Thorn appears throughout the Shadow of the Mad King Event! Yay!

It is good to see Mad King Thorn appear during the entire event since I don't have to attend during a Holiday that I don't celebrate off of my Computer. Anyone else happy about this?

I'm very happy about it.

I've gotten to do the GW1 Wintersday finale event precisely once, because it only happens on New Years Day and I'm never home or able to spend long on the computer that day. The one year I did get to do it was because all of my plans were ruined and getting to play Guild Wars was literally the only good thing about it and pretty poor compensation for not getting to see any of my family.

Halloween usually isn't as busy for me, so I generally managed to do that finale event at least once. But even so it's much better to have it (and the Wintersday stuff) happening throughout the entire event rather than just on one day.

However, I am concerned about it from a lore perspective. We've been told in both games that Thorn was able to return on Halloween because the barriers between worlds are weakened. In GW1 we were told (admittedly by the Lunatic Court who may well not be a reliable source of information) that Queen Salma ascending the throne broke one of the seals keeping him in the Underworld and over the intervening 250 years the others have weakened which is why he's now able to return for several weeks instead of one day. The Court is hoping that soon he might be able to return for an entire month, and eventually forever - at which point they'll attempt to retake Kryta and potentially all of Tyria. As fun as Halloween is that would obviously be a very bad idea, possibly even worse than Joko gaining control of Elona. And if it does happen our characters, in both games, will have played an integral part in helping it along - once again endangering the world we're supposed to be defending.

It's just not really Guild Wars unless what we do to save everyone also dooms everyone!

Hopefully Thorn's ascendance comes following a reveal of Jennah being one(the other obviously left before Kormir did) of the twin Goddesses known as Lyssa as Balthazar didn't curse her like the other Gods and received her Mirror somehow.

Thorn taking over once we have killed an actual Deity who stole the throne from it's proper ruler would be an interesting event. Since someone would have to claim her power it would probably be Thorn who would use said power to constantly revive his subjects after killing them and feed them Candy Corn and other sweets for all eternity. After we've dealt with Dhuum of course.

Palawa Joko's reign seems merely egotistical and non threatening in comparison to Thorn's cruelty though I'm quite certain Kryta can become used to Thorn's constantly killing and reviving his subjects and turning them into some creature just as well as the Elonians can handle Joko threatening to exile them to the Elon Riverlands and turning them into Undead(which is treated as an honor).

If Palawa Joko dies then Thorn will take his territory as well and likely keep Joko's "turn Elonians that please him into Awakened" reward.

All that's needed to complete the set is to draw both Castle Thorn and the Realm of Torment into Tyria itself(Castle Thorn would be taking the place of Jennah's palace and the Upper City)!

Hopefully(for the fans that do celebrate the Holiday's sakes) his majesty keeps the Mad Realm reserved for the Holiday Season or there would be no reason to celebrate it.

The rise of Madness is upon us!