Guild Wars 2

At the moment, it is only possible to become a Squad Commander by spending 100 gold.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Commander%27s_Compendium
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Commander#Squad_commander

The problem is that inexperienced WvW players can also become “Squad Commanders” if they spend real dollars (USD) on gems, convert those gems into gold (Guild Wars 2 currency) and buy a Commander’s Compendium.

Well I guess this is somewhat fine since ArenaNet could use those extra dollars.

Except that sometimes, some unpleasant things may happen for some players. Let me quote this from the local gaming community forum that I am a part of:

tl; dr Summary:
The hard earned efforts of some players were destroyed due to bad leadership of some “Squad Commanders” well I guess this is part of the meta game eh?

Hence, I suggest that, similar “Squad Commanders” status / WvW map presence should be obtainable as well, not just via 100 gold (Guild Wars 2 currency)

Perhaps via and influence:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Badge_of_Honor
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Influence

Say, for example:
(or better names ArenaNet can come up with)

Tactician
- obtained via redeeming Badges of Honor
- ??? colored symbol on map
- maximum of 40 players per squad

Guild Tactician
- obtained via Guild Upgrades – Art of War (Spending Influence)
- ??? colored symbol on map
- maximum of 50 players per squad
- symbol on map only visible to representing guild members (suggested by Nyrlina.1875)

Squad Commander
- obtained via spending 100 gold to buy Commander’s Compendium
- blue colored symbol on map
- maximum of 30 players per squad

The current “Squad Leader” is a blue colored symbol while these 2 new ones could have other 2 suitable different colors or symbols etc.

So what say you all?

Seconded. I don’t know if I’m allowed to say this but this was also discussed in reddit as well but this suggestion is much more interesting. Maybe Anet could work something out from this idea. Sometimes, listening to guild leaders or experienced players are better than 100G-Forged commanders.

Reddit suggest Vote to be commander, and with this suggestion (tactician and whatnot), larger, more organized guild can lead better. But maybe they wont show to all other members, instead, only towards guild members. I say this because if it shows to all members it’s almost no difference with commanders, people with no guilds, lone rangers, randoms will just go to it and zerg and die without a plan. I need someone in my guild to be an icon i can follow. Someone that can also lead squads not just the commander. Squads within my own guild.

I’m not saying I think better than ANet devs and maybe this issue was already spoken of but with the current state of 100g = commander, it certainly ain’t a good idea.

i will be honest most of the people i play on sever i play on have 0 commander or at lest when i play we just have a group of player talking in team chat. figuring out best course of plan. i think changing the requirement would be a lot better say 20 gold and 1000 honor coins ? by that point you would understand the game clearly. i would also like an idea for commander be able to draw on World map give easier placement for setting up sieges. i had problems in game where people be like “BUILD SIEGE ON ME !” when there 100 people around you that not easiest way to run a siege.

Nyrlina.1875:

Seconded. I don’t know if I’m allowed to say this but this was also discussed in reddit as well but this suggestion is much more interesting. Maybe Anet could work something out from this idea. Sometimes, listening to guild leaders or experienced players are better than 100G-Forged commanders.

Reddit suggest Vote to be commander, and with this suggestion (tactician and whatnot), larger, more organized guild can lead better. But maybe they wont show to all other members, instead, only towards guild members. I say this because if it shows to all members it’s almost no difference with commanders, people with no guilds, lone rangers, randoms will just go to it and zerg and die without a plan. I need someone in my guild to be an icon i can follow. Someone that can also lead squads not just the commander. Squads within my own guild.

I’m not saying I think better than ANet devs and maybe this issue was already spoken of but with the current state of 100g = commander, it certainly ain’t a good idea.

well at least give us more choices to have “commander” status or function (ability to create squads / teams etc)

i thought guild wars 2 is about having multiple choices?

Taobella.6597:

i will be honest most of the people i play on sever i play on have 0 commander or at lest when i play we just have a group of player talking in team chat. figuring out best course of plan. i think changing the requirement would be a lot better say 20 gold and 1000 honor coins ? by that point you would understand the game clearly. i would also like an idea for commander be able to draw on World map give easier placement for setting up sieges. i had problems in game where people be like “BUILD SIEGE ON ME !” when there 100 people around you that not easiest way to run a siege.

besides drawing on world map, i think setting “map notes” on the world map would be better also right?

other players can mouse over and see what text the “commander” wrote there.

really like this idea of being able to use badges of honor and/or influence to become a guild commander or tactician, but the only suggestion i have would be to make the required badges of honor a very high amount. that way it would allow the people who are actually active in WvW to obtain something they deserve, rather than who can spend the most money. on my server alone there are already about 5 or so “commanders” running around that really don’t know wth they are doing or talking about.. and we really don’t need more of those ruining WvW.

Agreed. But not only in this, but everything. PVE gold should have no influence at all on WvW. WvW needs it’s own currency, or just everything running off champions marks.

A player that never WvWs suddenly comes in and unbalances the game (purchasing 10+ golems) should not happen. What happens in PvE, stays in PvE. Same for WvW.

My guild has rallied to get books for our WvW leaders by asking members for donations.

I don’t fear bad commanders because it wouldn’t take more than a time or two for you to figure out if you like a squad leader or not.

Calling it PvE gold isn’t accurate – you make the same in WvW as you do in PvE — there’s a reason you can BLTC from WvW.

Making other cheaper ways of getting commanders is not going to get you quality control in leadership. If someone fancies themself a leader, they can get the book. It’s up to you if you wnt to follow them or not.

I think this is a good idea. there some squad commander that just enter borderlands and do nothing and most of times what will happen is that people will most of the time gather where there’s a commander icon in the map which is sometimes not really a good idea.

Oh yeah even just having a little message telling your sever where to go that would be great i just find map and team chat are just mostly complaining of people not doing stuff right or talk about stuff that does not matter. if we had a way commander some way of lead i am all for it.

I like your idea but why do people who don’t spend 100gold get more player capacity

+1
Already seeing some stupid commanders wandering in the WvW ground misleading people and splitting up groups. Apparently they don’t have the experience and knowledge and brain to be a commander. It is a good system if we do have a good and capable commander, not people just showing off their golds.

Badges, kills, number of gold medals in WvW events, playtime in WvW, many other achievements would be reasonable requirements for it.

I seconded this idea, but would love to add some touch up for this idea.
Other than Badges of Honor,I think gold is a must as well.
A good leader is not just merely good in WvWvW they must be financialy stable too.
One can farm whole day at WvWvW or find a way to kill whole day for the badges. To add gold in it,they somehow have to brainstorm the whole games and save up their shiny.

For guilds I would like to see the ability to use influence to buy a temporary Commander-like status (Captain?) which would allow for a large squad (~50) to be created. Ideally these captains would then be able form a party with other captains to lead a more structured campaign.

Perhaps a restriction could be that you have to be representing that guild to be in the squad, so that the guild gets to recoup the influence if they play well.

Some of the WvW achievements suits the requirements much better, like how many times taking down keeps and castles, also defense count, orbs and etc + that 100g (sure you must be willing to pay and you certainly have that gold if you really spent that much playing the game).