General Updates
Special Quests
For the duration of 7.5, you can play one match to unlock the Coldsnap Furia skin previously given away during Hi-Rez promotions. Players that already own Furia will instead receive crystals.
In addition, playing 10 non-practice games of Siege, Team Deathmatch, or Onslaught will grant players an Anniversary Token to purchase a Limited Skin from the Anniversary Store.
New Chest: Voices of the Realm
We’ve added 22 announcer packs to this new chest to make it easier than ever for players to acquire their favorites.
MVP Sale
We’ve made MVPs available for direct purchase!
- Legendary MVPs will cost 100 crystals
- All other MVPs will cost 75 crystals
To celebrate this change, we’re also putting them on sale for 25 less than their new full price for the first 2 weeks of this patch, so from 09/04/24 - 09/18/24, so go ahead and grab your favorites now!:
- Legendaries will cost 75 crystals
- All other MVPs will cost 50 crystals
Event Pass Changes
We’ve heard player complaints about our inaccurate in-game messaging about the Feudal Fables deadline, as well as the initial issues with the Buried Treasure Flashback Pass. These issues were uniquely severe for an Event Pass, and we apologize for their impact on players. As a one-time make-good, we’re doing the following:
- We’ve brought back the Feudal Fables Pass for a limited time so players have the chance to complete it.
- We’ve extended the Buried Treasure Pass by 6 levels, including the following new rewards:
- 1 additional Avatar
- 1 additional Death Stamp
- 1 additional Spray
- 5 Skin Boosters
- 40K Gold
- 1 Paladin’s Accord Chest - this contains the items from the Abyss’s Destruction, Magistrate’s Resolve, & Resistance’s Daring Chests, as well as the following:
- Screech Androxus
- Dasher's Antlers Androxus
- Cangaceiro Androxus
- Old Glory Fernando
- Tough Cookie Fernando
- Parasite Seris
- Frosty Foliage Grover
- Ghoulish Goalie Jenos
- Resplendent Jenos
New Trials Rewards
With another Trials reset, we're bringing back some rewards locked behind older Trials sets featured in the Tidal Surge's Flashback themes. Here's what players can look forward to earning:
- New "Shiver Me Timber" Limited Title
- Sunset Avatar
- Fearless Leader Spray
- Pirateer Avatar
- First Mate Announcer
Event Mode: Reality Warp
Inspired by Siege Remixed & Truly Talented, Reality Warp is an Event Mode where Seris has combined Paladins' past and present into a single timeline, bringing back infamous builds and nostalgic sights. This sandbox is designed specifically to harken back to an era where Champions were overall stronger & there was a heavier emphasis on power plays. Consider it a love letter from us at Evil Mojo not only to the community who has stuck by our side, but also paying respect to all the players and developers who have been involved with Paladins over the years. Basically: we’re playing the hits.
Rules
- All Card Levels are set to 5
- This LTM has a Talent pool mixing the current sandbox with select fan favorite (or infamous) options from the past & recent Truly Talented alumni.
- Alternating Current Torvald (replaces Thanks, Grandpa)
- Architectonics Barik (replaces Forgefire)
- Artful Dodger Maeve (replaces Street Justice)
- Bucking Madness Buck (replaces Bulk Up)
- Celerity Furia (replaces Cherish)
- Defensive Curl Yagorath (replaces Unnatural Persistence)
- Efflorescence Grover (replaces Rampant Blooming)
- Firefight Viktor (replaces Burst Mode)
- Firing Line Khan (replaces Vortex Grip)
- Heads or Tails Saati (replaces Spare Change)
- Illuminated Jenos (replaces Luminary)
- This Talent is a recreation of original Luminary: Allies affected by your Astral Mark deal 15% increased weapon damage.
- Just Breathe Cassie (replaces Impulse)
- Lingering Curse Androxus (replaces Defiant Fist)
- Reign of Terror Drogoz (replaces Combustable)
- Retaliation Zhin (replaces Yomi)
- Sapper Rounds Vivian (replaces Suspect Everyone)
- Scorched Earth Willo (replaces Nightshade)
- Super Smash Ash (replaces Battering Ram)
- Suppression Kinessa (replaces Octopressor)
- The Law Won Lex (replaces Discovery)
- The Void Protects Seris (replaces Infernal Torment)
- Wekono’s Curse Mal’Damba (replaces Wekono’s Wrath)
- Wrath of the Stagalla Inara (replaces Tremors)
Map Pool
When selecting maps for this Event, we wanted to focus on our legacy as well as maps that have stood the test of time as players' favorites to compete on. While this Event is mainly meant for fun, we wanted to put an emphasis on maps that play well at all levels of play while also including 2 of the Alpha options. Balancing this list was quite difficult, so we’ll be listening to player feedback as well!
- Temple Ruins
- Enchanted Forest
- Serpent Beach
- Stone Keep (Classic)
- Brightmarsh
- Splitstone Quarry
Dark Tides: Champion Difficulty
While we continue to work on performance & future iterations of Wave Defense, we wanted to offer an experience for those looking for a harder challenge in the mode. For select weekends throughout this update, Wave Defense will return as Dark Tides: Champion Difficulty. This version includes harder bots with more tools in their arsenal, a quicker ramp up in opponent strength, and the return of Death Speakers: one of Dark Tides' original bosses. Players who defeat this version during this patch will be rewarded with the Limited Title Champion of the Tides to distinguish their accomplishment in preventing an Abyssal Rift.
New TDM Map: Dragon’s Call
Speaking of updates to modes, Dragon’s Call has slowly been given some work & will be added to Customs as a traditional shooter team deathmatch map. What does that mean? Unlike other Paladins TDM maps, this map still features set spawns to encourage teams to work together to take space control & have to coordinate to avoid getting locked down. It’s experimental, but we thought we’d let players be the judge of how fun it is while we continue to improve it before adding it to TDM proper.
Returning Map: Trade District (Classic)
After the Classic Maps LTM, we heard a lot of players call out for us to look into restoring other older maps. Trade District felt like an important return, both to mirror Stone Keep once more as well as bring the Classic Map love to non-Siege modes! Both the TDM and KOTH versions of the map will be available in queues and Customs starting in this update!
Map Updates: Frog Isle and Stone Keep
In addition to the excitement of returning maps, we wanted to take some time and clean up some of our current maps. This includes investigations into what causes “heavy walls” in Paladins to allow for their removal, making certain play spaces feel more fluid, and overall improving the experiences players have when interacting with maps. Our first ventures were into Stone Keep (Day & Night) as well as Frog Isle, and we hope to continue improving our maps!
Stone Keep (Day + Night)
- Cleaned up collision around lampposts. This includes slightly reworking the collision volumes around the lampposts as well as lowering the player-blocking volumes above the lampposts to allow for more fluid navigation.
- Removed a heavy wall on the sides of the Cathedral near the second-floor bridge.
- Removed player collision on several fish downspouts around the map to reduce frustration with getting stuck on them while navigating around the map.
- Removed tall invisible collision on top of the wall in the back alley at Curve. This wall is now considered valid, base-able ground.
Frog Isle
- Added small steps behind the Frogs on the Payload push path. This prevents players from getting stuck under the Frogs in multiple circumstances, and allows for players to get on top of the Frogs more easily.
- Removed heavy walls on the broken pillars near the drop-down towards the mid-point. These pillars are now considered valid, base-able ground, sharing that property with the walls next to them.
Daily Quest Completion Streak
Our Quest system has taken a small backseat due to Trials' return, but now is time to revisit the system & help it feel more impactful and engaging for players who chose to log in every day. We’re greatly increasing the amount of XP and Gold you can gain from streaks to reward those who stay on track and allow a deterministic path to currency rewards.
- Increased 7 Day Rewards
- 20,835 ➡️ 120,000 Event Pass XP
- 145 Gold ➡️ 750 Gold
New Mastery Titles
Players have often asked for more rewards to earn through Champion Mastery & the team has been exploring various ways to add to what can be earned by each Champion. This update, 16 select Champions are getting additional italicized Mastery Titles for players who reach Level 100 on that Champion. We hope to expand these to eventually cover the full roster & add more styles over time!
- Ash
- Slayer of the Fallen
Map Pool Rotations
Casual Map Pool
- Siege
- Stone Keep (Day) has been replaced by Stone Keep (Classic). Its rate of appearance has been increased.
Ranked Map Pool
We waited to rotate maps for Ranked Split 2 in order to collect a bit more data on map-specific stats and popularity. This rotation is planned to persist until Split 3, which will be the final Split of Season 7 of Ranked in October.
High Frequency Maps
- Brightmarsh
- Jaguar Falls
- Splitstone Quarry
Normal Frequency Maps
- Ascension Peak
- Bazaar
- Frog Isle
- Ice Mines
- Serpent Beach
- Stone Keep
- Night has double the odds of Day, but both combined is equal to one of the other maps.
Limited Time Modes
This update, Wave Defense: Champion Difficulty will be featured 2 weekends over the course of the update in order to allow anyone who wants multiple chances to try for the Title. Reality Warp will also be featured 3 weekends in order to allow players who only play on weekends access to the mode. Finally, the other 2 weekends will host other Casual modes we don’t get to keep available often!
- Reality Warp (September 6th - September 9th)
- Wave Defense: Champion Difficulty (September 13th - September 16th)
- King of the Hill (September 20th - September 23rd)
- Reality Warp (September 27th - September 30th)
- Capture the Flag (October 4th - October 7th)
- Wave Defense: Champion Difficulty (October 11th - 14th)
- Reality Warp (October 18th - 21st)
Balance
General
Anti Healing
- Increased scaling speed in Siege from 50s to 40s.
- Increased scaling speed in Onslaught from 40s to 30s.
- Increased scaling speed in KOTH from 45s to 30s.
- Increased scaling speed in TDM from 30s to 25s.
Anti-Healing Scaling has long been a point of feedback from experienced players as something that should be quickened in order to reduce frustrations around healing in the early & mid-game. These changes are directly aimed at that feedback; however we’re closely watching the effects on the average lobby and players less intensely focused on this mechanic.
Bot Behavior
- All bots in the game now utilize more logic, with bots replacing players who have disconnected given additional difficulty.
- This includes a tendency to stick with their teammates, reposition when low health, and chase low-health targets.
We’ve been investigating how to improve our bot’s behavior and logic in various scenarios, this specific update is aimed to ease frustrations around when a player leaves the match & a bot takes over their place. As a reminder, please report any malicious AFK behavior at the end of the match to help us cut down on rampant leavers, but this change should help along the way!
Champions
Cassie
Ability
- Blast Shot
- Poison duration reduced from 3s ➡️ 2s
- Poison strength reduced from 10 ➡️ 8%
The original buff to Blast Shot overperformed, so we’re bringing it down a bit in both strength and duration. We’re keen on Cassie keeping this additional utility to enhance her moment-to-moment decision making during a match, but we’ll continue to keep a watchful eye on her power level.
Jenos
Ability
- Astral Mark
- Duration increased from 12s ➡️ 13s
- Cooldown reduced from 6s ➡️ 5s
Jenos has been lagging behind other Supports for a minute now, so we want to give him some basic but effective buffs to Astral Mark to help boost him back up. This also has the side effect of buffing his Astral Mark Cards, so its a win-win for our resident ascended monk.
Kinessa
Weapon
- Carbine Rifle
- Damage reduced from 215 ➡️ 200
- Fire rate increased from .19s ➡️ .17s
Ability
- Oppressor Mine
- Decreased Slow strength from 15% ➡️ 12.5%
While Kinessa’s refresh hit a lot of notes we were hoping for, her strength and utility has come in a bit more overtuned than we intended. We want to take a look at a few more problematic chunks of her kit (e.g. Oppressor Mines & moving away from a Talent for them) so these changes are intended as a continued effort of adjusting her to keep a lot of what players have loved about her changes while ensuring the frustration currently felt is lessened over time.
Lex
Talent
- Heroism
- Decreased Combat Slide cooldown from 8s ➡️ 7s
Heroism has been left in a weakened state for a while, and we want to slowly bring it back to relevancy without trivializing Lex’s other options. Shaving a second off the cooldown penalty feels right as a first step to letting the Hand of Justice improve at his duty.
Makoa
Ultimate
- Ancient Rage
- Collision growth reduced from 50 ➡️ 25%
Cards
- Barrier Reef
- Trigger value reduced from 1000 ➡️ 900 damage
Similarly to Jenos, Makoa has been struggling in his category to make a splash, but we’re trying something a little different for him. Before we get to the buffs though, we’re currently still investigating Ancient Rage’s collision issues. The theming behind it is strong enough to us that we feel its worth to keep for now, but we’re reducing the total size growth of his collision to prevent some instances of the stuck-in-place bug. We’ll be continuing to investigate this and searching for a fix. That being said, buffs! Makoa’s been on the weaker side of Frontlines lately (consistently in the bottom 3 in terms of winrate) so we took the kitchen sink approach for him today as we continue to work on his core issues. We’ve buffed a majority of his cards to give him more freedom of loadout while also increasing his overall loadout power to give players more options to optimize their turtle power. Most significantly, we’ve adjusted Sea Legs and Harden to always activate even if Dredge Anchor misses, greatly boosting Makoa’s average durability. Even if his durability is challenged, the reworked Ebb and Flow means Makoa can always try spinning to solve his problems and get out of sticky situations (or initiate some crazy dives if he’s got Ancient Rage), either way Makoa will be able to duke it out in the frontlines much more effectively.
Moji
Abilities
- Spit
- Now heals allies for 300 HP on hit at base
Talents
- Spit Shine
- Reworked to grant 10% bonus move speed to all allies in range of a max Magic Mark detonation. Lasts 4s, stacking 3 times, with each stack falling off individually.
We’ve been hearing frustrations surrounding Moji - and her data supports it - so we’re knocking some of her stats down as well as giving her a little quality of life change. We’re moving Spit Shine’s Healing into base as a reduced value so that Jubilation / Realm Runner can have more space to shine at Talent Selection, since Mojis tended to overwhelmingly lean towards Spit Shine to support their team while staying safe. To compensate for this increased consistency, as well as to bring her stats more in line with what we’re comfortable with, we’re reducing the size of Magic Mark and the Healing from Sparkle. With these changes Moji will have to be more aware of her team at any given moment to maximize her Magic Mark’s value, while also requiring more situational awareness to maximize her reduced healing against Anti-Healing. Finally, with Spit Shine moving into base, we’re revamping it to instead give allies movement speed on mark detonation. This’ll let Moji facilitate aggressive team wide pushes or escape from danger if she’s able to properly manage the marks range.
Pip
Talents
- Combat Medic
- Increased fire rate bonus from 10% ➡️ 15%
Combat Medic has slipped behind Pip’s other Talents in selection and viability, mainly due to being in a tough spot compared to the flexibility of Mega Potion and Catalyst. We’re giving Combat Medic’s fire rate increase a bit more strength to make it feel a bit more compelling and give Pip more DPS/HPS potential when using Potion Launcher.
Seris
Cards
- Blood Pact
- Reworked to “Heal for 105|105 over 1.5s after casting Restore Soul”
Similar to Mal’Damba’s changes to his cards to accommodate his burst healing, we’re adjusting Seris' two channeled heal cards to now work with Forsake. Blood Pact is staying similar in power level and function, while Spirit Leech is seeing its numbers brought down slightly to leave a bit more value in putting the card at a higher level. We plan to continue to watch Forsake and Internal Torment’s performance to look for improvements, while keeping in mind the benefits of the older Talent set and considering them as needed.
Strix
Weapon
- Pistol
- Now generates 3 stealth energy per hit
Abilities
- Stealth
- Now grants 20% movement speed bonus while in stealth
- Stealth energy cost per second reduced from 12 ➡️ 8
Ultimate
- Flashbang
- Now turns players' screens a dark grey instead of bright white.
Cards
- Stalker
- Reworked to instead heal for 15|15 every 1s while in stealth
Talents
- Crack Shot
- Increased Talon Rifle damage from 900 ➡️ 950
- Removed Burn effect
- Pistol now gains perfect accuracy
- Now reduces Pistol's fire rate by 40%
- .15s ➡️ .21s
Hot off the heels of Kinessa, we wanted to take a shot at one of our other notorious snipers. Strix faced a fair amount of issues, and with these changes we’ve tackled quite a few of his pain points while we continue to work on making Strix the best (and still enjoyable to fight) sniper he can be. We’ve added stealth energy generation into his pistol at base, giving more merit to swapping weapons to keep invisibility available. This will probably be one of the biggest changes feel-wise, since getting caught doesn’t mean there isn’t a chance anymore - landing enough shots opens up a chance to sneak away just in time. Speaking of stealth, we’ve incorporated a bit of Nocturnal into base, making stealth overall better for all Talents on Strix, since Nocturnal had a strangle hold on his selection rates. Now Nocturnal allows Strix to stay in stealth indefinitely as long as is standing still, letting him line up the perfect shot or narrowly dodge a scouting Flanker. The stranglehold wasn’t just apparent in his Talent selection, Guerrilla Tactics also had a lion’s share of his loadout points on average. We’ve spread the power out a bit not only through his pistol change but by also updating Roost into an energy generation supplement while taking some of that generation away from Guerrilla Tactics. This requires the card to have more investment to get the same bang for your buck as before, but still keeping it in a powerful place with how much energy you get out of it. With more opportunities for stealth through duration and generation, we wanted to give all of Strix’s Talents some love to utilize said stealth. We’ve shifted Unauthorized Use into a more utility role, retaining its damage identity but also providing a powerful debuff that Strix and his team can capitalize on for aggressive plays. We’ve also moved Crack Shot’s stats around, giving his pistol perfect accuracy at the cost of fire rate, putting both his weapons into a new playstyle with one Talent selection and pushing Strix into a much more skirmisher oriented role. There are a lot of game-feel changes to Strix that we can’t wait for you all to experiment with as we continue to work on our notorious snipers. Don’t worry though, all the extra Strixs running around doesn’t mean you’ll need to turn down your brightness. Flashbang now turns your screen gray instead of white. Hurray for eye health (remember to blink often)!
Yagorath
General
- Added new Crit Spots to Yagorath on her Tail.
- Her default skins shows these Crit spots glowing alongside her mouth.
Abilities
- Acceleration
- Removed initial wait time for momentum, added a staggered speed curve
- Yagorath will go from 0 to 100% speed over .5s, then reach 200% after another .5s
Ultimate
- Devour
- Increased pull speed from 350 ➡️ 390
Cards
- Ancient Wounds
- Reduced scaling from 2|2% ➡️ 1.5|1.5%
Yagorath has continued to be one of the most polarizing designs and disruptors of game flow, and the team has taken many swings at trying to balance her viability with her enjoyment to play and fight against. The goal of these changes is simple on paper but difficult to deliver: shift Yagorath to feel more engrained with traditional Paladins gameplay. This starts with how she feels to play, from her movement to her vulnerabilities. We’ve smoothed her movement in Travel Form to make her feel more responsive and fun to roll around as, while also slightly reducing the penalty for hitting her Crit Spots. We say Crit Spots because we’ve also brought back a discarded idea from her original design: multiple Crit Spots! Now, if you shoot Yagorath in her tail, it will also count as a Critical hit and deal double damage. This was done in order to allow more counterplay between her and opponents, as well as reinforce her fantasy of being a boss-style character by asking players to do something unique to counter her. Meanwhile, Acceleration has acted as a major crutch when it comes to her ability to poke and relocate from backlines to her team, so with the base improvements to her movement we wanted to shift this ability to a more skillful tool. On activation, she now reaches her base speed over .5s before rolling out at the abilities' enhanced pace. This is intended to allow players to punish her for using it as an escape in moments where she's not careful, so we’ve given it small buff to make it feel better to use frequently and to get from spawn to objective. Hardening also leans into the idea of Yagorath playing around her team more, with the Acid Pool she gains on Corrosive Acid now base kit with an added new effect: providing DR to teammates standing within her pool. Yagorath’s design lacks a lot of tools for her to maintain point presence, but now she has some tricks to help her team survive by her side and make a play for control. Piercing Quills and Caustic Acid have always had a strained relationship, both being limited resource abilities that players tend to spam. We wanted to help make Quills in particular feel a bit more distinct, so we’re removing all the resource capping and instead giving it a simple cooldown between shots. This allows players to focus on Acid management better as well as makes for a more engaging tool to use at range, especially if done to help hold an objective or finish off an escaping kill in off-lanes. These changes also meant we had to adjust various Yagorath cards slightly down to account for the increased uptime, including a rework to Futile Efforts. Devour is also seeing a speed buff on how quickly she pulls people close to compensate for the changes to her survivability. All in all, these adjustments to her kit are meant to make her feel more fun to play as well as more manageable to fight against.
Bug Fixes
General
- Fixed an issue where some Talents were not available to all players in Truly Talented.
- Fixed an issue where some skins were improperly ordered due to mismatching exclusivity and rarity settings.
- This involved raising the rarity of various skins to match their Limited, Unlimited, or quality statuses.