Valorant: Riot Games give their take on damaging abilities and overall ability design

In yesterday’s Ask Valorant #5, lead character designer Ryan “Morello” Scott discussed some of the pressing issues that Riot Games' shooter has been facing.

Anti-cheat, abilities that kill… sometimes, and kits we’d never put in game. All that and more in this week’s edition of Ask VALORANT. Read all about it: https://t.co/8AbgxuF4IO pic.twitter.com/yfCmK3p50B

— VALORANT (@PlayVALORANT) August 13, 2020

The problem of ability design and damaging abilities has been bothering the Valorant player base for quite some time now.

When a user asked him:

“I heard someone at Riot once say that “abilities don’t kill” in VALORANT, but... there are clearly ones that do, like Raze. Are you breaking your promise?”

Morello replied:

“This statement isn't completely accurate—especially in a game that already had Raze and Killjoy's gameplay locked in before our announcement... Anyway, that was our mistake—a big part of that mistake was in missing the nuance (specifically that tactical fundamentals—not just “abilities don't kill”—are a key component).”

From the design perspective, Morello suggested that the Agent abilities in Valorant, especially the damaging ones, were made in such a way that their primary goal is to create threats. Guns will still provide ‘the vast majority of kills’ and with some practice, damaging abilities can be played around.

Having said that, Morello does agree with some of the criticisms that the design team has been getting for Raze. Raze has been at the hotbed of a lot of controversies, and when played right, her abilities can easily be the most oppressive things on the map.

Morello added:

“If this promise (abilities never kill) was the thing that made you come to try VALORANT, we're sorry if we misled you, even unintentionally. But our position is, and has been, that abilities that deal damage are a core part of tactical games—whether it be VALORANT or other tac shooters.”

Riot doesn’t want to remove ‘high-consequence gunplay’ in Valorant

Another user then asked:

“Are there any abilities or kits that are a no-go in VALORANT? How far is too far?”

Morello replied by saying that there are so far only two types of abilities that are under the dev’s ‘no-fly zone’- an ability that increases maximum health beyond 150 and a non-ultimate ability that replaces guns.

Riot Games do not want Valorant to have "abilities that would remove the high-consequence gunplay". So if an Agent is capable of taking their health beyond 150, it would mean that there will be a lot of guns that will not be able to get a direct one-tap kill. This would result in an indirect nerf and would compromise the overall integrity of gunplay in the game.

Moreover, non-ultimate abilities that replace guns should also be a no-go. Even though Jett and Raze can replace their guns with an ultimate, it doesn’t feel that that is the direction Riot Games are willing to take with Valorant.

Designing more Agents who can replace guns is going to adversely affect the core gameplay mechanic of Valorant.