Forced duplicate last names and reputation per account.

The bottom line, the thing that won't change, is that you are expected to play as yourself. Not some other character. This has been stated by RG many times, and his position will not change. Sure you can have a different appearance, and change your skills, but that's it. Portalarium will not implement any game mechanic that makes it easier for you to bypass that fundamental intent of the game.

 

The great wall of china wasn't finished until the last stone was placed. There is still time until the product is finished.

 

Heh we haven't seen problems until they do that! The uproar is deafening, and it hasn't even happened!

 

yu can't sell me potatoes and then decide to deliver spinach. Whatever the reason, accounts wit multiple slots were sold. Seems like the discussion ended there.

 

Sure...

But yeah, the whole DLMB thing.

 

I remember playing Ultima IV as evil as I could. I didn't need a new character to recover from my evil deeds. Exploring the story line is very possible to recover. I am betting it will be recoverable in SotA too.

 

no you can't retrain. You have to start at zero in the new skills you want, which means you need gold to buy the basic skills you want. That is unacceptable.

 

and thus contradicts RG's vision for the game. So saying different characters on the same account can't have different alignments and reputation no longer holds water as they have already thrown that logic right out the window and at the very beginning of the game.

 

What's so hard about this. They are not saying they will not be listening to feedback.

He didn't say implementation will not be adjusted due to feedback.

It's just like consensual PvP. It's one design choice the details of that choice are negotiable.
Housing is persistent across all instances. No one is arguing the devs won't listen and make housing fully instanced.
Shall I go on? There are plenty of things that are not going to change. While at the same time, they are listening to feedback for implementation adjustments.

Deck combat, still going with it, and it's constantly changing.

/sigh this is starting fires before the forest has even been planted. Beating a horse before it's conception.

 

You can retrain. It'll just take work.

 

no, retrain implies you can re-adjust existing skill points. You can't, you have to start over.

 

Semantics. No matter what you start with, you can get to another set of skills with work.

 

But you're missing the point completely. RG's vision is for me to play my soul and yet to start the game I have to twist my answers to get the arch-type I want. Even if I could re-assign all my points into the arch-type I wanted it is still a subversion of his vision.

And no, you are well behind the skill curve. If I want to level straight from the questions I have a group of developed skills to use. If you ignore those you start at zero. Where would you level up for that?.....no where. You would have to go to the same area and die and die until you worked up high enough to match what the starting player who lied their way to get the arch-type they wanted. That's A LOT of death and frustration.

 

you could do the quests like the mail delivery to get gold. I'm sure there will be other non combat quests also to gain gold initially.

 

The arch-type you want sounds like it is not the real you. I want to be able to play the piano well, but my hands limit this. Wants are quite different then actual being.
As for starting at zero, patience and study of the environment along with observation of NPCs will get you far fast.

 

Actually, personally, my issue is more about the last names than about the reputation. I'm not interested in playing through the game with two characters. One of my characters will just be for role-playing purposes, to allow me to speak with a different voice, show up to events in that persona, and author books with his name. Same reason, you, Drocis, want to be able to author books with a different voice. Same reason RG has both Lord British and Shamino.

I don't even care about the last name so much, either. Though if its the same last name, I'd personally prefer game lets me choose how to display my name on my nameplate and in the maker's mark. So I could choose to display no last name, or a title (ie "the Merry"), or a last name. Although, I might end up just not choosing a last name and avoid the issue altogether. Or, I might find a last name for both characters I'm happy with.

As far as playing the story as an evil or good character, I don't know how much the game will be built to bend to that. After all, virtues will be tied to the plot, and I think RG probably wants us to actually try to do the quests in the plot as best as we think we can, and not purposely choose certain quest decisions "just to be evil."

 

@galdrmadhr,

The whole surname issue aside, I don't see how that will work. Even if some player avoids an item made with his name, how many players are we going to have in this game that will buy the item regardless of the name? A player acting poorly will still be able to sell.

 

@galdrmadhr,

I think it would be great if we could put a guild name as the maker's mark too, but that's a whole other discussion I guess.

 

FWIW,

From what I get from the "intent" behind the multiple accounts, I sort of see the extra character slots as a couple of things:

1. Each character is a different "incarnation" of the player; perhaps one aspect focuses more on the valorous side than others; another is much more honest and in tune with the magic within; one's more compassionate and focuses on community rather than adventure, etc. To refer to myths, it's sorta like if Thor decided to manifest in his warrior thunder god aspect one day, then as his benevolent crop-nourishing rain-bringing god of the common folk aspect another day.
2. The character slots represent members of a "Family" of characters—mom, dad, child; siblings; cousins; etc.

Now, in SW:ToR, I have both good & evil characters, albeit they are all part of the same legacy (since they're all on the same server). I do have a chance to play the villain (to the hilt) with my Sith Sorcerer (guess what his name is... and there's a story behind that one), but I often prefer the heroic role of my Jedi Sage, Jedi Sentinel, or my Smuggler; or, even for a twist, my not-so-bad mostly-good-choice-based Bounty Hunter (which is set as being a bad guy class from the get-go, for those not in the know).

This doesn't bother me as much, because I typically prefer playing the good guy (always have, and U4+ kinda reinforced that for me). I considered having a bad guy character as one of my 3 characters for SotA, but I don't want to impugn the reps of my other good characters in the process.

(Besides, if I did have such a baddy, he'd be a rather squick sort; he'd be based off of an insane tabletop RPG gnome wizard-necromancer named Skullik Skor who was well on his way to Axe Crazy Evil Town. For SotA, think of a short & skinny [as possible] sickly pale human with a striking resemblance of RHPS's Riff Raff combined with the voice of Zorak ala Space Ghost Coast to Coast:

+

As said, he'd be quite a squicky sort, and would be all too keen on using Chaos magic for fun & Death magic for his social/romantic life. O.O

Hey, if you're gonna be a bad guy, why not have fun with the role?)

...

But, all that aside, I don't mind the system as is. Prefer to play the good guy anyway. (And some would rather I'd not play the bad guy at all. )

 

Unfortunately it is all too common for those in positions of power to impose restrictions on everyone in order to control the behaviour of a small minority.

It's bad enough in real life, but worse in a game that is supposed to be an escape from all that crap.

My avatar does not have a last name. I don't want my avatar to have a last name. The problem that forcing last names supposedly solves can and should be solved through other means.

EDIT: If I'm forced to have a last name, it will be something like Xx_YOLO_360_NOSCOPE_xX. I won't see it, so it won't bother me.