PLEASE NOTICE that IGG titled this a transfer event only, even though name change is still scheduled.

Why?: because name change only works for names with illegal characters in them... and only sometimes does it work (ask DSOFA how many times he has tried to change one of his characters names and just lost the credits)
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Character Transfer Service Available

May 19, 2022

Character Transfer Service for March is now available, visit the immigration page to submit your application, new immigration rules have been added: 

During the transfer, if backup names (optional character names players supplied) can’t be used, a random number will be attached to the name to distinguish it.

If you have any question about the updated immigration rules, check this announcement for more detailed info.

Announcement About New Character Transfer Applications Dec 9, 2010; https://vc.igg.com/news/newscon.php?aid=2626


* No I have no idea why they still post 4 servers when we only have 3.... can they really not be bothered to delete 2 lines of code?

Server	Immigration Status
Columbus	Allowed to transfer in and transfer out
Magellen & Marco Polo	Allowed to transfer in and transfer out
Dagama & James Cook	Allowed to transfer in and transfer out
Zheng He	Allowed to transfer in and transfer out

After much consideration, we have decided to implement the following changes to the service, as below.

1. Should your character name contain illegal characters or symbols, you will need to apply for a name change before applying for a change in server. Please keep in mind that only alphanumeric figures will be accepted in character names.

2. Should your character name contain illegal characters or symbols, the name change must be applied for and approved at least ONE (1) week before you apply for a server change.

3.  A name change can be applied for in place of another character with illegal symbols in his/her character name; however, it requires confirmation from that party before we can proceed.

4. An administrative fee of 500 Credits will be charged for performing a name change. The change in name will take place right after the next scheduled maintenance.

Note: Your character will automatically leave his/her current guild and fleet upon a successful name change. It is advised to prepare beforehand to avoid unnecessary losses.
Click here to Follow the below steps to change your character name or help others with changing their character names.

Name Changing Service Jan 10, 2012; https://vc.igg.com/news/newscon.php?aid=3122


Name Changing Sign-UP Time: now until 11:59pm June 6th EST(GMT-5)
Name Changing time:  June 7th 2:00am EST (GMT-5)

Character Transfer Sign-UP Time: 5:00am June 7th until 11:59pm June 13th EST(GMT-5)
Character Transfer Time: 2:00am June 14th EST

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Warnings and cautions

Stated cut off time may be incorrect
Do NOT try to sign up at the last minute... you know our servers are slow and if you miss the cut off time by 1 second - you are too late!.... give yourself at least 24 hours!!
The transfer rules actually state you must apply 3 hours before the transfer... going by that rule, transfer sign up should end 1 hour before the stated time at 10:59 pm not at 11:59 pm.


**Name Change is Broken (and not worked correctly for many years) - use it at your own risk.**
Supposedly Name Change works only for names with illegal characters/letters/symbols in it.
**TAKE A SCREEN SHOT (of the bottom area of the Immigration Page) showing your character is currently signed up for name change... in case your characters name change fails** (name change costs 500 credits - that's how IGG's customer service will know which service you signed up for)

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** Known Transfer BUG; Transferred character not visible - CAUTION -**

There is a bug where if you have a character already standing in one of the 4 slots (where you do character selection on the dock) on the server that that the character being transferred too... the transferred character will not show and you have to delete the character standing in that spot to see your transferred one.

Example: character JOE is on Columbus in slot 1 and character SAM is on MMP in slot 1.
If you transfer SAM to Columbus he will not show unless you delete JOE.

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** Known Transfer BUG; Items lost from Warehouse pull down menu**

There is a bug or perhaps it is a setting;  That you will loose all items in your transferred characters warehouse initial and possibly secondary pull down menus when the character is transferred.
(If you have multiple characters on one account you will already know that a warehouse prize is not assigned to a certain character until the first pull down is completed - so definitely you will loose the items in the first menu)

If you have 2 characters on the transferred account - and one stays in the old server.... it is not known if the items are still accessible by the left behind character - someone please pm me and let me know.

For your piece of mind; before the transfer date, be sure to do the initial pull down of any items, free lunch or IM at the warehouse or you will not be able to claim them with your transferred character on your new server.

** Not sure if 2nd pull down needs to be emptied or not - when I transferred I cleared it just in case.


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Costs
If you want to change character name, you need to pay 500 credits.
If you want to transfer a character, you need to pay 1200 credits.

Credits
Are earned from buying non-sale IM items
Or
During the transfer and name change event, others can gift you their credits.


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Credits use to also be "made" by exchanging forum karma into credits.  However, the karma exchange page no longer exists.
Karma WAS earned (Prior to March 2016) in the old forum by participating in forum events or given by moderators as a reward to those who had written helpful posts and/or guides.

Name Changing Service
(Only works for illegal names*)

*Illegal Names have illegal "letter" or symbol characters in them.
IGG has never defined what the illegal character are; but if you created a name using an ascii (example; Alt + 255) or keyboard characters; !@#$%^&*()+=[]\{}|;':",./<>? .... that is what they mean.

Illegal characters throw off the Chinese to English translations/programming and your character can not transfer if your name has illegal characters in it.

The current character creation interface will not let you use any non English letter character EXCEPT the underscore line and the minus sign made with the regular keyboard key ; _ and -

**TAKE A SCREEN SHOT (of the bottom area of the Immigration Page) showing your character is currently signed up for name change... in case your characters name change fails** (name change costs 500 credits - that's how IGG's customer service will know which service you signed up for)

*Caution*
We do not know if the underscore and minus are really legal characters or not. I would not use these characters (underscore line or minus) in a character's name.  Because if they are illegal characters, your character will not be able to transfer servers. AND the initial sign up page may or may not recognize your name as "illegal".  The program that changes the names probably will NOT recognize it as "illegal" and there for the program could take your credits and not change your name!!
IMHO IGG forgot to disable that particular key... all the other non letter keys including the num lock keys will not work for a new character name.

We have past reports of the system just taking some people's credits and not changing the name, and yet it works for others!

After some testing of illegal characters it might be an error in programming - e.g. not being able to change your name if your illegal name has an underscore or a minus (same key on English keyboard)... but I can not be sure with out a lot of feed back from players.


*Caution*
Also NOTE the following rule may still apply:
3. Guild Masters of guilds Level 5 and above can no longer apply for the name change service.
see this notice: https://vc.igg.com/news/newscon.php?aid=3124

DSOFA looked at the code and also discovered the following rules;
1. Form will not validate if there are no backup names written (if you leave the fields empty).
2. Form will not validate if one of these words are used:

3. Form will not validate if the name has a space as one of the characters.
4. Form will not validate if the name has more than 15 characters.

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Name Changing - The IGG page - how it is suppose to work;

from; https://vc.igg.com/news/newscon.php?aid=3122

Jan 10, 2012

 a) Log in to your IGG account that has the character name you want to change, and click on “Immigration service”.
or click http://vc.igg.com/immigration/index.php


b) Then, click on “I want to transfer character.”, or “Help the others to transfer” to help a friend.

OR 


c) Should your current character name contain illegal characters or symbols, the system will then prompt you to perform a name change. Please also provide 2 backup names as so to heighten the chances of success of your application in one go.

Below is an illustration of the process of applying for a name change.
note that after you choose a server IF you have an illegal character name on that server then the former and back up name fill boxes and text will show
(Self change)


(Help others)
Put your friend's account name / account you want to give credits to... in the "Account name" box.
Source server is the server your friends character is on.
Your friend will have to log into the immigration page and choose which character from that account and server they want to have change names (they could have up to 4 to choose from).



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I am no longer including the code change to try to force the system to accept a name change.
Changing the code with "inspect element" has not allowed me to change a non illegal character name since 2017.

Character Immigration/ Transfer
https://vc.igg.com/immigration/index.php

SERVER TRANSFER
When transferring servers the back up names (info entry lines) will not show until you pick a server to transfer FROM.
AND, the lines will only show if you choose a server you have characters on with the account you are currently signed into.


The TRANSFER sign up page looks like this (note the difference in the lines you select);
Select Source Server and Target Server and the cost 1200 credits, then the character name line will automatically show (unless "helping others to transfer" ).
on the character name line you type in the name of the character you want transferred and 2 possible back up names.  be sure to check mark the box on that line if you want your back up names used.



Help others to transfer page looks like this:
Put your friend's account name / account you want to give credits to... in the "Account name" box, their source server and their target server.
IDK for sure, but I assume you have to gift the full 1200 credits.
Your friend will have to go to the immigration page and select which character (from the account you gave credits too) that they wish to transfer.


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Character Transfer Rules from the Immigration Page:
https://vc.igg.com/immigration/index.php

Character Transfer Rules of Voyage Century Server Type   Type A: Columbus, Magellan&Marco Polo, Da Gama&James Cook and Zheng He Character Transfer Rules of Different Types of Servers   Character Transfer Rules of Type A Servers: A character in a type A server can be transferred to another type A server. Character Transfer Rules:   1. Make sure that amount of char in the target server will not exceed 4 after immigration.   2.The data that should be deleted will be deleted automatically if you didn't delete them by yourself before the character transfer.   3. You should prepare 2 backup character names in case there are duplicates. If there are duplicated names, we will use the first available backup name.   4. Please note that only English Letter and Number is acceptable in the Backup Name.   5. Once the character transfer succeeds, the data regarding former social intercourse and the items you purchased but not yet withdrew will all be deleted.   6. After the character transfer, you will automatically quit your former guild and fleet.   7. Your friends list will be wiped out after the immigration.   8. Immigration will probably be held during the maintenance.   9. After migration any item mall items purchased prior to the move will be lost, unless they are picked up from you warehouse 'prize taking' and stored before the move.   10. When the character transfer succeeds, all temporary effects, including beneficial and harmful effects are cancelled.   11. Please make sure the immigration info you offer is correct and submit it 3 hours ahead of immigration, otherwise you can't immigrate. And We will deduct 30% of your total immigration fees as punishment fees.   12. To help friends to immigrate, please make sure your friend confirms and completes the info required before immigration.   13. Character names containing invalid codes and identical names will have to be renamed after the server transfer.   14. During the transfer, if backup names (optional character names players supplied) can’t be used, a random number will be attached to the name to distinguish it. Costs   If you want to transfer a character, you need to pay 1200 credits.   If you want to change character name, you need to pay 500 credits.   If the character transfer fails due to technical problems or a breach of the character transfer rules, the credits you paid will be refunded within 5 working days. (Character transfer may be delayed due to server maintenance or client updates, etc.)

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Announcement About New Character Transfer Applications
https://vc.igg.com/news/newscon.php?aid=2626

Dec 9, 2010

Good news! The modifications to the Character transfer application have been completed. Here's the details,

1.The process that helps friends transfer their characters has been improved.
You are now able to help friends transfer their characters without knowing their passwords. Enter your friends' account name on the character transfer page and select 'original server' and 'target server' , then your friend will receive a notice for confirmation on the immigration page (https://vc.igg.com/immigration/index.php).
When your friend confirms the notice and completes the info required, they can then apply for character transfer.

2. Name Validity has been applied to backup names entered for your character on the new server.
If the backup name is already in use on the target server, you'll receive a notice to rename.

3. Name Restrictions have been applied to backup names you enter for your character on the new server.
If the backup name contains invalid codes, you'll receive a notice to rename.

4. The Character Cap now applies to the number of characters you want to transfer.
Each player can have up to 4 characters on one server. If the number of characters you wish to transfer (plus any characters you may already have on the target server) exceeds 4, you'll receive a notice to reduce the amount of characters to 4.
Also, to guarantee a smooth gaming environment and avoid problems arising from frequent character info changes, the officials have decided to control the immigration frequency, former regular immigration during Tuesday maintenance will be cancelled, the officials will announce the exact time for immigration on the website each time.
The most recent time available to apply for Character Transfer is December 10th to December 13th EST (GMT-
5).

Character Transfers will occur during the server maintenance on December 14th
Click here to apply for immigration!
https://vc.igg.com/immigration/index.php
The VCO Team
IGG

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Your previous transfer information will show below the  Costs section of the immigration page.




.

All transfer and name change links checked 
A lot of text was re-written
Text about "fixing" the name change to work for non illegal names removed
June 3, 2022  - Ele

References

old transfer announcement from March 2021
Link: http://vc.forum.igg.com/topic?fcid=16&ctid=63998#logo