I think the discourse plugin sounds like a great idea.
FWIW, I’d keep the commblog. I think keeping it separate would help it to stand out from the commotion here on discourse and give it more “status” than just some random person’s comment.
I think WordPress, Discourse and Element could work well together as a sort of hierarchical division of communication based on frequency/quality.
- WordPress – low frequency, high quality
- Discourse – medium frequency, medium quality
- Element – high frequency, low quality
The more, the better when it comes to cross linking the above. Ideally they would all work with the same account system. I also think it would be good to have some sort of consistency with the themeing between them.