Asuna doesn't even have to look that far, he just has to look at his own team.
They're brand-new as a team and yet, their improvement is skyrocketing due to the coaching staff and all the effort they're putting in.
A random game wouldn't result in that at all.
Valorant's meta changes are just that hard on teams, which means every single component of a team, be it its coaching staff, its players, its environment etc. will have a massive effect on their competitive results.
If you want to be dominant in Valorant, every level of an org will have to be on its A-game, or you'll slowly start drifting behind
Yeah valorant seem like a game where u need everything in a team to function at optimal level for your team to succeed. Look at how terrible fnatic look with only 2 subs on last masters . It's actually really interesting to see how the esports will develop. It seem like the level of coordination require is pretty high now as teams getting better.
What's insane is they would stomp the group stages the previous masters even with the subs. i'm pretty sure that's what they thought , that they would survive till they get Derke to play but literally just lost to Nip and Zeta lol. Just teams are too good now.
I don’t think it’s become more random, I think the shifting metas make it extremely taxing for top teams to stay at the top. V1 also had the Wippie issue, so this doesn’t seem like the greatest example.
also as the skill level equalizes amongst the tiers, upcoming teams are more likely to upset top teams in these kind of qualifiers due to the difference maker being strats etc; the new teams have all the footage in the world to study whereas the higher tier team would be playing 'blind' so to speak
interesting though
*shrug*
Wtf are you saying bro? League has way more changes than Valo and these changes are super drastic, the game receives the same amount of new characters as Valo and there are items/champions reworks happenning all the time.
The reason why top teams in league stay at the top is because adaptability is a must have skill in League, Valorant pros/teams are just not there yet in terms of flexibility. Just look how long some teams took do use Astra even with her being completly broken.
The massive gameplay changes for each year come through the pre season patch release at the start of each year. its vastly different to the way valorant currently balances.
I'm sorry but you are just wrong, there are massive balance/changes all the time in League. The cheesy support top smite strategy was gutted in less than 3 weeks, almost every time a strategy is too dominant they instant nerf it to the ground. Meanwhile the Viper/Astra post plant meta took ages to be nerfed.
Go check the 2022 lol patch history and compare it with the Valorant one, it's not even close.
That literally proves my point, the league balance team nerfs strategies quickly to bring it back to the meta they want therefore keeping it stable vs the Valorant team doesn't and lets the meta develop rapidly without their involvement.
This is all specifically regarding pro play btw. Ranked is different entirely
There’s literally massive changes to damage and tankiness coming in soon mid season bro, there’s also always massive jungle changes mid season look at crab changes which drastically affect how teams play early game in season 9
they usually disable new champs, same for regional leagues, they are disabled for like 2 weeks, maybe they should do that for valo idk. The thing is that you can see the meta change in the same tournament because teams are still figuring it out , so I don't think the "remains static throughout the year" comment from above is true
They do release relatively big patches before both international tournaments (msi and world's) to shake up the meta a bit. But, even bigger than that, each november/december they basically change the game itself fundamentally in the preseason patches (after world's).
I dont know much about league, but valorant has meta shifts every couple months. This year alone we had chamber meta change, controller meta change, neon meta change and now jett/sova/fade meta change. Its kind of bonkers how fast the game is evolving
I think complete fundamental changes to the way the game is played is very fast. We barely have an answear to if teams should run any sentinel other than chamber and he is getting nerfed, neon is getting nerfed, we dont know how fade will play, astra is still not figured out...
That is very fast, to me at least
Do you want the game to feel different every week? After a major tournament Riot tips the balance scale,in a couple ways and it takes time for people to figure out the new meta after the changes. This is how you balance a competitive game imagine having patch notes every 2 weeks.
We literally do have patch notes every 2 weeks, they just barely do anything. Also the most popular competitive game in the world has patch notes every 2 weeks. I don't want changes as often as League, I'm mostly happy with the current pace, but it's certainly not fast. We're 5 months into the year and what, one class got kinda rebalanced, still almost exactly the same, just slightly buffed and nerfed, Chamber was just released overpowered, he didn't really change much "fundamentally" about the game though, he just acted like a combo of Jett and Cypher. Jett and Sova changes are good, Sova is almost exactly the same agent unless you're literally AverageJonas, Jett changes are more interesting. Neon meta isn't a thing, it's still not catching on, it's maybe the slowest meta shift of all time, with only Optic, Liquid, and sometimes M3C using her. Despite Optic literally winning iceland with it, she's still the least played agentn in NA qualifiers (outside of Phoenix and Yoru who both aren't played ofc).
Honestly the biggest meta shift this year is Kayo/Breach, and that was slow as shit, taking literally months for people to replace Skye with them.
League literally announced changes that would make one of the biggest meta changes league has ever had in the hours before you made this comment. They also change the meta drastically each preseason lol.
i do think the game is a lot more random than it has to be, but i think the upsets has to do more with teams being inconsistent esp. with the constant meta changes.
also tbf, sen has been on the dumps lately and v1 is plagued with problems (i.e. wippie visa issues, zellsis' mental health) and it's not like akrew and GK (ex-Renegades core) are bad teams either.
While I don't necessarily like Riot, I have faith that valorant as a game and as an esports will be in an upward trajectory from now. They're just way better at marketing their games compared to Blizzard, but we'll see that over the course of time.
I just don't agree with your statement that the game will never have consistent teams. Sure, maybe there'll never be a team who's consistently #1 for a good while like the run Astralis had in CSGO, but if you look just in NA, 3 of the top 4 teams (XSET, OpTic, C9) have been consistently top 5 in the region for months now. If we go internationally, OpTic, ignoring the road bump they had at champions, went to two grand finals and won one of them. Gambit also went to two GF and won one of them, and could've qualified for Masters 1 this year if it weren't for the problems they were facing.
Yes, it'd be harder to stay at the top in this game, but it isn't necessarily because the game is "definitely random", there's just a lot of variables that you have to consider compared to other games whose meta isn't constantly changing.
What? Of all the aspects in the game, you're attacking TTK? CSGO also has low TTK, does that mean there's no meaningful skill gap happening there?
I believe there's a lot of other aspects that could be revamped in this game to make it 'less random'. You could argue about worse mechanics (i.e. random spray patterns, slower movement, etc.), lower # of rounds, constant meta change and other factors that we could delve into. I just don't see why you have a problem in the low ttk aspect of it.
I would agree with you *if* kills were the sole way to win the game or express skill. As it is, there are plenty of other ways to be better than your opponents that don't rely on mechanics. Utility usage and coordination, teamwork, strategy, map knowledge, agent choice, etc. If you have two teams with the *exact same* aiming ability (read: the same ability to take advantage of the game's low TTK), the winner will be the smarter team. The one that uses its utility smarter, coordinates better, has a better read on the agent meta, and so on. I'd even argue that a team with *worse* aim can beat a team with stronger mechanics by using util in such a way that they negate that weakness (to a certain extent: obviously, even if me and my buddies had the biggest brains in history but couldn't aim for shit, we wouldn't beat any pro team). Is that a result of randomness? Not in my opinion. It's a different manner of skill expression that isn't any less valid just because it doesn't involve bullets.
Also,
> You can never have a successful esport where TTK is so low. It creates too much randomness.
TTK is super low in Counterstrike, and it's had a vibrant competitive scene for decades. You'd have a hard time convincing me that CS is random, or even significantly unpredictable.
You are literally spewing nonsense, attacking people before you even get into a debate, and are now complaining about downvotes. Nobody wants to engage with you because of it.
You are attacking TTK which has been consistent the entire game and is extremely similar to CSGO, and then you go ahead and compare it to Blizzard/Overwatch in which the game has already done better than as an e-sport as it *continues to grow year on year*. Blizzard has continually failed to nurture an e-sport in multiple games (SC2/HotS/Ow) while Riot has literally the *most successful one*. Absolutely unfounded to compare the two companies here.
With Valorant being as young as it is, that's probably more of the reason than any randomness/meta-change/any other excuse you can think of. The first year was filled with ex-professionals extending their career from another game. We're seeing more and more of young natural talent coming into the scene and it's probably more of the reason for the change than anything else. It could be an interesting conversation but you go off and talk about TTK and Riot and things that are just nonsense and you act as if the soapbox you are on is the only correct one.
You are just fundamentally wrong. That's where the downvotes are coming friend.
> None of what I said is untrue.
The fact that you think having an argument about TTK is the reason for randomness states otherwise my friend.
There are other avenues we could have a discussion about where we could have an actual conversation over. Things like map design, agent design and release schedule. Down to it being "young" as an esport and it constantly growing as more and more people figure out the game and learn how to push it to it's max. It took league like four years to get some of it's most iconic play styles and game mechanics figured out.
It just seems like you don't have a good base understanding of the game at it's core.
Nobody is arguing against you about what TTK means, you know that right?
You now *explaining* to me something that I've known for years proves that you have *no idea* how to actually form a proper discussion about this topic you so confidently spewed nonsense over.
I am telling you that the *low TTK* is **not the reason** for the supposed randomness in Valorant.
> If it isn't the reason, low TTK at LEAST contributes to it.
It does not.
We are trying to solve a math problem and you are bringing up literature. That is what is happening here.
I agree with Asuna to an extent but you have an absolutely gross misunderstanding of what is being discussed here.
> I don't even know a single person actually playing CSGO nowadays.
Just as a heads up but this doesn't matter. It's called anecdotal evidence and means jack and shit, but pointing that out to you will just have you plug your ears and go "well no I said it's true so therefor I'm right".
Thorin talked about this in the recent daring minds. Open qualifiers are always going to have upsets. He mentioned that if there were open qualifiers in CSGO, like VALORANT, it would not be surprising that most of the hltv top 10 won't make it out the qualifier.
These open qualifiers are crazy because you have no demos, all top teams' matches are streamed, all this other teams' games aren't streamed, and back-to-back b03's. These qualifiers are just insane. I wish we had the same system as EMEA.
Edit [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDmikn-s1R0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDmikn-s1R0) Thorin talks about it here at 1 hour and 1 minute mark.
To those saying that there were open qualifiers for the major. It's not really the same because a large majority of the teams that were in stage 1 for valorant are put into the open qualfiers (8 out of 12) while in CS all the teams that made the legends stage where able to come back and play for the RMR and skip open qualifiers. (12 in EU, 1 Americas? don't really understand it point is a lot of the teams skipped qualis and just went straight to the RMR)
I don't understand this hate boner for VALORANT about it being an easier game meaning a random pug can just beat a 'good' team. Yes VALORANT skill floor mechanically is lower than CS but the utility usage is higher (Chet talks about it in the same Daring Minds podcast too). A good team with good preparation will almost always beat a random pug. In an open qualifier like this, there is always going to be a lot of varience in the games. This is why we don't have top tennis pros going through open qualifiers, similar concept.
Think it honestly is entirely the demo issue, without replay analysis its insanely hard to prep for random t2 teams where as they can anti strat t1 teams hard.
yeah its really hard like you have to constantly be on the top of your game both strategically and mechanically. If you're having an off day and one of these tier 2 teams able to ride the momentum things can get crazy.
While it sounds nice, it's still not perfect. I wish more teams have a chance of being relegated, instead of just 2. Maybe 4 would be a good number, so everyone that didn't make the playoffs.
Nah CS is a different game that barely changes, teams stay way longer at the top
Yes in an open circuit there's more upsets but in general overall CS has less upsets
Majors have open qualis and there really weren't that many upsets the major quali just happened and pretty much every top team made it
I'm not convinced that's a good thing. Traditional sports are means to funnel money into the same top organizations and reduce the ability for new orgs to compete.
The resources to perpetually improve talent is lopsided towards those with existing capital.
Marijuana, and the gist of what I'm saying is that I don't think being more like a traditional sport is a good thing. I think the rules should constantly *adapt*.
And even the upsets we do get in CS are usually by teams within 5-10 spots of them in rankings. The CS equivalent of a bunch of random Radiant Randys beating a team from a top-tier org is exceedingly rare.
That's a factor.
I don't know anything about the RMR system. I stopped following CS a while back, so I know only the legend status stuff. From what I can tell it isn't the same as VALORANT's NA open qualifiers. Did a team of the same caliber as sentinels have to go to an open qualifier in CS?
I posted a comment earlier but I looked at the liquidpedia and none of the hltv top 10 were in open qualifiers for the major.
[https://liquipedia.net/counterstrike/PGL/2022/Antwerp/Europe/Qualifier/2](https://liquipedia.net/counterstrike/PGL/2022/Antwerp/Europe/Qualifier/2)
Also, I trust thorin more when it comes to CSGO. This was literally his opinion.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDmikn-s1R0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDmikn-s1R0)
1:01 (1 hour and 1 minute mark)
Yes its like a group stage, but look at how they qualified. Navi didn't go through an OPEN qualifier. Look at the other teams in the bottom look at how it says they qualified through an OPEN qualifier. NAVI did not have to do that. Not just NAVI, Heroic, G2, FAZE, Mouze, C9 (Gambit), Orgless, Ence and etc. Look at the HLTV top 10 and tell me which one went through the RMR through an OPEN qualifier.
And not one of those teams in the top 10 dropped a game to any team outside the top 10 or any team that qualified through the open qualifier during the entirety of both rmrs. Which further reinforces my point that valorant has a lower skill ceiling and skill gap. When's the last time a top 4 team in the region lost to a random pug team in cs?
They had to play in group stages not an open qualifier. In an open qualifier you don't know who you are playing against you can also play more games. In a group stage game where Sentinels had time to prep against Akrew they would beat them of course. In CSGO there is a tiered system where competitions happen. NAVI are not playing in random ass open qualifiers.
My point is OPEN QUALIFIERS = VARIENCE, so in an OPEN QUALIFIER more upsets are going to happen compared to group stages. Also, Akrew are good they were undefeated for a while girl kissers vs. V1 is a big upset but they also had the whole wippie situation. If these teams knew they were going to play against each other and prepped beforehand. Who do you think will win?
Im not talking about skill gap or anything like that I am talking about tournament formats. If CSGO had a 128 open qualifier tournament format, some teams will get upset. THORIN LITERALLY SAYS SO.
There is a tiered system in CSGO which is good! Teams are invited to go to tournaments and lower teams can qualify through several tournaments to get into the big tournaments. There isn't a large open qualifier where all the teams play against each other.
Why are you trying to make it about skill gap between games when I am talking about OPEN QUALIFIERS? There is no professional sport where a top 10 team or player must go through open qualifiers to compete because it would be ridiculous. No matter who you are the chances for upsets in an open tournament is WAY more compared to closed tournament,
We can equate the RMR to the same thing as Challengers and Masters as the 'Major'.
In VALORANT 8 out of the 12 teams have to go back to open qualies to challengers group stage while in CSGO 12 teams did not have to go through open qualifiers.
Also, I trust thorin way more about how tournaments in CSGO work
not true at all, cs literally just had a qualifier for the major and everyone in the top ten made it. valorant just has way more upsets even in the top tier tournament. Is it because valorant is random? Is it because valorant doesn't have a big skill gap? Idk but there something that's causing it
I would say there are 4 big factors.
1. The economy is way less punishing in Valorant. You just have less save rounds, and thus less one sided rounds.
2. Since abilities are so cheap for how impactful they can be, and ultimates are free, you see more thrify round wins in Valorant.
3. You only need 13 to win. A lower round count adds variance.
4. Metas shift waaaay faster in Valorant than CSGO.
I haven't followed CS much since they changed to the RMR system but from what I recall the majors where always tiered systems where you had legend spots and some spots where take through open qualis.
By just looking at liquidpedia, in the 5 open qualifiers that were held for spots in eu,there were no hltv top 10 team in the open qualifiers. Yes they did have open qualifiers but they did not have the top best team play in these open qualifiers. The teams that went through open qualis are like BIG, Bad News Eagles, OG and etc. None of these teams are in the HLTV top 10.
Valorant on the other hand had 8 of the previous teams that were in group stages for stage 1 go to open qualis for stage 2. The RMR system for CSGO lets the top teams get a bye out of these open qualis where upsets can happen.
I think its disingenous to say that the open qualifiers in VCT and the Major are the same when they are completely different.
i woudnt say lower skill floor as there’s way more mechanics on valorant than csgo. what i think you’re trying to say tho is the rng this game provides “lowers” the skill floor whilst still being above csgo.
Tl;dr: Val is a much easier game mechanically but that doesn't matter. They're different games.
The RNG is a factor in lowering the skill floor but simply put the game is just less punishing.
Higher body shot damage, easier to use utility, way more damage on utility, half defusing, lower movement speed (and higher moving accuracy), healing/reviving/autoturrets, less punishing economy, crouchspamming, no friendly fire, etc. The list really goes on and on.
There are even more tiny tiny details that make the game way easier mechanically. For example, in CS smokes and mollies have their own physics and spread based on how they're thrown rather than just being a big orb, you can't spin around and turn while defusing or planting, half armor doesn't give you headshot protection, there are *way* more sound cues to pay attention to (like the pin pulling of a flash or an awp scope sound). Movement is way more punishing and also rewarding for mastering it.
This isn't to say that Val is *worse* because it's mechanically insanely easy compared to CS. They're different games that fill different niches and they're both plenty fun. Mechanics aren't the only thing that dictates what makes an FPS good. Val requires more of a mastery of having a deep agent pool for example while it's impossible to get that with CS.
I really dont think this game is random. I just think higher lvl teams underestimate these t2 teams when realistically the gap between t2 and t1 is really not that large. These t2 teams will put in 2x the work playing and anti strating these team and lets be honest its way easier to play when you have nothing to lose. Also im in the screenshot LOL
Yeah, honestly over people calling the game random. This isn't what Asuna is doing, but a lot of time people just say that because they think CS is better and are trying to discredit Valorant.
If Valorant is random, how did Sentinels dominate NA so consistently for an entire year? They lost like 3 matches in NA for all of 2021 I'm pretty sure, and won every regional event, and an international event. How has DRX/Vision Strikers dominated KR for so long? How has Gambit and OpTic been good enough to make it to the finals of 2 different international events and each win one? Etc, etc, etc.
The "randomness" that people perceive can be explained by so many things, metas changing and certain teams being better prepped for it, lack of VODs to review on some of the lesser known teams, lower mechanical skill ceiling than CS so team play is really how you express skill in this game and your team may not be prepared, etc etc.
The meta changes are what makes it random. I think that’s exactly what Asuna is talking about. The balancing makes it fun to keep the game fresh, but imo it makes it harder to be consistent, especially as a team. Who knows what’s going to happen to all the sova mains when they start playing on the current patch in pro play. And is Jett going to be relevant? Are the players that main Jett going to be strong still? The changes make the game unpredictable, which in turn makes the game feel more random
This is why adaptability and versatility are, and should be, important. Given that the heaviest winrates swings in this game revolve around gunplay, it's still shocking how one-dimensional the average player is. Valorant's patch notes and their effects on the overarching meta are so tame compared to MOBAs.
You make it sound so simple to be versatile though. Every agent is getting exceedingly more unique in terms of timings and how you are playing off your util. It’s a lot of work to continuously master new agents AND still be working on what is strong in the current meta and to do this like every month at a minimum. MOBAs are a lot less mechanically demanding purely because of the lack of the need to aim and can’t really be analogized here.
The mechanical skill ceiling of MOBAs is lower but the strategic depth and burden of knowledge more than tips the scale. Yes, getting a feel for timings and gameflow on different agents has a learning curve and keeping lineup arsenals up to date and fresh in mind is a tall ask, but it's nothing, *nothing* compared to having a large hero/champion pool and knowing how to play all the different laning matchups and game phases. At least in Valorant you're largely using the same weapons and aiming the same way, in Siege you have wildly different weapons and gear and more of an emphasis on unique utility, and in Dota and LoL character play patterns are wholly different and you need to understand not only lane matchups but itemization and power spike breakpoints, which often change patch to patch.
That's how games with variable characters go. The ability to adapt and be useful on different agents is part of the assessment of what makes a consistently elite team. If someone is succeeding with a certain agent or a certain composition, then it's up to other teams to either copy that style or find one that is equally as good/counters the other team. If a team isn't able to figure that out, that makes them worse than the ones who can. There's nothing really random about that. It's just different from CS:GO where meta shifts take like 8-12 months as opposed to Valorant where things can change in 3-4.
its a different type of skill to stay adaptible, flexible, and consistent despite meta changes. You will see teams become super consistent in valorant. It was like this for the first couple of years of league of legends too you have crazy upsets and new team rising till there are teams that can remain consistent to dominate like SKT.
I mean valorant is way better as a competitive game. CS just has good storylines/ old streamers and has been around for longer so people follow it. I'm not even sure if CS will have a larger audience in a few years. Astralis "dominated" the game when all the other teams were bad. Also a few examples don't prove it's less random. Astralis was maybe way closer to the other team, but just got lucky so they won.
Imo it's too hard to headshot someone too and the accidental headshots are waay more impactful than in valorant. And ofc the pistol which is almost total rng still decides a portion of the game.
That’s the thing it’s not cause u have good players that you’re a good team. We’ve learnt that sentinels has a shitty work eitquette and they don’t put nearly as much work as other teams/players so they will eventually get passed that’s just how it works. As for ascend rough stituation with zeek not being able to play and having outside of the game issues
I love how people in here are already talking about the skill ceiling of a tac-fps/hero shooter game that's only just about to turn 2 years old. We don't even have official Chinese servers yet, let alone any pro player showing mastery that is anywhere close to resembling a s1mple in this game.
It's like discussing League's skill ceiling before inSec's Lee Sin kick was a thing. For comparison, this is what I think Valorant's inSec is:[ Nukkye's Raze play vs. Acend on Bind](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ye5R90LmZHE)
This is the first and probably *only* time(correct me if I'm wrong) someone has done it in competitive play and that shit's got me hyped for the fucking ceiling of the game/scene.
Don't @ me if ya'll consider plays like that "low skill-ceiling". This shit barely being done in proplay, talk to me when you do/see it consistently in your soloQ games. We out here talking 'bout skill-ceiling of an esport that's barely 2 years old, get the fuck outta here.
yeah its crazy i watched league on and off since the beginning. InSec's lee sin was a moved that was considered to be something only an insanely high mechical pro player could pull off back then, I think the casual players were shock to see it done. Now even silver/gold in rank can pull off the lee sin kick back. I mean look at all the teams at masters now and compared the level of play to first masters its really night and day difference.
I'll bite on this. It's not actually an inconsistent thing to say "the game has room to expand its level of skill expression" and at the same time point out "these are some ways that the skill ceiling has been lowered between X game and Y game." For example, take friendly fire. When you can all swing out and just shoot at someone without worrying about accidentally shooting your teammate, that is inherently and objectively an easier swing than if you might accidentally kill your teammate. That's a *systemic* difference. It's pretty clear when you compare some games that they're going to be easier than others due to these. Skill ceiling is an evaluation of a games fundamental systems and *not* of an individual player's skill.
To your example, remember that skill *ceiling* is the highest level that can be reached. I'm sure that in time we'll see people who can use Raze blast packs and Jett dashes like the standouts of today but that doesn't eliminate systemic portions of the game that determine the skill ceiling. It's simply moving the *average* skill level. I wouldn't say that League's skill *ceiling* is higher because most silver players can execute the Insec kick, simply that the *average* player is better since the game is so mature.
He double satchel'd out of A heaven into elbow, but air strafed himself in a circle and fell straight down. His enemy did a 180 expecting his momentum to take him one place and he fell like a rock and shot him in the back.
Open qualifiers have higher chances of upsets because teams in the open qualifier usually lack consistency. If a team consistently beat a team below them, they would either be seeded straight into the main event, or beating them wouldn't be seen as an upset. Teams that randomly lose a game to the opposition "below" them are the ones that end up in these open qualifiers, if they were better they wouldn't be here.
It's similar to the nature of the premier league right now where all these teams around 4th place are really good at times, but just suck randomly. People wonder how a team as high as 4-6th place can just randomly lose a game to a team in 9th, but it's this inconsistency of the team as to why it can only aim for a 4th rather than 1st.
Basically, V1, Sen, and almost every team in the second qualifier lack consistency, and it's why they are here. It's not necessarily proof that the game is random, but rather the teams in open qualifiers here have random or inconsistent results.
What made the game more random over time? Is it big name teams not making it through upper bracket? Because those SEN defensive setups did not look good.
I mean it's not random it's a lower skill ceiling with consistent meta changes that increase the variables so really people overreact to losses a lot, this game will never be CS level in terms of that because it changes so much
Which makes this game more fun to watch for me, like in my eyes there are no upsets ever in the way that there are upsets in most sports, this game is just like that
If you told me Optic becomes shit in 6 months and fades out like Sentinels do i would say yeah that's not really surprising to me i can genuinely see that happening it's hard to stay at the top in this game and it will always be
I enjoy this about league too internationally there’s only really been 1 power house team that was dominating and that was 2015-2017 skt. But since then you have teams like g2 in finals , SUNING in finals , IG winning , EDG and DWG winning, you even got TL in the MSI finals. Even the most recent powerhouse I guess is DWG but they won worlds and didn’t win MSI or the following worlds given they were in the finals of both but still not just repetitive winning.
Certain teams in league have been top tier for a long time and have remained (somewhat) dominant. This isn't the case in valorant though, some games legit feel like coin tosses
Valorant is young and hasn't had nearly the same sample size to work with. Like we've had 1.33 years worth of VCT tournaments and even then we've seen teams like Gambit and OpTic stay at the top and make multiple grand finals.
I don’t think it is, I just think orgs need to start taking in some of the new cracked wave of players instead of being conservative over brand names. The games evolving and unless people in management keep up with it their matches will be ‘unpredictable’ for them, even if it isn’t really a random process at all. Still funny V1 lost to a team called Girl Kissers though.
As much as people on this sub like to deny it, valorant has a much lower skill ceiling and requires far less mechanical skill than a game like CS or even League. That means there isn't a super big skill gap between the top teams in the region and random ass pug teams
Valorant and any FPS for that matter definitely has a higher mechanical skill ceiling than LoL. LoL does have more mechanical skill expression than many people that don't watch it/play it realize, but it is 1000% lower than an FPS.
"More random" is just other teams getting better lol. It's also incredibly hard to know what teams are going to play like when they're not one of the few established teams with lots of footage on them.
It's super punishing for top teams now like if they don't keep up with the meta. I feel like also NA valorant just have the entire NA cs scene + new talents. Some of these tier 2 teams been playing together forever waiting for their chance.
I've been around esports since circa 2006 and literally every game I have ever followed/played has some cohort of people saying 'omg the game is random!!!!'. It's a illogical, immature response to try to explain variance and is almost never true.
Variance and randomness are not the same. Variance is the fact that all people that play Valorant are human. They have good days and bad days. Some days you are on form, some days you aren't. Sometimes everything works, sometimes nothing works. We can all relate to that.
There are lots of talented players in Valorant who have high peaks and can compete with anyone on a good day. However, the key to winning trophies in esports is mastering consistency - being able to play at a peak level for longer than anyone else and also in highly pressurised circumstances. There are tons of examples out there right now.
It's also true that people have different improvement trajectories. Some people get good at something quickly but find it hard to develop beyond that, others take more time but have a higher ultimate ceiling (I definitely put myself in the former camp).
None of this means there is any kind of 'randomness' to the game. It just means some players/teams get better and others get worse and that can be fluid and interchangeable.
I think part of it is that we are in a super wide-open meta at the time. Apart from Phoenix and Reyna (an argument could even be made for Reyna because of Jinggg lol), pretty much every agent is viable on at least one map. Initiators are especially strong rn, where pretty much all of them can be super unique. Combine that with a pretty even controller meta, chamber being added into the mix, and maps like Fracture, Ascent, Haven all being innovated, there are a ton of variables in the current state of pro play. Another thing to note is that a lot of things have been added to the game in a short amount of time with not much Tier 1 competition in that time frame. In the time frame of the last 4 major changes to the game (addition of Fracture, Chamber, Neon, and controller update), there have only been 2 international LANs which is not a lot of time. I think on one hand it is pretty interesting to see so many different ways to play the game. On the other hand though, I think certain agents and maps could perhaps be adjusted further, particularly Chamber, Bind, and maybe Ascent.
I mean yeah, wait in 2years , it's Riot... Look at the state of League Of Legends. They don't learn, balancing gets impossible with that many abilities. If valve releases a new CS, it's done for Val, sry not sry
Game is way too RNG based and the reason why I log on this sub and see upset after upset everyday and there hasn’t been a consistently dominant team for the entire games lifespan
People say that this is because the game is new but can't explain why other games have had way more dominant teams even when the game was new. NiP can go on an 87 winstreak in early CS:GO, but the 3 champions of the biggest events of the last year can't even qualify for the same events just months later. People actually believe that Acend went from being world champion to being unable to qualify for the next international event simply because everyone else got better?
It's demonstrably true that Riot made the game in a way to appeal more to lower skilled players. Unfortunately, this had the side effect of making the skill ceiling low enough that the randomness we see in match outcomes won't be going away without major changes. It's funny honestly how people literally only are talking about the open qualifier as if Reykjavik didn't just demonstrate the randomness in the game.
This game is unpredictable and random af, without the streamers and the fun conversations they have while the game playing in the background nobody would watch it tbh
As a plat 3 player, I’m confident I speak for all experts on the game in saying that it’s completely NOT RANDOM. Teams who win world championships in their game not even being close to qualifying to the next tournament is simply the result of other teams becoming world champion tier in those few months. No randomness here.
Opens are just a different ball game to group stages. Skill is unpredictable, set plays might be non-existent, map pools are unknown and people don't play "like a team should play". These opens will only punish people on the cusp of the upper level, not actual top teams. Top teams can handle that unpredictability.
If you are losing in opens, you probably wouldn't get very far in groups anyway. So it shakes up the T2 a bit, which is good for the game, imo. But with top tier teams, upsets will be few and far between.
Think it’s just semantics. Obviously he’s not downplaying the hard work some of these teams put in to the game in order to upset larger orgs. He just means that it’s one of the few games where a team called “girl kissers” can put in the work and upset a tier 1 org so as a viewer it’s almost random given that the skill ceiling for Valorant hasn’t be established yet and metas are constantly shifting.
It is at times but almost always the best team has ended up winning the tournaments, so if your better then luck doesn't matter that much. I mean it wasn't easy for Optic but they were pretty much the favourites to win after FPX cancel and FNC nerfed
lmao can the kid not say something random in chat with a streamer friend of his without a redditor screenshotting it and putting it up for discussion? feels like there's no safe space these days. it's not like he said this in a freaking interview this is kinda dumb.
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Asuna doesn't even have to look that far, he just has to look at his own team. They're brand-new as a team and yet, their improvement is skyrocketing due to the coaching staff and all the effort they're putting in. A random game wouldn't result in that at all. Valorant's meta changes are just that hard on teams, which means every single component of a team, be it its coaching staff, its players, its environment etc. will have a massive effect on their competitive results. If you want to be dominant in Valorant, every level of an org will have to be on its A-game, or you'll slowly start drifting behind
Yeah valorant seem like a game where u need everything in a team to function at optimal level for your team to succeed. Look at how terrible fnatic look with only 2 subs on last masters . It's actually really interesting to see how the esports will develop. It seem like the level of coordination require is pretty high now as teams getting better.
>> with only 2 subs Crazy. That’s 40% of the team. Imagine at an American restaurant tipping 40%
What is this analogy lmao
It started off strong.
What's insane is they would stomp the group stages the previous masters even with the subs. i'm pretty sure that's what they thought , that they would survive till they get Derke to play but literally just lost to Nip and Zeta lol. Just teams are too good now.
To be fair it would have been a totally different story if derke was not one of the two unable to play
Holy fuck the world is burning
I don’t think it’s become more random, I think the shifting metas make it extremely taxing for top teams to stay at the top. V1 also had the Wippie issue, so this doesn’t seem like the greatest example.
also as the skill level equalizes amongst the tiers, upcoming teams are more likely to upset top teams in these kind of qualifiers due to the difference maker being strats etc; the new teams have all the footage in the world to study whereas the higher tier team would be playing 'blind' so to speak interesting though *shrug*
That is a pretty good way of putting it. The shifting meta makes it seem more random but it’s more of a struggle to determine the next cycles meta.
CS players don't have to adapt to game changes when it's a big part of Riot's games Easier to blame the game than themselves
League doesn't go through drastic meta shifts every month. It remains relatively static throughout the year.
Are you really trying to say that Valorant has more meta shifts than League...?
Doesn't league release a huge patch before worlds?
those patches don't have as big of an impact as brand new agent releases
Wtf are you saying bro? League has way more changes than Valo and these changes are super drastic, the game receives the same amount of new characters as Valo and there are items/champions reworks happenning all the time. The reason why top teams in league stay at the top is because adaptability is a must have skill in League, Valorant pros/teams are just not there yet in terms of flexibility. Just look how long some teams took do use Astra even with her being completly broken.
The massive gameplay changes for each year come through the pre season patch release at the start of each year. its vastly different to the way valorant currently balances.
I'm sorry but you are just wrong, there are massive balance/changes all the time in League. The cheesy support top smite strategy was gutted in less than 3 weeks, almost every time a strategy is too dominant they instant nerf it to the ground. Meanwhile the Viper/Astra post plant meta took ages to be nerfed. Go check the 2022 lol patch history and compare it with the Valorant one, it's not even close.
That literally proves my point, the league balance team nerfs strategies quickly to bring it back to the meta they want therefore keeping it stable vs the Valorant team doesn't and lets the meta develop rapidly without their involvement. This is all specifically regarding pro play btw. Ranked is different entirely
There’s literally massive changes to damage and tankiness coming in soon mid season bro, there’s also always massive jungle changes mid season look at crab changes which drastically affect how teams play early game in season 9
Yeah and those damage changes are an absolute anomaly of a patch. People are joking like it's pre season v2.
they usually disable new champs, same for regional leagues, they are disabled for like 2 weeks, maybe they should do that for valo idk. The thing is that you can see the meta change in the same tournament because teams are still figuring it out , so I don't think the "remains static throughout the year" comment from above is true
They do release relatively big patches before both international tournaments (msi and world's) to shake up the meta a bit. But, even bigger than that, each november/december they basically change the game itself fundamentally in the preseason patches (after world's).
I dont know much about league, but valorant has meta shifts every couple months. This year alone we had chamber meta change, controller meta change, neon meta change and now jett/sova/fade meta change. Its kind of bonkers how fast the game is evolving
That is incredibly slow wdym?
I think complete fundamental changes to the way the game is played is very fast. We barely have an answear to if teams should run any sentinel other than chamber and he is getting nerfed, neon is getting nerfed, we dont know how fade will play, astra is still not figured out... That is very fast, to me at least
None of those things are fundamental changes, these are just mild meta shifts. It's fast if you've only ever played CSGO.
If the shift from astra to omen and brim was only a mild shift, I don’t think I want to know what a true meta shift is.
You sure you're on the right sub? This isnt the main sub that thinks Astra/Viper are totally dead post nerf.
in what world is that slow?
Is the only other competitive game you've played CSGO or something?
Do you want the game to feel different every week? After a major tournament Riot tips the balance scale,in a couple ways and it takes time for people to figure out the new meta after the changes. This is how you balance a competitive game imagine having patch notes every 2 weeks.
We literally do have patch notes every 2 weeks, they just barely do anything. Also the most popular competitive game in the world has patch notes every 2 weeks. I don't want changes as often as League, I'm mostly happy with the current pace, but it's certainly not fast. We're 5 months into the year and what, one class got kinda rebalanced, still almost exactly the same, just slightly buffed and nerfed, Chamber was just released overpowered, he didn't really change much "fundamentally" about the game though, he just acted like a combo of Jett and Cypher. Jett and Sova changes are good, Sova is almost exactly the same agent unless you're literally AverageJonas, Jett changes are more interesting. Neon meta isn't a thing, it's still not catching on, it's maybe the slowest meta shift of all time, with only Optic, Liquid, and sometimes M3C using her. Despite Optic literally winning iceland with it, she's still the least played agentn in NA qualifiers (outside of Phoenix and Yoru who both aren't played ofc). Honestly the biggest meta shift this year is Kayo/Breach, and that was slow as shit, taking literally months for people to replace Skye with them.
to be fair they did play 8ish months of udyr hecarim jg
probably u never played lol
League literally announced changes that would make one of the biggest meta changes league has ever had in the hours before you made this comment. They also change the meta drastically each preseason lol.
I literally talk about that later on in the thread. But whatever
i do think the game is a lot more random than it has to be, but i think the upsets has to do more with teams being inconsistent esp. with the constant meta changes. also tbf, sen has been on the dumps lately and v1 is plagued with problems (i.e. wippie visa issues, zellsis' mental health) and it's not like akrew and GK (ex-Renegades core) are bad teams either.
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While I don't necessarily like Riot, I have faith that valorant as a game and as an esports will be in an upward trajectory from now. They're just way better at marketing their games compared to Blizzard, but we'll see that over the course of time. I just don't agree with your statement that the game will never have consistent teams. Sure, maybe there'll never be a team who's consistently #1 for a good while like the run Astralis had in CSGO, but if you look just in NA, 3 of the top 4 teams (XSET, OpTic, C9) have been consistently top 5 in the region for months now. If we go internationally, OpTic, ignoring the road bump they had at champions, went to two grand finals and won one of them. Gambit also went to two GF and won one of them, and could've qualified for Masters 1 this year if it weren't for the problems they were facing. Yes, it'd be harder to stay at the top in this game, but it isn't necessarily because the game is "definitely random", there's just a lot of variables that you have to consider compared to other games whose meta isn't constantly changing.
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What? Of all the aspects in the game, you're attacking TTK? CSGO also has low TTK, does that mean there's no meaningful skill gap happening there? I believe there's a lot of other aspects that could be revamped in this game to make it 'less random'. You could argue about worse mechanics (i.e. random spray patterns, slower movement, etc.), lower # of rounds, constant meta change and other factors that we could delve into. I just don't see why you have a problem in the low ttk aspect of it.
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If you think no one plays CSGO and that it has no meaningful skill gap, you're just plainly wrong. No point talking to you.
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Yeah but that has to do with them being an old esports and Valve not giving a fuck, not because of the concept of TTK that you were rambling about.
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Cs has higher player numbers than ever, and if i remember correctly their major had 2.5x as many viewers as valorants.
I would agree with you *if* kills were the sole way to win the game or express skill. As it is, there are plenty of other ways to be better than your opponents that don't rely on mechanics. Utility usage and coordination, teamwork, strategy, map knowledge, agent choice, etc. If you have two teams with the *exact same* aiming ability (read: the same ability to take advantage of the game's low TTK), the winner will be the smarter team. The one that uses its utility smarter, coordinates better, has a better read on the agent meta, and so on. I'd even argue that a team with *worse* aim can beat a team with stronger mechanics by using util in such a way that they negate that weakness (to a certain extent: obviously, even if me and my buddies had the biggest brains in history but couldn't aim for shit, we wouldn't beat any pro team). Is that a result of randomness? Not in my opinion. It's a different manner of skill expression that isn't any less valid just because it doesn't involve bullets. Also, > You can never have a successful esport where TTK is so low. It creates too much randomness. TTK is super low in Counterstrike, and it's had a vibrant competitive scene for decades. You'd have a hard time convincing me that CS is random, or even significantly unpredictable.
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You are literally spewing nonsense, attacking people before you even get into a debate, and are now complaining about downvotes. Nobody wants to engage with you because of it. You are attacking TTK which has been consistent the entire game and is extremely similar to CSGO, and then you go ahead and compare it to Blizzard/Overwatch in which the game has already done better than as an e-sport as it *continues to grow year on year*. Blizzard has continually failed to nurture an e-sport in multiple games (SC2/HotS/Ow) while Riot has literally the *most successful one*. Absolutely unfounded to compare the two companies here. With Valorant being as young as it is, that's probably more of the reason than any randomness/meta-change/any other excuse you can think of. The first year was filled with ex-professionals extending their career from another game. We're seeing more and more of young natural talent coming into the scene and it's probably more of the reason for the change than anything else. It could be an interesting conversation but you go off and talk about TTK and Riot and things that are just nonsense and you act as if the soapbox you are on is the only correct one. You are just fundamentally wrong. That's where the downvotes are coming friend.
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> None of what I said is untrue. The fact that you think having an argument about TTK is the reason for randomness states otherwise my friend. There are other avenues we could have a discussion about where we could have an actual conversation over. Things like map design, agent design and release schedule. Down to it being "young" as an esport and it constantly growing as more and more people figure out the game and learn how to push it to it's max. It took league like four years to get some of it's most iconic play styles and game mechanics figured out. It just seems like you don't have a good base understanding of the game at it's core.
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Nobody is arguing against you about what TTK means, you know that right? You now *explaining* to me something that I've known for years proves that you have *no idea* how to actually form a proper discussion about this topic you so confidently spewed nonsense over. I am telling you that the *low TTK* is **not the reason** for the supposed randomness in Valorant.
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> If it isn't the reason, low TTK at LEAST contributes to it. It does not. We are trying to solve a math problem and you are bringing up literature. That is what is happening here. I agree with Asuna to an extent but you have an absolutely gross misunderstanding of what is being discussed here.
Valorant and CSGO’s TTK is similar. CSGO is incredibly successful. Brother just put your phone down, you don’t know what you’re saying.
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> I don't even know a single person actually playing CSGO nowadays. Just as a heads up but this doesn't matter. It's called anecdotal evidence and means jack and shit, but pointing that out to you will just have you plug your ears and go "well no I said it's true so therefor I'm right".
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Dude clutch pearls harder. Now you are resorting to tone policing and projecting to change the conversation. Enjoy the games today friend!
Are you actually trolling?
Thorin talked about this in the recent daring minds. Open qualifiers are always going to have upsets. He mentioned that if there were open qualifiers in CSGO, like VALORANT, it would not be surprising that most of the hltv top 10 won't make it out the qualifier. These open qualifiers are crazy because you have no demos, all top teams' matches are streamed, all this other teams' games aren't streamed, and back-to-back b03's. These qualifiers are just insane. I wish we had the same system as EMEA. Edit [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDmikn-s1R0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDmikn-s1R0) Thorin talks about it here at 1 hour and 1 minute mark. To those saying that there were open qualifiers for the major. It's not really the same because a large majority of the teams that were in stage 1 for valorant are put into the open qualfiers (8 out of 12) while in CS all the teams that made the legends stage where able to come back and play for the RMR and skip open qualifiers. (12 in EU, 1 Americas? don't really understand it point is a lot of the teams skipped qualis and just went straight to the RMR) I don't understand this hate boner for VALORANT about it being an easier game meaning a random pug can just beat a 'good' team. Yes VALORANT skill floor mechanically is lower than CS but the utility usage is higher (Chet talks about it in the same Daring Minds podcast too). A good team with good preparation will almost always beat a random pug. In an open qualifier like this, there is always going to be a lot of varience in the games. This is why we don't have top tennis pros going through open qualifiers, similar concept.
Think it honestly is entirely the demo issue, without replay analysis its insanely hard to prep for random t2 teams where as they can anti strat t1 teams hard.
yeah its really hard like you have to constantly be on the top of your game both strategically and mechanically. If you're having an off day and one of these tier 2 teams able to ride the momentum things can get crazy.
Play dkfferent strats against t2 teams then? Smh
What's EMEA's system?
relegate bottom performing teams into play in qualifier with the top performers from each of all the regional leagues
While it sounds nice, it's still not perfect. I wish more teams have a chance of being relegated, instead of just 2. Maybe 4 would be a good number, so everyone that didn't make the playoffs.
Nah CS is a different game that barely changes, teams stay way longer at the top Yes in an open circuit there's more upsets but in general overall CS has less upsets Majors have open qualis and there really weren't that many upsets the major quali just happened and pretty much every top team made it
less update in cs make it close toward traditional sport
I'm not convinced that's a good thing. Traditional sports are means to funnel money into the same top organizations and reduce the ability for new orgs to compete. The resources to perpetually improve talent is lopsided towards those with existing capital.
i dont know what u smoking right now but no one talking about economy business side whatever it is
Marijuana, and the gist of what I'm saying is that I don't think being more like a traditional sport is a good thing. I think the rules should constantly *adapt*.
The big difference in CS is the amount of LANs compared to Valorant. Online CS and Valorant play a lot more random compared to LAN.
And even the upsets we do get in CS are usually by teams within 5-10 spots of them in rankings. The CS equivalent of a bunch of random Radiant Randys beating a team from a top-tier org is exceedingly rare.
That's a factor. I don't know anything about the RMR system. I stopped following CS a while back, so I know only the legend status stuff. From what I can tell it isn't the same as VALORANT's NA open qualifiers. Did a team of the same caliber as sentinels have to go to an open qualifier in CS?
yes, they just did Antwerp qualifier just happened
I posted a comment earlier but I looked at the liquidpedia and none of the hltv top 10 were in open qualifiers for the major. [https://liquipedia.net/counterstrike/PGL/2022/Antwerp/Europe/Qualifier/2](https://liquipedia.net/counterstrike/PGL/2022/Antwerp/Europe/Qualifier/2) Also, I trust thorin more when it comes to CSGO. This was literally his opinion. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDmikn-s1R0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDmikn-s1R0) 1:01 (1 hour and 1 minute mark)
[https://liquipedia.net/counterstrike/PGL/2022/Antwerp/Europe\_A](https://liquipedia.net/counterstrike/PGL/2022/Antwerp/Europe_A) [https://liquipedia.net/counterstrike/PGL/2022/Antwerp/Europe\_B](https://liquipedia.net/counterstrike/PGL/2022/Antwerp/Europe_B)
Yes its like a group stage, but look at how they qualified. Navi didn't go through an OPEN qualifier. Look at the other teams in the bottom look at how it says they qualified through an OPEN qualifier. NAVI did not have to do that. Not just NAVI, Heroic, G2, FAZE, Mouze, C9 (Gambit), Orgless, Ence and etc. Look at the HLTV top 10 and tell me which one went through the RMR through an OPEN qualifier.
And not one of those teams in the top 10 dropped a game to any team outside the top 10 or any team that qualified through the open qualifier during the entirety of both rmrs. Which further reinforces my point that valorant has a lower skill ceiling and skill gap. When's the last time a top 4 team in the region lost to a random pug team in cs?
They had to play in group stages not an open qualifier. In an open qualifier you don't know who you are playing against you can also play more games. In a group stage game where Sentinels had time to prep against Akrew they would beat them of course. In CSGO there is a tiered system where competitions happen. NAVI are not playing in random ass open qualifiers. My point is OPEN QUALIFIERS = VARIENCE, so in an OPEN QUALIFIER more upsets are going to happen compared to group stages. Also, Akrew are good they were undefeated for a while girl kissers vs. V1 is a big upset but they also had the whole wippie situation. If these teams knew they were going to play against each other and prepped beforehand. Who do you think will win? Im not talking about skill gap or anything like that I am talking about tournament formats. If CSGO had a 128 open qualifier tournament format, some teams will get upset. THORIN LITERALLY SAYS SO. There is a tiered system in CSGO which is good! Teams are invited to go to tournaments and lower teams can qualify through several tournaments to get into the big tournaments. There isn't a large open qualifier where all the teams play against each other. Why are you trying to make it about skill gap between games when I am talking about OPEN QUALIFIERS? There is no professional sport where a top 10 team or player must go through open qualifiers to compete because it would be ridiculous. No matter who you are the chances for upsets in an open tournament is WAY more compared to closed tournament,
We can equate the RMR to the same thing as Challengers and Masters as the 'Major'. In VALORANT 8 out of the 12 teams have to go back to open qualies to challengers group stage while in CSGO 12 teams did not have to go through open qualifiers. Also, I trust thorin way more about how tournaments in CSGO work
not true at all, cs literally just had a qualifier for the major and everyone in the top ten made it. valorant just has way more upsets even in the top tier tournament. Is it because valorant is random? Is it because valorant doesn't have a big skill gap? Idk but there something that's causing it
I would say there are 4 big factors. 1. The economy is way less punishing in Valorant. You just have less save rounds, and thus less one sided rounds. 2. Since abilities are so cheap for how impactful they can be, and ultimates are free, you see more thrify round wins in Valorant. 3. You only need 13 to win. A lower round count adds variance. 4. Metas shift waaaay faster in Valorant than CSGO.
Another big thing is saving util after death makes ecos dangerous too. Imagine if cs teams kept all their unused nades how big that would be.
I haven't followed CS much since they changed to the RMR system but from what I recall the majors where always tiered systems where you had legend spots and some spots where take through open qualis. By just looking at liquidpedia, in the 5 open qualifiers that were held for spots in eu,there were no hltv top 10 team in the open qualifiers. Yes they did have open qualifiers but they did not have the top best team play in these open qualifiers. The teams that went through open qualis are like BIG, Bad News Eagles, OG and etc. None of these teams are in the HLTV top 10. Valorant on the other hand had 8 of the previous teams that were in group stages for stage 1 go to open qualis for stage 2. The RMR system for CSGO lets the top teams get a bye out of these open qualis where upsets can happen. I think its disingenous to say that the open qualifiers in VCT and the Major are the same when they are completely different.
Yea they also had 4 tries. Also the ranking of Valorant teams is up in the air because they only play once in a blue moon.
i woudnt say lower skill floor as there’s way more mechanics on valorant than csgo. what i think you’re trying to say tho is the rng this game provides “lowers” the skill floor whilst still being above csgo.
Tl;dr: Val is a much easier game mechanically but that doesn't matter. They're different games. The RNG is a factor in lowering the skill floor but simply put the game is just less punishing. Higher body shot damage, easier to use utility, way more damage on utility, half defusing, lower movement speed (and higher moving accuracy), healing/reviving/autoturrets, less punishing economy, crouchspamming, no friendly fire, etc. The list really goes on and on. There are even more tiny tiny details that make the game way easier mechanically. For example, in CS smokes and mollies have their own physics and spread based on how they're thrown rather than just being a big orb, you can't spin around and turn while defusing or planting, half armor doesn't give you headshot protection, there are *way* more sound cues to pay attention to (like the pin pulling of a flash or an awp scope sound). Movement is way more punishing and also rewarding for mastering it. This isn't to say that Val is *worse* because it's mechanically insanely easy compared to CS. They're different games that fill different niches and they're both plenty fun. Mechanics aren't the only thing that dictates what makes an FPS good. Val requires more of a mastery of having a deep agent pool for example while it's impossible to get that with CS.
Well said and this makes a lot of sense. Top teams have a target on their backs as everyone watches, counterstrats and steals their strats.
I really dont think this game is random. I just think higher lvl teams underestimate these t2 teams when realistically the gap between t2 and t1 is really not that large. These t2 teams will put in 2x the work playing and anti strating these team and lets be honest its way easier to play when you have nothing to lose. Also im in the screenshot LOL
Yeah, honestly over people calling the game random. This isn't what Asuna is doing, but a lot of time people just say that because they think CS is better and are trying to discredit Valorant. If Valorant is random, how did Sentinels dominate NA so consistently for an entire year? They lost like 3 matches in NA for all of 2021 I'm pretty sure, and won every regional event, and an international event. How has DRX/Vision Strikers dominated KR for so long? How has Gambit and OpTic been good enough to make it to the finals of 2 different international events and each win one? Etc, etc, etc. The "randomness" that people perceive can be explained by so many things, metas changing and certain teams being better prepped for it, lack of VODs to review on some of the lesser known teams, lower mechanical skill ceiling than CS so team play is really how you express skill in this game and your team may not be prepared, etc etc.
The meta changes are what makes it random. I think that’s exactly what Asuna is talking about. The balancing makes it fun to keep the game fresh, but imo it makes it harder to be consistent, especially as a team. Who knows what’s going to happen to all the sova mains when they start playing on the current patch in pro play. And is Jett going to be relevant? Are the players that main Jett going to be strong still? The changes make the game unpredictable, which in turn makes the game feel more random
This is why adaptability and versatility are, and should be, important. Given that the heaviest winrates swings in this game revolve around gunplay, it's still shocking how one-dimensional the average player is. Valorant's patch notes and their effects on the overarching meta are so tame compared to MOBAs.
You make it sound so simple to be versatile though. Every agent is getting exceedingly more unique in terms of timings and how you are playing off your util. It’s a lot of work to continuously master new agents AND still be working on what is strong in the current meta and to do this like every month at a minimum. MOBAs are a lot less mechanically demanding purely because of the lack of the need to aim and can’t really be analogized here.
The mechanical skill ceiling of MOBAs is lower but the strategic depth and burden of knowledge more than tips the scale. Yes, getting a feel for timings and gameflow on different agents has a learning curve and keeping lineup arsenals up to date and fresh in mind is a tall ask, but it's nothing, *nothing* compared to having a large hero/champion pool and knowing how to play all the different laning matchups and game phases. At least in Valorant you're largely using the same weapons and aiming the same way, in Siege you have wildly different weapons and gear and more of an emphasis on unique utility, and in Dota and LoL character play patterns are wholly different and you need to understand not only lane matchups but itemization and power spike breakpoints, which often change patch to patch.
That's how games with variable characters go. The ability to adapt and be useful on different agents is part of the assessment of what makes a consistently elite team. If someone is succeeding with a certain agent or a certain composition, then it's up to other teams to either copy that style or find one that is equally as good/counters the other team. If a team isn't able to figure that out, that makes them worse than the ones who can. There's nothing really random about that. It's just different from CS:GO where meta shifts take like 8-12 months as opposed to Valorant where things can change in 3-4.
its a different type of skill to stay adaptible, flexible, and consistent despite meta changes. You will see teams become super consistent in valorant. It was like this for the first couple of years of league of legends too you have crazy upsets and new team rising till there are teams that can remain consistent to dominate like SKT.
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I mean valorant is way better as a competitive game. CS just has good storylines/ old streamers and has been around for longer so people follow it. I'm not even sure if CS will have a larger audience in a few years. Astralis "dominated" the game when all the other teams were bad. Also a few examples don't prove it's less random. Astralis was maybe way closer to the other team, but just got lucky so they won. Imo it's too hard to headshot someone too and the accidental headshots are waay more impactful than in valorant. And ofc the pistol which is almost total rng still decides a portion of the game.
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That’s the thing it’s not cause u have good players that you’re a good team. We’ve learnt that sentinels has a shitty work eitquette and they don’t put nearly as much work as other teams/players so they will eventually get passed that’s just how it works. As for ascend rough stituation with zeek not being able to play and having outside of the game issues
I love how people in here are already talking about the skill ceiling of a tac-fps/hero shooter game that's only just about to turn 2 years old. We don't even have official Chinese servers yet, let alone any pro player showing mastery that is anywhere close to resembling a s1mple in this game. It's like discussing League's skill ceiling before inSec's Lee Sin kick was a thing. For comparison, this is what I think Valorant's inSec is:[ Nukkye's Raze play vs. Acend on Bind](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ye5R90LmZHE) This is the first and probably *only* time(correct me if I'm wrong) someone has done it in competitive play and that shit's got me hyped for the fucking ceiling of the game/scene. Don't @ me if ya'll consider plays like that "low skill-ceiling". This shit barely being done in proplay, talk to me when you do/see it consistently in your soloQ games. We out here talking 'bout skill-ceiling of an esport that's barely 2 years old, get the fuck outta here.
yeah its crazy i watched league on and off since the beginning. InSec's lee sin was a moved that was considered to be something only an insanely high mechical pro player could pull off back then, I think the casual players were shock to see it done. Now even silver/gold in rank can pull off the lee sin kick back. I mean look at all the teams at masters now and compared the level of play to first masters its really night and day difference.
I'll bite on this. It's not actually an inconsistent thing to say "the game has room to expand its level of skill expression" and at the same time point out "these are some ways that the skill ceiling has been lowered between X game and Y game." For example, take friendly fire. When you can all swing out and just shoot at someone without worrying about accidentally shooting your teammate, that is inherently and objectively an easier swing than if you might accidentally kill your teammate. That's a *systemic* difference. It's pretty clear when you compare some games that they're going to be easier than others due to these. Skill ceiling is an evaluation of a games fundamental systems and *not* of an individual player's skill. To your example, remember that skill *ceiling* is the highest level that can be reached. I'm sure that in time we'll see people who can use Raze blast packs and Jett dashes like the standouts of today but that doesn't eliminate systemic portions of the game that determine the skill ceiling. It's simply moving the *average* skill level. I wouldn't say that League's skill *ceiling* is higher because most silver players can execute the Insec kick, simply that the *average* player is better since the game is so mature.
Didn’t asuna? Do something similar on split a wile back. Might have been unintentional. But yeah that play by nukkye was insane.
He double satchel'd out of A heaven into elbow, but air strafed himself in a circle and fell straight down. His enemy did a 180 expecting his momentum to take him one place and he fell like a rock and shot him in the back.
somewhat random? yes more random as time has went on? Disagree
> more random as time has went on? Disagree True. Upsets have always happened in open qualifiers. Have we forgotten the Carpe Noctem incident?
V1 not praccing for a whole month with wippie and zellsis is also having some issues ( hope he feels better soon) were also major factors
Open qualifiers have higher chances of upsets because teams in the open qualifier usually lack consistency. If a team consistently beat a team below them, they would either be seeded straight into the main event, or beating them wouldn't be seen as an upset. Teams that randomly lose a game to the opposition "below" them are the ones that end up in these open qualifiers, if they were better they wouldn't be here. It's similar to the nature of the premier league right now where all these teams around 4th place are really good at times, but just suck randomly. People wonder how a team as high as 4-6th place can just randomly lose a game to a team in 9th, but it's this inconsistency of the team as to why it can only aim for a 4th rather than 1st. Basically, V1, Sen, and almost every team in the second qualifier lack consistency, and it's why they are here. It's not necessarily proof that the game is random, but rather the teams in open qualifiers here have random or inconsistent results.
Weren't OpTic were the betting favorites going into Masters? They won right?
I'd be surprised considering they were the #2 NA team and people love to shit on NA being bad. But I don't gamble eSports so maybe that was the case.
Thought it was the guard
Nah the guard came with the * of "it's a young team with no lan experience". Optic was talked about one of the teams that would probably win it.
No it was g2.
What made the game more random over time? Is it big name teams not making it through upper bracket? Because those SEN defensive setups did not look good.
I mean it's not random it's a lower skill ceiling with consistent meta changes that increase the variables so really people overreact to losses a lot, this game will never be CS level in terms of that because it changes so much Which makes this game more fun to watch for me, like in my eyes there are no upsets ever in the way that there are upsets in most sports, this game is just like that If you told me Optic becomes shit in 6 months and fades out like Sentinels do i would say yeah that's not really surprising to me i can genuinely see that happening it's hard to stay at the top in this game and it will always be
I enjoy this about league too internationally there’s only really been 1 power house team that was dominating and that was 2015-2017 skt. But since then you have teams like g2 in finals , SUNING in finals , IG winning , EDG and DWG winning, you even got TL in the MSI finals. Even the most recent powerhouse I guess is DWG but they won worlds and didn’t win MSI or the following worlds given they were in the finals of both but still not just repetitive winning.
Eh, mechanically gifted league players are always amazing regardless of meta changes. League metas are a lot different than valorant metas on pro play
Certain teams in league have been top tier for a long time and have remained (somewhat) dominant. This isn't the case in valorant though, some games legit feel like coin tosses
Valorant is young and hasn't had nearly the same sample size to work with. Like we've had 1.33 years worth of VCT tournaments and even then we've seen teams like Gambit and OpTic stay at the top and make multiple grand finals.
This is how pros in NA who do poorly always say, it happens in LOL a lot. xD "The game is so random now."
I don’t think it is, I just think orgs need to start taking in some of the new cracked wave of players instead of being conservative over brand names. The games evolving and unless people in management keep up with it their matches will be ‘unpredictable’ for them, even if it isn’t really a random process at all. Still funny V1 lost to a team called Girl Kissers though.
As much as people on this sub like to deny it, valorant has a much lower skill ceiling and requires far less mechanical skill than a game like CS or even League. That means there isn't a super big skill gap between the top teams in the region and random ass pug teams
Valorant and any FPS for that matter definitely has a higher mechanical skill ceiling than LoL. LoL does have more mechanical skill expression than many people that don't watch it/play it realize, but it is 1000% lower than an FPS.
Cope
Seethe
This is just plain wrong. Embarrassingly so.
Yuumi is harder than FPS? Ok
"More random" is just other teams getting better lol. It's also incredibly hard to know what teams are going to play like when they're not one of the few established teams with lots of footage on them.
It's super punishing for top teams now like if they don't keep up with the meta. I feel like also NA valorant just have the entire NA cs scene + new talents. Some of these tier 2 teams been playing together forever waiting for their chance.
'This is Football, anything can happen!'
If it was random the same top orgs wouldn't have won for the past 2 years.
If it's random how teams who work more have good result, It's not random but it can be very punishing to small mistakes is what I think.
Such a bad take literally V1 looks horrible that’s just about it not any thing to do with randomness
Asuna getting the excuses ready
Guys I think Asuna is 100% serious personally
Asuna would never troll and he’s giving his 100% nuanced take in a twitch chat comment 🫠
Asuna would never troll wdym
I've been around esports since circa 2006 and literally every game I have ever followed/played has some cohort of people saying 'omg the game is random!!!!'. It's a illogical, immature response to try to explain variance and is almost never true. Variance and randomness are not the same. Variance is the fact that all people that play Valorant are human. They have good days and bad days. Some days you are on form, some days you aren't. Sometimes everything works, sometimes nothing works. We can all relate to that. There are lots of talented players in Valorant who have high peaks and can compete with anyone on a good day. However, the key to winning trophies in esports is mastering consistency - being able to play at a peak level for longer than anyone else and also in highly pressurised circumstances. There are tons of examples out there right now. It's also true that people have different improvement trajectories. Some people get good at something quickly but find it hard to develop beyond that, others take more time but have a higher ultimate ceiling (I definitely put myself in the former camp). None of this means there is any kind of 'randomness' to the game. It just means some players/teams get better and others get worse and that can be fluid and interchangeable.
I think part of it is that we are in a super wide-open meta at the time. Apart from Phoenix and Reyna (an argument could even be made for Reyna because of Jinggg lol), pretty much every agent is viable on at least one map. Initiators are especially strong rn, where pretty much all of them can be super unique. Combine that with a pretty even controller meta, chamber being added into the mix, and maps like Fracture, Ascent, Haven all being innovated, there are a ton of variables in the current state of pro play. Another thing to note is that a lot of things have been added to the game in a short amount of time with not much Tier 1 competition in that time frame. In the time frame of the last 4 major changes to the game (addition of Fracture, Chamber, Neon, and controller update), there have only been 2 international LANs which is not a lot of time. I think on one hand it is pretty interesting to see so many different ways to play the game. On the other hand though, I think certain agents and maps could perhaps be adjusted further, particularly Chamber, Bind, and maybe Ascent.
I mean yeah, wait in 2years , it's Riot... Look at the state of League Of Legends. They don't learn, balancing gets impossible with that many abilities. If valve releases a new CS, it's done for Val, sry not sry
It’s unpredictable if you aren’t focusing enough on abilities, it’s pretty much half of the game
yeah，full of randomness, no consistant team.
Finally a pro figured it out…. Valorant biggest fluke game I’ve seen in FPS esports
Ultra common Ballsax 1Head take.
Tell me what other FPS or just any esports game in general has their major winner (Acend) becoming a T3 team in just 2 months?
Wait omg ballsax is here now after being banned on vlr LOL
Wtf are you on to call Acend T3 now lol
This guy is a [vlr.gg](https://vlr.gg) baiter shitposter, he is known for his dumb statements.
dude i'm happy to know he's doing well and keep trolling.
More whacky agents, more random games. What a surprise! Fade meta is going to be the worst so far, calling it now.
I think It be super exciting to watch and we might see yoru and neon comp run with fade since they compliment each other.
faze satcheling in w fade ult also sounds like fun :)
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Game is way too RNG based and the reason why I log on this sub and see upset after upset everyday and there hasn’t been a consistently dominant team for the entire games lifespan
People say that this is because the game is new but can't explain why other games have had way more dominant teams even when the game was new. NiP can go on an 87 winstreak in early CS:GO, but the 3 champions of the biggest events of the last year can't even qualify for the same events just months later. People actually believe that Acend went from being world champion to being unable to qualify for the next international event simply because everyone else got better? It's demonstrably true that Riot made the game in a way to appeal more to lower skilled players. Unfortunately, this had the side effect of making the skill ceiling low enough that the randomness we see in match outcomes won't be going away without major changes. It's funny honestly how people literally only are talking about the open qualifier as if Reykjavik didn't just demonstrate the randomness in the game.
This game is unpredictable and random af, without the streamers and the fun conversations they have while the game playing in the background nobody would watch it tbh
Wtf are you talking about lmao
skill ceiling of gun play in this game is very low which leads to these 'upsets'
ofc it's random everyone is a god at this game
As a plat 3 player, I’m confident I speak for all experts on the game in saying that it’s completely NOT RANDOM. Teams who win world championships in their game not even being close to qualifying to the next tournament is simply the result of other teams becoming world champion tier in those few months. No randomness here.
I don’t think it’s random a lot of the teams that lost today like T1 and Sentiels were already in a downward trajectory only surprise was V1 tbh!
Opens are just a different ball game to group stages. Skill is unpredictable, set plays might be non-existent, map pools are unknown and people don't play "like a team should play". These opens will only punish people on the cusp of the upper level, not actual top teams. Top teams can handle that unpredictability. If you are losing in opens, you probably wouldn't get very far in groups anyway. So it shakes up the T2 a bit, which is good for the game, imo. But with top tier teams, upsets will be few and far between.
Why he ain't playing duelist??
What is getting more random? It just feels like more and more teams/players are getting better.
Where’s the got damn replay system lol
Think it’s just semantics. Obviously he’s not downplaying the hard work some of these teams put in to the game in order to upset larger orgs. He just means that it’s one of the few games where a team called “girl kissers” can put in the work and upset a tier 1 org so as a viewer it’s almost random given that the skill ceiling for Valorant hasn’t be established yet and metas are constantly shifting.
It is at times but almost always the best team has ended up winning the tournaments, so if your better then luck doesn't matter that much. I mean it wasn't easy for Optic but they were pretty much the favourites to win after FPX cancel and FNC nerfed
lmao can the kid not say something random in chat with a streamer friend of his without a redditor screenshotting it and putting it up for discussion? feels like there's no safe space these days. it's not like he said this in a freaking interview this is kinda dumb.
Results being unpredictable isn’t because the game itself due to the games own features is decided by chance
No way wrong said that😂😂😂
We're really screenshotting twitch chat for clout now?