My thoughts
I have read thru what all of you have written about roles and charachters and I can only say that I have no thoughts on that myself. Rather I will try to add my toughts on the subject on names being displayed in the OW.
Remember I only write my thoughts as of now and you're free to add to them or to not like them.
Names in OW:
I think that names of players in the open world should either be shown or not, it doesn't matter for me as long as it applies for every player regardless of what you sail or do. Having some players basically hidden feels weird if some players are not.
My explaination for why names should not be shown for anyone is that from the distance you can first hail someone it sort of makes sense to just be able to know nationality. Then if you should see the name of the captain (if player) when you're inside attack range or when you are in the battle instance, I have no idea.
Please remember and consider that my thoughts are just that they might change or become opinions but so far there thoughts.