Valorant officially launched on June 2 and just a week later the number of pro teams continues to grow. T1 announced that they will maintain a whole three rosters in Valorant.
Riot’s new shooter already attracted many organizations during its closed beta (which lasted a few months). Some of the biggest orgs have already started recruiting players for their Valorant rosters. Among them were Cloud9, TSM, 100 Thieves and T1, for example.
The latest trend in the competitive CS:GO scene is to increase the number of players per roster. The Valorant pro scene is not yet mature, but T1 is already taking it a step further. The South Korean organization announced that it plans to create not one, but three rosters. One for each of the regions – South Korea, North America and an Academy team. The news comes from an exclusive ESPN interview with T1 CEO Joe Marsh.
T1 completed their first Valorant roster last week with Tyler “Skadoodle” Latham and we thought that was it. With the current roster consisting of five American players and one Canadian, the next roster will have to be the South Korean one.
In an interview with ESPN, Joe Marsh, CEO of T1, commented as follows:
“Unless Riot says you can only field one team, obviously the Korean team will stay in their region, but we will also field an Academy team. We really want to invest in the whole ecosystem and team and expand from South Korea to NA. That’s why we took the first step, we wanted to make a big entrance.”
But what is an Academy Team, anyway? Basically, it’s a training ground for new players to eventually join the main squad. Additionally, a lot of players are also switching their main games right now, as numerous pros from Fortnite, Overwatch, and CS:GO have decided to continue their careers in Valorant.
However, the question arises, what happens when Riot announces that organizations can only have one roster? Will the additional players be sold to other teams or will they be left without a team?
Whether Riot’s new title will really be the CS:GO killer remains to be seen. Organizations around the globe, however, prefer to play it safe and are ready with their Valorant roster. There is still no news on upcoming leagues or major tournaments for Valorant, but so far the big organizations don’t seem to care. More updates and news about Valorant can be found daily on EarlyGame. For example:
- Valorant Weapons Guide – Operator
- Valorant Map Guide: Haven
- Valorant: Spike Rush Tips and Tricks
Valorant: How to put together the optimal team
Which roles do you need to fill? How do you divide up the positions? And who is the in-game leader? We have the answers!
Many roles for five positions in the team
You can roughly divide the roles and responsibilities in a team. There is the solo defender, who can hold a point alone. The Support, who makes room with skills that need to be respected. The In-Game Lead makes the calls and works with the information of his teammates. The Entry Fragger and the Secondary are the players who go together on a point and are not afraid of enemy contact. The Sniper, who preferably holds certain angles with an Operator and can get a big advantage for the round with a First Blood, can also be beneficial to the team. Last but not least, there is the Lurker, who preferably keeps opponents busy at the other end of the map and comes from an unexpected side after enemy rotations.
The individual roles can also partially overlap or can be left out entirely or can change from round to round. An in-game leader can also be a solo defender and can also focus on minimap and communication due to defensive play. A balanced team with the assignment of such roles has the advantage that the team members know what their tasks are in the current round and can thus also build on the strengths of their agents.
The Spearhead: Entry Fragger & Secondary
The Entry Fragger is optimally the first player to make contact with the opponents around the Objective being targeted by the team. This can also be an important place on a map as a defender, e.g. to gain some control over the center in Ascent. By his push he makes room for the other mates, passes on the positions of the opponents and has the chance to get the point alone by nimble kills. The best agents for this role are Phoenix and Reyna.
As a secondary, you try to build on the moves, information and kills from the entry fragger. At a certain point, it pays to take a different position, hold different angles, or get behind enemy lines very quickly to take opponents who are rotating out of the action. Jett, Raze, Omen and Breach are particularly suitable for this role.
The Solo Defender
Since most maps have 3 main lanes, only two of them can be defended with a duo, the third “lane” then belongs to the solo defender. On Attack the role is obsolete, but an agent made for this role can here protect the team from flanks or focus on making sure the spike is well placed and defend them additionally with appropriate skills. Those who like this style of play might be satisfied with Cypher, Sage and Sova.
The Support
The main task of the support player is the optimal use of his abilities to make it easier for his own team to attack a point. This includes for example optimal placement of Smokes and the use of Flashes. As supports, many agents are suitable for this role: The solo defender agents can support well in the offense to get information or to cover some angles. Other agents are suitable as supports thanks to their sight-blocking abilities, like Brimstone and Viper, which can make it very easy to access a point. But Sova or Skye are also welcome in the role, as they can scout ahead with their Recon abilities.
The In-Game Leader
No team can function without an IGL. The game starts with the operator choice: Who plays which agent? How should the team split up on the map by default? Which agents do the opponents have? What do we have to pay attention to? How do we time the round? All this information and more have to be communicated to the team. If you want to take the role of the IGL, you should look for an agent who supports this role additionally like all agents who can get additional information by ability like Cypher, Sova and Raze.
The Sniper
Do you have an operator god in your team? Then let him take the role of the Sniper. Defensively, the Sniper can hold many angles where he can stand faster than the enemy team and get free kills especially against slow peeks. If it goes a bit offensive, he tries to move out after the spearhead, gradually covering positions where opponents can come. Good agents to support the sniper’s playstyle are for example Jett to play more offensive angles without risk or Cypher who rotates to other points after building up camera and tripwires to stay unpredictable.
The Lurker
Last but not least, there are the Lone Wolfs, who don’t like to hang out with the team, also called Lurker. This role is also useful in a team to avoid giving half the map to the opponents or to get impatient opponents when they don’t expect it because they rotate through their own spawn. Omen, Reyna and Jett are especially useful for playing off the enemy team, as their abilities make them less likely to fall victim to refrags or to escape from a bad position after a successful kill.
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