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Can You Get Banned in ESO Just For Having a Lore Friendly Character Name?

By Andrew | 21 Jun 2022 | Share

Let's be honest - it isn't very uncommon for players in the Elder Scrolls Online to have lore friendly names, such as the surname Telvanni. People who are interested in roleplaying are especially likely to name their characters in this way.

It's also not uncommon for people to name their characters after an existing NPC or lore character, either in ESO or another Elder Scrolls game, such as Skyrim.

However over the last few days there has been a storm of confusion and controversy surrounding this issue, with players reportedly getting banned from the game for having names like this. This has left some players worried for their characters, others just angry about the rumored bans, and Zenimax employees scrambling to offer clarification.

So what exactly is all of this about, and do you need to be worried?

Would naming your ESO character after Vivec result in a ban?

Banned for Being a Telvanni?

Yesterday, a thread emerged on the official ESO Forums stating that a member of the community had been permanently banned for for naming their characters after a trial in the game, as well as several sets obtained within the trial.

This was swiftly met with an outcry from many players who couldn't believe that someone would be permanently banned for something so minor.
Zenimax Community Manager Gina Bruno then replied to this thread after quite a few unhappy messages, stating that making a character named after any in-game item sets, locations, major NPCs or bosses is against the Terms of Service. This does therefore suggest that you are risking a ban if you have a name like this on one of your characters.

However, after many more players responded to this statement saying that it was a ridiculous state of affairs and asking for more clarification, Gina came back with a more detailed statement which seemed to partially contradict the first one.

She said that most of the time, players with a character name that is against the Terms of Service will simply be forced to change the name of the character and will not be suspended or banned. However in some cases where someone has previous Terms of Service violations on their account, a suspension or ban might happen.

Gina Bruno's message about lore friendly character names in ESOShe then went on to say that using Tamrielic House names like Telvanni, or other lore friendly names, isn't a problem. However copying the name of an in-game character like Abnur Tharn, or copying the name of an in-game boss, location or item set is not allowed.

This clarification seemed to ease the concerns of most players, however there were still quite a few that thought it was a very unfair situation. It generally does seem odd that someone could be banned over a completely inoffensive lore name, regardless of whether or not ToS violations have happened in the past.

So do I need to Worry about my ESO character?

From what Gina said, it seems that as long as you don't copy the name of anything (or anyone) in ESO, you should be fine. If you have already done this, then there's still probably a good chance you will be fine as long as you haven't had several previous warnings or suspensions on your account - you'll just be made to change the name of the characters if you get caught. However if you have character names like this and do have recorded warnings or suspensions, then there might be a bit of a cause for concern.

For people who fit into this last group, it's a pretty bad situation because your only ways to make your account compliant with the Terms of Service and thus avoid a potential ban is to either delete the character in question, therby losing hours upon hours of progress, or purchase a Name Change Token, which costs real money. Neither of these options seem fair.

All in all this situation is just very strange and it's definitely ruffled a lot of feathers in the ESO Community.

We hope you enjoyed this article about ESO. The Elder Scrolls Online is a massively multiplayer online game (MMO) developed by Zenimax Online Studios.

by Andrew

21 Jun 2022

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