Valorant devs open up about “aggressive” Agent updates in future patches

When it comes to balancing Valorant to help maintain its competitive fairness, Riot Games pulls no punches.

The recent Valorant patch 2.06 update shows that the developers are willing to make drastic changes to keep the game as healthy as possible on both a professional and casual level.

Both Viper and Yoru saw massive buffs coming their way in the latest Valorant update. As they were the more underwhelming Agents in the roster, the upgrades that they received this time around were much needed.

Character Producer @RiotMEMEMEMEME drops knowledge on the recent Viper changes and our balance outlook in 2021. Read up on the State of the Agents: https://t.co/25Jna5rytf pic.twitter.com/GhqukFnuWQ

— VALORANT (@PlayVALORANT) March 31, 2021

In their latest State of the Agents blog, the Riot devs opened up about their plans for Agent updates in the future. They revealed that they would not shy away from making aggressive changes to Agents and other aspects of the game. They will also be departing from their previous style of making "small, targeted changes."

Valorant character producer John Goscicki explained:

"Starting with 2.06, we’re taking a more aggressive approach with our updates so that we see a larger impact to Agents with each one. This is because we know seeing your Agent in the patch notes over and over can be frustrating, especially when they do not move the needle, so to speak."

Aggressive Agent balance changes in future Valorant updates

Great post! Love that viper is meant to be unique and they hunkered down on it. Yoru new playstyle looks great too; hated only being able to make "one play" a round. Brim needs another smoke for fakes! Shorten Breach flash again please & maybe revert back to old Cypher cages pls

— Rykee Rodriguez (@iamrykee) March 31, 2021

Being a tactical first-person shooter, Valorant is incredibly hard to balance as a game, especially when Agents and Agent abilities are taken into consideration.

Hence, the balance team always has their work cut out for them when it comes to maintaining the competitive integrity of the shooter.

Goscicki goes on to say:

“As much as we want to get Agent updates out, we also highly value stability in esports and don’t want the entire game meta to shift under our pros’ feet leading into events like Masters and Champions.”

“With Masters 1 behind us, you’re going to see us try out a few things. Viper is up first. Then, as Masters 2 approaches, we’ll evaluate the changes and stabilize versus making large changes as we feel is necessary. Throughout 2021, you should see this pattern: Once a large tourney concludes, we’ll release some larger impact buffs/nerfs, and as the next large one approaches, slow down and focus on stabilization.”

Despite the aggressive changes that they will look to bring in future updates, the Valorant devs will always keep esports on a high priority list and will not dish out changes that bring drastic shifts in the meta.