Paragon is shaping up nicely and Epic Games have today released another patch, adding a variety of fixes as well as Private Matches. It seems people have wanted them for some time and in this early implementation, we'll finally get our hands on them. Personally, I'm not too fussed about them at this point in time but I can see why players want them. It'll finally allow for competitive, organised matches. On top of that there's various fixes to visual effects, Heroes (notably Gadget is now bug free) as well as a new graphic for Dekker's ultimate ability. 

You can view the full list below.

For this week's update, due for release on Wednesday, April 6, we've turned on a really early version of private matches. This has been one of the most-requested features, so we decided to turn it on even though it's really, really rough.

There are no custom settings or private lobbies. You won't earn XP while playing in private matches.

Here's the process to get into a private match...

1. Gather a party of five.
2. Once party is gathered, the captain presses the gear located in the Gif below.
3. The captain creates a password.
4. The opposing captain gathers a full party of five.
5. The opposing captain presses the gear and enters password.

At that point, the game should start. We are going to make private matches a more robust feature over the coming weeks and months, but this is it at its earliest state.

We'll be addressing movement speed and Travel Mode in upcoming releases. We'll also be releasing a certain fire-wielding duo in the near future. In the meantime, read the rest of the notes below...

RELEASE NOTES - .23

NOTE: Existing replays will not be compatible with this update.

GENERAL CHANGES

• Added early support for Private Matches.
• Added a timer on the reticle for Travel Mode/Shadow Plane.
• Added in-combat movement speed slow to Super & Jungle minions. Speeds currently 50/60/70% of max for Jungle, Lane, and Super Minions respectively. Goal is to make the minions less jumpy in combat so it's easier to hit them when they decide to move.
• Very early support for mouse and keyboard on PS4.
• The escape key now cancels selection. This allows the user to cancel the key selection in the controls menu, and prevents them from binding escape which causes other problems.
• Polish on lighting and post-processing in Agora. Darker areas are more lit.
• Players can no longer cast Travel Mode while falling.
• Fixed an issue where Recall wouldn't start if used while in Travel Mode.
• UPDATE FOR CLARIFICATION: Card XP is now referred to as Card Power.

AI

• Stopped Bots from using friend-support abilities on teammates who are too far away.
• Fixed bots' movement abilities' targeting so that bots don't end up inside rocks.

CARDS

• Honor the Pure. Replaced broken bonus ability with Unique Active: +Shield based on your level to nearby allies. (Cooldown: 120s). Increased cost from 2 to 4.
• Fix for Stasis Gem rapidly jittering.
• Active items that do not consume charges will now not show when it is on cool down.
• Added a delay to prevent Blink Charm from activating before Portal tone was done activating.

REPLAY

• Replays have been renamed to "Watch"
• Added "Paragon TV" tab that shows live-only games.
• Changed "Recent" tab to only show completed games.
• Fix for replay recording continuing after exiting a replay.
• Removed extra whitespace around exported animated GIFs.

UI

• Updated the FX on the Harvester placement pad.
• Adding tooltips to scoreboard header.
• Hero Passives now display in the Main Menu play tab and the abilities section.
• Improved visualization of shared Card Power.
• Fix for in-game FPS counter displaying "0.0."
• New ability tooltip - shows mana cost, cooldown, binding, and icon.
• More style updates on the card tooltips and hero tooltips.
• Updated affinity material to allow specifying the accent color.
  • Updated all places affinities are displayed to use the material.
  • Updated corruption to be dark purple.
• Combined rarity and card type in the card tooltip.
• Max level now displays appropriately in the XP wheel tooltip.
• Removed the confirmation dialog when a team has been found during matchmaking.
• Updated how active items display.
• Updated the Super Minion death FX.

HUD

• Card Power received from teammates now draws lower, in order to be less obtrusive.
• Added visual feedback on Card Power and PlayerXP meters when a level occurs.

AUDIO

• Added water footsteps, water lands, and water jumps for Heroes.
• Added card activation sound.
• Added Hero spawn sound.
• Main Menu music now persists through loading screens.

ALL HEROES

• Added camera lens effect timer to the recall ability to show the casting time to recall.
• Removed Twinblast, Howitzer and Muriel as recommended Heroes.
• Updated lobby animations for Sparrow, Gideon, Grux and Steel.

• Added vocal efforts when attacking, walking, jumping, etc.
• Added new art for the Containment Fence Ability (below).

• FX Polish on Stasis Bomb ability.

• Seek and Destroy projectile radius indicator is now the proper size.
• Fixed a bug when using Sticky Mine that prevented other abilities from being cast until  the mine landed on the ground.
• Fixed a bug causing collision issues after casting Sticky Mine.

• Now listed as a recommended Hero to play in the Hero select screen.
• Added subtle wind and hover audio to Travel Mode. 

• If the Rocket ability is cancelled or replaced by another ability during the targeting state, it will now go on a short cooldown.
• Added new targeting infor into the Rocket ability reticle. It now changes color to "red" when placed over an enemy target.

• Added Kallari vocal efforts when attacking, walking, jumping, etc.
• Fixed a bug where Kallari's Backflip ability would be canceled when targeting with Death Sentence.
• Kallari's passive ability, Marked for Death will now only trigger vision and marking targets while she is still alive.

• Muriel will now drop the Orb Prime if she tries to use her Reversal of Fortune while holding it.
• Fixed a bug with Consecrated Ground ability that temporarily disabled the reticle.
• Fixed a bug with Reversal of Fortune that allowed card activation while flying.

• Added vocal efforts when attacking, walking, jumping, etc.

• Fixed an issue with the Colossal Blow ability where you can start swinging, turn around and hit the player in that new direction.
• Fixed the Challenger Skin textures to display properly.
• Added the cooldown reduction when Colossal Blow is interrupted.
• Shortened the timing window on the Hammer basic attack so that it won't trigger off an inadvertent double click.
• Sped up the activation time for the Colossal Blow ability so that targeting begins immediately after activating the ability. To compensate for the adjustment, the swing animation was slowed a bit.

BUG FIXES

• Fix heroes replaying their spawn in animation when any new team member is found.
• Fix for having recent players, blocked players, etc. showing up for recommended friends on PS4.
• Fixed an issue where enemies shooting shielded players under tower would not take aggro.
• Separating the activation fail message from the cooldown fail message. Activation fail will display a message that says "Ability Not Ready" that happens when it's not cooldown or low energy related.
• Addressed an issue where AI could be killed instantly when they spawn.
• [PS4] Pressing Circle while on Social Panel "Status,' "Settings," or "Add Friend" social tabs does not take the user back to the Friends List.
• Fixed several issue with collision around Agora.
• Fixed a collision issue with Shadow Pads.
• Fixed a bug for targeting now displaying while in the Shadow Plane.