Epic Games had a rather eventful year for its free-to-play MOBA Paragon, which is still in Early access on Steam.  It has released 25 heros, has more than 5.7 million players and has shipped 132 updates since March. But there is still more to come this year and the game's executive producer is laying it all out for the fans.

"We’ll be providing regular updates on what’s to come for Paragon, both in the short term and beyond," Epic's John Wasilczyk said in a PlayStation Blog post. That means that you’ll hear about plans that may change, or features and ideas that don’t always ship, but we think that’s better than keeping you in the dark."

He acknowledged up front that the card system is broken and they are currently redesigning it to make it more valuable and easy to use. He added that they are also looking at new game modes, including one for PvP that is quicker and lasts about 20 minutes. Nothing is set in stone yet, but the process is ongoing. He then laid out the following as goals for the coming months:

• Matchmaking system V2: All new from the ground up.
• Lots of balance changes: We know many things need to be improved and we listen intently. Expect continuous improvement and a handful of mistakes along the way.
• Banners: add your signature to every kill with this new system (screenshots and videos coming soon). It’s experimental but we think it’ll be cool.
• New Skins and Skin Variations: We’re giving you even more skins and a new system that will allow players to unlock more variations for almost every skin.
• “Hero Mastery” improvements. More content, more progression, and more rewards for getting Heroes to max level.
• Loot Crates: More loot (with more variety) will be rolling into crates over the next few months. Expect to find some rare banners and skin variations coming soon in crates.
• Hero Reworks: Revisiting old Heroes with new kits and balance.

Wasilczyk said that competitve play is still in the works, but the team doesn't want to rush it. "Games that push ranking, events, and tournaments before the game is actually competitive are missing the point and going through the motions," he said. "Our guiding principle has been to work with you to figure out when Paragon will be ready, and we’re getting there."

Players can expect Competitive Play to be rolled out in stages, with Ranked Mode coming later. Laddered events will eventually become a Paragon Invitational that will include real money rewards.

Epic continues to push the game forward and will be doing more than just relying on word of mouth to bring in new players. "Our goal is to make it much, much bigger over time," Wasilczyk concluded.

The latest hero Aurora was released this week.