Dev. blog - Changing Names, 27 August

[Bauke]

 

As for abuse: Some people need to stop busting innovation for the sake of looking up and down to find ways that people will troll it. "Omg someone will take my username just to laugh at me!" Your personal squabbles are minuscule in comparison to the benefits this could bring Runescape, particularly in the countless accounts that were banned for too many spaces, because someone from CS thought they were bad, etc.

 

QFT.

[doomy]

Wonder how long you'll hold your name for? I plan on changing my random accounts name to something random and then changing my main accounts name to that.

 

 

 

Unless I can get in on the update and snag me a better name ;)

[Reztral]

Cool. I'm looking forward to it.

[PlzPuddngPlz]

I think this is a good idea, but are there any bets on how slow the game will be to load, from all the hordes of noobs requesting zezima & the like?

 

 

 

Actually, I'm happy with this name, but may change it if I ever think of something good.

[Me_Hate_Libs]

One thing I'm curious about is how exactly we can figure out someone's name. I mean, if we report somone under name, does the report function get changed so that it'll report the account name of the person using that display name?

[Bauke]

That just has to be the case. Else it's not possible to report anyone anymore. I'm sure Jagex will take this into account.

[Kidd_Varrow]

We even found a number of extra benefits from this idea. With the display name separate for the account name, we werent bound by existing restrictions on name length, or the characters it could contain.

 

 

 

I really hope this means we can have longer names. That would mean I can finally have the name I wanted originally but couldn't have, since it has 13 characters, one over the current max. :wall:

[ilovecuttingyews]

Wow! It's really going to get confusing when reporting players...

 

Report their username or display name? Can you tell their username?

 

If there are 'special characters' that people can use, what if our keyboard can't type them?

 

 

 

I sure hope their are no major bugs with the reporting system when they introduce this because it will spread like a wildfire. And with something that took 8 months to create, it won't be a simple change like aquanites not giving exp or something like that.

[Dexek]

Wow! It's really going to get confusing when reporting players...

 

Report their username or display name? Can you tell their username?

 

If there are 'special characters' that people can use, what if our keyboard can't type them?

 

 

 

I sure hope their are no major bugs with the reporting system when they introduce this because it will spread like a wildfire. And with something that took 8 months to create, it won't be a simple change like aquanites not giving exp or something like that.

 

 

 

We could possibly get the option to right-click the username in the chat window and select report. That is how it is done on Arcanists, and it works quite well. I don't see what the problem would be if this was impletmented into Runescape. Actually, it would prevent problems.

[Sheep Tails]

I am kinda worried. Here's my reasoning from what I understood:

 

My Username is Sheep Tails.

 

My display name would have to be something else.

 

But then, someone else muight take Sheep Tails.

 

 

 

Also, wouldn't this put people who don't change their names at a disadvantage because their names are their usernames? Because I do not want to change my name, I made it a few yeras ago and I do not intend to lose it.

[Kidd_Varrow]

I am kinda worried. Here's my reasoning from what I understood:

 

My Username is Sheep Tails.

 

My display name would have to be something else.

 

But then, someone else muight take Sheep Tails.

 

 

 

Also, wouldn't this put people who don't change their names at a disadvantage because their names are their usernames? Because I do not want to change my name, I made it a few yeras ago and I do not intend to lose it.

 

 

 

You wouldn't have to change it. Your display name starts out being the same as your username.

[All_Is_Great]

I don't like this, I don't want people to use my account's name for their second name :( And I like my name the way it is, I don't want a second name, this is really confusing.

[Mil]

I don't like this, I don't want people to use my account's name for their second name :( And I like my name the way it is, I don't want a second name, this is really confusing.

 

wat.

 

You don't need to do anything if you are happy with your current name. Just forget they are releasing this feature ;).

[RSBDavid]

I was thinking about how they would implement this (as a programmer) and this is what I have determined.

 

 

 

Lets say a previous character sheet looked like:

 

 

 

username

password



stat1

stat2

stat3

....

stat24



bank1

...

bank496

 

 

 

Now, they would look like:

 

 

 

username

displayname

password



stat1

stat2

stat3

....

stat24



bank1

...

bank496

 

 

 

It would pretty easy to implement in theory but not in actuallity as you have to go through and change all of the arrays/loops to factor in that line in character sheets and make sure nothing gets mixed up.

 

 

 

Also, to those who say there account name will be taken, if you have played on the account, then the name will not be u pfor grabs according toa post on high level forums. If you have done eventhe basic things, your account name is safe. If you only just made the account but have never logged in, then the name will be up for grabs.

[All_Is_Great]

I don't like this, I don't want people to use my account's name for their second name :( And I like my name the way it is, I don't want a second name, this is really confusing.

 

wat.

 

You don't need to do anything if you are happy with your current name. Just forget they are releasing this feature ;).

 

 

 

So other people can't use my name as their display name? But I also have to log onto my pures which I also want to keep their names =/ :wall:

[Troacctid]

I don't like this, I don't want people to use my account's name for their second name :( And I like my name the way it is, I don't want a second name, this is really confusing.

 

wat.

 

You don't need to do anything if you are happy with your current name. Just forget they are releasing this feature ;).

 

 

 

So other people can't use my name as their display name? But I also have to log onto my pures which I also want to keep their names =/ :wall:

 

Your pures will be in the same place as your main, then. Don't change their names, and there you go.

[SwreeTak]

My word... they use player usernames as the primary key?! It is incredible that a company filled with software engineers doesn't appear to have heard the concept of an unique ID number for each account as the primary key. If they'd done this in the first place, there would be no issues whatsoever. ID numbers are meant to be transparent to the user of the application and never change. Usernames are very poor record identifiers.

 

 

 

Consider the way phpBB is designed (correctly). All our usernames are not the unique reference to our ID. Yes, they are unique, but they are not identifiers. We have ID numbers for that... for example, mine is 189809. This number, in the Tip.It's phpBB database, references everything about my account, and is why username changing is easy and efficient.

 

 

 

Now theres what, a 9 year backlog on RuneScape, prevention is better than cure, but it's going to be a nice feature just I hope too many people don't change their names, people coming up to me;

 

 

 

Him: "yo do you remember me?"

 

Me: "not really"

 

Him: "my name was propker34"

 

Me: "no?"

 

Him" "b4 dat it was pwnage66"

 

Me: "no."

 

Him: "b4 dat it was zezima9462"

 

Me: *teleports*

 

 

 

I laughed IRL when I read that. Hopefully not that many of my friends will change their names. I have troubles remembering some of my old, of those who I rarely meet, friend's names already.

 

Myself I will probably keep my name. I like it and it is simple. However, if I could, I would like my name on TIF to be changed to Swedishboy7, as my name in RS is.

[Fools_Taco]

The day before this hits live make sure you remove everything you character has on and its all banked behind a pin.

 

 

 

I remember way back in the day the blizzard devs made a mistake on an update creating a naming bug. Basically all someone had to do was make a new char with your name but all in caps and the could log in as you and take everything. Not to mention use the same bug with their accounts and dupe everything. It was an epic debacle. If you were on the ladder you got hit. Its the one and only time i have ever seen a rollback announced and implemented.

 

 

 

 

 

Why take a chance, log out naked.

[Albel]

I'm very intrested in this idea. Hope it works out because it sounds great :

[Zaaps1]

Anyone else think people will start selling "cool" or "rare" account names for rl money?

 

 

 

I agree with all of you who say: "Who the hell would buy a name?!" But we can't deny that some people will.

[Aslan]

Doubt that Jagex won't block certain usernames such as Zezima for example.

[Bauke]

Doubt that Jagex won't block certain usernames such as Zezima for example.

 

The display name "zezima" is already taken... by zezima. So unless he'd change it, it can't be used. And he doubt he'll change his name...

[Emmentail]

So basically if you've leveled your runescape character at all that means your name is safe? (Is that right?)

[ilovecuttingyews]

So basically if you've leveled your runescape character at all that means your name is safe? (Is that right?)

 

Yeah, they said that they are really only making the names available that have NEVER logged on (or passed Tutorial island I think). I kinda hope they make it so they can make a name available if a character has under 200 total or no stats over 60 and has not logged on in over 2-3 years.

[All_Is_Great]

I don't like this, I don't want people to use my account's name for their second name :( And I like my name the way it is, I don't want a second name, this is really confusing.

 

wat.

 

You don't need to do anything if you are happy with your current name. Just forget they are releasing this feature ;).

 

 

 

So other people can't use my name as their display name? But I also have to log onto my pures which I also want to keep their names =/ :wall:

 

Your pures will be in the same place as your main, then. Don't change their names, and there you go.

 

 

 

What I don't like is that I have to log onto accounts I don't use AS MUCH. And I think if I thought of the name first, I ought to have it.

 

 

 

Also, why can't they have a system like xbox gamertags, like have them pay to change the name, or something to that extent?