So I think what I've taken away is we should absolutely cull the clearing of pet names immediately since people worked so hard for them... why do we have any right to these names?

I mean. That's what I've read.

We just want nicknames, no more pet name clearings ever because someone at some point worked "hard" for the pet name.

That's silly. We all know most of us have never worked for a pet name; we stalked, we woke up/called in dead/took a late lunch, and we refreshed. Sometimes we beg friends to do the same. The only time effort is put into acquiring a pet name is when an application is involved. So let's be real, this isn't effort or work. It's about not wanting anyone else to play with a red ball because I'm the only one who can have it.

This isn't about feeling good because you're the only one with a toy, this is about NONE of us can have toys if subeta tanks. Sure it's existing now but how fast is the CW queue moving? How many pets we see? How many item releases/revamps? Do y'all remember plots? Y'all remember massive hoards of holiday items?

Existing =/= content. Existing =/= growing. Existing = existing and not going under.

If non-unique names helps? Do it. I'll throw down right now if a patreon pops up to fund this happening.

If it doesn't, what else.

Because at the end of the day NONE of us will be special snowflakes with our unique names if the damn site is dead. NEVERTHELESS if that's what we want I think staff need to remove pets from daily inactivity clearings because wow someone worked hard for those how unfair2share.

I mean you could argue that waiting upwards of a year for a name to clear and setting alarms and multiple windows open to create the pet when the second finally comes is quite a bit of effort, really, especially compared to applications that are thought up on the spot for characters that don't exist yet.

If unique names go away I agree there's no point in clearing accounts anymore.

I'm an old crotchety Old Times user I guess who values uniqueness, but I really feel like a huge reason it's even an issue is because slots were never capped. Like, I have quite a few and could do with one more just so they line up nicely on my profile but there's people with over twice what I have and that's insane. Probably seemed like a good idea at the time of increasing limits, but they kind of shot themselves in the foot because with fewer names to choose from, others don't need as many slots. Unfortunately that can't be fixed now :/

I can see maybe paying csc to take a name that already exists. If there's no sort of barrier, there's going to be an unmanageable number of pets named Love and Angel and the AC will be flooded with names/words that nobody wants because they can just create their own, y'know? There would be 0 reason to adopt between users aside from birthdays and IDs. The site wouldn't be able to handle that influx of pets as it is now.

Tbh though non-unique names seems like a quick, easy "we're doing something" to try and improve the site but the priority should be making it playable, updating the look of the site (we can all agree the layout has very little appeal to young people, right), and future-proofing enough to keep it physically running. Nobody wants to play on a laggy, buggy website, unique names or not.

I personally hope they do the patreon thing, because if csc already isn't enough, waiting on new users to pay for the site will never happen.

If having non-unique names would bring in more players then I am for it. I'm not sure how big of a difference it would really make but it's worth a shot.

EDIT: Just read the comment above mine and agree with:

As a ux designer the lack of responsiveness and general usability of the site is not ideal.

I firstly admit I don't have any strong feelings on the unique name discussion. Personally, I've spent most of my time here enjoying the challenge of getting creative with a word that I thought was ~neato and seeing how it inspired a new story or how I could make it work for an existing one but we've also all experienced that frustration of having our heart set on a single name and feeling unmotivated by not having it. I think we could go back and forth on personal preferences all day and there's really no right or wrong answer there.

Since we're talking about how this might benefit the site, however, a big concern still exists for me, and that's what the servers can handle. Subeta has always been unstable. Right now I think the number of users who actually do have 100+ pets is a small minority but we might see that gap begin to close if everyone could have every name they've ever wanted. The site would likely see a little financial boom from pet slot sales, but it wouldn't last. I certainly don't think it would be enough to hire on and keep an additional programmer with. A few of us would happily dump money into name changes rather than abandon/create but we're also in the minority, because most of the site prefers a cheap alternative. I just foresee all the creation/abandoning and all the little informational extras that go along with a mass influx of pets to be very difficult on Subeta because it would create long-term costs for site but not to most users.

It might help some to cross into drama-spawning territory and make it an active GA-only feature. Subeta used to do that with the number of pet slots/layers on an HA. If it expired, and you reached your limit, you couldn't make anymore pets and might have items removed from your HA. Non-unique names could work the same way. You have a GA? You can make 50 pets all named Tom. It expires? You suddenly have Tom_1234834039, Tom_329132894, etc.

That said, I don't know that it would be a long-term solution, or bring more players into the game. It certainly wouldn't make us any more unique as a site. As sad as it is, in Keith's own words, pet sites are a dying breed. Subeta has already faced incredible odds for lasting as long as it has, but its days might be numbered regardless of what changes are made.

Keith has said in the past that pets create almost no strain on the site, hence our ability to have 100+ now. The wardrobe seems to be the biggest offender - I feel like capping the number of items stored in there would have been a MUCH better move, but retroactively I doubt it's possible now. :/

Honestly, removing the extra pet slots form the GA feature was a terrible idea, and I personally haven't had a GA since. Before that, I had one active constantly for years to keep all of my pet slots in case I needed to adopt or abandon. If a GA ties into anything pet-related when the name system changes, it should be the number of pet slots available for use. The old GA gave you +5 slots, which I think would be great for new users and people who have lower numbers of pets.

...Personally, with 102 slots already, I don't know wtf to do with the number I have now. I bought them to support the site through pet-related avenues because I felt it was important to show that pets can bring in money, but honestly I've just been filling my recent slots with Pokemon, so... |D It wouldn't be something I wanted personally, but I'm sure tons of people would happily pay for a +5 boost to slots like in the old days, even if the GA expiring meant those slots were no longer mutable. You keep your pets just as they are, but if you abandon one you can't fill that slot until the GA is renewed, just like before.

Idk I play enough phone games to know the easiest way to kill your product is by hiding something game changing behind a paywall.

Pretty sure new users seeing "Sorry there's already pets named Max but if you want to buy a $5 a month account upgrade you can have whatever names you want!" would somehow be more off putting than a "sorry there's already a pet with that name"

Plus I'd be pretty livid if irl happened (as it does, relentlessly and without remorse, every chance it gets) and I lapsed a day in my GA and every single one of my pets was renamed. No way in hell I'd pay to rename them, nor get another GA. And yeah I know subscriptions and whatnot but technology glitches, cards expire, cards get compromised and funds get frozen, etc. It'd be one thing to say you can rename pets whatever and if your GA expires the names won't change but you can't rename others.... but really that just, is a week GA mass rename and rinse and repeat.

Not to mention pounded pets, adopted out pets... etc.

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If unique names go away I agree there&;s no point in clearing accounts anymore.

said there's no reason for pet names to clear accounts in general still need to clear for usernames to be freed up

wow how did i hit enter too early on a post that requires me to confirm posting gg sick, tired me

i DO agree that subeta needs a lot of cleaning up in other areas, not just the pet name department. the site does need an overall rehaul but staff has already said they're working on these things so i don't see the issue in implementing non-unique names if the site, in it's current state, can handle that change.

Even if pets don't put much strain, it would be wise to to put a permanent cap on it sooner than later or never. It could have been avoided with the wardrobe too, but again, hindsight's 20/20. Only way to fix the wardrobe with a cap would be to do it now, and just say 'tough shit, get over it'. Harsh as hell, but sometimes you have to force the hand for the greater good of the site.

I also enjoy watching shit blow up, so I'd be loving every second of watching the wearables community lose their fucking minds.

And I concur, I'd throw down at least $20 for a Patreon goal or whatever method of donation to get the non-unique name system project going. I'd throw even more money at a site layout overhaul. Take volunteers, do something to give the site a fresh look. We've had the current layout for at least a decade. I hate change, but I'd adjust if it meant making the site look part of the current trend or whatever and gets people to stay.

i mean yeah my entire post was about pets, in response to pet names being freed up but thanks for driving that point home i guess

please. please please please subeta put limits on this website

It is work in a way but equally it's luck; being available, having a solid connection, having friends who'll be available, ARs, etc.

But I'd much rather see that effort & energy spent on users enjoying what they have and doing fun stuff with them.

And absolutely in hindsight I wish we still were capped at 20-30 pets or whatever the limit was pre-loyalty boxes. I would have saved a ton of money on renames and unique names definitely wouldn't be an issue. Here we are though.

Regarding pets in the pound, probably around 5ish years ago there used to regularly be 400+ pets in their for months. Then from time to time, staff deleted them all. Rinse and repeat. If the pound becomes an issue, there's always that. Perhaps a modified version where if x users hit "not interested" the pet would get moved to a backend archive state. Stinks for IDs/birthdays but if it becomes an issue.

I was one of the users that loved pound surfing, so I don't necessarily have an issue with a full Adopt-R-Us! I just don't think there's much purpose in having an uncontrolled dumping ground for pets that will mostly be untrained, average, and without any desirability in the name since it's always going to be available. Something about that seems really messy and... sad lol

[edit] forgot to add that yeah, if there was some way to actively filter out & delete pets that nobody wants, maybe it would help the issue. I'm just not sure how that would be implemented!

Ever since the idea was brought up, I love the idea of non-unique names, and while I'd also love to do away with pet IDs, there is a simple hurdle concerning this - pets with the same name owned on the same account. Can't win them all.

But if some people want to stick to unique names and not use the ability to have duplicates names, they can still play that way. Like, no one is stopping you to use a workaround if the name you craved is taken.

lmao do this and watch the site die within a month. piss off the cw releasers and wearers and you don’t have a site anymore

think before you speak dude.

If pet people and gallery collectors had to deal with a cap for the sake of the servers, why can't wardrobe people accept it, especially since it's been known the wardrobe is the heaviest thing on the database?

If wardrobes are causing server problems - yeah, they should be capped. That's a complete no-brainer.

There is no rhyme or reason why the wardrobe should remain uncapped. There's no friendly or easy means of doing it either; it's too far gone at this point that there isn't much else except force the hand.

Look at everyone's wardrobes somehow, find the average or find the median (averages get skewed by newer accounts naturally), set the number, and give people an ultimatum: clear out your wardrobe in X amount of time to the new suitable capped number, or your wearables will be randomly tossed out into your inventory, so you don't lose them (losing them permanently would be a bit more of a motivator, but that'd be unfair to those on hiatus. I'm also not that heartless.), but you get to enjoy the fun of organizing what you want to keep or get rid of either way. A "now or later" scenario, you're gonna have to face the music eventually.

The wardrobe cannot continue uncapped, especially since it is the heaviest impact on the site's servers, and I strongly advise a cap happen sooner than later or never.

I get that CW makers supply a large part of the site's money currently, but I'm completely behind the idea of a wardrobe size cap.

Considering the sheer amount of "Have X number of items in (specific wardrobe layer)!" achievements, and the SBQ-specific achievements, and various other wearable set achievements (lifelike dolls, seasonal/holiday wearable sets, etc.), I would be absolutely down for capping the wardrobe and giving people an incentive (and an easier way) to clean that junk out. I have a ton of garbage in my wardrobe thanks to those achievements. Items that I'm never going to use, but that I can't be bothered to filter through and remove because the site is chugging as is. I'd rather spend my time doing something enjoyable than cross-referencing which items are for achievements, and which items I want to keep.

An achievement-item drawer filter & a limit for the v4 wardrobe would both be great. If you have a hard 25k item limit in the wardrobe, you're not going to clutter it with wearable dolls and SBQ sets you never use - you're going to sell those as soon as you get the achievement and save the space for things you actually like using. Plus, if there's incentive & a way to spend sP for a wardrobe size increase until you get to the 25k limit... :X Well, it's something to think about.

While we're at it, definitely add a size cap for pet TCs too. Nip that in the bud before it becomes an actual issue (for example: when Subeta moves to non-unique petnames and gives thousands of people incentive to work on their pets).

[edit]Did a rough Item Directory search - approx 33k wearables currently on-site. This does not include CWs.

They could also retire the 15k wardrobe achievement, like they did with the 45k shops one. I have a ton of stuff in my wardrobe that I don't need or care about, and it's all because I'm trying to get an achievement. I have almost 11k items and probably 2/3 of it is stuff I don't want.

Same. I personally wanted to only get 5000 items in my wardrobe because apparently that gives you 500 CSC via an item. Is that prize still active????

Wait, 102??? I'm starting to get a little confused at 51... But I'm happy that pet slots are no longer tied to a GA. Maybe we need to drum up another GA perk.

This is a legitimately good suggestion and I'm 100% behind it - good job Avel.

Pet treasures start to lag after like, 500 - I had a pet with 1000+ slots and navigating their treasure was hell. I do think that should be capped too, if it causes the site issues

Yeah, it was replaced by the direct-to-collections perk, plus the auto pet leash, if I remember right.

Just another note that we're reading this thread and making plans internally. is especially making a plan for the unique names!