Vinna asked in the comments to yesterday's Breakfast Topic, "How do you feel when a guildmate makes a character with a questionable name, i.e. offensive/borderline offensive?" After all, your name appears above your guild name, so should guilds be policing their members' alt names?

We already know that unless someone reports a name, it doesn't get changed. We also know that there are some extremely offensive names out there. So, if you are in a guild you want to stay in and someone makes an alt with a name that offends you what should you do, if anything?


Vinna's solution was to quietly report the offending name, which I think is a good one. The player could have been reported by anyone and this method avoids confrontation. On the other hand, it won't prevent the player or other guildies from trying again.

Another solution is to have a guild naming policy to uphold the reputation of the guild. But this could get messy, with people having to decide what to censor and what is acceptable. Censorship is always a touchy subject.

My favorite method is patience. Guildies who think offensive names are funny often have other issues that respectable guilds are unwilling to put up with and then bye bye offending guildie. Or the amusement value of a questionable name may run out and the guildie may change the name without any interference.

I know someone who named an alt after a porn star, which really irritated me. After a couple months of playing this character, he ended up turning himself in. He also got a funny story out of it because he had to make the GM google the name before he got the free name change.

Do you think guilds should police their members' names since they are representing the guild as a whole? What methods, if any, does your guild use to do this?

Tags: name, name-change, names, offensive, offensive-name, warcraft, world-of-warcraft, wow

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Odds and ends, Breakfast Topics