As I've noted in my review when Paragon first launched in Early Access - there is a ton of potential for greatness here, but its unfortunately all hidden by gameplay mechanics so rough they're almost impossible to look past. Back then I wished for a massive update that would rework the combat, the general movement system, and even how many of the heroes function, and as it so happens this is exactly what Epic is currently doing!
Once the Monolith Update makes its way to Paragon on December 6 you'll be able to explore a new and significantly smaller map, as well as toy around with much faster and more action-orientated gameplay. But most importantly, you're probably going to spend a couple of days in utter confusion as every single hero is being updated... every single one!
While Epic hasn't released all of the details for this update just yet, they did take the time to at least explain why and how they are planning to achieve all of this. You can read the full article by heading over to Paragon's website, but if you're feeling particularly lazy here's my brief summary:
• The goal is to make Paragon much faster and more visceral, without losing any of the meta game and strategy that comes with it being a competitive MOBA.
• Travel mode is being removed, and in turn every character now moves a lot faster. The idea is to once again encourage more aggressive play, but also to provide more skilled players a way to juke their opponents and potentially win disadvantaged fights.
• Primary attacks now deal "Basic" damage, while any activatable powers deal "Ability" damage, as such it should be easier to know which items to grab when trying to counter certain enemy heroes.
• "Physical" and "Energy" heroes are no longer a thing. Instead, everyone is now able to equip a unified "Power" stat that increases their "Basic" and "Ability" damage. The idea behind this is to increase the amount of interesting items (aka cards) the team can toy around with, while also keeping the game accessible to all players.
• Cooldown reduction is going away, but don't worry, the heroes that relied on it are being slightly buffed in order to compensate.
• Mana has long since been useless in Paragon, but with the Monolith update its once again going to be an important part of gameplay.
• Instead of using the generic and rather poor "Ranger/Caster/Fighter" hero descriptions, they will now be classified with traits such as: Burst, Assassin, Elusive, Sieger, etc.
• Shadow Pads are going away, and instead we'll be getting giant Fog Walls, quite alike those from Dark Souls. The idea is exactly the same, but these Fog Walls should function in much more organic and interesting ways.
• Once again, there will be massive hero changes coming in with the Monolith Update, but don't worry, the developers won't destroy your favorite playstyles.
And there you have it, a 'brief' version of everything Epic has decided to announce so far. What exactly will be the ramifications of these changes, I have absolutely no idea as they are simply too massive to even comprehend, but I have a feeling they going to be a rather positive thing! So bring on December 6, and hopefully the full, official patch notes in the next couple of days as well!
