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How to delete unwanted characters & files from your profile

Erstellt von Guest_Darth Midville_* , Jan 10 2010 02:16

96 Antworten in diesem Thema

#1
Guest_Darth Midville_*
Geschrieben 10 Januar 2010 - 02:16

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Do you have old, unwanted characters hanging around your profile page, cluttering the place up and coming back again and again no matter how many times you delete them? Or is your game telling you that you have files stored online, even though you've deleted all your characters and your profile seems empty?

Here's good news: it's possible to get rid of these relics forever, with the help of the profile diagnostics page. But it takes a bit of finesse and patience.

The following information is reposted (with a few modifications) from the DA Game Profile Diagnostics Page thread, in the hope that giving it a separate thread will make it easier for folks to find.

To start, you should have a look at your diagnostics page. Go to your Dragon Age player profile and click on the "Profile Diagnostics" button above your portrait on the left side of the page. You'll see a listing of all the files you have stored for each of your characters.

If you see a character with a 1001 error code, that is most likely a character that is not showing up on your online player profile at all. If it's an old character that you've already deleted from the game, then any files remaining in this list represent storage capacity that could be put to better use, such as screenshots from your latest playthrough. You can use the procedure below to delete such files and reclaim that storage capacity.

You can also use the procedure to delete old characters that are showing up in your online player profile, assuming you have already deleted those characters from the game. (If you still have saved games for a character you want to delete from your online profile, you should probably start by deleting the character from your game data. In that case go straight to step 7, then continue on from there.)

IMPORTANT: The following procedure was intended for use in deleting unwanted characters from the profile page. If you want to delete the profile for a character you're keeping in the game (perhaps to troubleshoot a profile issue) then you should look at this thread instead.

1. Create a new character with the same name as the character to be deleted.

Note: Be sure to select the same background (e.g. human noble) as the old character you're trying to delete.

2. Zoom through the opening dialog or whatever.
3. Fiddle with inventory a bit (unequip and re-equip armor, et cetera).

This step may not be necessary, but I do it anyway on the off chance it will inspire the game to upload faster.

4. Save the game manually.
5. Minimize the game, then check the diagnostics page.

Usually by this point the game will have uploaded some files for the character. If the diagnostics page shows that a Character XML file exists for the character in question, you can go on to step 6. (It doesn't matter if any of the other files are missing.)

If the Character XML file hasn't been uploaded, you can return to the game and continue playing that character (running around, accepting quests, fiddling with the inventory) and repeat steps 4 and 5 until the diagnostics page shows that a Character XML file exists for the character. It generally happens pretty quickly. Then go on to step 6.

6. Return to the game and exit the current game.
7. Select the Load command, then Switch Characters.
8. Select the character you're trying to delete, and delete it from the game.
9. Repeat steps 1 through 8 for any other characters to be deleted from the site.

It's not necessary to delete files for one character at a time, unless you're really worried about getting confused and deleting the wrong character. The main thing is to avoid creating a new character (in step 1) with the same name as a character that already exists in your game data; that can lead to complications that are best avoided.

10. Quit the game.
11. Wait a while for the characters to appear on the profile page.

I've found it helps to use a second computer to access my player profile without logging in to the Bioware site. This generally gets the site to synch up. (To do this, you'll need to enter the URL for your playerprofile.php page directly. Going through the "full profile" page will only get you an error.)

While you're waiting, it would be a good idea to check your Documents/Bioware/Dragon Age/Characters folder and make sure that it doesn't contain folders for any of the characters you deleted in step 8. If the game has not completely removed the folder for a deleted character, you should trash it by hand so it won't cause complications down the road.

12. Once the characters to be deleted show up, go to the Manage Characters page.
13. Click the "Delete" button under a character.
14. Wait for the character to disappear. This can take a while.
15. Repeat steps 13 and 14 for any other characters to be deleted.
16. Open the diagnostics page and see how effective the deletions have been.

At this point, one of three things will have happened for each deleted character:

(A) The site will have deleted all files for the character in question.

This does happen, though not very often. If this does happen, rejoice! You're done with the character in question. It should not reappear on the site.

(B) The site will have deleted some of the files, but not the Character XML file.

This happens quite frequently. If it does, you don't have to recreate the character in the game (yet). You simply have to go back to step 11 and try deleting the character again. As long as there is a Character XML file for the character, it should show up on the site and give you the chance to use the Delete button.

© The site will have deleted some of the files including the Character XML file.

This happens very frequently, and is the biggest pain in the neck. When it does, you have to go back to step 1 and do it all over. Hopefully next time you'll get result (A) or (B). Hang in there.


To summarize, this whole process can be broken up into two stages:

First, you use the game to make sure the site has a Character XML file for the unwanted character. It doesn't matter if the diagnostics page reports that other files are missing. Only the Character XML file is important.

Second, you use the Manage Characters page to delete all files for the character. It doesn't matter if you can't get rid of them all at once. The only thing that's important is that the Character XML must be one of the last files to go. The problem is, the effects the Delete button will have are very unpredictable.


That's all, folks. I hope it's useful. Credit goes to Snoteye, who helped me figure out just how useful the Diagnostics page really is; and to SusanStoHelit, who pointed out both the necessity of choosing the same origin as the character to be deleted and the possibility that the game may be less than complete in its deletion of characters.

Bearbeitet von Darth Midville, 26 Februar 2010 - 02:11 .

#2
SusanStoHelit
Geschrieben 10 Januar 2010 - 09:37

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Wonderful help, thanks Darth.



Would it be possible to get this stickied? It is a massive help to those of us having problems with unwanted files and characters on our profiles.

#3
LadySeryn
Geschrieben 10 Januar 2010 - 10:27

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It still bothers me that we should even have to do this.



The Diagnostics page can tell that we have files left over from other characters. Why can't we simply delete the files from that page by clicking a button next to the character's name, and it will delete any remaining files for that character?



Or for that matter, why isn't there a giant "Delete all my character data and screenshots" button somewhere in our profile? So we could just nuke everything and re-upload any characters and screenshots that we want to appear on the site?

#4
Guest_Darth Midville_*
Geschrieben 10 Januar 2010 - 11:20

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I agree, LadySeryn, either of those things would be big improvements. Or they could just fix the Delete button on the Manage Characters page so it deletes all the files for the characters, every time.

I for one am hoping this particular thread will become useless eventually, when one of these changes is made.

Bearbeitet von Darth Midville, 10 Januar 2010 - 11:21 .

#5
LadySeryn
Geschrieben 11 Januar 2010 - 05:15

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The problem with only fixing the delete button is those of us who have a ton of characters that are already messed up have no easy way to clean up the mess.



I've got about 5 or 6 characters that I would have to clean up, many of which have the same name, so I ended up with Character, Character1, Character2, etc. Makes it really hard to delete the files.



I agree they need to fix the delete. But they really need to make a way for the rest of us to clean up the mess as well.

#6
Guest_Darth Midville_*
Geschrieben 11 Januar 2010 - 06:44

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SunStoHelit had a similar situation. You can delete them using the method described above, except you'll have to create several characters and delete them in descending order.

For example, assuming your profile's diagnostic page shows three characters named Character, Character1, and Character2, you'll need to create three characters named "Character" as described above, but don't delete the first two from the game. Delete the third one from the game, then delete its files from the site. Once you've gotten rid of all files for Character2, you can delete the second one from the game and remove the files for Character1 from the site.

The reason it needs to be done this way is this: if you try to delete them all at once and manage to get rid of all files for Character and Character1, but are left with residual files (other than the Character XML) for Character2, you'll have to create Character and Character1 all over again in order to re-create and delete Character2.

It may be a good idea to give each of the three Characters a different appearance, so you can be sure you're deleting them in the right order.

... I agree. It would be best if they gave us a "Nuke All My Files Dammit" button on the diagnostics page.

Bearbeitet von Darth Midville, 11 Januar 2010 - 06:46 .

#7
LadySeryn
Geschrieben 11 Januar 2010 - 02:54

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Thanks for trying to help Darth Midville, and for posting the excellent summary of the steps required in the original post. I appreciate it.



However, I think I will just wait for BioWare to fix the problem, or live with broken character uploads for now. I just can't be bothered to go through all those steps for something that should just work, and doesn't really affect gameplay anyway.

#8
SusanStoHelit
Geschrieben 12 Januar 2010 - 09:31

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I can report that I have finally deleted all excess characters and files from my profile. It took four days of creating, uploading, deleting, rinsing and repeating. But it is finally done.

I wholeheartedly agree that this shouldn't be necessary. It drove me pretty nuts, and I've hardly had time to play. But my profile was badly messed up - and now it isn't. Which is such a relief - it was an itch I couldn't scratch, AND it meant that I was nearing my limit on files. Whether you think it's worth the time and effort is up to you.

Oh, and the multiple character thing (Halrin, Halrin1, Halrin2, etc) is caused (I discovered) by the fact that sometimes when I delete a character from the game, his/her file is not deleted from my documents folder. While going through this process I got up to Halrin4 - then thought to check the Documents/Bioware/Dragon Age/Characters folder. And I discovered folders for characters that I'd deleted (they didn't show up in the main menu ingame). You can just trash those extra files manually from there. I'll be checking that every time I delete a character now.

Thank you once again Darth.

Edit: For the mutiples of one character, Darth is right, you have to delete the character with the highest number first - when he/she is finally gone, move on to the next. I looked at the character pic for each (they all looked different) and made a note (Halrin4, red hair and beard), so that I could tell which was which when deleting characters in 'manage characters'. When number 4 was gone, I went on to 3, and so forth. This morning, I finally got rid of original Halrin - and I never want to see him again. <_<

Bearbeitet von SusanStoHelit, 12 Januar 2010 - 09:36 .

#9
Guest_Darth Midville_*
Geschrieben 13 Januar 2010 - 12:39

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 Once again you are welcome, Susan! And congrats on having run the gauntlet to the end! :)

I haven't run across the problem you describe (regarding characters not being completely deleted by the game) but I can certainly imagine it happening. I've modified the original post to reflect this possibility. As you say, getting rid of that folder is important, especially should you end up getting result © for the character and have to create it again.

Bearbeitet von Darth Midville, 13 Januar 2010 - 12:42 .

#10
Snoteye
Geschrieben 13 Januar 2010 - 07:05

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Incidentally, is there more than one way to delete characters in-game?

Bearbeitet von Snoteye, 13 Januar 2010 - 07:05 .

#11
Guest_Darth Midville_*
Geschrieben 13 Januar 2010 - 11:14

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The way described above (going to the Switch Characters screen and deleting) is the only one I'm aware of. And I only discovered it recently, at that. Previously I had been trashing my characters' folders manually. Which seemed to work well enough, too; I'm not sure the in-game method does anything more than trash the folder.

Bearbeitet von Darth Midville, 13 Januar 2010 - 11:19 .

#12
Guest_Darth Midville_*
Geschrieben 22 Januar 2010 - 02:03

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Just a brief follow-up about deleting characters from the game:

SusanStoHelit wrote...

Oh, and the multiple character thing (Halrin, Halrin1, Halrin2, etc) is caused (I discovered) by the fact that sometimes when I delete a character from the game, his/her file is not deleted from my documents folder.

I have never seen this happen when deleting characters as described in the original post. But I have seen something like this happen if you delete saved games instead of deleting the character.

If you have created only one character and you delete all of the saved games for that character, the game will not let you select the "Load Game" command any more. It will assume you want to start a new game, which means creating a new character. This means you can't select "Switch Characters" (which is only available on the Load Game screen) and so don't have the option of deleting a character.

So it looks like you've deleted the character, but you haven't: the data folder for that character still exists, which means you'll need to remove it by hand before re-creating the character, or you'll end up with Character1, Character2, and so on.

I assume the same thing will happen if you create more than one character and delete all the saved games for each. You'll end up with multiple character data folders that the game won't let you delete.

So the moral is: if you want to delete a character from the game, don't delete all the saved games for that character! It's better to use the method described in the original post. Click "Load Game," then "Switch Characters," then select the character and delete. This gets rid of all saved games and all character data files.

Bearbeitet von Darth Midville, 22 Januar 2010 - 02:07 .

#13
LightSabres
Geschrieben 28 Januar 2010 - 09:16

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This is Gold! Thank you so much for posting this Darth!



I plan on trying this to fix my profile when I get home tonight. I'm hoping it's the deleted characters that still have little "bits" of themselves remaining that is making my icons disappear...

#14
Guest_Darth Midville_*
Geschrieben 28 Januar 2010 - 10:57

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You're welcome, LightSabres, and good luck!

As for the disappearing avatars, I've seen that happen even when my profile said I had all four files and no errors for my character (and I had only the one character at the time), so I suspect that it may be a glitch on the server side that's causing it in some instances. When it happened to me, I just played a bit longer, changed my armor, and manually saved the game, and eventually the character got updated and the avatar came back.

If you've got partially deleted (or never fully uploaded) characters with missing avatars, then deleting them completely may help clear the situation up a bit. I'm not sure fully deleting a character will make it easier for the game to upload that same character in the future, but I suppose it could help prevent some errors.

There are a few factors that seem to prod the game to upload or update characters. The main thing is, you have to save the game manually. It also seems to help if you change your armor prior to saving. The game also seems more likely to update characters after you level up. Using a new slot (instead of overwriting an old one) also seems to help, but I could be wrong about that.

I'd really like to compile a second wall of text to help people when their profiles won't update. But in general I have not experienced that sort of thing too much, and it seems the issues vary depending on the platform being used, so I'd really need help from someone more knowledgeable than myself.

Bearbeitet von Darth Midville, 28 Januar 2010 - 10:58 .

#15
LightSabres
Geschrieben 29 Januar 2010 - 01:38

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Well for me it seems it didn't really start happening until I deleted a couple characters I didn't like the look of one I started them. Since then updating has been VERY spotty. I was living with until the avatars started disappearing.



One note though - You can no longer delete any character if any files are missing. I have two damaged characters that have xml files and I do not see the link to delete them from the webpage.

#16
Guest_Darth Midville_*
Geschrieben 29 Januar 2010 - 05:06

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As far as I know, if the Character XML file is present, then the character should show up for deletion. Eventually. I've seen characters take anywhere from an hour to a couple of days to show up, but they've always shown up eventually.

Of course the web devs may have changed something since I put the OP together, so there are no guarantees. But I can see that you succeeded in uploading three characters (one with an avatar and two without) an hour before your last post. Those aren't showing up on your profile now, so I'm guessing you've managed to delete them at least partially. Do you have any others that aren't showing up at all?

#17
LightSabres
Geschrieben 29 Januar 2010 - 07:14

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I decided to wipe everything clean. Of 8 total character 1 is completely gone (and copied out of the DA save folder) and 7 have pieces left. Getting all those pieces gone could take awhile...

#18
LightSabres
Geschrieben 29 Januar 2010 - 04:18

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Ok so apparently if you have the "Character Respec" mod there is an EASY way to force an update to the server - just drink the respec potion!

It automatically triggers a "level up" event that update your profile. Now I just have to run 2 different Dwarf Nobles through the opening campaign to get to the Raven in Ostagar so I can try and delete them again...

NOTE - the level up event only forces an upload of the character that drank the potion.  So this has to be done for each character.

Bearbeitet von LightSabres, 29 Januar 2010 - 04:24 .

#19
Guest_Darth Midville_*
Geschrieben 01 Februar 2010 - 02:40

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You could also trigger a level up event by, um, leveling up. I haven't played the dwarf origins yet, but if they're anything like the human noble origin, it should be possible to get one or two new levels even before you get to Ostagar.

I usually don't have any problem getting a new character to upload immediately after creation. I use the tome that comes with the bonus ring DLC to add a skill point to the character, which I presume triggers a level up event. Then I do a manual save and wait a minute or two. Presto! The files show up on the diagnostics page right away.

#20
Guest_distinguetraces_*
Geschrieben 01 Februar 2010 - 03:07

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I had characters with missing files, and I deleted them from the website in hopes they'd be fixed in the re-upload.



Now they're back, still with the missing files. But my main now ALSO has the new error 1005 for extra files. Argh.

#21
julitro666
Geschrieben 01 Februar 2010 - 09:27

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it's not the same but what if no player appears in my profile? i check the diagnostic page and said this: Error Code 1000 - No characters were found in your on-line storage.

#22
LightSabres
Geschrieben 01 Februar 2010 - 09:35

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Ok so I've ALMOST got everyone fixed now. All the "old" Characters are deleted and only one (bloody Arcane Warrior) is giving me any errors at all.



During the course of this I discovered one very very important tip.



Do your deletions on Friday or Saturday Night!! When less people are playing the server doesn't try and cough up a hairball during deletions and everything happens smoothly.



The following is a very good test to see how clogged the server is. It will increase your chances of success exponentially.



- Navigate to your "Persona" page

- Click on "Profile Diagnostics.

- Once you get the diagnostics (not any of the various "error" messages) hit refresh

- Refresh 10 times total. Wait for the screen to finish loading before hitting refresh again.



If you get 3 or less Error screens then the connection is passable enough and will increase your chances of successful deletions.

#23
LightSabres
Geschrieben 01 Februar 2010 - 09:38

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Darth Midville wrote...

You could also trigger a level up event by, um, leveling up. I haven't played the dwarf origins yet, but if they're anything like the human noble origin, it should be possible to get one or two new levels even before you get to Ostagar.

I usually don't have any problem getting a new character to upload immediately after creation. I use the tome that comes with the bonus ring DLC to add a skill point to the character, which I presume triggers a level up event. Then I do a manual save and wait a minute or two. Presto! The files show up on the diagnostics page right away.


I COULD play through to level ups but I was looking at going through the Dwarven Noble origin for the 5th and 6th times in rapid succession.  Not my idea of a good time.  Re-specing turned out to be the fastest way to get characters to upload to the server when I wanted them to.

#24
Guest_Darth Midville_*
Geschrieben 02 Februar 2010 - 12:45

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distinguetraces wrote...

I had characters with missing files, and I deleted them from the website in hopes they'd be fixed in the re-upload.

Now they're back, still with the missing files. But my main now ALSO has the new error 1005 for extra files. Argh.

Argh, indeed! The only thing you can do is delete and try, try again. I've also gotten the 1005 error twice. In both cases deleting the character got rid of the extra files, and the next character update got me back to the standard four. YMMV, but it's worth trying.

julitro666 wrote...

it's not the same but what if no player appears in my profile? i check the diagnostic page and said this: Error Code 1000 - No characters were found in your on-line storage.

This simply means you haven't gotten your game to upload a character yet. The good news is you don't have to worry about deleting any files, because you shouldn't have any to delete. The not so good news is that it seems there are a lot of factors that can impede or prevent character updates, so there's no single solution.

You'll find some advice for getting your characters to update scattered about this thread, if you read it carefully. But since this thread is about deleting characters, which is the opposite of what you're trying to achieve, there are probably better places to look. Check around this forum for other threads with titles like "characters not appearing in profile" or "slow profile updates". There are quite a few of them.

LightSabres wrote...

Do your deletions on Friday or Saturday Night!! When less people are playing the server doesn't try and cough up a hairball during deletions and everything happens smoothly. 

That's some good advice. I had also noticed there are some times when deletions seem to go through much more smoothly, but I hadn't managed to pin it down to a specific day or time slot.

I'm more than half convinced that a lot of the trouble people are having getting their characters to update is also related to server congestion. You can do everything to get your game to upload the character (level up, change armor, manual save) and it still doesn't go through sometimes. Why? I suspect it's because the game times out while waiting for a response from the server, and silently gives up on that attempt.

Here's another thing that people may be overlooking: if you're in the habit of quitting the game immediately after a manual save, this could be preventing your character updates. It seems the game can take a little while to contact the server and get the update processed. So even if you're done playing for the day, it might be a good idea to leave the game running for a minute or two before quitting. I've found my characters update much more reliably since I've started doing this. YMMV, of course.

Bearbeitet von Darth Midville, 02 Februar 2010 - 12:45 .

#25
LightSabres
Geschrieben 02 Februar 2010 - 05:32

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The biggest problem I can see with the Manage Characters screen is the fact that it seems that the web page itself tries to do the deletions. If they only changed it so that a deletion request was sent to another server that would hold the requests in a cue I believe it would solve a lot of problems. The second server could perform the deletion, check to ensure all files for that character were gone, and re-cue it for deletion again if it didn't work the first time.
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