Get Rid of Name Exclusivity

[Sextonator]

2 hours ago, Fuzzbucket said:

 

Couldn't agree less, sorry.

And "just not naming it" because you can't call it Harry Potter is just chiodish over-reaction.

????? What? It is not childish to leave a dragon nameless if the chosen name is taken. Not everyone has the luxury of being able to take the time to come up with a new name or a work around, or have a backup name already picked out.

[AsymDoll13]

Whoa, whoa. Let's all calm down. It's just names. ^^

[Charu]

I'll always support this suggestion.

 

 

The technical side:

Overall, I think having /n/ links also include scroll ID is a good workaround. Someone suggested this a few pages back and I think it's better than what I suggested, which was a number tacked on the end of the URL.

F/E:

view/n/<UserID>/<Your%20Dragon%20Name%20Here>

 

I also support unique names per user, rather than being exclusive. From a data perspective, the same name across 50 different dragons makes no difference because the computer will reference the dragon ID, which will be what most people call the dragon's code. But, 50 dragons named the same is confusing for the user since the name replaces the code. But this can be adjusted by including the dragon's code alongside the name on the scroll.

F/E:

Your Dragon Name Here (abcde)

 

Depending on how TJ has the database set up, he probably already has the framework in place to allow for unique names attached to UID instead of exclusive. It would be a matter of potentially creating a new table that references points of data already available and editing what the name check code searches for.

A security issue can come up if the UID can link to a scroll, but it seems to me that scroll linking is based off the name, not the unique UID that distinguishes me from you.

 

 

Addressing fakes and suggesting user control:

Some of the complaints brought up are reasonable: fakes are a problem that people will take advantage of. However, I think the Dorkface lineage (an example countlessly brought up in this thread) is deserving of being uniquely identified like genuine Thuweds are. The lineage is valued due to its constant presence in DC history.

 

I think the users should be allowed to flag important lineages. Why? We can't rely on moderators to approve things like this for the website because descriptions just kinda hang out in limbo for months on end.  Users used to have power to help approve descriptions and I believe that they used to be able to override waiting for moderator approval. I'd love to see something like this again because... I've been waiting on a description to be approved for well over 6 months. I wrote the description back in February. At the very latest, March.

 

This isn't even a super big deal. I'm not losing sleep over this. But an argument can be made that user customization for their dragons is already highly limited already when a short paragraph telling you why I think my dragon is unique sits in "awaiting moderation" hell. Not even "wow your description sucks, fix this." Just a state of null. Nothingness. Purgatory.

 

As a side note, creating a system that would allow users to approve certain dragons to be tagged specially is probably a bit more difficult than just scribbling some code together to check if the name belongs to the user, instead of at all. But if descriptions used to allow for user approval, overriding moderator approval, then the framework is already there. It just needs adjustments.

 

 

Problems with name exclusivity:

Lyrical lineages are often the victim of name exclusivity and this problem is why I've never completed a lyrical lineage. I started having to insert spaces where they don't belong and... yeah. It looks awkward and now I have to re-plan the entire tree because I can't fit a word into the name that used to fit.

 

You can try to search for the lyrical lineage you might want to plan through user created threads meant to document this, but this relies on users going to the forum to list their lineage. This is inherently flawed because you might start work on a lineage and find out someone already started it, but they started in the middle instead of the top. No, naming lyrical dragons "Never Gonna Give You Up Halcyon" (the surname I've often given my dragons) is not a solution because it mucks with the flow of the lyric and leads back into the problem of planning around this. There are also circumstances where a lyric you might want to use might share the same words with another. Word combinations can be very similar or common, especially with the same artist. This is a stylistic choice by the artist and is part of what identifies one artist from another.

There are also users like me that lost names they used to have before names would not be released anymore. This is especially a problem with users like me that disappeared for a bit and came back. Here's my favorite example that bugs the snot out of me because I wrote this description when this dragon was named Doctor Nefarious Tropy.

 

But, somewhere between me taking a break and coming back, the name got made available for someone else to claim and... that user is now inactive. D'oh. I just complained about how long user descriptions take for approval, so I'm not lying when I say this description has existed for at least before Oct 2019. Not only is it highly unlikely a moderator will approve a name totally irrelevant to the dragon's current name, but that's most likely when the next person that wanted this name got it.

 

No, I'm not going to harass a random person that seems inactive, over a name. Even if they totally don't care about it.

 

 

Name exclusivity creates a problem that doesn't exist in the real world:

Additionally, another argument is that everyone will name their dragon Drogon. So? How does this affect your gameplay? Why is the value of your chosen name based on its exclusivity rather than you wanted to name your dragon that name? I've given my Sims names like John Smith or Sherlock Holmes. The name I've chosen for my Sim in my game has zero effect on what someone else's experience is. I feel more personally attached to my mass-collected pixels when I can actually name them what I want. There might be 100 Drogons, but they are not mine. This 1 Drogon is mine and he matters to me.

 

For a real world example, there are probably a million cats named Tom. However, I don't care about those million cats, because my Tom is my Tom. He's not Tom Halcyon. He's just Tom. He doesn't need a last name to his last name to distinguish him from other Toms. If I told someone that "this Tom is mine" they would accept that this Tom belongs to me based off the nametag with my info on it and probably the markings and age. Even if there's a Tom born at the exact same second as my Tom and looks exactly like my Tom, I'll still know which Tom is my Tom. My vet distinguishes Tom from other Toms because he has a unique identifier that identifies this Tom as my Tom. He gets a patient ID. The vet just so happens to call him Tom because his common name is Tom, not cat_129513. But for the purposes of not mixing up my Tom with Sarah's Tom, his paperwork distinguishes him as cat_129513.

 

 

Side note regarding zombies:

Also, I'm pretty sure dead dragons don't automagically release names. Correct me if I'm wrong, I'll remove this from the post if I'm wrong.

 

I know that this is at the very least somewhat true enough that users must be the messenger for other users to let them know to strip names from fodder before attempting zombification. Imagine if you couldn't use the name Rodney Smith in real life because your grandpa has exclusive rights to that name. If this is a problem, a check needs to be added for releasing names (as discussed, this code used to exist for inactive users...) We can create this check easily since zombies have not been treated as "dead dragons," for years, hence why they don't take up kill slots anymore.

Is dragon dead? If TRUE,
Has dragon been dead 2 weeks? If TRUE,
- release name

 

Then again, TJ could totally just have added an exception to his code that states that zombies are exceptions to kill slots and are still treated as "dead dragons." The logic for the code doesn't change much, except it now asks if the dragon is a zombie at the second step.

Edited November 3, 2021 by Charu

[ShorahNagi]

1 hour ago, Charu said:

Also, I'm pretty sure dead dragons don't automagically release names. Correct me if I'm wrong, I'll remove this from the post if I'm wrong.

Correct, killing a named dragon causes the name to be lost forever. Theres a thread somewhere in this forum calling for allowing dead dragons to be unnamed (by the owner as an optional thing so as to not upset deadlines)

 

*Edit: Found the most recent variant of it, second post has links to similar requests

 

 

1 hour ago, Charu said:

Want to name their dragon Drogon. So? How does this affect your gameplay? Why is the value of your chosen name based on its exclusivity rather than you wanted to name your dragon that name? 

*Lineage preference and 'creativity' aside*

 

I think the problem with this is that some people feel a sense of pride in having gotten a certain name [ex. The pride you felt over having originally gotten Doctor Nefarious Tropy]. Or that some names have special meaning (somewhere in this thread was a person with a dragon named after a deceased relative, and they stated they'd be a little upset if someone else had the name)

 

That being said, I think Fuzzbucket summed up the whole of the situation quite well that - no matter what is decided - one side WILL be unhappy about it.

 

Edited November 3, 2021 by ShorahNagi
Added link

[Charu]

9 minutes ago, ShorahNagi said:

I think the problem with this is that some people feel a sense of pride in having gotten a certain name [ex. The pride you felt over having originally gotten Doctor Nefarious Tropy]. Or that some names have special meaning (somewhere in this thread was a person with a dragon named after a deceased relative, and they stated they'd be a little upset if someone else had the name)

 

When I claimed the name probably a decade ago, I didn't really feel "pride" for having that name. I was just excited to have a permanent marker on my scroll of a fandom I enjoy for a character I like. Instead, I'm stuck with a permanent reminder that I had that name once, but someone else also liked the name and now has exclusive rights to it because I didn't engage with DC for a bit. I could remove the description, but at this point, it's there by principle, even if I've shifted which dragon I want that name for. The entire situation is frustrating to me because people do hoard names (several in this thread mentioned this!) and others reserve names. When I temporarily rename (sometimes for a week or two while I wait for a better fit to grow up), I reserve the name now because I'm paranoid it's going to be another name I'll never be able to use again. 

 

Even if I had "exclusive rights" to Doctor Nefarious Tropy (single-space), I wouldn't be upset at all if other people wanted to also use that name. Instead, I get Doctor  Nefarious  Tropy (double-space). There's a vampire dragon I wanted to name Sire Denathrius (single-space), but instead I get Sire  Denathrius (double-space). And what of the next people that might want these names? I got lucky that I "only" had to double space the names to make them look even and somewhat like their single-spaced variants. Other people will have to make it look even more awkward.

F/E:

Sire   Denathrius (triple-space)
S i r e  Denathrius
Doctor Nefarious  Tropy (single-space, double-space)

 

I don't think that's fair for those people. Nor does it look good. It makes the URL look incredibly awkward, too.

Instead of:

/view/n/Sire%20%20Denathrius

 

The URL populates as:

/view/n/Sire%20 Denathrius

 

Granted, the first will redirect to the latter, but it still looks so wrong.

 

In general, fandoms are about sharing and I'm unhappy that someone cannot share the love for the same fandoms I love because I happened to get the less ridiculous looking variant of a name. And if I choose to have Sire  Denathrius go off and make vampires that show up in his "bitten" list that are lore friendly for the actual Sire Denathrius, well... I'll have to play the name game again for those names. To make it even worse, some of those names might end up double spaced or single spaced, which will look totally absurd and stands out like a sore thumb.

Here's an example:

 

 

[Wahya]

A second argument for my stance of leaving exclusivity alone is this is one of the last mechanics of the site that gives non-artist scrolls something special aside from your own username.

Edited November 3, 2021 by Wahya

[Mephino]

I mean personally I have a hard time naming my dragons because I'm not really a creative namer, and after a few 100 dragons any names I could come up with/use just becomes mute and void. I find people hounding others for not naming their dragons with this restriction on names and it's like....either I say "My Username + Whatever I was gonna name them originally" kind really clutters up the name and makes me struggle to actually...well....read it. (Easily overwelmed and Dylexia yay )

 

It's also a waste of time to have to name every single dragon and trying several variants of a name you really wanted, leading to burnout and deciding to not bother if you can't get it. I wouldn't really think it's childish in that manor. (Generally I only name dragons anymore if they have a funny code that I can twist into something fun)

 

and I've been on this site for a hot while, was here when Frilled were still around and when they got discontinued. I found some names I had that would have been hot for the MLP Fandom (Princess Cadence, Shining Armor, and Princess Skywhatever it was-) and I felt that it was really silly no one else could potentially name them anything similar to that. just because I got there first.

 

If lineages are important enough for you it's best to double check your lineages before getting or doing anything. I know even with the current system people still get scammed from people fake naming theirs just to get something rare or smth. Nothing stops anyone from faking something.

 

The market for the names really only exists because of a limitation in the system at the time.  If it's fixable now, I think it's best to just fix it, Rather have the ability to name, rather have the ability to give my dragons a funny name or follow a theme (like I've seen some folks do whole lyrical songs through their dragons and that's impressive!) and whatnot rather than just....idk wowee my dragon's named Lucky. Oh no I got a dragon related to Dumpster Fire why would anyone name them that this dragon is worthless. idk I just kinda value Fun more over Market I guess.

[Stormphoenix42]

4 hours ago, Wahya said:

A second argument for my stance of leaving exclusivity alone is this is one of the last mechanics of the site that gives non-artist scrolls something special aside from your own username.

This 100%. It's a collection game, I'd hate to lose a major collection mechanic.
I got really excited about a Halloween dragon I found in the AP earlier from two character-named dragons. If there were 29 dragons out there named after those characters, the excitement would have gone from "this is maybe my favorite catch so far this Halloween" to "oh look, another 2G." There wouldn't be anything special about the lineage anymore.

As for market vs. fun - I know some people do "name trading", but I never got into that. I just enjoy collecting, it's not really a market value thing to me.

(I know this wasn't really a serious point, but I checked - Dumpster Fire is a Gold Shimmerscale! I'd be happy to have a dragon related to him, regardless of the name 😄)

[Eggy0]

Looking at the thread while kind of lurking, I'm very much wishing there was some sort of middle ground where most if not everyone could agree.

I still firmly stand by the side of removing name exclusivity, but... I also wish for the other side to be happy too, as much as I can't truly comprehend the reasons why they want it to stay. For instance, I don't get why it's so important to some people for names to be completely unique; while it does make some lineages special as outlined by the post before me, it also prevents people that don't care for something like that from actually customizing their dragons however they want. Like, there's at least one dragon out there with a fandom name that I would've loved to have on one of my dragons because I love the character in question (and who isn't even mainstream like let's say Harry Potter), but I can't because said dragon was named long before I even had the chance to be aware of Dragon Cave. Other webgames I've been to don't have this strict of a customization - not even Flight Rising, which forces you to have unique names for each of your dragons but doesn't restrict you from using names owned by other people's dragons - and I've never seen people advocating for names to be completely unique there. I've also seen the argument that uniqueness breeds creativity, but I've come to realize that said creativity is bound to run out eventually once people start resorting to intentional typos to get their wanted names and then potentially preventing other people from using it by using up the variations alongside the original, and I wouldn't be surprised if I were to start seeing gibberish names one day due to the userbase claiming all the "readable" ones. Not helping matters is dead dragons taking up names forever... I don't know if I remember correctly, but from my memory I've heard that someone killed one of their dragons with a common/popular name just so no one else could have that name. To reiterate, I don't understand why people care about having unique names so much (especially as dragons in my opinion are already unique enough thanks to their code and the scroll they're on), but even so I really want there to be a solution that benefits those people as well.

It's really unfortunate: if the feature stays, people like me won't be able to customize our dragons to our heart's content, and if the feature goes away, the fears of the loss of uniqueness might come to be. I really want to be able to comfortably name my dragons what I want (name exclusivity is the biggest reason why most of my scroll is unnamed), but I'd hate to see people who actually care about the feature become inconvenienced by its removal

My only idea is the aforementioned thing with Flight Rising where your own dragons must each have an unique name but can have the same name as a dragon owned by someone else. Though given that this is already listed in the first post and it isn't getting brought up as of these recent posts, I'm guessing it was probably discussed before and wasn't sufficient middle ground...

[purplehaze]

1 hour ago, Eggy0 said:

My only idea is the aforementioned thing with Flight Rising where your own dragons must each have an unique name but can have the same name as a dragon owned by someone else. Though given that this is already listed in the first post and it isn't getting brought up as of these recent posts, I'm guessing it was probably discussed before and wasn't sufficient middle ground...

I'm afraid that would end up satisfying mostly the non-exclusive side. The people who have pride in the special names they have claimed would no longer have an exclusive claim. There would still be problems with the other reasons that people like exclusiveness -- easy inbred checks, view/n/ searches, etc.

And the lyrical lineage people would not be satisfied, either, since they would still have to awkwardly space out repeated lines if they could not repeat names on their own scrolls.

I am afraid, as Fuzz and others have said, that there really is no good middle ground here. No matter what happens some are going to be unhappy.

[Eggy0]

6 minutes ago, purplehaze said:

I'm afraid that would end up satisfying mostly the non-exclusive side. The people who have pride in the special names they have claimed would no longer have an exclusive claim. There would still be problems with the other reasons that people like exclusiveness -- easy inbred checks, view/n/ searches, etc.

And the lyrical lineage people would not be satisfied, either, since they would still have to awkwardly space out repeated lines if they could not repeat names on their own scrolls.

I am afraid, as Fuzz and others have said, that there really is no good middle ground here. No matter what happens some are going to be unhappy.

Yeah, it's really unfortunate as I already said, and it's why I said I wish there was a middle ground that would benefit both sides. I mentioned the idea on the bottom of my post because that was my only idea but even so I kind of had the feeling that wouldn't work either because, again, I didn't see it being discussed despite being mentioned in the first post. I'm honestly pretty bummed that this particular instance is basically a Morton's fork - name exclusivity bothers me and a bunch of other people but I also feel for those who will be bothered by its absence even though I personally can't identify with the reasonings. It's just... a lot of the points are valid and it's gonna be hard if not outright impossible to figure out some sort of compromise for both parties.

[Mephino]

54 minutes ago, Eggy0 said:

Yeah, it's really unfortunate as I already said, and it's why I said I wish there was a middle ground that would benefit both sides. I mentioned the idea on the bottom of my post because that was my only idea but even so I kind of had the feeling that wouldn't work either because, again, I didn't see it being discussed despite being mentioned in the first post. I'm honestly pretty bummed that this particular instance is basically a Morton's fork - name exclusivity bothers me and a bunch of other people but I also feel for those who will be bothered by its absence even though I personally can't identify with the reasonings. It's just... a lot of the points are valid and it's gonna be hard if not outright impossible to figure out some sort of compromise for both parties.

Yeah the problem is I think there's not a in between answer, the question is "Should we get rid of this, Yes or No"

 

Any solutions I can think of for the other side isn't satisfactory aside from "introduce a new Collection Mechanic to replace the old one" Which would still hurt if that's the in-between we need or get. I wouldn't even know what kind of collection mechanic it'd be honestly or how hard it'd be to implement.

 

But it really seems to just come down to...the question isn't set or fit for a in the middle answer. Either way if they do it, a lot of people aren't gonna be happy.

 

I'm personally for getting rid of it because while it'll suck for people who got name exclusivity, it's something that could eventually be gotten over.  I find more often than not the people who want to keep the exclusivity are the ones who like to flaunt it more or tend to get aggressive with people who don't name their dragons. I think it'd help casual players too since I feel majority of people who want to get rid of it just play Dragon Cave because it's fun and they just wanna fulfill the small tasks they make for themselves.

[dragongrrl]

1 hour ago, purplehaze said:

I'm afraid that would end up satisfying mostly the non-exclusive side. The people who have pride in the special names they have claimed would no longer have an exclusive claim. There would still be problems with the other reasons that people like exclusiveness -- easy inbred checks, view/n/ searches, etc.

And the lyrical lineage people would not be satisfied, either, since they would still have to awkwardly space out repeated lines if they could not repeat names on their own scrolls.

I am afraid, as Fuzz and others have said, that there really is no good middle ground here. No matter what happens some are going to be unhappy.

I am seriously on the exclusivity side, and have had no problem getting the names I want on all my new Halloween collections, but also understand the frustration of the lyric lineages. I started Cat Stevens' "Moonshadow" many years ago, couple other songs as well, and someday I'll finish them. I live on the middle ground.

[kiramaru7]

I decided to take another peek at this thread again & I'm really sorry; I don't get why name exclusivity is the be all to end all that those in favor of it  claim it to be. Seriously. Think of your own given names are you any less special in your parents' eyes if the J. Does down the block have a child with the same name? Also think of all the hatred & resentment that would go on if said Does had the only child on the planet with that name, cuz they named their child first. And think of all the weird & stupid work arounds or just weird & stupid names that people would have if everyone on the planet had to have a unique name. Can you imagine how obnoxious those Does would sound if they went on about having 10 kids with names that no one thought of first & how it easy it was for them to come up with those names? Right? Now imagine them saying to their neighbors, who wanted to name their child Bob, but the Does had the name first, that they could try naming their kid B o b or BoB  or bOb, or Bobb, or even 808. I for one can't see that neighbor being told that being very happy about it.  And what about Bob's dynasty, you ask? How do people distinguish it from Bob's dynasty? By the time & place each occurred. And what about those horrible fake!Bob dynasties? And the inbred ones? Well, there's ways to determine those too. So it takes a bit of effort to figure out which Bob dynasty you want, it seems a lot less effort than trying to come up with an acceptable work around for the ones who also want to have a Bob in their family, cuz Bob is a name that screams "mighty destiny". Or maybe they just want to name all their kids Bob. Honestly, having a million Bobs in the world isn't that a thing & it doesn't make your Bob any less special. And for those who like unique names, well, they can name their kid bOb.

 

I just want to say, it's not my intention to call anyone out or make anyone feel bad or insulted cuz they like something I seriously don't get. Names aren't exclusive in real life, with the exception of usernames, but that's not what we're talking about here and they have to be unique in order to identify those who are abusing the system. I do childcare for a living & let's just say you can tell which names were popular in a given period. Is it confusing? Yeah it can be in the beginning, but you get used to it, & to make it even more confusing, my boss & another woman I've worked with both have the same name, but no one has any trouble telling them apart.

 

One more thing; I like to write stories for fun & I've given 2 different characters the same first name & no one to my knowledge has ever confused them or thought they were the same character in a different setting.

[Stormphoenix42]

The "this is a problem that doesn't exist in real life" argument has always been a little bit funny to me. DragCave has never operated on real-world rules - it even specifically avoids similarities to the real world in certain cases (description guidelines, anyone?)

The "Bob" example falls particularly flat because... no one names their kid just "Bob". Even in this example, Bob Doe would be distinguished from his neighbors down the street by a last (and likely a middle) name. I know people named John that go by their first and middle name to avoid being confused with other Johns. As someone with a fairly common name myself, I've had to use additional names to avoid confusion. I don't think we should all name our kids things like X Æ A-12 or whatever (though this is unfortunately a real world example) but people in the real world do deliberately set their kids apart with unique spellings and/or name combinations. Similarly, users on DragCave who have their heart set on naming a dragon "Bob" have the option of adding a clan name or last name to set their name apart from the others.

 

But that's beside the point anyway, since real world examples of name exclusivity do exist. An actor can't use the same working name as someone else in their guild who "got there first". Registered racehorses have to have unique names - probably for lineage concerns similar to the ones described here. Trademarks have to be unique. Website domain names are frequently bought for their unique value. Etc.

 

[Shadowdrake]

1 hour ago, Stormphoenix42 said:

The "this is a problem that doesn't exist in real life" argument has always been a little bit funny to me. DragCave has never operated on real-world rules - it even specifically avoids similarities to the real world in certain cases (description guidelines, anyone?)

This is true, but in most cases game differences are less annoying than reality, not moreso. And your examples involve financial matters and direct competition, so they're hardly applicable to a mostly single-player free-to-play online game.

[Stormphoenix42]

6 minutes ago, Shadowdrake said:

...your examples involve financial matters and direct competition, so they're hardly applicable to a mostly single-player free-to-play online game.

Not really? I mean, the horses are racing, but there's no naming competition. They just need to be able to tell them apart. Ditto for actors. I'll let you have trademarks, though, since you can put those on a balance sheet
Anyway, it's not really an argument I'd use to support name exclusivity. Just pointing out that it's not so rare as all that.

[dragongrrl]

1 hour ago, Stormphoenix42 said:

Not really? I mean, the horses are racing, but there's no naming competition. They just need to be able to tell them apart. Ditto for actors. I'll let you have trademarks, though, since you can put those on a balance sheet
Anyway, it's not really an argument I'd use to support name exclusivity. Just pointing out that it's not so rare as all that.

I knew someone lucky enough to purchase a daughter of Secretariat. They wanted her registered to race and had to submit a series of name choices to the Jockey Club which approves the names. There was a time limit and they got the final name in a day before the deadline. It sounded like a major competition when the process was described to me.

 

Now, that's exclusive!

 

And as things turned out, she never raced.

[Sextonator]

Dragons are already logged by a unique name via their code. They don’t need a completely unique given name too.
 

And you wouldn’t call jane doe jane doe all the time, and when you have a jane doe and a jane smith, one might become or jane d or jane s, or one might adopt a nick name or a shortened name, like jay, or js or jd. And pets, though dragons aren’t pets but I would assume similar name rules would apply, you might call your cat mittens, one of many mittens, and you’d only ever use mittens, but it’s implied that mittens full name is mittens ____. So a dragon named trogdor would only show trogdor, but would be trogdor ____ as would be implied.

 

Dragons aren’t trademarkable, they aren’t raceable, they’re not a website, and they’re not going to be a part of an acting guild. They don’t need to have unique names, especially since they already have unique codes that act as an identifier.

[Fuzzbucket]

9 hours ago, Stormphoenix42 said:

 

But that's beside the point anyway, since real world examples of name exclusivity do exist. An actor can't use the same working name as someone else in their guild who "got there first". Registered racehorses have to have unique names - probably for lineage concerns similar to the ones described here. Trademarks have to be unique. Website domain names are frequently bought for their unique value. Etc.

 

 

 

5 hours ago, dragongrrl said:

I knew someone lucky enough to purchase a daughter of Secretariat. They wanted her registered to race and had to submit a series of name choices to the Jockey Club which approves the names. There was a time limit and they got the final name in a day before the deadline. It sounded like a major competition when the process was described to me.

 

Now, that's exclusive!

 

 

Now (especially as I am one of the evil exclusive brigade) I find I have a sudden need for my very own racehorse....

[ShorahNagi]

On 11/4/2021 at 8:26 AM, Eggy0 said:

Looking at the thread while kind of lurking, I'm very much wishing there was some sort of middle ground where most if not everyone could agree.

After rereading the various suggestions, the only way I see a middle ground of sorts working would be a coding nightmare to implement (I suspect, I know very little of coding) - and that is:

 

Let the User who holds the name *currently* decide if the name should be exclusive.
 

*I have a long explanation but I suspect this will be unpopular and will only give the short explanation

 

Say I own the names Riven, Iron Man and Guardian of Nature.

 

A lot of people love the Avengers and want their names, I got it first but I'll be nice and share. I unchecked the box making the name exclusive, allowing everyone to name a dragon Iron Man [I can't change the exclusivity back UNLESS my Iron Man goes back to being the only one as I had the name first]

 

I don't want to share Riven because that name is very special to me, so I make sure the box under 'Actions' that locks her name from use is still checked.

 

I do the same for Guardian of Nature because - yes, it's the name of a breed and I'm sure a lot of players would love to name a dragon that...But I got it first and want to keep it as mine.

 

Thus, there's now a bunch of Iron Man's, but still only one Guardian of Nature and one Riven.

 

If implemented names would be checked exclusive by default to 'protect' players who may be on a hiatus for reasons (ex. A player in the hospital) and would need to manually be changed.

 

[Mephino]

22 minutes ago, ShorahNagi said:

If implemented names would be checked exclusive by default to 'protect' players who may be on a hiatus for reasons (ex. A player in the hospital) and would need to manually be changed.

The problem with that is old names stuck on dead accounts/dragons or accounts of people who haven't logged in for a while. It'd also be a mental pain for everyone if it could be incorporated to actually go through and check and uncheck which dragons they want the name to remain exclusive for. I would imagine most people would just not bother anyways- Making the issue  rather unchanged. (Sure you may have a few names you can use now but probably never the ones you wanted like Lucky or smth.)

 

There's also the fact that it'd probably be rather unknown to people if they hadn't been following Dragon Cave for a while for whatever reason. Granted they can get accustomed to it but it'd probably take a while.

[Eggy0]

32 minutes ago, ShorahNagi said:

After rereading the various suggestions, the only way I see a middle ground of sorts working would be a coding nightmare to implement (I suspect, I know very little of coding) - and that is:

 

Let the User who holds the name *currently* decide if the name should be exclusive.
 

*I have a long explanation but I suspect this will be unpopular and will only give the short explanation

 

Say I own the names Riven, Iron Man and Guardian of Nature.

 

A lot of people love the Avengers and want their names, I got it first but I'll be nice and share. I unchecked the box making the name exclusive, allowing everyone to name a dragon Iron Man [I can't change the exclusivity back UNLESS my Iron Man goes back to being the only one as I had the name first]

 

I don't want to share Riven because that name is very special to me, so I make sure the box under 'Actions' that locks her name from use is still checked.

 

I do the same for Guardian of Nature because - yes, it's the name of a breed and I'm sure a lot of players would love to name a dragon that...But I got it first and want to keep it as mine.

 

Thus, there's now a bunch of Iron Man's, but still only one Guardian of Nature and one Riven.

 

If implemented names would be checked exclusive by default to 'protect' players who may be on a hiatus for reasons (ex. A player in the hospital) and would need to manually be changed.

 

That was actually an idea I had as well! I had been thinking about it but also tried to consider the possible drawbacks of name locking. So here's what I imagined it to potentially offer in regards to that:

 

The benefits

• Common names can be used by everyone while preserving the uniqueness of names that their respective owners want to be special
• Things like lyrical lineages could be reasonably possible
• When it comes to name hoarding and trading, people will still be able to do that - they could lock the name and, when trading, unlock it then have the other person lock it

The drawbacks

• Players could still be able to lock any name they like that's potentially desirable by other players, potentially leading to harassment (may or may not actually happen)
• Unscrupulous players could abuse it by taking a popular name and locking it so no one else could use it (although that's already kind of possible by killing a named dragon)
• If there's more that one dragon using a particular name and one of the owners wanted to lock it for some reason, that could lead to some issues
• Coding feasibility might be questionable. Although since the website already seems to check if a person is trying to use a name belonging to another dragon, it might be possible to add a yes-no flag to each dragon that tells the database if other dragons are allowed to have this dragon's name.
• Trading names meant to be exclusive would have to rely on both parties upholding the deal of locking the names once the trade is done (unless they agree otherwise), and there's nothing stopping unscrupulous players from, again, sniping the names during a trade and then locking it

 

2 minutes ago, Mephino said:

The problem with that is old names stuck on dead accounts/dragons or accounts of people who haven't logged in for a while. It'd also be a mental pain for everyone if it could be incorporated to actually go through and check and uncheck which dragons they want the name to remain exclusive for. I would imagine most people would just not bother anyways- Making the issue  rather unchanged. (Sure you may have a few names you can use now but probably never the ones you wanted like Lucky or smth.)

 

There's also the fact that it'd probably be rather unknown to people if they hadn't been following Dragon Cave for a while for whatever reason. Granted they can get accustomed to it but it'd probably take a while.

The "people who haven't logged in for a while" thing might be solved by having these names unlocked by default - and giving a sufficient grace period before the unlock actually goes into effect. During that time names would still have to be unique but people would also have a chance to lock names they want to keep exclusive before the new mechanic starts working, and names that were locked would stay locked. The announcement could also potentially be distributed via email so people (well, those who still use the same email anyway) would get notified and given ample time to decide what they want to do. There's still other potential drawbacks to consider though, like the ones I had listed above.

Edited November 5, 2021 by Eggy0

[Stormphoenix42]

14 hours ago, dragongrrl said:

I knew someone lucky enough to purchase a daughter of Secretariat. They wanted her registered to race and had to submit a series of name choices to the Jockey Club which approves the names. There was a time limit and they got the final name in a day before the deadline. It sounded like a major competition when the process was described to me.

 

Now, that's exclusive!

 

And as things turned out, she never raced.

 Wow, that's cool! Sounds like an ordeal for sure. Not certain where the competitive element comes in, but I'll take your word for it. At least with DragCave you find out right away, haha... imagine if there were a time limit for naming dragons 0_o
 

 

13 hours ago, Sextonator said:

...you wouldn’t call jane doe jane doe all the time, and when you have a jane doe and a jane smith, one might become or jane d or jane s, or one might adopt a nick name or a shortened name, like jay, or js or jd. And pets, though dragons aren’t pets but I would assume similar name rules would apply, you might call your cat mittens, one of many mittens, and you’d only ever use mittens, but it’s implied that mittens full name is mittens ____. So a dragon named trogdor would only show trogdor, but would be trogdor ____ as would be implied.

 

Dragons aren’t trademarkable, they aren’t raceable, they’re not a website, and they’re not going to be a part of an acting guild. They don’t need to have unique names, especially since they already have unique codes that act as an identifier.

Not in conversation, but most documentation related to her would have her full name. I'm curious what you'd fill in the blank with for Trogdor - it doesn't seem like an obvious implication to me. The owner's username? The clan name established somewhere in the user's lore? Something from the description, if he had one? Why not just include it in the name in that case?

And yes, you've found the flaw in the analogy - dragons don't exist in real life, so any comparison made to real life items is unfortunately not going to be a one-to-one perfect representation
 

 

33 minutes ago, ShorahNagi said:

After rereading the various suggestions, the only way I see a middle ground of sorts working would be a coding nightmare to implement (I suspect, I know very little of coding) - and that is:

 

Let the User who holds the name *currently* decide if the name should be exclusive.
 

[snip]

This would be interesting! My immediate concern would be user harassment if someone chose not to share a popular name like Harry Potter (or what have you) but hiding your scroll is always an option. And I'm sure most people here aren't the sort to do that.

[High Lord November]

It really just comes down to values and personal preference. There isn't any objective 'best answer', and you can't use your personal preference to argue away someone else's personal preference. Some people love having exclusive names, other people hate it. Whether or not it changes probably depends on how much TJ et al cares, and how easy it is to code/change.

 

The only true middle ground seems like letting people choose if they want the name to be exclusive or not. It would have to be an opt-out system (everything is automatically exclusive unless you check a box) and I don't know how many people would care to go through their scroll and make things non-exclusive. And if someone has names on their scroll and doesn't play any more, it wouldn't really make the non-exclusive people happy. It could open up harassment too, and it would still mean the non-exclusive people would have to think and try out different names to find one they could use.  Then it starts to just get complicated, so is it really worth it?

Edited November 5, 2021 by High Lord November