RIFT MMO News, Guides, and Features at Ten Ton Hammer

Trion Worlds stepped on a bit of a landmine recently when GM Giant posted a thread explaining a new way to submit GM feedback. But what set the thread off was a few players expressing that they felt like GMs didn't read most reports and this escalated to the fact that so many silly names have been permitted to run around on roleplay servers that clearly violate the naming policy. GM Giant returned to the thread later and posted some incoming revisions to the naming policy with this post, which removed certain rules from the roleplay servers. That did not go so well.

Thank you. I have been in discussions with the necessary parties and we will be removing the following from our Terms of Use in the near future.

9. Comprised of partial or complete sentence (e.g., "Getpwned", "Luvtodance", etc);
11. Referring to pop culture icons or personas (e.g. "McLovin", "Kyle Broflovski", "Catwoman");
12. That utilizes "Leet" or "Dudespeak" (e.g., "Roflmao", "Roxxurboxx", "Lolzumad"); or
13. That incorporates titles. For purposes of this subsection, "titles" shall include without limitation 'rank' titles (e.g., "General Chow," or “Captain Kangaroo”), monarchist or fantasy titles (e.g., "KingLoko", "LordPauleyC"), and religious titles (e.g., "ThePope," or "Reverend Run").

GM Giant attempted to explain Trion's stance by using a smoker/non-smoker analogy, which wasn't well received by the forum community. Members were quick to point out that Giant's analogy of some people play on that type of server but choose not to RP wasn't the point, but rather many prefer the tighter name policy. Things began to spiral downward from there and that analogy was quickly turned against Giant.

Needless to say, this announcement sent players into a frenzy and prompted Executive Producer Scott Hartsman to make a post and try to calm the waters a bit. Hartsman noted in his response that a modified version of the naming policy will be added to roleplay servers only to ensure the atmosphere remains immersive as intended and free from SirPwnzalots and MyLittlePwnys. Hartsman also pleaded with players to use a little common sense when reporting to avoid overloading GMs with names that they simply disliked. As such, rules 9, 11, 12 and 13 will be returning to the roleplay server rules list.

This is a prime example of how important immersion can be to some players and one of the key reasons that they play on roleplay servers. It also shows the minefield that developers must walk through sometimes when addressing issues that are important to the community.

Sources:
GM Giant's Ne Way of Submitting Feedback
GM Giant's Proposed Naming Policy Change
Scott Hartsman's Response to CS and RP Servers