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Edit: I forgot to say I peaked asc 3 but didn’t play for an episode so now I’m at dia 2
def not controller
initiator is high impact role
sentinel is easy self sufficient role, but i feel like the game is kinda out of your hands sometimes? its just that you can get value on your own
duelist is good cause you take the more important fights usually
tbh i think theres a strong reason for anything other than controller and i think it depends on you yourself
facts
Before I quit a year ago I got out of the trenches of low elo by learning how to play cypher and lurk (didn’t know many setups, maybe 1-2 per map max)
It forced me to learn how to get better game sense and take better fights, which I relied on since my aim was terrible for my elo
I hit ascendant 1 with mostly solo q and haven’t played the game at all since then
If you have a duo you can play controller and let your duo play sentinel or vice versa. If you solo queue and you're confident with your aim go dualist. If you're confident with your game but your aim's kinda meh go sentinel. Never play controller or initiator while solo queuing or you'll be flamed to death by your team plus playing controller without comms is pretty hard.
Edit- I'm assuming you're gold-plat hardstuck as you're asking help to rank up. I'm Ascendent so Im not sure about my opinion if you're trying to rank up to immortal or above
Astra.
you will learn to look at your map and help teammates from afar + learning when to use util vs when to have gun out.
she's very hard but its a trial by fire for newer players and you will improve quickly.
if you feel hardstuck, try learning Astra, i guarantee you will subconsciously improve something when you go back to your main agent.
Cypher, esp in my pisselo everyone is to fucking dumb to break trips or entry together, so u gain so much value from being passive and playing of util. Either ur team retakes with number advantage or the enemy just refuses to hit ur site so ur team can stack other site. On attack just go lurk and punish over rotates and flanks.
I wouldn't think of it like that. The issue is a bit more complicated than "what agent could help me climb."
First, you have mechanics and theory. There is a base level game that is being played here where it's about angles, positioning, timing and just infinite complexity depending on your appetite. Most people are deficient in both, especially in the ascendant range. For mechanics, focus less on gridshot type scenarios and more horizontal targets. A big mechanical thing people tend to forget is that no one in Valorant stays still. Your practice needs to mimic the actual game you're playing, which is head level moving targets.
Theory is another hard one. This in itself has endless complexity. I think people tend to forget that the people you gave you the terminology we have today were not scholars. At best they were burnouts and some even methed up cokeheads. There's a lot of information out there that is not correct or has been washed over so many times the meaning is lost. That leaves everyone in a very perplexing problem. There's no textbook here. No one is doing experiments and reporting back to us. For me, this has meant throwing out the rules from previous games (CSGO) and painstakingly trying stuff that goes against the current tradition/meta. For you, it could be completely different. Just go forward unsure and make sure anything you "know" is something you have personal experienced/tested and it's not just cuz some drug addict from the 2000s thought it was important.
The second thing working against you is matchmaking. Unless you are already a top 10 player or have special advantages that other people don't... wink wink... the path through ranked is not linear. You are fighting a bell curve that is trying to stay in place. You are fighting a mmr range that is expanding because it is taking too long for Riot to find similar skilled players. You are fighting the players who consistently end games with 5 or less kills in games that go to overtime. And you do all of this while your teammates act against their own interests constantly.
So all that considered, this notion that, "oh it's just the agent I play" ... it's like that meme where if you know you know. It's way deeper than it seems...