• The Grey Wardens joined in on celebrations for The Liberty Gala 2022 for festivities centered around defending and all other things fun in cards, party games, and much more

• The Liberty Gala led up to the Defender Awards where the Wardens took home awards upon awards (11 in total!), including the Anarchotopia Award for the second year in a row as the organization most successful at preventing invasions - be sure to check out the winners in the announcement thread

• The Order is preparing for a busy holiday season with anticipated events such as the Christmas Charity Fundraiser and Harry Potter & the Festival of Friends which are sure to fill the coming month!

In recent months, The Order redid its internal faction system that drives friendly competition with totaled points every month. Factions are teams of members of The Order of the Grey Wardens community named after various Dragon Age regions that compete with each other in a friendly way for Darkspawn Kill Points (DKP). DKP is earned through a set of tasks/activities known as Quests like recruiting, attending updates, participating in guardian missions, and more.

For several months the previous faction system had been dominated by Nevarra only to be overturned by Ferelden after the system rework in October. High participation in recruitment and a rebalancing of members proved beneficial to Ferelden to win the top system for the first time ever!

Thornstorm and the Holy Cross, aka Kai, is one of the newer recruits to the Order. Having joined us over the summer, Kai has proven to be a reliable and enthusiastic presence in the region and at update. Being one of the few Wardens with the dedication and resolve to earn the "Top Recruiter" title for sending communications encouraging new nations to join, Kai has helped bring many new nations to the Order to increase our domestic strength. Having been a great addition to the region for some time now, he is November's Featured Warden.

November's Featured Warden
Thornstorm and the Holy Cross

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General Information

Alias(es)	Kai, Kaios
Joined NS	June 15th, 2022
Joined TGW	July 10th, 2022

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Warden

Service July 10th, 2022- Present

Quebecshire: Hello Kai! Thank you for agreeing to be interviewed for this month’s featured Warden. Can you start by telling us how you found NationStates?

Kai: I was super bored last year and I just remembered my old "project" when I was a kid which was the nation I started. I made its founding history, its map, and everything. I wanted to reconnect with that past of me so I searched the web for games, and then I landed on Stately and eventually realizing it was an app for NationStates.

Quebecshire: Gotcha! Personally I’ve never used Stately but from what I’ve seen, people generally like it. What led you to our region specifically?

Kai: Yeah, Stately looks good for starters. I remember being overwhelmed at first after grasping what the NS website really is XD. What led me to TGW? Hmm. Honestly, aside from the well-written recruitment template as well as the convincing campaign against The Blight, TGW sounded really cool and fit the aesthetic of the nation/kingdom I was trying to create.

Quebecshire: That’s fair, if TGW has anything going for it with recruiting it’s definitely a unique theme/spin. When you joined us, did you hop right in to defending or did you hang around as a resident for a bit first?

Kai: I think it took me quite a few days to really situate myself on NS, reading all the guides and all. Then on my birthday (yes, on my birthday), I finally decided to join the discord server and immediately worked on my Warden application.

Quebecshire: Gotcha! So it seems you got into things somewhat quickly, though took a little time to situate yourself. Since enlisting you’ve been pretty active, is it reasonable to say you’ve found defending to be a good fit?

Kai: Definitely, I find defending quite purposeful and it's fun to gradually gain speed in chasing and detagging over time.

Quebecshire: That’s good to hear! What do you think your biggest challenges and successes as an up and coming chaser have been?

Kai: Hmm, my senior wardens really taught me well and I can't think of any challenge I came up with. Perhaps the lack of visuals? I mean, in terms of the procedure in chasing especially. Its quite overwhelming for new recruits because of all the things happening in a short span of time HAHAHAHA. Aside from that, I think TGW's senior wardens/defenders really do a good job training new recruits :>

Quebecshire: That’s certainly reassuring to hear. In addition to defending, you’ve been an active recruiter, often one of the top performers. Would you like to talk more about that and why you’ve been so persistent with it?

Kai: Recruiting is fun, I get to earn DKP while doing other stuff irl or even when I'm playing games. Plus, I once said I'll bring back Ferelden's glory days — and so I did.

Quebecshire: Lmao very nice. Do you have any goals in the region that you haven’t accomplished yet?

Kai: I'm planning to get more involved in RP or the WA when I have more free time, just to have a nice change of pace. Regional goals though, I really don't know. I'd probably just be more active in defending in order to get promotions :>

Quebecshire: That makes sense! What would you say your favorite part of NationStates (and our regional community) is outside of defending?

Kai: I admire NationStates' inclusivity with all the different kinds of players across its communities, games like this tend to be more diverse and I really like how players deal with each other. It's my first time to be a part of a forum-like text-based community and as far as I can say, this one's a keeper. You'll probably see me still hanging around on NS' golden anniversary XD.

Quebecshire: Yeah, NS, especially gameplay is fairly inclusive and diverse for sure. Before we wrap up, is there anything you want to add?

Kai: I would just like to give a special mention to Moon, Luca, and GK. They have been the ones that helped me from the start and I would like to thank them for the time and effort they've put to guiding my trembling Warden-recruit butt back then.

Quebecshire: Im sure they’ll appreciate it! Thank you for your time, Kai!

Kai: Thank you very much for the interview too, Quebec!