(I couldn’t quote the people I wanted to because my message would go over the word count, but this is not just to the people I meant to quote)
At the end of the day the commander of the squad has a choice. If the commander only wants certain people in the squad then they can make it happen. It doesn’t matter how good or bad the commander is at what they do, or how well people could perform with or without TS communication. If they don’t want you in their squad you are not getting in their squad. TS is never mandatory and there is always the option to form smaller parties with other people who face a similar situation of being blocked from the squad. It is entirely possible to survive without being in the squad or a lone party in large fights, you just have to play differently. It takes some getting used to especially if you don’t know how, but with mistakes you learn. For example, if the commander has been known to run from fights then it is safe to assume you will be going the opposite direction every time a bunch of red names appear. If you don’t know your commander at all or what they want from their group then play to your own survivability. Another example can be veils from a Mesmer. A commander will ask for veils as they wish, but if you are not in TS a Mesmer can still make a veil call or know when to veil based on the commanders movements, and position. Also sometimes commanders will play know very well what people outside of TS will do. A commander may set up catas on a tower, let’s say, and run off to another objective knowing that people who cannot hear them will stay behind to cata. If they die the commander then knows where a force is, big or small. If they do not die the tower is captured while the commander is multitasking on something else. It comes down to whether you trust your commander or not in such a situation, and reading your commander.
Going back to TS I understand it can be a little frustrating when you don’t get a group, but it should not deter you from playing. When I first started to WvW way back whenever I had no idea what was going on because I didn’t know TS was being used, but I followed commanders whether they wanted me there or not. I asked questions about what to do and generally had a good time. WvW can be extremely fun and each commander is different. I have known commanders for remembering names and allowing access into groups despite not being in TS because they have shown they can hold their own and can provide without a voice communication system. Commanders and people in the group will also make suggestions to you via say or team chat (for my server at least) if you ask. So say you are not in TS or squad, and each fight you are getting one pushed; a commander might ask you to tank up even though the commander’s own group is a bit more glassy, let’s say. It is not that commanders do not want to help.
They do not care that you are hearing impaired. As harsh as that may sound commanders use squads and TS as a way of organization. Being in a large squad is about communication. If there is no communication the group falls short of what it can do. From this the commander is going to want to prioritize people who they receive their preferred form of communication from. There will be commanders who do not have a care in the world who joins and then there are those who only want TS users. A commander is going to play differently if they know they can not get commands out to the majority of their group in a fast enough manner and the type of people they have following them. So a commander who has their entire squad in TS is going to communicate faster and more often than a text commander. As a result of this they are going to be more daring in their attacks. It is up to the person to communicate what they are capable of doing though.
A good commander wishes the best from everyone and sometimes that is hard to achieve. Talking (or typing) to the commanders and what you can and cannot do will help the commander get an idea of what both you and they can do. They may make exceptions, or decide whether to or to not avoid certain situations knowing the community around them. There are going to be people willing to help, and it is just a matter of seeing what people have to say. There are going to be some bad people and bad commanding, but TS is not a device used to pull apart communities. Speech is just a common form of communication, so TS takes advantage of that. When someone who is hearing impaired comes along, simply put, people don’t know what to do with them in terms of command relay. They do not know if your are lying (which people do for some reason), or how to get commands out to them in a fast enough and efficient manner.
After all this, again, it is still entirely up to the commander on how to run a squad, but do not let the commander’s actions prevent you from having a good time. I do not personally know what the communication is like on other servers from my own, and it may be drastically different from what I know. WvW does not have one singular way of playing, though. If you don’t want to join TS then don’t. People who are not in TS are not useless. They still matter and by just playing and having fun are still being useful in some way.
