A Character Name Release Was Done Today (29th May)

Community General Discussion
1

Character name releases (for accounts that have been inactive for 2 expansions) are done sporadically and quietly, without any notice or advertisement by Blizzard. They arent solely done prior to expansion launches, but rather, whenever Blizzard feel like it. And can be done multiple times throughout an expansions lifecycle.

A CHAR NAME RELEASE WAS JUST DONE TODAY.

Every few days I try to create new characters (using names I want) which names I know are already taken… and it fails, telling me “That name is unavailable”. However today I managed to create those characters successfully and claim the names I wanted, hence a name release was just performed. The name ‘Tinker’ was available on my server, for example.

SOOOO… if you’ve got a favourite name you want badly, or want the perfect char name in anticipation of any rumoured upcoming classes/allied races etc… log on to check if it was freed up!

Edit - Before people bring it up, the name release is done from an inactive-account (two expansions) level… NOT an inactive-character level.

So whether the char/name you want is inactive doesnt matter in itself, its whether the account its on is active or not. And theres no real way to tell that without trying to create a char you want (it could be someones forgotten unused lvl 1 reserved name, while their main is off on another server etc).

7 Likes
2

Thank you! Just made characters with 2 names I’ve been trying to get for years.

3

Niiiice thank you!

4

What happens if that account becomes active again? Are their characters deleted?

5

Thanks! I got one of my favorite names that’s been taken forever. :slight_smile:

6

Thank the warchief all hail the horde!

7

They are given place holder names and prompted to name it, if I remember correctly.

3 Likes
8

This; i got back into an account i lost back in BC and the characters were named A10249581 B102001 C120401901 (Not actually just examples but the same format) It just randomly gives a value as the character name and promts you to rename before you can log in.

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Seems like a raw deal, but I get it… Can’t hold names hostage forever! :smiley:

10

This is the correct answer. Before the player can enter the game they’ll go through a forced name change.

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And one of the names I’ve been wanting so I can move one of my toons isn’t available… I’m a sad Gnome.

:cookie:

12

Uh…

Why is this a repost of exactly the same thing posted here by someone else?
https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/a-character-name-release-was-done-today-29th-may/186141

Weird. Good info, but very strange not to just post there, and even stranger to plagiarize the entire post!

1 Like
13

OP - you are awesome!!!

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I honestly don’t understand why Blizzard does not enable spaces and dashes in names, or just add a separate (optional) “surname” field. In Guild Wars 2 it works so well, if the name “Badasshero” is not available you can just make “Badasshero the Badassest” and there is a high chance it will be available. I’m sure it was a technical limitation in 2004, but it should not be a problem anymore. And it is not immersion breaking like enabling special characters would be. It is impossible to create readable names in high pop realms nowadays without resorting to especial characters or 12 letter strings.

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The name I wanted was still not available :frowning: one day I will reclaim my first characters name! One day…

16

Thanks for the info, claimed a couple of names yesterday that I’ve wanted alt code free.

Now to grind the gold to name change :upside_down_face:

17

how do you gold name change?

18

Buy a WoW token and convert it to bnet currency.

19

Nope, they just are forced to make new names.

20

No, they will be told to create a new name. Blizz will put a numeric character after it and say illegal name when they log on. That’s my guess. I transferred a toon to a server where I had a name reserved and replacement showed up with a number, so I deleted the level one toon, then could rename transfer toon.