Guild Wars 2

I also posted this in Suggestions section, but since this only applies to WvW, I figured this would be an apt place to post.

I was thinking, why isn’t the commander status (the icon) also being applied next to their name in team/squad chat?
For me, sometimes the team chat gets flooded with other players either whining, asking for help, calling out enemies, that you sometimes lose sight of the commander’s orders for WvW.
I know blizzard uses it for their GM’s when they’re working. Part of that is so that players can easily identify them in chat — another part of it is authenticity, ie preventing people from pretending to be a GM, but that doesn’t apply to my suggestion.
Since it only applies to team (and squad?) chat, this will only matter in WvW.
tl;dr, Add the commander symbol to team chat for WvW.

if you would like to comment on it in the suggestions section, see link: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/suggestions/Commander-Status-1/first#post603848

There are a lot of aspects of the Commander that needs retooling.

An icon is not enough for commander chat. It needs to be a new color completely. A color that stands out.

I believe that at an end of a match, a Rating/Voting System becomes active. Starting at Thursday 5pm PDT to Friday 5pm PDT.

Ultima Online had a wonderful system for rating their factions leader. It was based off Voting. But the Rating system should have more to it than a mere vote.

The player’s deeds and feedback is just as important as the commanders’ play time and actions.

As a commander or player actively plays in WvW they get Voting Merits (some sort of marker to establish ranks of time invested). The more merits one acquires, the stronger the vote is that a player may casts. As for commanders, the more merits they acquire, measures the strength of votes they can accept by individual voters.

Example:

Commander A played for 10 hours in the week and acquired 40 merits.
Commander B played for 40 hours in the week and acquired 160 merits.

Player Y played for 5 hours and aquired 20 merits which allows him/her to cast 20 votes, he/she could give them all to A or B or split them.

Player Z played for 80 hours in the week and acquired 320 Merits. If player Z desires he/she may cast 40 votes for Commander A but no more because that is Commander A’s cap, and if he/she desires player Z may also give commander B 160 votes.

There are more than just 2 commanders per server so each player that spend enough time in WvW may be generous to several commanders.

At the beginning of each week, commander enter WvW and interact with some device in the Realm’s Citadel. They may opt to take a Vacation for the match (status is disabled) or Qualify for Votes (status remains active). Merely doing this awards the commander X Merits and adds the commander to the list of candidates.

When a Match ends, all votes are counted. Commanders that did not meet a threshold of votes (not counting those that chose to vacation) have their status stripped and book refunded. They may not use the book again for 30 days but this book may be sold on the trade post. Of course they will not get the 100% gold back but they may get some. They may also opt to use the book on another character and try to start fresh.

Commanders that met a certain threshold retain their status, but their titles may be altered and sorted as thus:

Lieutenant
Lieutenant Commander
Commander
Captain
General

Also, Orbs of Power needs to be slightly altered so that only commanders may carry them. This would eliminate any chance of griefing and dishonest play.

Later, as the system is refined, other rewards should be added to reflect what commanders do, such as taking/defending a tower, keep or castle. Or capturing an Orb of Power. These should also add merits to the commander.

I will refer to my posts in the suggestion forums in terms of my replies to you, undermine.

they need to remove the gold=commander status before everything else.
Put some sort of Honor Point or similar and make commander status be available with that.
Ah please rework the token system with something more suitable and cool for pvp. the whole idea of killing a player and get a bag down your feet is so weird and it does not really feel that next gen mmo.

Gold to buy Commander is perfect. no change necessary.

Undermine.1678 except for this:
" Commanders that did not meet a threshold of votes (not counting those that chose to vacation) have their status stripped and book refunded"
The rest is a awesome idea
+1

I read somewhere a nice suggestion. Can’t remember in what forum, but here’s the main context of it:

Have us pay the following for the commander status

• Karma
• Gold
• WvW Tokens

Have some prerequisites:

• Have a certain rank in achievements regarding WvW
• Reached a certain amount of WvW kills

Everyone can earn 100 gold. But to get all the other you’ll need to spend some time in WvW and this will also ensure that the commander hopefully knows what he is doing.

Here’s my thoughts regarding commanders:
I don’t see where team chat is for commanders? The commander is not the leader in WvW. People get the title and then they can form a squad. Commanders then form squads with people they think will fit their army and then give commands in the “Squad” chat.

Now I find most of the commanders being people who either bought the gold or farmed their way to that nice title. I’ve only met one commander who actually knew what he was doing. He formed a squad and led us into a glorious battle where we defended our borders from enemy invaders for hours. He only used team chat to talk to other commanders. He told the roamers to give reports from the battlefield in map chat so that everyone on the battlegrounds could see it. He led us to several victories, and this is rare in the bg’s now.

Most of the commanders don’t know kitten about WvW. They just farmed in PvE to get the gold and bought their title, which is sad, because people constantly complain about having a bad time in WvW because of kitteny commanders. Every time I enter WvW and ask where stuff is happening, I’m always getting the same answer: “just follow the commander”. In other words; “The zerg is where the commander is”. If I don’t follow the commander or try to get some people with me to capture a resource camp or a tower I’m always told to gtfo because I’m not following the commanders orders.

And please, remove that stupid commanders icon from the map! Make it so only people that are in the squad can see their commander. I have no reason to see the commanders in the battlegrounds.

tl;dr: Commanders: form squads and leave team chat alone. You’re not the boss.

People are forgetting that COMMANDER is also intended to be used in PvE, doing Epic Raids and Dynamic Events.

The 100g is just fine and does not need a change. And it is fair and right to allow anyone an equally opportunity to be a leader if they spend 100g for the book. As a player, you have the choice to follow the commander or not.

It is the commander system that needs to be adjusted. And I feel that through Actions and Public Support, commanders are allowed to maintain their title as per the suggestion above.

The problem is, if you don’t follow the commander you will be hated by the rest..

But I have to say: I have several times taken the command although I’m not a commander and there was a commander present. Some of them just bought it for the title :/

The overwhelming majority of Commanders exist for their guilds. Nearly every suggestion related to Commanders does not acknowledge this.

Our guild has a number of Commanders that we use for individual squad chats, designating leaders, and for a clear icon on the map. We also use them interchangeably with other guilds.

We don’t have them as a prestige item.

Changing them to an elected position basically destroys the current use of them. This makes it into a popularity contest and makes guild Commanders essentially impossible. This forces the Commander icon into being a prestige item. The changes suggested above basically attempts to make Commander icons a major focus in WvW instead of just a useful tool.

The current implementation is simple and works. No need to fix what isn’t broken.

The 100g, in Anet’s own words, is there to discourage anyone from buying it. You only nab it if you really, REALLY want to be a Commander; a trait possessed by people who will do something with that title. And if they don’t, then whatever. It’s not like you’ll see them around, anyway.