What is the hill you will die on?

#1

eric_5008

Speak your mind

VCT 2021 and 2022 were the best years to watch and play. val has become a game based off of abilities instead of gunplay with the addition of abilities. Its just so hard to watch and play without some random bs happening. Also VCT has become retake simulator now which is boring asf

#2

Frooti

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I agree!

The game has become less skilled imo

Also chamber meta was the best meta

#16

eric_5008

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I agree on the chamber meta. I loved how strategic the teams had to be, which is a huge reason why optic and loud were so good that year.

#3

catNmouse

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vct 2022 and 2023 are more entertaining than 2021

#4

marika_knows_the_end

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bro tried to sneak 2021 in there cause sen won

#12

eric_5008

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I personally liked 2021 bc it was cs with extra util and it felt like gunplay was the number 1 focus. Obviously a high mechanical ceiling is still needed now but abilities IMO are too strong to the point where if you play site, most of the time you're guaranteed dead. When compared to 2021, it felt more brawly for site control and you didn't have to play retake all the time

#18

catNmouse

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the game was still developing back then, could you imagine teams play split in 2024 with no initiator? also gambit came in and completely reinvented the meta so most of the time it wasn’t even as chaotic. to each their own though 🤝

#20

eric_5008

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I liked it bc it was carried by gunplay, now there's too much util to keep track of when watching/playing. Also by no means am I down playing the years after bc the players/teams are way better than what they were in 2021, its the valorant that I sorta prefer (but I still watch vct now)

#5

babysasuke

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FaZe would have won a trophy in 2023 if they made franchising

#6

foythvlr

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2024 was the weirdest and worst valorant year ever in terms of level of play and meta (and 2023 was the best)

#7

catNmouse

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level of play was good enough in 2024, meta wasn’t

#11

foythvlr

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really disagree. while watching i felt like it was a competition of who was the less bad team, specially in americas. emea did seem a little better overall tho

#17

eric_5008

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The nerf to skye messed with that alot IMO, and then with the addition of run it down maps like icebox and breeze. It made the quality of the games go down alot

#19

catNmouse

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yea but teams who were heavily reliant on skye should’ve adapted to other agents

#35

foythvlr

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i dont think the problem is necessarily with skye nerf but with gekko buffs, at least in the first half of the year. he's too much of an exec agent and he was too strong on almost every map, turning most of them into attack sided. so we just watched the same round over and over again, because every exec was very strong, every post plant was very strong (specially sunset) and people were just playing retake instead of holding a bomb. there was no space for creative plays and readings because the best way to play was to just stick to the manual. pearl on 2023 was kinda like that too with the harbor viper, but there was much more space for counters

on the other hand we had a lot of fun plays with him because his util is very good for solo rounds (like sacy 1v4 vs loud), but most games were just kinda boring to see.

second half was better but it was just the neon and breach fuckfestival and it went to too much chaos too quick. but it was still too exec-oriented for my tastes

#50

kanyefan4238173

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hard agree, level of play in 24 felt way worse than 23

i feel like lev would be easily worse than loud, edg worse than eg, and heretics worse than fnatic

and americas was way less competitive than 23, 23 americas league was a cinema with great games each week. 24 was predictabl e

#56

foythvlr

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in 2023 i felt like any team in the top 4 of champions (eg, prx, loud, fnatic) could win because everyone was so good that could have a great day and steal the trophy. in 2024 i felt like any team in the top 4 could win because everyone looked so bad that it felt no one really wanted to

#8

Aayan

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Single elim (bo5 playoffs) at Champs would be better

also this is how I'd rank the years
2023=>2022>2024>2021 (Champs 22>23 imo though)

#10

catNmouse

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I don’t wanna imagine PRX winning a trophy so i’m good on that

#52

SolarX

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single elim with bo5 playoffs is the worst idea ive heard
whoever wins the upper finals automatically wins the grand finals because theres so much footage to watch from a team
hella long matches
significantly more expensive to keep running
also putting 2023=>2022 instead of 2022=>2024 is insanity

#62

Anguibok

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How do you "Win upper final" in a single elim ? They are no Upper final, just a grandfinal

#69

Aayan

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no, that's not how a single elim bracket works
instead of max 6 maps a day it's max 5, and it's half the matches so unless you've got tiktok brain syndrome you'll be fine
no
ironic

also drop your tracker bro

#9

ParodyAccount

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Nothing tops champs 2022 Istanbul. The time zones, the rivalries, the significance of the present teams. Yeah I know back then the meta was kinda fucked but at the time it was so exciting to watch.

#13

Prancer

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stuns suck and its one of the worst wide spread game mechanics

#14

cloudberry

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I actually live on a hill. I hope it's the one I end up dying on. Would be a nice full circle kinda thing, returning home to end my journey

#15

localkoolkid

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Shifty Shafts is goat status

#46

oshifudge

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Finally someone cooking in this thread

#21

saynotoherpes

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lock-in was the best tourney in val and probably will never be surpassed, it was just so hype as it was our first time in franchising and watching so many teams go against eachother was awesome

#22

KyLZi

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There is a vlr utopia beyond the bait and hate posts where users of all walks of life can congregate and enjoy watching good valorant. This place exists and it's a mindset

#24

Aayan

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that vision isn't even that far off
if they had more moderation like r/valcomp it might happen

#25

cloudberry

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This is true. I swear I'll find it one day

#23

guuz

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aspas refusing to join ZETA right now is like Paul Atreides putting off the jihad

#26

saebr

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wha? we don't want aspas

#27

8kunai

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2021 relied too much on gunplay imo. teams went with 2-3 duellist comps and basically whichever team had the best shooters would win (large reason why sen dominated their masters event with tenz and friends)

#28

Nachtel

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No conventional team should ever sign a duelist that can only play Jett

Idc if they have the best aim in the world by a mile

#29

Yuh_aye

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https://www.vlr.gg/248277/paper-rex-vs-evil-geniuses-valorant-champions-2023-playoffs-gf

#31

Harapan845

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are you aware of what the word only means?

#36

Yuh_aye

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the literally signed him while the only duelist he could play was jett

and it was obviously his main role/agent, as he played 251/459 rounds at champs on Jett

and he had the best aim in the world

So the exact decision you said a 'conventional' team should never make won them champs

#30

femboyenjoyer

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marved over yay in iceland 2022 though it was close people dont seem to agree w me :(

#32

SolarX

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neon isn't op

#33

destroylonely

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Less was the lockin MVP over Leo let me explain why

https://www.vlr.gg/event/stats/1188/champions-tour-2023-lock-in-s-o-paulo?exclude=16332.16333.16334.16335.16336.16337&min_rounds=0&agent=all

More rounds played, higher acs, higher adr , 22FK > 6FK

Leo is good but his stats are inflated bc he never takes first duels

Also Less had the best performance in the grand finals

https://www.vlr.gg/167393/loud-vs-fnatic-champions-tour-2023-lock-in-s-o-paulo-gf

#34

catNmouse

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you are right but sadly mvp goes to the winning team, which makes sense because a team outside of the grand finals could have players with monstrous stats and still not get mvp because they didn’t make it to top 2. it would be weird in that case

yay would be mvp of champs 22
chronicle mvp champs 21

#37

burritx

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dgzin is a great player

#40

eric_5008

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Wasn't the issue with him that he was kinda toxic? I thought I read some stuff about him not being a great teammate

#38

Liwus

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There are a few.

Lock/In is the greatest esport event ever.

Vandal and Phantom should shoot a bit faster ( make it so you can actually kill a plat player shooting their torso before they flick you)

Playoffs shouldn't have lower brackets

We need more teams at internationals and more internationals.

They play FAR TOO FEW games in a year (12 series for some of the teams).

They need to move Americas VCT somewhere else

#43

eric_5008

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My only issue with lock-in was that I felt bad for the teams that went to brazil to bootcamp, just to lose one game for it to be done. Lock-in was a great event tho.

Riot should let some third party orgs run tourneys like CS does

#39

Paraplant

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agent changes kill the game

#51

SolarX

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Would you like to have 3 rechargable skye flases? Or pre-nerf chamber? Or pre-nerf astra? Or pre-nerf reyna? Or pre-nerf iso? Or pre-nerf jett? Or pre-nerf raze? Or pre-nerf viper? Or pre-nerf breach? Because thats what this comment implies.

#41

toaddiee

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the whole "kru plays like shit and then qualify to champs" is overblowed out of proportion, they played good this year and just chocked the first split.

#44

catNmouse

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kru would’ve made shanghai over lev if they didn’t throw the 4v1

#42

JawXG

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Asuna is one of the best AMER flexes, provides so much value for 100t and it would not be an improvement if he was replaced by nismo for example

#45

cioccolat

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Acend was not worthy of it's 2021 title.
There was active attempts from the organizers to help them through

Gambit, VK and other teams could've won of not for the interference

#47

catNmouse

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There was active attempts from the organizers to help them through

is this about the whole interview thing

#48

oshifudge

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Termi is the problem and drx could've/could be winning sm more

#58

eric_5008

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This one, I heavy agree with. What he did with zest and only bringing him in for important games, also not scrimming with zest. Apparently termi wouldn't call timeouts bc he wanted stax to grow as an igl, then all of a sudden the past year, he starts coaching again when the core is gone

#64

merciless-pity8989-89

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notice how not 1 of the player we dropped even had a semblance or success after we dropped them

#49

tserc

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if ZETA didn't have role issues, they would've been top 4 in Pacific during the 2024 season

#53

Anguibok

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Sage isn't a Sentinel, I rather put her in initiator or controller

#54

moomoomoomeadows

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Chamber meta was better for esports

#55

peetherium

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It's a very stupid decision to not invest in academy teams and every team that doesn't will be negatively affected in the upcoming seasons.
More struggling teams should be doing open tryouts instead of directly poaching tier 2 players
Everyone trying to say that pre-franchising was better because the 'meta was more enjoyable' are blinded by nostalgia and the actual reason was because teams had identity and character (LOUD and Optic were the 200iq superteams, DRX Korea's last hope, Zeta was Japan's unlikely hero, etc)

#57

nooomy

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2024 was way more boring than the previous 2 years. People are gonna defend this year because popular teams won/ did well but the meta was boring af and the scene lacked personality compared to previous years

#60

eric_5008

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For me, it was the map pool that ruined the year. No one wanted to play breeze, icebox or ascent, so it was just the same maps every series, lotus specifically

#59

TM06Nick

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how do you know playing in VCT 21 and 22 were good is your name yay or TenZ

#61

eric_5008

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Like..... in game............... playing ranked. It was more fun for me 2 years ago

#63

Froggy0_0

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2021 was way better than 2022

#66

catNmouse

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gotta have to disagree there. the quality of play in 2022 and how competitive some of the matches were just blows 2021 out of the gate. say all you want about the chamber meta but it was really cool to see many unique comps teams ran, such as raze on haven and fade being popular etc

#65

Sandy_05

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2021 was literally start of this val champs ofc we all were excited for it

#67

SAMPV6

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Orgs would make money if players weren't lazy and worked on their personal brand and audiences

#68

ninjaturtle

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I agree. Not to mention Riot keeps adding stupid ass maps like Sunset and Abyss where you just plant the spike and the MOST EFFECTIVE post plant idea, is to go back into main and spam the spike, which makes pro games on those maps so bedge and annoying to watch

I swear, who is Riot even hiring at this point? I wanna know, cuz us fans can design better maps and agents than them