Gems of War (All Platforms) 7.4 Update: Pillars of Light (2024 March 5)

Monoliths

We have added the first expansion for the new PvP system, Monoliths. Monoliths are PvE battles that provide buffs to your team when fighting PvP Battles. Learn more about them below.

Monoliths

• All Regions have Monoliths, however, the number of Monoliths will be related to which ring the Region belongs to:
  • Center Ring: 3 Monoliths
  • Inner Ring: 4 Monoliths
  • Outer Ring: 5 Monoliths
• Each Monolith gives a buff that applies to all Regions in PvP
• Winning a battle in a Monolith will unlock its Buff which applies for 1 hour.
• Winning further battles within a Monolith will increase the effect of the buff and give an additional 1 hour to the duration.
• If a Monolith’s duration reaches 0, then the Monolith will reset and players will need to win the first battle again to activate it.

Monolith Battles

• Players can fight up to 5 Battles in a single Monolith.
• This means there are 5 levels of power for the Monolith’s PvP buff.
• Monolith Battles require Monolith Sigils, which can be gained from purchasing the Monolith Sigil Bundle from the PvP Shop or defeating Valhawks in PvP Battles (see below for more info about Valhawks).
• While there is a cap on the amount of Monolith Sigils that players can earn from Valhawks of 6 per day, there is no cap on the number of Monolith Sigil Bundles that can be purchased.
• Each Monolith Battle has a “Boss Enemy” that will appear in every battle
  • This Boss Troop will appear in the Monolith’s menu
• Enemy teams will be built of predefined team restrictions that fit the theme of the Boss or Monolith.
• Players will need to fight battles using the Region’s current team restrictions
• After winning battles 3 and 5, players will also receive some copies of a new Talisman – the Victory Talisman.

Valhawk

• Players can only encounter the Valhawk in PvP Battles (no matter the Region).
• Players have a 20% chance of encountering a Valhawk in a battle.
• Valhawk can be defeated up to 3 times per day.
  • It will not count toward the daily limit if the Valhawk runs away or the player loses the battle.
  • Once the Valhawk has been successfully defeated 3 times, it will no longer appear in PvP Battles that day.
• Winning a battle against a Valhawk will give 2 Monolith Sigils.
  • Valhawks will only give Monolith Sigils if the player is victorious
• Monolith Sigils do not reset at the end of the week.
• The Valhawk will be available as a troop from the Vault after the weekly reset.

Victory Talisman

• As mentioned, Players can earn Victory Talismans from Monolith Battles 3 and 5
• When used, Victory Talismans will double any Victory Points earned from that Battle (+100% Victory Points)
• If the Victory Talisman is used in a Blood Frenzy Region (more on Blood Frenzy Below), the bonus will be additive
  • (so it’s a x3 bonus not x4 as 100% Regular Amount + 100% Blood Frenzy + 100% Victory Talisman)

Monolith Buff Menu

• On the World Map, the Buff button will display how many Monolith buffs are currently active.
• Players can use the Monolith Buff menu to see how many Valhawk Encounters they have left for that day.
• The Monolith Buff Menu will display Monolith Buffs in a set order in the list:
  • Active Buffs – These are all the Monolith Buffs currently active, and they will display their current progress, effect, and how much time remaining for that Buff.
  • Available Buffs – Monoliths that are available to play battles to activate them.
  • Locked Buffs – These are Regions which the player doesn’t have access to yet.
• Players can select a Monolith Buff in the list to be taken to that Monolith’s menu to play a battle there if they wish.
  • If a player doesn’t have a Region unlocked the Region’s Monoliths cannot be selected to shortcut to them.

Blood Frenzy
Blood Frenzy is a new feature of PvP that will apply to 2 Regions daily, making the battles harder but giving increased rewards.

• Blood Frenzy applies in 2 Regions each day
  • While it should mostly be different Regions each day but sometimes a Region may experience 2 days in a row
• Blood Frenzy will never apply in Central Spire
• Blood Frenzy changes Regions with the Daily reset
• The Regions chosen will be the same for all players
• Blood Frenzy will increase the skill points of opponent teams by 50%
• Winning battles in a Blood Frenzy Region will give double Victory Points (+100% bonus), and double Silver Marks if the Blood Frenzy Region has the Region Bonus active in it.
• Blood Frenzy Regions will be easy to identify on the PvP World Map by the Red Crystals that will appear beside the Region’s name when it is affected.

PVP Improvements

We have made a few improvements to PvP

• Players can now view the Region Bonus tracker from the Quick Battle menu. So they no longer need to return to the Region Menu to see their current progress for the Region Bonus.
• When players earn the Silver Marks from a Region Bonus they will see an animation popup celebrating this as they return to the Quick Battle menu (in case they missed seeing the Silver Marks in the Victory menu).
• PvP Pets in the PvP Shop will now sort Silver Marks Pets before Gold Mark Pets in the list.

Achievements

We have 2 new Achievements for this update:

• A Monumental Achievement: Win a Monolith Battle.
• Put me on a Pedestal: Complete all Battles in a Monolith.

Note: The new achievements will become available for Xbox players later on

General

• We have added a new Heroic Gem for a future Campaign
• We have added a help button to the Event Headstart offer menu so players can view the Shiny Troop’s card before the troop releases.
• We have made some improvements to the navigation of the World Map.
• We have updated the Kingdom Slayer Weapon offer to match the new visual style of the game.
• In shop menus, players can now tap on the resource in the top right corner to view the resources popup help.
• We have added some darkness behind the locks on the Path Menu, to help make it easier to see what rewards are locked and cannot be collected.
• We have adjusted all the Buttons in the Top Left corners of menus so they should be consistent in size
• We have adjusted the Headings of each menu so they should be consistent in size.
• We have updated all the feature lock banners to match the Underworld-locked message.
• We have set up the XP, Gold, and Soul boosters so they appear the same size and in the same location on the World Map.

Bug Fixes

• We have made additional improvements to PvP to reduce the lag that some players are experiencing.
  • This is in addition to the server improvements we have made after the release of the 7.3 Update.
• We fixed an issue where some players on Xbox and PlayStation were not receiving their purchases correctly.
• We have fixed an issue where Ironhawk and Queen of Sin would cause the game to lock at the end of a battle.
• We have fixed an assortment of visual issues in the UI
  • This includes a fix to the Epic Trials button in the Games menu so that it correctly takes you to the current Kingdom Epic Trials screen.
• We have fixed an assortment of smaller issues.
• On the world map, if you select Games > Epic Trials and then play a Trial battle, collect your rewards, and then select to close the Trials menu, it causes the game to soft lock
  • Fixed in hotfix