Right now Commander status is, I won’t say ‘easy’ to get, but it is sufficiently difficult in completely the wrong way.
I’ve seen Commanders who had no business being, nor the capability to be a Commander. They bought the status because they were rich and it was just something to buy. This is not how the status Commander should be bestowed. I understand that they may learn, and in time, become a good Commander. But thats not good enough. You should only have the rank if you are already good at it, otherwise you are quite literally leading your server astray.
I suggest that Commander instead be tied to Guilds. You would need Rank 5 in Art of War to begin researching the Right of Command which would cost 1,000,000 Influence. If you were to buy this influence directly from the Guild Promoter, it would cost 200 gold – twice the amount that the status currently costs. Once this research has been completed, the Guild is able to research a buff called Authority of Command for 5000 influence. This buff should take 1 day to research, last for a week and allow the Guild to give the permission to certain ranks to enable the Commander status. Only 1 of the players with the correct rank would be able to use the Commander status in each map, and trying to activate it while there is already a Commander from your Guild in the map would result in a message appearing on your screen saying “Your Guild already has a Commander in this map.”
This would also mean that the Commander status is no longer character-bound. As it stands, if you buy commander on one character, you cannot activate the status on any of your other characters, meaning you have no choice but to play that one character if you plan to command in WvW. I’m sure this was done to promote familiarity with the Commanders with the general population, making their names widely-recognisable, almost making them pseudo-celebrities on their server. While this is a good thing, it is rather limiting for the Commander as they will never be able to play another character if they want to lead their server.
This also means that a dedicated Guild can always have a Commander in a map, and the general population is never without direction. Commanders cannot be online all the time (as much as they do try to be). If one Commander goes to bed, another player from that Guild, who has the relevant permission, can take up the status and continue leading their server. The status can be passed around as needed between the players that the Guild has decided have the capability to command well.
Because Commander status is tied to the buff, Authority of Command, and needs to be renewed weekly, having the ability to use Commander status becomes an ongoing expense to a Guild to ensure that they are not simply ‘buying it because it is just something to buy’. The very fact of having the status shows a deep commitment to the betterment of the server as a whole.
All existing Commanders who bought the status for 100g should be reimbursed their gold, and those still desiring to command could put it towards unlocking it for their Guild.
TL;DR -
Commander needs to be changed. New guild upgrade requiring rank 5 Art of War and costing 1 million influence (200g from Guild Promoter) that unlocks access to a week-long buff that takes 1 day to research and costs 5000 influence. This buff allows permissions to be assigned to guild ranks so that the players in those ranks can use the Commander status. Active Commander status would be limited to 1 per Guild per map. All existing Commanders could be reimbursed with their 100g shoudl the new system be implements.
~ Radthor Dax, lvl80 Elementalist