BYOND account: Dendydoom
Character name: Dreary Doom
Ban type: Character name
Ban reason: I have asked them not to use their long-standing name of Dreary Doom as I feel it does not meet naming policy. The player was fully understanding, accepting and co-operative during the ticket and important context is that their name has been used for 120+ rounds before I asked them to change it. I agreed to allow the player to change their name after the shift this note was placed in is over. I have asked the player to read over naming policy at https://tgstation13.org/wiki/Rules - Specifically the section on "Rule 3(?|F) Precedents" I have asked the player to update their character preferences and advised them to ahelp if you accidentally join a future shift with the name by accident.
Time ban was placed: 2020-12-03 22:20:49
Server you were playing on when banned: Manuel
Round ID in which ban was placed: 151476
Your side of the story:
Good evening.
It has been almost 2 years since my initial appeal for this note. My character's name, "Dreary Doom", was found to have been below the minimum standard for names on the roleplay server. In that time I have since been playing under a similar but totally different alias, and have played many more rounds under that new name than under Dreary Doom. It still feels wrong, and many people who interact with me will still call my character Dreary. I have been approached by many of my friends and fellow Manuel players to encourage me to post a second appeal to this note. I have tried my utmost to make peace with the decision to banish my character's name to the shadow realm, but well, after such a long time I still find myself unable to fully accept the name ban and the reasoning behind it.
My argument for being allowed to use the IC name Dreary Doom again comes in 3 parts. Firstly, the following precedent from the naming rule:
When I made the character I was brand new to the server. It sounded like a name that a cartoon character might have in some kind of episodic wacky space adventure show, or some overly "cool" name from a 60s pulp sci fi novella. I feel that both of those moods fit the intended feel and setting of the RP server. It is worth bringing up here, as a facet of my argument, that there is very little IC "lore" to speculate upon to derive good names from. I wanted a name that was memorable and appropriate for the setting, and not something normal and forgettable. It could be argued -- depending on how much of these rulings are based upon player intent and forethought rather than outcome -- that a space faring culture of people generations deep and whom do not regularly land on planets would have cultivated their own unique naming conventions. I argue that, in some small way, with enough well intentioned thought and effort, Dreary Doom could be a sensible and reasonable IC name under the speculative circumstances of the wider lore.Make a minimum effort to have your name fit in a setting involving a wacky space station in the future.
Secondly, the ruling was made under the pretence of protecting RP. However, I assert that the decision itself has harmed more RP than it has preserved. In my entire time in this community, the only time I have ever gotten into "trouble" is over this name ban. I have placed the utmost importance and respect into understanding and cultivating the dynamics and inner machinations of the server's culture. I have tried my best to ensure that in every approach I take to this game and this server in particular I have always placed the ideals of fair, good-faith based co operative storytelling first. I bring this up because this behaviour has gifted me with a lot of good friends and good IC connections that I have meticulously built up over the time I have been playing on my single character. I have tried to put thought and careful reasoning into the decisions behind my behaviour for every single round, and in doing so, I believe I have brought good things to the RP culture of Manuel. When I had to change my name, it became very frustrating because it meant that I had to address this drastic IC change without referring to the OOC circumstances under which it was forced. People thought I was a different character entirely, or otherwise became confused over why this was happening. It created a lot of legwork on my part just to preserve the RP that I was already cultivating.
Why do I bring this up? Well, because forcing me to uproot this integral facet of my character in order to placate some ideal of protecting the sanctity of the RP space has, in itself, harmed the RP space that I have tried to help cultivate. Almost 2 years on, people who know my character still call them Dreary, because ultimately, that is their name. I believe that the precedent under which my name was banned was to stop names like "Shitty McDickAss" from becoming the norm and negatively affecting the RP space. I assert that nothing about my behaviour or my character's name has created any of the issues under which this precedent was set.
Thirdly, the decision itself, while I respect it and the people who came to a reasonable and well intentioned decision, is an incomplete decision which has done nothing except inconvenience me and deprive me of my RP. The intention was to set a new standard for roleplaying names by addressing the name of a known character. Since then, no other names that "toe the line" of naming policy have been addressed in a similar manner, and I feel that it would be ridiculous to enforce such strict conventions, because it would do more harm than good. I feel that I should not have to shoulder the burden of this experiment any longer.
Thank you for your time.