No flame i just genuinely wanted to know how you guys have been feeling about this year? so far across the last two ints EMEA has literally only beat china, themselves and LEV. Do you guys think you'll bounce back at champs or are you just waiting for offseason atp
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Non toxic EMEA Question
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Pretty much this. That being said I feel like EMEA has been hemorrhaging a serious player base since early 2023, I think the lack of high budget EU orgs willing to gamble on Valorant franchising drove a lot of younger players and mid budget orgs back to CS.
It feels like the scene is regularly cycling through older names and occasionally adding 1 or 2 young guns to a roster and assuming that will fix things. There doesn't seem to be enough players for regular complete roster overhauls.
I know statswise Valorant has supposedly dropped a lot of player count since 2023 July, although cant be certain in reliability of that considering Riot don't share info. If the figures are true though I can see a lot of those falling numbers being from EMEA as CS2 was slowly getting fixed and the Valorant hype has died down.
Tldr, it might be a player base size issue and if so I fully expect it to get worse.
and two of those three teams would have taken 7th-8th if they weren't saved by the bracket. also NA still has both of their teams in, and the NA team that won last tournament didnt even qual for this one. meanwhile, you only have one EMEA team left, and last tournament both EMEA teams bombed out of the tournament.
how r u talking about being saved by the bracket. the #1 seed teams were mean to pick their opponent but our #1 seed FNATIC couldnt pick their opponent and got GenG who are practically the best team this year and are on course for their second grand finals. So really i thin EMEA are unlucky as EMEA have all knocked their own regions out at the end of the day
Heretics and Karmine Corp are teams built for the long run. This year is looking like a developmental stage for them and next year I expect them to really contend internationally. And even then Heretics have made top 4 and were 2 rounds away from utterly curbstomping for G2. Feeling quite good about them.
NAVI has been robbed by the format twice. If they were at either Masters I'd expect them to outperform pretty much every EMEA team.
FUT are a weird one, half the time they look incredible the other half they look awful.
FNC need changes imo.
Overall not the worst in the world, next year I think they'll actually be Barack
I have already given up on teams like FUT, FNC and TL because they lack the passion to restore this region to its former glory. I am not trying to be offensive, but players like cNed and Derke should no longer compete on the international stage because their time has passed.
The region faces a number of issues in various aspects, but I believe this is one of the most important.
Heretics will win LANs in the future for sure. They could already win this one despite a giga turbulent year with constant changes due to visa, exams burnout etc. This team has a fantastic future.
FNC messed up coasting in the offseason and were as a result behind in the race for the rest of the year. But (!) they still could have beaten GenG who are now tournament favourites with 2 more round wins.... so i do think they will be strong at champs. They are catching up.
FUT is a decent team that will make playoffs in internationals but not win them which is fine. Cant complain.
It is such a bummer that Navi isnt here... they were looking better than Fut and like a clear top 3 team. As it stand i expect them to make champs and perform well.
Kcorp is also pretty much a rookie team with insane talent but just not ready yet. I think they will need some more time to develop and will be strong in 2025 onwards.
The point is Europe went heavily into rookies which is great since the scouting has been great but obviously longstanding established cores like 100T and G2 will have an advantage in the shortterm if they do their jobs well. Therefore i think champs and especially 2025 will look great for us.
EMEA has improved a lot this season, I think the average level of the top6-7 is pretty decent, the work being done in terms of giving chances to t2 players is great since there were a lot of washed players and all of the players from t2 are showing a great level (except maybe Runner?), Heretics is the only team rn that I am 100% confident have what it takes to win an international event but there are others that could do it with 1 roster change or with some improvements. I think the direction of the region is the right one and it will lead to EMEA being the best region in the future but rn I dont have high hopes outside of Heretics/Fnatic if they find form.
Might be controversial because of the international performances on paper but I think its a very positive year for the region, wether EMEA is back for real next year or not will depend a lot on the offseason, what killed EMEA in the first place was teams becoming complacent and keeping players that werent that good while refusing to give chances to our talent in t2, same goes for coaches, many coaches/igls in EMEA are shit but they are there because they have been since the start of Valorant but that will change next year imo.
If you look at teams like Gentlemates, KOI, Giantx, Vitality, NaVi and Liquid they all have talented players to build around but they need to make some changes in coaching staff since their ideas arent good or change IGL/upgrade on 1-2 players but there is a core to build around. We also have KC who showed a great level at KickOff and have a nice young core but you can feel there is something missing that makes them struggle sometimes.
I think the biggest problem is EMEA is how teams play valorant and an intellectual problem not a lack of talent, its that and also how some of the current teams were built almost without any balance and overall just poorly built overall.
I will say what I think teams in EMEA need to do to keep moving forward and reach the levels of the past:
M8: kadavra instead of wailers and hopefully an upgrade over Logan even if its not as needed.
Giantx: -Pipson (not bad coach but his ideas arent t1 level and just needs something fresh), -Redgar, build around purp0/Cloud maybe keep Fit1nho, hoody needs to go too, UCAM is their partner team so I would look at Olizera/Flickless since I think they are t1 level players but most important part will be finding the right coach/igl.
KOI: waste of talent, they have a roster perfect for a 4-1 fast paces style but they are playing the characteristic slow Barbar style, whole coaching staff needs to go + Shadow, the other four I would keep even if I know this will be unpopular among KOI fans, I think starxo should try to build a fast paced style like he had in Acend while developing him as an IGL, grubinho is a solid smokes player and Kamo has potential to be a worldclass explosive type of duelist, Sheydos is still a great player imo and has been looking as a sentinel recently, used to not like him in that role but I think he has developed well, smart player too with experience which will be key, would look a mechanically talented initiator player, would probably get zeek who I think would be a perfect fit for this roster both in terms of personality, already knows starxo and stylistically, the double duelist combination of Kamo+zeek and overall aggressive acend esque style that they could bring would be hard to stop, would love to see this team personally since I can really see it winning trophies.
Vitality: whole team is a mess rn even if there is individual talent, coaching staff is on fraud watch, cender could be a good fragging igl but idk about what igl part, kicks seems like a decent initiator player more as a support than pure firepower, Runner cant play duelist at t1 level so either kick him or make him change roles, sayf might be retiring but I dont personally like his mentality sometimes even if I love the player and like him personally, trexx is just an edge lord, talented player but loser mentality, its just a mess of a team honestly, whoever built this team needs to not ever get a t1 job again and seems like just focused on talented players and a duelist with good t2 stats but that didnt pass the eye test in terms of entrying/mechanics, wont comment since its too much of a mess and u need to be inside to know what to do in this case, good luck Mr.Gorilla.
NaVi: Ange1 I love you but your time is up, 50/50 playstyle and forgets this is valorant not CS, would love to see a slight change in style from ange1 both as a team and him as a player, if he can do that he can stay if not then just become the coach, Ardiis and Shao have some potential as IGLs imo but for different reasons, overall good team that only really needs 1-2 changes + different ideas to compete internationally, I would get a star duelist who can play both jett/raze, if Shao can become an IGL while Ange1 helps him with off the server stuff from a coach role then it would solve a lot of problems for this roster, this team so far has been on the more passive side of the spectrum so idk if a really agressive duelist would be a good fit but I do think they need to evolve their approach a bit more so maybe it works out.
Liquid: whole coaching staff needs to go, mistic needs to 100% go, keiko to be judged by the new coach/igl, jamppi needs to work on becoming a serious flex player, he brings great energy to the team but his individual level and decision making has been shit recently, Enzo should probably get cut too but its a bit hard to judge since idk how much influence he has on team, Nats should be the player they build around, since u need to build a team from scratch I would get bonkar if Fnatic doesnt get him, give him the keys basically, I trust him to be able to build the foundations of a future good team.
Fnatic: Boaster needs to go, wether you keep him as a coach or not is up to them, I am not sure if he would be ready for it and I dont like the way he sees the game, I think it would be better for him to move to a different team and start again from the bottom, will force him to evolve or die basically. I would get bonkar, if chronicle can IGL then make him IGL with Leo as 2nd caller, chronicle as smokes and get patitek?, I feel like the best firepower itw together with Heretics and PRX, I feel like they are missing a personality like Patitek who also has great modern valorant ideas, world class supportive util and his firepower has improved a lot in this masters, he is more than good enough individually for t1, this is just my take on fnatic personally but there are more combinations, the core for me is chronicle, leo and alfajer, everyone else could leave depending on the direction the team takes
KC: n4rrate is worldclass, marteen and tomaszy have been inconsistent but showed flashes of brilliance, sh1n is a very solid smokes player who brings great vibes, engh GOAT coach even if I think KC could have done things a bit differently in how they played at times at masters, would have liked them to play more together sometimes but cant complain tbf, Magnum needs to stop playing sentinel since I think you need a player with really strong firepower in that role (tomaszy), Magnum doesnt give me much confidence as an IGL and captain either, personally I would love if N4rrate can become the IGL with the help of Enghh, if not u would need to scout a fragging igl with potential to try to grow, if n4rrate can become the igl then it makes everything easier and u can just focus on getting some more firepower
FUT: pretty easy ngl, overall decent players but no1 is a true difference maker, u need to sign someone who can be an upgrade on qraxx and bring star power, wo0t would have been perfect but its too late, up to them to do the scouting
up to the players imo, its a players game and I think one of the problems when it comes to team building in valorant unlike CS is that the players are very rarely listened to, let guys like starxo/zeek/sheydos choose who they want to play with or what coach do they want, this obviously can also backfire since many players will just choose their friends and not the most competent people but I think in this case its fine, it will be up to starxo to choose what type of coach he needs
Honestly, our teams got improved a lot. TH and KC was so bad last year. FUT is getting better. BBL is getting better. TH is in top 4 at Masters. KC did looked good and they need to solve some problems in team. M8 looks strong. Vitality looks better than last year. Somehow TL is worse. No need to talk about KOI because who cares? Also, I don't wanna talk about Fnatic too.
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