This year, Santa came back, dropping presents like usual. This was a good way for even newer players to obtain decent to rare items. I personally enjoyed chasing him around and trying my luck to see if I could collect something interesting. Kudos to Tig for Christmas this year as quite a few players were lucky enough to get something they have not had.
We were also given the Q1 updates, and I may say this made a good turning point for mages with the wand updates with this. It gives special wands a good reason to try to obtain them.
The party system that was also released with Q1 was most likely my favorite. It helps you keep track of your party member's HP, SP, and Grace points. You can even click there name to select them to target them, or right click to see their profile, follow them, or remove them. This makes leveling together much more easier.
This was probably the best Christmas on GK in my opinion