Since zeek joined Acend, the team has simply moved to the next level. After his performance at Valorant Champions, now is the best time to take a closer look at him. Spoiler: He is one of the best players and we will definitely hear from him for a while.
Surprise!!! No? Okay, it was clear that he would be Player of the Month. I’m sure some of you even think he’s Player of the Year. Maybe he wasn’t as conspicuous as the stars around TenZ, ScreaM or Hiko, but nevertheless his performances were extremely constant throughout the year.
He confirmed that at Champions, the inaugural Valorant World Championship, by being named MVP of the tournament. So let’s dive in… who is this Alexander “zeek” Zygmunt anyway?
Valorant career of zeek
For zeek, it all started back in Fortnite when he was still representing AGO. And even then, he was already kicking ass! Many fans of competitive Fortnite (especially those from his native Poland) had high expectations for him. However, in April 2020, our Player of the Month turned his back on Fortnite because he had lost the desire to play the game. Instead, he focused on Valorant, the then still fresh shooter from Riot Games. Of course, he wanted to stir up the competitive scene again.
To be honest, the decision was quite brave: zeek already had an established name in Fortnite, a contract with an organization, the opportunity to perform at tournaments at a high level and… yep, then he decided to prove his skills in a new game. At that time, he couldn’t have known how hard Valorant would hit. Still, the passion was there from the start, as evidenced by one of his first interviews after Fortnite:
After playing the game for four days, it feels like I’ve never enjoyed anything as much as VALORANT. Feels like a new life. (Source)
As we now know, that decision paid off, too. He showed up on G2 Esports’ radar in January and six months later he was already on Acend’s Valorant roster. Now he’s already a World Champion, too. GG, Mr. zeek!
Why is zeek our Player of the Month?
Anyone who has been avidly following Valorant Champions will definitely understand our decision. For the rest of you, we’ve collected a bit of evidence here:
Yep, zeek had the tournament in his back pocket. With three different agents he managed 224 kills and a KDA of 1.73! Such stats at a World Championship really speak for themselves. In addition, he was heavily involved in Acend’s decisive final victory: 24 frags on Icebox, one of the two deciding maps in the grand final.
However, he is not only our Player of the Month because of his skills! During Valorant Champions, we also always kept an eye on his charisma. Even when Gambit pretty much took Acend down in the finals on Fracture, he was still laughing, cracking jokes, and even chatting with Gamit over in-game chat… even though they were one step away from defeat. Many players probably would have been tearing each other’s hair out, but Acend’s voice chat was a pure feel-good oasis throughout the tournament.
All in all, we can hardly wait for his performance next year. Now as World Champion, the bar is naturally quite high for zeek. But we are sure that with the passion he shows, he can continue to meet the expectations of the fans.
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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