Blizzard admits World of Warcraft Forever's naming filter was accidentally too strict

Should World of Warcraft Forever deliver on the long-lasting promise of its name, you'll probably want to make sure you're happy with what your characters are called. To try and give people a chance to grab their preferred monikers, Blizzard opened early WoW Forever name reservations this week, but so far it's caused more headaches than it's solved. Following an initial server struggle that forced the system to be taken temporarily offline, Community Manager Randy 'Kaivax' Jordan has now confirmed that the 'restricted name' list was acting far too draconically.

Jordan explains that Blizzard has "been working on the restricted name list" it's using in World of Warcraft Forever. which goes beyond simple checks for the more profane side of swears, slurs, and so on. Among some of the other limitations are "major Warcraft lore characters or names that are blocked for technical reasons." The process is a little different from how the MMORPG has worked before, because Forever utilizes two names rather than the single-word setup it's always had in the past.

Unfortunately, Jordan confirms that "a bug in the process" has led to the filter being "overly restrictive with some names." As one example, he confirms that names containing the three-letter string 'con' have been blocked. Some of this appears to be due to phrases or terms with specific meanings in other languages; two other combinations players have reported are 'nom' and 'duc,' suggesting that these are due to them being French for 'name' and 'duke' respectively.

Fortunately for players eager to dub themselves some manner of 'bacon,' 'ducky,' or so on, Blizzard is in the process of implementing a fix, which is rolling out with realm restarts in each region. If you have attempted to use a name that was marked as restricted and you believe it was a mistake, Jordan encourages you to try again.

Combined with the server struggles, this mess of confusion around the name reservations certainly won't have been what Blizzard was hoping for, especially given that the feature was opened up specifically for players who have already pre-ordered a paid edition of the game. Honestly, it still feels a little too punitive for me; while I can understand some of the decisions to limit specific name combinations, I've never thought twice about all the players called 'Lockheart,' 'Rosfield,' or even 'Estinien' in FF14.

World of Warcraft Forever launches on Wednesday, November 4. Hopefully you're able to secure the branding you're happy with by then.