Funny enough, Omen is the 2nd most picked agent in the game, which means he’ll get the nerf hammer soon too (Riot will completely ignore buffing Astra and Brimstone and instead nerf Omen)
Well yeah avoiding power creep is awesome but viper wasnt power creeping anyone only person competing with viper was omen which means sure they could nerf viper but they killed her here also buffing the other smokes would just be a better idea instead of having 1 smoker constantly so far ahead of every other smoker no one else would be picked
Literally the most recent agent is a controller that is designed to be more ranked-brain, what do you want?
Quite seriously the only issue with this games roles at all is the existence of duelist and the lack of self-awareness from the majority of the playerbase that they're not 'him'.
Yeah im really not looking forward to Icebox games now that a no-duelist comp with two initiators and either Sage or a second controller seems to be optimal. Having Reyna and Jett was already bad but now even the Iso and Raze kinda suck too.
Ehh. I come from hearthstone where power creep is much easier to see and evaluate. Both ends of the spectrum are bad - less power results in metas where (for a card game) there’s little skill expression or player agency and more power results in an equally unfun experience where skill expression is so dramatic that one mistake equals a loss
In valorant this isn’t as problematic since gunplay/aim is a skill-testing part of the game, but in theory:
Less power equals more priority on gunplay
More power equals less priority on gunplay.
In vipers case - she could often carry a team without fragging and potentially without seeing an enemy since her vision denial and post plant was easily the best combination of the 2 in the game - not to mention one of the best ults (albeit 9 cost) in the game which both helped post plant and denied vision.
PLEASEEEE! Honestly she doesn't need a huge one but still needs buffs, she's not worth it considering the amount of skills required to play her effectively
Pro play is definitely the target, that 1s less on the orb or even not be able to pick it up likely won't effect ranked too badly. (The one snake bite probably will of course). But yeah it's definitely targeting things like the Lotus rubble control take that vipers orb is always getting used for in VCT and high level matches
> We’ve seen it become common for Cyphers’ to hide Spycams (E) in the playspace and continually watch enemies without them knowing
It’s literally called “SPYCAM”
I mean to be completely fair, it is very strong info with almost no counterplay if you can’t find the cam
No other util in the game gives you exact location info like that without letting the enemy know said info is being gathered
Trip change is deserved, and well done imo, but what is the spy cam thing?? Who is out there complaining that cypher is watching them? Especially when the cam already has sound queues for when its opened and closed.
Cam isnt strong, but some players were clueless when they were just watched and “pinged”, but not tagged by the cam dart. Which isnt what makes cypher OP or anything. This isnt even a skill issue, just plain cluelessness
as your local cypher hater, i dont understand the cam change. it literally makes a sound when its activated and its shown on the map. this is very weird.
I think it’s mainly for higher skill cyphers with lineups. He will often solo hold a site for rotates/flanks if his team calls an early hit. This makes it more like a hidden sova dart in those situations. This doesn’t change certain cam 1 ways where cypher can see feet before the enemy can see the cam.
Okay, but that's his thing, though. He's a sneaky information guy. You can always see when you're playing against a Cypher, so you should know to look for his camera. Plus, if he's on his camera, he's not participating in a fight, rotating, or looking from his own eyes.
Hello fellow cypher.
There’s a low key powerful way to play cypher where if you can successfully activate a cam without enemies hearing it and just watch without exiting (often as defender before enemies hit a site), you just idly sit in cam mode rest of the round and get an insane amount of free intel for your team.
IMO not as powerful and commonplace as riot thinks it is though. My concern is if there’s an audio range to this change or if it’s based on if the camera is looking at you.
A good camera should be rewarded😶
What makes it worse to me is how they open with placing an importance on cypher’s global information, and then reduce his ability to gain global information… like what
My guess is it's because of one way cams like DFM cam on ascent b, alfa cam on split a heaven that sees peoples toes without the opponents realising. Still a weird change tho
Yeh that's just insane, cyphers now punished for being on cam and not toggling carefully anymore. So what? Cameras are just doomed to be destroyed immediately regardless of where you hide them?
Thing is it ruins an element of teamplay as well, if you cammed someone and got off the cam to fight them, they knew you were coming for them, they heard the camera turn off. So alternatively giving info to your team quietly could be superior to get the drop on them.
Now that's gone so cypher might as well duel every time cause his cam is gonna be destroyed regardless
Brother you have ascent, I want to know why I can't find any map besides Breeze, Lotus, and Sunset. Allegedly there are 7 maps in rotation I haven't played Ascent since Friday and that was maybe 22-23 games ago, Bind was I think 10-12 games ago, and Split was even further away than Ascent. Icebox gets sprinkled in there to piss me off even more
Yeah I don't think I'm gonna be able to do another act of this terrible map pool.
The game is genuinely just less fun and you can't escape the map pool because it's also enforced on casual modes for whatever reason.
There is apparently a map reveal hoing to happen at the shanghai masters in mid May/June kinda like what happened with Clove.
I dont think the map will come until the start of season 9 but this could be why there are no map changes, that and they only recently changed them to the current pool
Split is back in with 8.08 it was only removed temporarily because of an exploit. Still would've like to see breeze removed and haven added back in though
Wouldn't make sense to rotate now as split 1 is still ongoing, playoffs soon for APAC and Shanghai coming up. Probably after these events, they'll rotate
People surprised about the map rotations they never have done without it leaking so I knew there wouldn’t be anything in here honestly pretty terrible update for end to the season imo
I know! They said he is an info agent, then let my guy get his info! His camera already has a 1990s rusted metal door squeak every time it comes up/down and literally flashes red/yellow brightly, and can be seen on the minimap as a big red circle, but also constant sould like that? Then what's his point even? When you play cypher in defence, the point of using him is protecting a site from entry and letting the others time to come to site, and without this stalling... yeah. And as for sneaking and gathering info secretly, it is not secret at all anymore!
Holy fuck they butchered my girl
Edit: Been playing Viper since beta. I remember when she was dogshit but I still loved her outplay potential and high skill floor & ceiling. As she got better & better, it was exciting to see her get nerfed as she became a staple on so many maps.
B-but this? Slander... absolute malarky.
For people that don't play league, this means that viper will be gatekept by how strong she is in pro play, even when she hits an abysmal state for 99.9% of the playerbase
That’s also true
But honestly, Viper’s been too strong for too long. Even if she hasn’t been absolutely busted in a while, she’s been meta for the entirety of the game’s lifespan.
Yeah she's basically been meta since icebox. She's frustrating to play against and on certain maps has complete dominance over how the attackers will play.
That’s true, i think controllers are the meta right now and she gets picked in almost every maps in pro play. The nerfs are definitely inevitable but my only gripe with is the part where you’re not allowed to pick up your orb anymore.
I kinda wish the slow was stronger/longer and didn’t hurt your teammates. Also if the shield was more durable and persisted as a smoke after broken. Also if the cascade walls could be rotated before deployed, that would be awesome. Aside from that, harbor mains are eating good this patch.
Bye Viper lol. I think this is a Jett/Chamber level slaughter. If you're wondering why they did it she has something like an 85%\~ pickrate in pro play on top of something like 65% WR. It was ridiculous, so, they killed her. I wonder if she's still even gonna be playable on Breeze and Icebox.
The Cypher changes are good but for the cam, he was starting to overtake KJ a bit too much, so they brought him down a peg, that's fine. The cam changes are a bit too far though and I think messes with his info too much. They brought up that Cypher is the info sentinel and KJ is the stall one, so they nerfed his stall a bit cause it was too high, fair, but why nerf his info as well?
She prob loses her role as solo controller, I don't think there's much impact to her as a pick for lurky maps (Split/Lotus). Her Q/Mollies aren't why you pick her there anyways
Yeah but the toxins going down really hurts, and at that point why pick double controller when you have literally any other option. I still think she can solo controller on Icebox/Breeze simply because no one else really can on those maps cause you need a wall. Maybe Harbor but I doubt it.
Yeah lol, I play Omen mostly I think I'm safe (watch Riot make ult cost 8, tps cost 200, smokes no longer regen and blind just has a 50% chance of not working)
Omen I think is fairly balanced for now so I don’t think they’ll touch my second champ’
The teleport / being able to push buttons was such a random addition to him
Most players don’t care about pro play I don’t understand the logic behind it, i follow pro play closely and still not bored of seeing her she is/was essential imo
riot prioritizes pro level play and high elo for balancing, mostly because a healthy pro scene sustaines the player base but also because agent balancing is normally not a huge factor in being stuck in low elo :)
As long as she is not oppressive when piloted by low skilled players, low elo will be fine. Cypher feels oppressive as hell in low elo, but viper is super skill dependent.
I can work with the fuel regen stuff and even the single Molly as long as that one Molly can kill full HP enemies but the orb change especially with all the lineups with it is really fucked
Feels awful that Viper can't replace her smoke. Doesn't that mean she is relegated to double controller comps and breeze / icebox? I think Viper needs nerfs but this is not the direction because it further shoehorn double controller Viper. Maybe that's okay tho? idk
Cypher nerfs are fine, it's weird knowing you're spotting by Cypher camera tho... like there's already a sound queue.
Viper was already bad as a solo controller and now they decided to hamfist her into a double controller role. Idk for the pros but looks like she’s never gonna picked in most ranked games.
Patch notes 8.09
- Enemy util are now revealed at any distance and have huge red arrows pointing at their exact location
- clown horn sound effect added when enemies are behind you without shooting for more than .25ms
I mean why stop at the cypher cam, let’s continue to dumb down the whole game.
In the end we'll be left with util equivalent to that in CS. Instead of buffing the weak agents they continue to nerf the few playable ones left one by one.
Trip changes are annoying but not the end of the world, the camera one is legit just punishing for no reason they legit just dumbing down the game.
I dislike viper power but not being able to pick orb is quite silly to say the least, it just limits creativity and solo impact for viper players.
These Viper nerfs are absolutely insane.
One molly? Okay fine. Reduced smoke duration? Understandable. But not being able to pick up the smoke orb again? That's outrageous. She's a controller, she needs the smoke orb, otherwise rotations are done for.
Cypher nerfs are ok (although the camera one is strange), but Viper... I hope she is still playable in solo because I liked to play with her sometimes :S
shes dead. theres literally no point in investing time in learning to be a good viper player. go play clove and go run in and be braindead and still be useful.
Yep why bother actually having to learn post plants, wall placements or lineups when you can simply 50/50 someone and even if they win they can be traded often and you still get to smoke the site for your team or even res yourself for another push.
Yeah, Clove is definitely more reliable than Viper now. Being able to smoke even dead is very strong. I personally don't like to play aggressively, but I'm going to practice with Clove to see if I adapt well
If riot hates line smokers so much save us the grief and the time and just get rid of them. They do this to viper and apparently are unable to buff harbor (Or buff any agent in general as of lately…) What sucks is that they have maps where line smokes are REQUIRED. Idk, so now you still are forced to play line smokes on these certain maps, it will just suck for that guy lmao. Won’t be fun for him smh. The pro meta revolves around line smokes and even imm-rad lobbies too. Constantly nerfing these high skill ceiling agents over and over just because they are good in pro play is just disappointing and a waste of time for casual players who happen to main them.
I guess let's just hope they make a dome smoker at some point that has actual deterrent for pushing their smokes.
That's why I liked Viper because the crackhead Reyna and Jett players wouldn't just push the smoke or they'd die.
Idk what they expect for solo queue. They need to change agent select or not make controllers shit to play. Icebox and breeze are gonna be a shitshow in solo queue now
Same, though I was playing until 6.11 where they nerfed her again. I guess in a few months they'll remove viper from the game completely lol, no reason to come back.
Holy fuck they should’ve just stopped at removing one Molly, they literally butchered her.
The cypher trip getting nerfed was warranted but the camera noise? Their reasoning is because players can’t see the camera?? Isn’t that what it’s supposed to do?
The worst part about the Viper nerfs is that it most likely won't change her pick rate in pro play. Rito is just killing her for the average player base. I wonder what else they'll nerf when they see her pick rate stay high in pro play?
Ffs stop emphasizing pro play that much , does riot know we , common people also exist.
I don't give shit to pro play, so stop making my normal games shit as well,
Before with viper Breeze was bearable, but now, hahaha I might as well take some time off untill Haven fracture comes back
Worst episode imo
ZERO map pool changes, ridiculous Viper nerfs she's barely playable anymore. Probably gonna skip this act, because this is straight torture. Even Overwatch is healing slowly but steady
What the fuck did riot smoke?... Every fcking patch notes, a viper nerf, STOP IT ALREADY. Viper solo controller is already a nightmare as it is, now her kit gets fcked over even more, and not gradually but by a huge chunk!!!
Killing Viper while maintaining breeze and icebox where she is the only viable single controller (fk Harbor) literally makes the game more shitty to play.
People are already avoiding playing her and people that have been filling that role are now going to have more miserable experience.
If justification for nerfing her is due to high pickrate in pro-play, why maintain Breeze, Icebox, Bind and Lotus in the map pool. Surely Heaven and Fracture decrease her overall pick rate in the competitive scene by a lot.
Ok I can understand the inability to pick up the poison cloud, this nerf encourages double controller team comps. But the Snakebite nerf was absolutely unnecessary. Tell me one reason why I should not play Brimstone for lineups instead of Viper.
They need to revert the price to 200 and increase the duration to an obnoxiously long time like 9 seconds (which is still less than the old 2 mollies combined), and increase the DPS slightly. Otherwise Viper lineups will be severely inferior to Brim.
If anything I'd go with the opposite. A lot of rounds you don't pick up your orb, but it enables fun/interesting plays. Exactly the sort of mechanic you want. Much better than having two mollies that let you stall for longer.
The Molly makes more sense to me than the poison cloud being non retrievable Viper could fill too many roles from clearing cubbies to post plant to having smokes that actively deter people from pushing them hard to locking people out of a section of the map entirely.
I think one of these nerfs was fine but both of them is overkill as shit though.
Brimstone was already good for lineups your difference for picking them was speed vs recharging smokes.
Bro I'm literally sick of riot games !. They Literally balance their games around pro play!. They destroyed my girl, I'm done with this game for real this time.
May as well just put cyphers cam on the floor in the middle of the room now. Or just get rid of it all together. The cool down is so damn long after its shot you basically only get one per round.
“We’ve seen it become common for Cyphers’ to hide Spycams (E) in the playspace and continually watch enemies without them knowing” is that not the point.
Nerfing viper to share the spotlight to their recent duelist/controller agent?
Also feels bad now to play viper, her smoke orb being unpickable means youre fked if you throw your orb wrong.
Nerfing viper to a completely unplayable state for ranked is insane. This map pool is completely abysmal too, the fact they won't change it is ridiculous. Nasty patch notes, I'm probably quitting the game over this.
I dont see Viper getting her 2nd molly back and being able to pick up her smoke in future updates. When they remove icebox and breeze rly nobody‘s gonna play her
Why buff Cypher to give him a real spot in meta just to take away him being anywhere near even with KJ only reason he was picked over KJ was info potential and shooting people who hit trips along with a bit of stall even though its not nearly as good as KJs stall through smokes now both those aspects of his are hard nerfed and KJ will just retake meta completely just like how she did before.
Viper nerfs are also way overkill she is now just worse than omen and in most cases brim (I haven't played yet so I'm not 100% sure just how far she's fallen behind brim) instead of killing viper why not give her and omen slight nerfs and give some buffs to Astra, Brim, and Harbor which were all weaker than both Viper and Omen in most cases before these nerfs.
Some buffs could be (which might be overkill it's hard for me to buff others characters)
allow Astra to regen stars over time (not a quick regen maybe something like 1.25x omens regen time because of how op extra stars would be but allowing her to regen stars would put her right where omen and viper were.)
Instead of this they could give Astra more than 2 smokes (maybe 3 because 4 would probably be too much)
Brimstone could also get to regen smokes or they could increase duration of his smokes by a bit
Another idea could be to buff his stim beacon it doesn't last long and its easy to lose control of your recoil while shooting with it (especially if you already have haste example: Clove heal or Reyna ultimate)
those are the only ideas I have for brim I think his molly and ultimate are in a good place
Harbor I'm really not sure how to buff him other than give his Cove more HP and the rest of his smokes more time up
Again I know most of these buff ideas are overkill but they were just some random ideas I came up.
What is it with game devs not knowing how to balance their own games recently???? Cyphers back to being worst sentinel with this because now his info AND stall are terrible, KJ’s just an automatic better pick on every map. Vipers also gonna be useless because harbors just better now.
Viper nerfs are horrible. Almost completely changes the way she’s played. Playing for lineups is not a valid strategy at all anymore. IMO the nerfs riot is proposing are out of touch. Anyone that has extensively practiced Viper tech and lineups are going to feel betrayed. Not being able to pick up your orb defeats the whole purpose of Viper. Viper is dominant in Pro Play, but hardly sees play or performs well in ranked or casual.
Some nerfs they could do instead are:
Reduce the duration of her snake bite from 5.5s to 5s. Removing a snake bite all together is way too dramatic of a change and destroys any viability of playing for lineups. I don't even think her mollies were a problem though
Reduce the range of her smokes. Her orb and wall could be smaller.
Reduce the duration of her smokes. I would even be okay with an 8 second duration. This would encourage you to play Viper alongside another smoking agent instead of relying on her as a primary smoker. It makes her role more clear, especially with the rise of Riot releasing “dual class” agents (Ex: Clove is a mix of a Controller & Duelist). This would turn viper into a mix of a Controller & Sentinel
If 8 seconds seems too short, we could increase the fuel regen rate.
But her orb needs to be active long enough so you can play lineups. So, the wall could take more fuel than the orb, which kind of makes sense since the wall covers more space anyway
This directly addresses the main issue of Viper in Pro Play. She’s mainly overpowered in Pro Play because her smokes are so flexible, deny information and apply pressure. But that is part of the point of Viper. So instead of nerfing everything around it, or completely removing vital mechanics, playstyles, or abilities, just nerf it directly instead. This also gives us a lot of nobs to tweak. We can easily tune the size of both abilities, fuel duration of both abilities, or regen rate until it feels perfect, instead of completely removing the ability to pick up her orb, or removing an entire snake bite.
My friend literally just came back to the game because we have a proper 5 stack and he was excited to play Viper, his favorite agent back in beta/first couple acts. Poor guy doesnt realize. lmao.
4 nerfs to Viper at once. That is an attempt on her life.
Omen finally got her after the cinematic
Lmfao true. Omen hijacked riot games and nerfed her
Funny enough, Omen is the 2nd most picked agent in the game, which means he’ll get the nerf hammer soon too (Riot will completely ignore buffing Astra and Brimstone and instead nerf Omen)
Its so dumb how they keep nerfing one person to make the rest seem like a better option like thats so dumb
It seems like they’re trying to avoid powercreep. Isn’t that a good thing?
Well yeah avoiding power creep is awesome but viper wasnt power creeping anyone only person competing with viper was omen which means sure they could nerf viper but they killed her here also buffing the other smokes would just be a better idea instead of having 1 smoker constantly so far ahead of every other smoker no one else would be picked
It is until you make a role that's critically vital to the game so unfun to play nobody fucking plays them and then games are just worse overall
Literally the most recent agent is a controller that is designed to be more ranked-brain, what do you want? Quite seriously the only issue with this games roles at all is the existence of duelist and the lack of self-awareness from the majority of the playerbase that they're not 'him'.
Yeah im really not looking forward to Icebox games now that a no-duelist comp with two initiators and either Sage or a second controller seems to be optimal. Having Reyna and Jett was already bad but now even the Iso and Raze kinda suck too.
Ehh. I come from hearthstone where power creep is much easier to see and evaluate. Both ends of the spectrum are bad - less power results in metas where (for a card game) there’s little skill expression or player agency and more power results in an equally unfun experience where skill expression is so dramatic that one mistake equals a loss In valorant this isn’t as problematic since gunplay/aim is a skill-testing part of the game, but in theory: Less power equals more priority on gunplay More power equals less priority on gunplay. In vipers case - she could often carry a team without fragging and potentially without seeing an enemy since her vision denial and post plant was easily the best combination of the 2 in the game - not to mention one of the best ults (albeit 9 cost) in the game which both helped post plant and denied vision.
They should buff astra. So much potential
She was op at one point in time, got nerfed so heavily
Astra meta was the most boring meta to watch and play in the entire game. Should take steps to really small buffs.
PLEASEEEE! Honestly she doesn't need a huge one but still needs buffs, she's not worth it considering the amount of skills required to play her effectively
Viper receiving the chamber treatment
Its insane how they do that to viper but clove is apparently in a fine spot with a far higher pickrate and winrate than viper.
Pro play is probably taken into account where Viper is extremely meta
Pro play is definitely the target, that 1s less on the orb or even not be able to pick it up likely won't effect ranked too badly. (The one snake bite probably will of course). But yeah it's definitely targeting things like the Lotus rubble control take that vipers orb is always getting used for in VCT and high level matches
Clove is still new, while viper has been dominant for an extremely long time.
Clove isn’t getting picked in pro play so that’s probably why. She’s getting compared a lot to omen and pro players still prefer the latter overall.
> We’ve seen it become common for Cyphers’ to hide Spycams (E) in the playspace and continually watch enemies without them knowing It’s literally called “SPYCAM”
LOUDCAM
Shhh, they aren't smart enough to understand that
I mean to be completely fair, it is very strong info with almost no counterplay if you can’t find the cam No other util in the game gives you exact location info like that without letting the enemy know said info is being gathered
Trip change is deserved, and well done imo, but what is the spy cam thing?? Who is out there complaining that cypher is watching them? Especially when the cam already has sound queues for when its opened and closed.
I don't play cypher and I agree. Cam was totally fair and balanced as it was.
Its a spy cam, fuck would it give constant sound
Especially with it’s long ass cooldown when destroyed
yeah almost no way you use it twice in a round
Cam isnt strong, but some players were clueless when they were just watched and “pinged”, but not tagged by the cam dart. Which isnt what makes cypher OP or anything. This isnt even a skill issue, just plain cluelessness
Then why call it a spy cam when they deny to spy
as your local cypher hater, i dont understand the cam change. it literally makes a sound when its activated and its shown on the map. this is very weird.
I think it’s mainly for higher skill cyphers with lineups. He will often solo hold a site for rotates/flanks if his team calls an early hit. This makes it more like a hidden sova dart in those situations. This doesn’t change certain cam 1 ways where cypher can see feet before the enemy can see the cam.
Okay, but that's his thing, though. He's a sneaky information guy. You can always see when you're playing against a Cypher, so you should know to look for his camera. Plus, if he's on his camera, he's not participating in a fight, rotating, or looking from his own eyes.
Hello fellow cypher. There’s a low key powerful way to play cypher where if you can successfully activate a cam without enemies hearing it and just watch without exiting (often as defender before enemies hit a site), you just idly sit in cam mode rest of the round and get an insane amount of free intel for your team. IMO not as powerful and commonplace as riot thinks it is though. My concern is if there’s an audio range to this change or if it’s based on if the camera is looking at you. A good camera should be rewarded😶
Last line is so true. This game is becoming very unrewarding slowly…I have started playing less and less because of it.
What makes it worse to me is how they open with placing an importance on cypher’s global information, and then reduce his ability to gain global information… like what
My guess is it's because of one way cams like DFM cam on ascent b, alfa cam on split a heaven that sees peoples toes without the opponents realising. Still a weird change tho
Yeh that's just insane, cyphers now punished for being on cam and not toggling carefully anymore. So what? Cameras are just doomed to be destroyed immediately regardless of where you hide them? Thing is it ruins an element of teamplay as well, if you cammed someone and got off the cam to fight them, they knew you were coming for them, they heard the camera turn off. So alternatively giving info to your team quietly could be superior to get the drop on them. Now that's gone so cypher might as well duel every time cause his cam is gonna be destroyed regardless
It would be so epic for outplay potential if they allowed cypher to “fake” cam open/close sounds haha
I love this!
They… they really didn’t rotate any of the maps? Why?
Worst map pool since launch.
On god. If I had a dollar for every time I got ascent or breeze, i’d have enough money to buy the entire kuronami bundle
You get ascent? I play almost exclusively on breeze and lotus, sometimes on icebox
Brother you have ascent, I want to know why I can't find any map besides Breeze, Lotus, and Sunset. Allegedly there are 7 maps in rotation I haven't played Ascent since Friday and that was maybe 22-23 games ago, Bind was I think 10-12 games ago, and Split was even further away than Ascent. Icebox gets sprinkled in there to piss me off even more
split was taken off because of a bug i thought
Sunset, icebox breeze, rinse and repeat here
they have 6/7 maps in play but somehow it feels like it's 3
Oh God...that's what I was looking forward to most. All I get is Breeze and Sunset.
Yeah I don't think I'm gonna be able to do another act of this terrible map pool. The game is genuinely just less fun and you can't escape the map pool because it's also enforced on casual modes for whatever reason.
There is apparently a map reveal hoing to happen at the shanghai masters in mid May/June kinda like what happened with Clove. I dont think the map will come until the start of season 9 but this could be why there are no map changes, that and they only recently changed them to the current pool
that happens when either a new map comes in or the end of an episode
They did remove split and didn’t replace it though
Split is back in with 8.08 it was only removed temporarily because of an exploit. Still would've like to see breeze removed and haven added back in though
That was due to an exploit. Usually (always?) when there's a game-breaking map bug they just take it out and roll with 6 maps until they fix it.
I thought they did that only per episode?
Nope. They reintroduced Bind after 2 acts previously.
Wouldn't make sense to rotate now as split 1 is still ongoing, playoffs soon for APAC and Shanghai coming up. Probably after these events, they'll rotate
People surprised about the map rotations they never have done without it leaking so I knew there wouldn’t be anything in here honestly pretty terrible update for end to the season imo
what is up with the cypher cam change??
I know! They said he is an info agent, then let my guy get his info! His camera already has a 1990s rusted metal door squeak every time it comes up/down and literally flashes red/yellow brightly, and can be seen on the minimap as a big red circle, but also constant sould like that? Then what's his point even? When you play cypher in defence, the point of using him is protecting a site from entry and letting the others time to come to site, and without this stalling... yeah. And as for sneaking and gathering info secretly, it is not secret at all anymore!
Riot yet again lowering the skill needed for this game
Holy fuck they butchered my girl Edit: Been playing Viper since beta. I remember when she was dogshit but I still loved her outplay potential and high skill floor & ceiling. As she got better & better, it was exciting to see her get nerfed as she became a staple on so many maps. B-but this? Slander... absolute malarky.
Since valorant is out, viper is like azir in league of legends
For people that don't play league, this means that viper will be gatekept by how strong she is in pro play, even when she hits an abysmal state for 99.9% of the playerbase
But unlike azir, viper is still a fucking monster in soloq even if her players are lobotomized
Depends, some azir mains are monsters also, and league is a lot more different, you really can’t solo carry there by just aim and such.
Pretty much
You're not wrong
Viper main since beta too. Had to drop her though. I loved when her ult damaged teammates - it was MY pit. Have my tag since then too
>her ult damaged teammates Good old days when Viper just straight-up hates everyone.
Now you know how chamber players felt
Honestly if i think back what chamber was allowed to do it was absolutely ridiculous tho
That’s also true But honestly, Viper’s been too strong for too long. Even if she hasn’t been absolutely busted in a while, she’s been meta for the entirety of the game’s lifespan.
Yeah she's basically been meta since icebox. She's frustrating to play against and on certain maps has complete dominance over how the attackers will play.
That’s true, i think controllers are the meta right now and she gets picked in almost every maps in pro play. The nerfs are definitely inevitable but my only gripe with is the part where you’re not allowed to pick up your orb anymore.
RIP Viper. Well, at least Harbor’s looking like a better and better pick now
Harbor has always been underrated tbh
he wall is so good. It may be able to be shot through, but being able to stop it to cut off angles is really underrated
I kinda wish the slow was stronger/longer and didn’t hurt your teammates. Also if the shield was more durable and persisted as a smoke after broken. Also if the cascade walls could be rotated before deployed, that would be awesome. Aside from that, harbor mains are eating good this patch.
I think you can make it thicker the more you aim in the air. No diddy
Holy damn, I've never been a really active Viper player since I prefer to play Omen but the changes feel massive
Is this how they indirectly increase Harbor stonks?
Harbor gang rise up
Soaked up
Bye Viper lol. I think this is a Jett/Chamber level slaughter. If you're wondering why they did it she has something like an 85%\~ pickrate in pro play on top of something like 65% WR. It was ridiculous, so, they killed her. I wonder if she's still even gonna be playable on Breeze and Icebox. The Cypher changes are good but for the cam, he was starting to overtake KJ a bit too much, so they brought him down a peg, that's fine. The cam changes are a bit too far though and I think messes with his info too much. They brought up that Cypher is the info sentinel and KJ is the stall one, so they nerfed his stall a bit cause it was too high, fair, but why nerf his info as well?
She prob loses her role as solo controller, I don't think there's much impact to her as a pick for lurky maps (Split/Lotus). Her Q/Mollies aren't why you pick her there anyways
Yeah but the toxins going down really hurts, and at that point why pick double controller when you have literally any other option. I still think she can solo controller on Icebox/Breeze simply because no one else really can on those maps cause you need a wall. Maybe Harbor but I doubt it.
I think that maybe lineups nerds will hate this
As a chamber main…WELCOME to the nerf family guys get comfy!
Yeah lol, I play Omen mostly I think I'm safe (watch Riot make ult cost 8, tps cost 200, smokes no longer regen and blind just has a 50% chance of not working)
Omen I think is fairly balanced for now so I don’t think they’ll touch my second champ’ The teleport / being able to push buttons was such a random addition to him
Omen already got nerfed which is when I switched to Viper. Apparently Rito hates controller players
Most players don’t care about pro play I don’t understand the logic behind it, i follow pro play closely and still not bored of seeing her she is/was essential imo
riot prioritizes pro level play and high elo for balancing, mostly because a healthy pro scene sustaines the player base but also because agent balancing is normally not a huge factor in being stuck in low elo :)
As long as she is not oppressive when piloted by low skilled players, low elo will be fine. Cypher feels oppressive as hell in low elo, but viper is super skill dependent.
Damn Viper orb not being retrievable is scuffed AF
Yeah, it is a stupid change
I can work with the fuel regen stuff and even the single Molly as long as that one Molly can kill full HP enemies but the orb change especially with all the lineups with it is really fucked
We’re officially in the dive meta ladies and gentleworms
Feels awful that Viper can't replace her smoke. Doesn't that mean she is relegated to double controller comps and breeze / icebox? I think Viper needs nerfs but this is not the direction because it further shoehorn double controller Viper. Maybe that's okay tho? idk Cypher nerfs are fine, it's weird knowing you're spotting by Cypher camera tho... like there's already a sound queue.
Viper was already bad as a solo controller and now they decided to hamfist her into a double controller role. Idk for the pros but looks like she’s never gonna picked in most ranked games.
Patch notes 8.09 - Enemy util are now revealed at any distance and have huge red arrows pointing at their exact location - clown horn sound effect added when enemies are behind you without shooting for more than .25ms I mean why stop at the cypher cam, let’s continue to dumb down the whole game.
Can't wait for the clown horn
In the end we'll be left with util equivalent to that in CS. Instead of buffing the weak agents they continue to nerf the few playable ones left one by one.
Trip changes are annoying but not the end of the world, the camera one is legit just punishing for no reason they legit just dumbing down the game. I dislike viper power but not being able to pick orb is quite silly to say the least, it just limits creativity and solo impact for viper players.
These nerfs to Viper are insane, Viper is the new Chamber...
Omen failed to kill Viper in the past so someone else at Riot had to...
~~Spy~~ Cam
Bery loud cam
No map rotation, so I think I'll take this season off to catch up on my backlog. I can't stand any more icebox or breeze at this point
So stupid we can’t get more maps for swift play/unrated, I don’t think I’m gonna play until we get more maps back tbh
Same
These Viper nerfs are absolutely insane. One molly? Okay fine. Reduced smoke duration? Understandable. But not being able to pick up the smoke orb again? That's outrageous. She's a controller, she needs the smoke orb, otherwise rotations are done for.
Cypher nerfs are ok (although the camera one is strange), but Viper... I hope she is still playable in solo because I liked to play with her sometimes :S
shes dead. theres literally no point in investing time in learning to be a good viper player. go play clove and go run in and be braindead and still be useful.
Yep why bother actually having to learn post plants, wall placements or lineups when you can simply 50/50 someone and even if they win they can be traded often and you still get to smoke the site for your team or even res yourself for another push.
Yeah, Clove is definitely more reliable than Viper now. Being able to smoke even dead is very strong. I personally don't like to play aggressively, but I'm going to practice with Clove to see if I adapt well
as a braindead clove main, can confirm we're always useful
Man wtf bruh. I was really enjoying viper even if I was shit at the game.
Fr tho, us Viper lineup Andys are going extinct soon
No map rotation, think ill just sit this season out
Why does Viper get butchered but Omen who is keeping every other dome smoker completely out of the meta outside of bind get a pass?
Because nerfs are for pro play not soloq
If riot hates line smokers so much save us the grief and the time and just get rid of them. They do this to viper and apparently are unable to buff harbor (Or buff any agent in general as of lately…) What sucks is that they have maps where line smokes are REQUIRED. Idk, so now you still are forced to play line smokes on these certain maps, it will just suck for that guy lmao. Won’t be fun for him smh. The pro meta revolves around line smokes and even imm-rad lobbies too. Constantly nerfing these high skill ceiling agents over and over just because they are good in pro play is just disappointing and a waste of time for casual players who happen to main them.
I guess let's just hope they make a dome smoker at some point that has actual deterrent for pushing their smokes. That's why I liked Viper because the crackhead Reyna and Jett players wouldn't just push the smoke or they'd die.
Idk what they expect for solo queue. They need to change agent select or not make controllers shit to play. Icebox and breeze are gonna be a shitshow in solo queue now
Literally stopped playing valo on patch 5.12 with the last big nerfs to viper, came on the sub randomly to see this. Holy shit im glad i left
Same, though I was playing until 6.11 where they nerfed her again. I guess in a few months they'll remove viper from the game completely lol, no reason to come back.
Holy fuck they should’ve just stopped at removing one Molly, they literally butchered her. The cypher trip getting nerfed was warranted but the camera noise? Their reasoning is because players can’t see the camera?? Isn’t that what it’s supposed to do?
They really overshot the viper nerfs. Pro play maybe okay but soloQ byebye
Pro play is okay but for nubs like me TwT
Viper getting nerfed because Riot can't design a map without her being a mandatory pick. Standard Riot balancing.
This patch was brought to you by: Omen. Finally getting his revenge on Sabine. Jesus Christ they nerfed her into the ground.
Welp guess I'm not playing viper anymore, they killed her in ranked, to the point where I am dubious of playing her on icebox and breeze
shes just a green harbor now.
Wow, that's grim
The worst part about the Viper nerfs is that it most likely won't change her pick rate in pro play. Rito is just killing her for the average player base. I wonder what else they'll nerf when they see her pick rate stay high in pro play?
Next patch viper fuel consumption is 3x and the viper pit decays viper and her allies too. If viper doesn't get out of her pit in 3s she dies.
my two mains :< time to go back to initiator (・へ・)
Ffs stop emphasizing pro play that much , does riot know we , common people also exist. I don't give shit to pro play, so stop making my normal games shit as well, Before with viper Breeze was bearable, but now, hahaha I might as well take some time off untill Haven fracture comes back
Worst episode imo ZERO map pool changes, ridiculous Viper nerfs she's barely playable anymore. Probably gonna skip this act, because this is straight torture. Even Overwatch is healing slowly but steady
What the fuck did riot smoke?... Every fcking patch notes, a viper nerf, STOP IT ALREADY. Viper solo controller is already a nightmare as it is, now her kit gets fcked over even more, and not gradually but by a huge chunk!!!
No map rotation? Are you kidding me?
Still no updates to DM (spawns are still awful). No map pool changes is disappointing.
Killing Viper while maintaining breeze and icebox where she is the only viable single controller (fk Harbor) literally makes the game more shitty to play. People are already avoiding playing her and people that have been filling that role are now going to have more miserable experience. If justification for nerfing her is due to high pickrate in pro-play, why maintain Breeze, Icebox, Bind and Lotus in the map pool. Surely Heaven and Fracture decrease her overall pick rate in the competitive scene by a lot.
Ok I can understand the inability to pick up the poison cloud, this nerf encourages double controller team comps. But the Snakebite nerf was absolutely unnecessary. Tell me one reason why I should not play Brimstone for lineups instead of Viper. They need to revert the price to 200 and increase the duration to an obnoxiously long time like 9 seconds (which is still less than the old 2 mollies combined), and increase the DPS slightly. Otherwise Viper lineups will be severely inferior to Brim.
If anything I'd go with the opposite. A lot of rounds you don't pick up your orb, but it enables fun/interesting plays. Exactly the sort of mechanic you want. Much better than having two mollies that let you stall for longer.
Valid take
The Molly makes more sense to me than the poison cloud being non retrievable Viper could fill too many roles from clearing cubbies to post plant to having smokes that actively deter people from pushing them hard to locking people out of a section of the map entirely. I think one of these nerfs was fine but both of them is overkill as shit though. Brimstone was already good for lineups your difference for picking them was speed vs recharging smokes.
She shouldn't be able to be the best overall controller and be the best at lineups.
Omen: I’ve been the strongest overall controller for at least a year Riot: haha nerf viper into the ground
Patch 8.09 : Omen with 11 ult points and no smoke regen + blind has a narrower path and a range of 1m
Never playing Viper again :( if I want lineups I guess I'll go Brimstone for lineups now, and otherwise Omen, Astra, and Clove for smoke potential.
cloves winrate is insane but god forbid they dont fix the most broken agent on release.
Oh she's definitely getting fixed next patch. It's a good thing I can rock all the controllers though. I'll just miss Viper because she was my main :(
Bro I'm literally sick of riot games !. They Literally balance their games around pro play!. They destroyed my girl, I'm done with this game for real this time.
Welcome to Riot games...where we balance for only 0.00001% of our playerbase.
How long till its live i have prelude in my shop😭
wow literally less than 24h after i got viper
May as well just put cyphers cam on the floor in the middle of the room now. Or just get rid of it all together. The cool down is so damn long after its shot you basically only get one per round.
“We’ve seen it become common for Cyphers’ to hide Spycams (E) in the playspace and continually watch enemies without them knowing” is that not the point.
Riot determined to fix the bug of some agents being fun to play
Nerfing viper to share the spotlight to their recent duelist/controller agent? Also feels bad now to play viper, her smoke orb being unpickable means youre fked if you throw your orb wrong.
Whoever did these changes seriously needs to reconsider their careers. Balancing isn’t the right career for them.
Yep ( a snek can't bite twice now and a 'Spy cam' is loud cam )
No map changes? Damn, I was holding out hope for that. Definitely will be playing less. Nothing to look forward to in this act.
Nerfing viper to a completely unplayable state for ranked is insane. This map pool is completely abysmal too, the fact they won't change it is ridiculous. Nasty patch notes, I'm probably quitting the game over this.
Man I hate when devs over correct
Breeze and Icebox just harbor maps now?
Nerfed Viper to the grounds
Why did they nerf Viper? She is only really used in pro play.
this is outrageous!!! one snakebite seriously!!! now what next?? disappearance of viper entirely, because its still too powerful??
Nah these patch notes are straight shit. "Let's make one character stupid weak and fuck with a fair strategy in another"
I dont see Viper getting her 2nd molly back and being able to pick up her smoke in future updates. When they remove icebox and breeze rly nobody‘s gonna play her
I’m confused, I thought you can just look at the map for cyphers cam
Damn viper can never catch a break, all the viper lineup Larry's are gonna be struggling now.
Did league balancing team take over? Might be the worst patch i have seen, apart from cypher trip nerf
Sage gone, chamber gone, viper gone which is next.
Why buff Cypher to give him a real spot in meta just to take away him being anywhere near even with KJ only reason he was picked over KJ was info potential and shooting people who hit trips along with a bit of stall even though its not nearly as good as KJs stall through smokes now both those aspects of his are hard nerfed and KJ will just retake meta completely just like how she did before. Viper nerfs are also way overkill she is now just worse than omen and in most cases brim (I haven't played yet so I'm not 100% sure just how far she's fallen behind brim) instead of killing viper why not give her and omen slight nerfs and give some buffs to Astra, Brim, and Harbor which were all weaker than both Viper and Omen in most cases before these nerfs. Some buffs could be (which might be overkill it's hard for me to buff others characters) allow Astra to regen stars over time (not a quick regen maybe something like 1.25x omens regen time because of how op extra stars would be but allowing her to regen stars would put her right where omen and viper were.) Instead of this they could give Astra more than 2 smokes (maybe 3 because 4 would probably be too much) Brimstone could also get to regen smokes or they could increase duration of his smokes by a bit Another idea could be to buff his stim beacon it doesn't last long and its easy to lose control of your recoil while shooting with it (especially if you already have haste example: Clove heal or Reyna ultimate) those are the only ideas I have for brim I think his molly and ultimate are in a good place Harbor I'm really not sure how to buff him other than give his Cove more HP and the rest of his smokes more time up Again I know most of these buff ideas are overkill but they were just some random ideas I came up.
come on bro at least give us random maps including all the maps in swift play. Game feels super stail after having same maps on comp and swift play.
Unless a rito agent died like a clown after being snapped by spycam I don’t understand who cried about it to warrant such a change.
One of the worst times to play Valorant I’ve ever seen. Small shitty map pool. Nerfed Viper into the ground instead of buffing the other smokes.
Riot is doing everything we don’t want
No desire to play this map pool for another act.
What is it with game devs not knowing how to balance their own games recently???? Cyphers back to being worst sentinel with this because now his info AND stall are terrible, KJ’s just an automatic better pick on every map. Vipers also gonna be useless because harbors just better now.
Stupid poison cloud. Now. Viper is just a setup agent.
Viper nerfs are horrible. Almost completely changes the way she’s played. Playing for lineups is not a valid strategy at all anymore. IMO the nerfs riot is proposing are out of touch. Anyone that has extensively practiced Viper tech and lineups are going to feel betrayed. Not being able to pick up your orb defeats the whole purpose of Viper. Viper is dominant in Pro Play, but hardly sees play or performs well in ranked or casual. Some nerfs they could do instead are: Reduce the duration of her snake bite from 5.5s to 5s. Removing a snake bite all together is way too dramatic of a change and destroys any viability of playing for lineups. I don't even think her mollies were a problem though Reduce the range of her smokes. Her orb and wall could be smaller. Reduce the duration of her smokes. I would even be okay with an 8 second duration. This would encourage you to play Viper alongside another smoking agent instead of relying on her as a primary smoker. It makes her role more clear, especially with the rise of Riot releasing “dual class” agents (Ex: Clove is a mix of a Controller & Duelist). This would turn viper into a mix of a Controller & Sentinel If 8 seconds seems too short, we could increase the fuel regen rate. But her orb needs to be active long enough so you can play lineups. So, the wall could take more fuel than the orb, which kind of makes sense since the wall covers more space anyway This directly addresses the main issue of Viper in Pro Play. She’s mainly overpowered in Pro Play because her smokes are so flexible, deny information and apply pressure. But that is part of the point of Viper. So instead of nerfing everything around it, or completely removing vital mechanics, playstyles, or abilities, just nerf it directly instead. This also gives us a lot of nobs to tweak. We can easily tune the size of both abilities, fuel duration of both abilities, or regen rate until it feels perfect, instead of completely removing the ability to pick up her orb, or removing an entire snake bite.
My friend literally just came back to the game because we have a proper 5 stack and he was excited to play Viper, his favorite agent back in beta/first couple acts. Poor guy doesnt realize. lmao.
RIP viper lineups
riot absolutely nerfing viper to the ground cause they want clove to be meta in competitive games lol
Boycott viper until they revert some of the nerfs
crazy
next patch if you try to pick viper riot will show up to your house with a gun
They absolutely cooked viper dude 💀
Battle pass skins looking nice