page containing all dragons that have that name? Sort of like the offspring pages of dragons that have bred a lot.

 

 

[relaks]

For whatever my opinion is worth, I'm also in favor of removing name exclusivity. 

 

It sure does seem a hassle to try to work around it when I'm trying to name a bunch of dragons. Forced creativity isn't really creativity, it's adaptation to a system that doesn't allow us to play the game the way we want. 

I know the introduction of the trading center changed things, but in essence, DC is a game made for individual play, as in: I play my way, you play your way. The goal is to collect dragons. It never made a lot of sense to me why I couldn't name a dragon a certain way because another player had already used that name first – why does that player's decision affect my own game? We interact here because we use the forum, but someone could perfectly well spend their whole DC experience without interacting with another player directly. The game is designed for that to be possible, and it was encouraged for a long time. So really, why should my own experience depend on someone else? 

 

Regarding "fake dragons", a lineage is only valuable because people give it value, and (correct me if I'm wrong) it wasn't something specifically intended in the game (except for Thuwed lineages, maybe, but as someone has pointed out, those are easy to verify).   I don't know how much weight this argument has. 🤔

Anyway, nothing new. Just my two cents. Obviously the people who give their opinion here don't represent the totality of DC's players, but hey, any opinion is welcome I guess.  

In the end we don't even know if it's in the cards, so who knows. 

[Fuzzbucket]

1 hour ago, aegagrusScholarship said:

Also, to Fuzzbucket, I've seen some of your other posts in here too! Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that InvaderAlexis was the first one who was against. Also, maybe the /n/ function could send to a separate page containing all dragons that have that name? Sort of like the offspring pages of dragons that have bred a lot.

 

That's exactly what I hope it wouldn't do. I want to see the one I was looking for !

[aegagrusScholarship]

33 minutes ago, relaks said:

For whatever my opinion is worth, I'm also in favor of removing name exclusivity. 

 

It sure does seem a hassle to try to work around it when I'm trying to name a bunch of dragons. Forced creativity isn't really creativity, it's adaptation to a system that doesn't allow us to play the game the way we want. 

I know the introduction of the trading center changed things, but in essence, DC is a game made for individual play, as in: I play my way, you play your way. The goal is to collect dragons. It never made a lot of sense to me why I couldn't name a dragon a certain way because another player had already used that name first – why does that player's decision affect my own game? We interact here because we use the forum, but someone could perfectly well spend their whole DC experience without interacting with another player directly. The game is designed for that to be possible, and it was encouraged for a long time. So really, why should my own experience depend on someone else? 

 

Regarding "fake dragons", a lineage is only valuable because people give it value, and (correct me if I'm wrong) it wasn't something specifically intended in the game (except for Thuwed lineages, maybe, but as someone has pointed out, those are easy to verify).   I don't know how much weight this argument has. 🤔

Yeah, you summed up my thoughts exactly. I don't want my experience to negatively affect someone else's, you know? 

 

As for lineages, I'm sure someone will come up with a spreadsheet or something for verification. There's a lot of ways to work around non-unique names since codes still exist.

 

4 minutes ago, Fuzzbucket said:

 

That's exactly what I hope it wouldn't do. I want to see the one I was looking for !

Ah. Makes sense! Sorry about that. I guess it might be difficult if there's thousands of dragons with the same name, but maybe a workaround could be found.

[OMGitsKairi]

I'm still wholeheartedly in support of this. I like the idea of having a "Dragons with the name Smaug" page that looks similar to the progeny page.

 

But can we please have this with a side of some kind of name wiping??

[Tini]

20 minutes ago, OMGitsKairi said:

I'm still wholeheartedly in support of this. I like the idea of having a "Dragons with the name Smaug" page that looks similar to the progeny page.

 

But can we please have this with a side of some kind of name wiping??

can you elaborate on that? why would you need wiping with non-exclusive names? Just to prune down the hypothetical /n/ page? (which would only be One dragon pre-wipe actually)

Edited November 3, 2020 by Tinibree

[OMGitsKairi]

46 minutes ago, Tinibree said:

can you elaborate on that? why would you need wiping with non-exclusive names? Just to prune down the hypothetical /n/ page? (which would only be One dragon pre-wipe actually)

 

To pare down the hypothetical /n/ page. Before the wipe it would only be one dragon, yes. But as time goes on someone
may take a name and then eventually leave the site, leading to more dragons with the same name, some abandoned.

[Keileon]

No name wiping, please.

[Uther_Pendragon]

1 hour ago, OMGitsKairi said:

 

To pare down the hypothetical /n/ page. Before the wipe it would only be one dragon, yes. But as time goes on someone
may take a name and then eventually leave the site, leading to more dragons with the same name, some abandoned.

 Just spitballing here:

Could the inactive dragons drop to the bottom of this list and maybe gray out like when our dragons refuse each other during breeding? 
If the same named dragons were paginated, you could avoid the last however many pages once you see the grayed out ones.

I'd just hate to see wiping make a comeback. 

 

(idk if this is even possible, as I don't know how any of this works, lol)

Edited November 4, 2020 by Uther_Pendragon
Typing is hard yo

[KrazyKarp]

I mean, if name exclusivity is eliminated, there's little point in name wiping. Pruning the /view/n page where it hypothetically is restructured to show all dragons with the name n doesn't have much use from what I can see.

[Tini]

People have spoken up in this thread about coming back to hundreds of dragons having lost their name and how disheartening that is. I don't think we need to force people who might come back to lose all those names.

[HeatherMarie]

1 hour ago, KrazyKarp said:

I mean, if name exclusivity is eliminated, there's little point in name wiping. Pruning the /view/n page where it hypothetically is restructured to show all dragons with the name n doesn't have much use from what I can see.

 

Agreed. If name exclusivity isn't a thing there is no reason for name wiping because it doesn't matter if a name is 'taken' or not, you can still use it. There is no reason to assume the /n page would become too cluttered or need to be 'pruned' at all, maybe years down the line but certainly no need for name wiping *with* the removal of exclusivity. (Imo name wiping is kind of an anti- this suggestion, this suggestion is to allow people more freedom to name the way they want, name wiping prohibits people from keeping names they want if they go inactive for awhile...)

[lexi_]

even i, someone who's for name exclusivity, agree with the above posts; i was a little concerned about how cluttered some /view/n/ pages would become when trying to find a dragon, especially, say, if you have a fandom named dragon, or one with a name that might be somewhat common, but what point would there be in removing the old ones who shared that name if name exclusivity were removed? 

[Sextonator]

There's no point in wiping names on inactive accounts if name exclusivity ends.

 

@TJ09 Sorry for the ping but I figured I'd ask, but what do you think of the suggestion of removing name exclusivity, and the view/n/ page showing like a progeny page?

[Pickalope]

I'm someone who started playing back around 2008 and left for a while; I just recently came back and I still have many unnamed dragons from a wipe. Honestly, the wipe is one of the reasons I had trouble getting back into the game for so long. I had a lot of dragons named after online friends I had at the time and now I can't remember a lot of them; it would have been really nice to have seen all my old friends' names again attached to specific dragons.

So.. I would be kind of upset if we started name-wiping again.

I also am for name exclusivity being removed.

[Murkydepths]

Nah. I like name exclusivity, DC has so very few rare things and things to trade. It's awesome snagging a clever name. DC has been built upon name exclusivity for years, its one of the things that makes it unique. Changing it now would be a bad move.

 

[Sextonator]

2 hours ago, Murkydepths said:

Nah. I like name exclusivity, DC has so very few rare things and things to trade. It's awesome snagging a clever name. DC has been built upon name exclusivity for years, its one of the things that makes it unique. Changing it now would be a bad move.

 

How so?

[aegagrusScholarship]

I agree it's awesome getting a name and realizing it hasn't been used, but again, it comes at the cost of someone else, and that's the part I don't personally agree with. But, yeah, as Sextonator asked too- how so? A lot of other 'exclusive' things got changed too. I mean, I wasn't personally around to see it but it definitely helped me get into the game (with the past Halloween biome, for example).

[Paintra]

I think a lot of the arguments around keeping name exclusivity just boil down to "It's been this way for a while so let's not change it." But I think removing Name Exclusivity would be a positive for site growth as a whole. As more and more people join the site, more names will get taken, and the situation around name exclusivity will simply get more frustrating. When even my random keysmash-esque names are taken by people, it's concerning, because it means that even strategies to 'getting around' name exclusivity won't work in the long term. I really think the best time to change it was years ago, and the second-best time is now.

[KrazyKarp]

10 hours ago, Paintra said:

When even my random keysmash-esque names are taken by people, it's concerning, because it means that even strategies to 'getting around' name exclusivity won't work in the long term.

This especially. People against exclusivity have suggested the strategies to work around it, but they aren't going to work forever. Maybe in the short term, sure, but definitely not in the long term. I'm looking for a long term solution, and eliminating exclusivity seems to be the best and simplest solution.

[Murkydepths]

20 hours ago, Sextonator said:

How so?

 

DC is an old and frankly, dying, site. It's golden days are long gone. Trying to change the formula significantly is changing what a lot of people stay on the site for. It's a collecting game, not a creative design game, the whole appeal is to collect and show off rare stuff. What is there that's actually rare that you can collect now? Codes, names, lineages from re-coloured sprites. Everything else is fairly easy to get. There's joy in just collecting CB's of every type, but the site is mostly oldies who've likely already got them all. I think the changes to make rares more available (CB holidays, prizes coming back) came a little too late and also wasn't implemented the best way. DC should have embraced the exclusives. 

 

People shouldn't be worrying about site growth or long term health, in order to keep up with current trends DC would have to be a totally different game. Games that have exclusive rares(though account bound is bad for the actual collectables) stay popular because people don't want to abandon their valuable collections. Games that have a lot of creative areas stay popular because the fun is designing which never gets old as long as new tools are put in. The middle ground is just....eh.

Edited November 11, 2020 by Murkydepths

[Fuzzbucket]

1 hour ago, Murkydepths said:

 

DC is an old and frankly, dying, site. It's golden days are long gone. Trying to change the formula significantly is changing what a lot of people stay on the site for. It's a collecting game, not a creative design game, the whole appeal is to collect and show off rare stuff. What is there that's actually rare that you can collect now? Codes, names, lineages from re-coloured sprites. Everything else is fairly easy to get. There's joy in just collecting CB's of every type, but the site is mostly oldies who've likely already got them all. I think the changes to make rares more available (CB holidays, prizes coming back) came a little too late and also wasn't implemented the best way. DC should have embraced the exclusives. 

 

People shouldn't be worrying about site growth or long term health, in order to keep up with current trends DC would have to be a totally different game. Games that have exclusive rares(though account bound is bad for the actual collectables) stay popular because people don't want to abandon their valuable collections. Games that have a lot of creative areas stay popular because the fun is designing which never gets old as long as new tools are put in. The middle ground is just....eh.

 

If it's dying it's the first I've heard of it. Each of us has ideas we would like to see implemented - but I don't like to see scare tactics used to try and force those ideas (or the nixxing of those ideas) on others. It seems to me it is still pretty popular - I'm a mentor and usually have a few new students who seem keen; none of my IRL friends who have signed up has shown any interest in leaving.

 

To quote from Mark Twain, after the publication of his obituary in the New York Journal.

 

 'The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated'

[Murkydepths]

47 minutes ago, Fuzzbucket said:

 

If it's dying it's the first I've heard of it. Each of us has ideas we would like to see implemented - but I don't like to see scare tactics used to try and force those ideas (or the nixxing of those ideas) on others. It seems to me it is still pretty popular - I'm a mentor and usually have a few new students who seem keen; none of my IRL friends who have signed up has shown any interest in leaving.

 

To quote from Mark Twain, after the publication of his obituary in the New York Journal.

 

 'The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated'

 

I didn't say it was a quick death, DC has held on admirably, but it's never going to get as popular as it was in it's peak. It was built around the concept of forum signatures, and forums are edging away in favour of either more personalised social media like instagram or more anonymous social media like reddit. Collectable websites in general have lost favour in lieu of the more design/customisable pet games. 

 

I recall when the cave emptied at each hour, when abandoned eggs were usually at 5 days, when there were hundreds of user made sprits being worked on, when the forum was less structured and stagnant, when you would see hatchlings frequently in forum signatures. 

 

But even if were not, new players have plenty to draw them into the game - the tons and tons of dragons to collect. Sure, not being able to name them whatever they want might put some people off, but I think getting rid of name exclusivity would just push out some of the oldies who have nothing left to collect and trade except names. And any oldies returning suddenly find they have nothing of value collected. I also do think the name exclusivity makes people more creative, the only reason I check out other people's scrolls is to see what neat or funny names they've come up with, because there's no customisation and if I just wanted to see sprites I could look on the wiki.

[MissK.]

4 minutes ago, Murkydepths said:

But even if were not, new players have plenty to draw them into the game - the tons and tons of dragons to collect. Sure, not being able to name them whatever they want might put some people off, but I think getting rid of name exclusivity would just push out some of the oldies who have nothing left to collect and trade except names. And any oldies returning suddenly find they have nothing of value collected. I also do think the name exclusivity makes people more creative, the only reason I check out other people's scrolls is to see what neat or funny names they've come up with, because there's no customisation and if I just wanted to see sprites I could look on the wiki.

 

If new players have plenty to draw them into the game then how is the site dying...? I'm not prepared to either agree or disagree with that general idea here, just saying, that seems a bit contradictory.

 

Also I've been playing since 2008, pretty sure I count as one of the oldies, and I've been in favour of this suggestion. At least a few others who have posted here are also in the same boat - heck, Infinis is the OP and has definitely been around quite a while. So I don't think any conclusions can be drawn about this suggestion alienating such a large number of "oldies" to have a negative impact.

[Paintra]

2 hours ago, Murkydepths said:

I didn't say it was a quick death, DC has held on admirably, but it's never going to get as popular as it was in it's peak. It was built around the concept of forum signatures, and forums are edging away in favour of either more personalised social media like instagram or more anonymous social media like reddit. Collectable websites in general have lost favour in lieu of the more design/customisable pet games. 

 

I recall when the cave emptied at each hour, when abandoned eggs were usually at 5 days, when there were hundreds of user made sprits being worked on, when the forum was less structured and stagnant, when you would see hatchlings frequently in forum signatures. 

 

 

But even if were not, new players have plenty to draw them into the game - the tons and tons of dragons to collect. Sure, not being able to name them whatever they want might put some people off, but I think getting rid of name exclusivity would just push out some of the oldies who have nothing left to collect and trade except names. And any oldies returning suddenly find they have nothing of value collected. I also do think the name exclusivity makes people more creative, the only reason I check out other people's scrolls is to see what neat or funny names they've come up with, because there's no customisation and if I just wanted to see sprites I could look on the wiki.

I would argue that DC is more popular now than it's ever been. Maybe it doesn't have the sheer number of players at once, and the forums are certainly not nearly as active, but I would argue that DC is one of the furthest petsites from dying, right next to Flight Rising in terms of longevity. The sheer amount of currently active players from 2018 and 2019 shows me that people aren't just joining and leaving;

 

And even if DC was dying, I could not disagree with you more on any of your points about name exclusivity needing to stay, and is also a horrible thing for a developer to hear from a suggestion standpoint. Why give up on making the site better because it's "dying soon anyways?" I don't think any of us want DC to die; and I don't want to alter my ideas to make it better just because it might.