Esport By Dash Spencer

Valorant as an Esport

The in’s and out’s of Valorant Story by Dash Spencer

Your plane landed in Reykjavik, Iceland 1 hour ago and now you’re in your hotel room. You specifically chose this hotel for its WiFi. Instead of going out for dinner, you take out your computer and load into Valorant. This is the start of your week leading up to VCT Masters, the most prestigious event for Valorant.

Valorant is a relatively new game developed by Riot that came out in June of 2020. Even with the game’s young age, Valorant has cemented itself among the top Esports. Valorant, originally known as Project A, takes tactical shooters like Rainbow Six Siege and mixes in Agents with abilities. Valorant is a 5v5 first to 13-round game where you are either on the attackers or defenders. The attackers will try to plant the bomb while the defenders try to defuse the planted spike or eliminate the whole attacker team before the spike is planted. This style of game is not unknown to the Esports scene. One of the largest Esports, CSGO, has a playstyle just like Valorant’s. What separates Valorant from CSGO is Valorant’s use of agents.

Valorant is able to use a mix of abilities and raw aim making the Esports scene even harder to get into. You have to master a certain agent’s abilities and have the raw aim if you want to make it to the top.

In Valorant each player on the team of 5 can pick the agent they want to play before the game starts. Each agent is equipped with their kit of abilities making it important to have variety in your team’s picks. In Valorant there are 4 types of agents, Dualists, Sentinels, Controllers, and Initiators. Duelists are self-sufficient fighters who their team expects, through abilities and skills, to get high eliminations and seek out engagements first. Sentinels are defensive experts who can lock down areas and watch flanks, both on attack and defender rounds. Controllers are experts in slicing up dangerous territory to set their team up for success.Lastlt, Initiators challenge angles by setting up their team to enter contested ground and push defenders away. Valorant’s 18 agents are divided into these categories. Each one shines in different scenarios making it crucial to master as many agents as you can. The most skilled Valorant players are also the most versatile.

In an interview with professional player Ultra, he stated that “In order to win you need to adjust to your teammate’s play styles.”

Team chemistry and effective teamwork are already vital to succeeding in many games. However, Valorant takes this to the extreme. Unlike a lot of games, Valorant is not primarily judged by skill. Each player on a team will play a different role and you need to understand how your teammates play. Certain players will be better at certain things. An example of this is letting your support player push onto the site instead of the duelist. Duelists kits are made for an aggressive

© 2022 Riot Games, Inc. Used With Permission. REYKJAVIK, ICELAND - APRIL 14: Yuma ÒDepÓ Hashimoto of ZETA DIVISION prepares to compete at the VALORANT Masters Bracket Stage on April 14, 2022 in Reykjavik, Iceland. (Photo by Lance Skundrich/Riot Games) playstyle and so having them push first is crucial. Solo Queueing is a prime example of how important teamwork is.

Even if you’re just a casual player any Valorant veteran will tell you not to solo queue. Solo queueing is the act of playing alone instead of with a party. Even though you’re playing by yourself, you still need 5 players per team. This means that you will be on a team with 4 other random people who you don’t know. Communication will be limited, if present at all, when your solo queueing, and winning your games will be much more difficult.

Winning games is already important for casual players, but for professional players, it’s mandatory. Even losing one game can lead to your team being thrown out of the tournament so everyone is always striving to improve. There are many ways to get better at Valorant, these can include aim training and playing scrimmages.

When you play any sport at a professional level you want to know what you are up against before you play against another team. This can consist of watching said team’s past games or even playing a practice game against the previously stated team.

“Every team analyzes their competition’s gameplay so they can look for weak spots.” Said Sean Gares, the 100T coach in a recent interview.

As a professional player, learning how the enemy plays can be extremely beneficial. By understand-

ing how your enemy plays you’ll know how you should be playing. For example, let’s say Jett, one of Valorant’s duelists, always goes to site A. To counter this your team should always have a player near site A to eliminate Jett. By seeing that Jett always goes to site A your team can take advantage of that weakness. Scrimmages are a fantastic way of learning your enemy’s playstyle and finding those weaknesses. Every team needs practice and scrimmages against other teams are a superb way of experiencing what the match will feel like before it even happens.

Another commonly looked over way to get better at Valorant is improving your mental. mental is short for mentality and helps keep you focused on the game. Although mentality might seem unimportant at first, when it comes to Valorant, it’s the exact opposite. Being in a good headspace can help you communicate, stay consistent-whether that has to do with raw aim or game sense-and keeps your emotions in check.

A lot of professional Valorant players are fairly young and now that they’re making a sustainable income they’re leaving home. Most players will move to Texas due to it having the lowest possible ping. To a casual player, a 3ms ping difference couldn’t matter any less. However, TSM, which is one of the top Valorant teams, kicked Wardell from their roster because he didn’t want to move to Texas with the rest of his team. This was an incredibly surprising decision since Wardell is seen as one of the best players in North America. You might think that moving to Texas isn’t something that should be protested especially if the consequences include being kicked. However, The Sentinels player Tyson “TenZ” Ngo said in a recent stream that he chose not to move to Texas because “there’s nothing to do there”. Living in LA, especially for a 20-year-old like Tyson is a great option.

In 2021 the team “Sentinels” won the first VCT Masters without dropping a single game. Now, the second VCT Masters is approaching and brand new talent is on the table. Valorant is only two years old which gives the game, and its esports, a lot of time to mature.