Spent this past weekend building a PC for the very first time all by myself.

Had some hiccups along the way. For one, I forgot to buy my CPU cooler with the rest of my parts off Newegg. Bought one off Amazon, same-day shipping, and they sent me the wrong part entirely. Decided to give up and bought a different cooler (basically my third choice) at a brick-and-mortar store because it was the only one available.

Despite the stress and annoyance from that cooler saga, the PC is built and runs. I used to play Valorant on a gaming laptop with a second monitor and I'd get ~180fps which was good. But now I get about 450-500 and nothing feels the same.

So if anyone on this website is debating whether to build a PC, I would recommend you do! If you're scared of frying/breaking parts, build it with a friend that has built before. I just took my time and followed some Youtube videos if I got stuck. It was a little nerve-wracking while building but it felt extremely fulfilling seeing everything run and I'm excited to play new games with this thing!

My parts for those interested (not virus link I promise) (to clarify i have the cooler i ended up buying on there and also i bought a windows key online for $25 i did not buy the actual windows dvd from microsoft that shit is a SCAM)

the gpu probably since it's nvidia

can't wait for bait review of the day

i got a code for it because i bought pc parts, is it actually that good

she honestly just reads like an anti-entry agent for those duelists that only know how to press W

unless she makes ascent B site even more stupid to attack she won't be meta

• forgotten
• forgotten
• literally retired from the game (supposedly)
• who?
• forgot this guy existed
• fair point

this was SEN's best year since 2021. would be kinda stupid (imo) to not keep the core

And on my end, I really also envy people that stick around in one area for a while lol. Never lived in one place more than 4-5 years (average 2-ish years each). But, now that I'm working and I like my job (even though I'm scrolling vlr to pass time) I'm hoping to stick around my new city for at least 5 years!

As for the PC, installing Windows is literally the last thing I need to do. I have the key so I just need to make the bootable drive so I can actually log into the PC and start the setup like anyone would a new computer. And clean up, obviously. My apartment living room is now cluttered with boxes and boxes and boxes :p

1. i am a practicing mechanical engineer
2. i've lived in 10 cities across 5 countries across 3 continents
3. i built my first pc this past weekend. very stressful but rewarding seeing it load into the BIOS and seeing nothing got fried. after work today i'm gonna make a usb boot drive and get windows on that baby

this has unfortunately been the year i've been the least invested in ascension. i kinda wanna see either riddle order or sin prisa winning just because i think their logos go hard. don't know anything about the players or team strengths

the power of the rookie is very strong

2023 gave us demon1, 2024 gave us the entirety of team heretics

imagine 2025 sees an ascension team reach champs finals, that'd be crazy

i've rated verno since 2022, i hope to see him in tier1 next year

ascension will keep users sane for a few more weeks at least

(sane meaning regular levels of stupid)

i don't entirely agree with your point but i do agree that having one life game/year doesn't automatically make you part of the goat convo IMO.

TenZ's life year was 2021 (had the international ACS record until this year) but no one puts him in the goat convo anymore. yay's life year was 2022 and i don't think people put him in the conversation anymore either.

KK best player of 2024? imo absolutely, top 3 at minimum. of all time? too soon

i was just going to mention the recency bias is crazy

KK only became part of a potential GOAT conversation after this Champs, and MAYBE a little last Champs too.

aspas has ALWAYS been in the conversation since 2022. literally every time there's a mention of a goat conversation he is always mentioned somewhere

i really hate to word it this way but absolutely not

imagining the optic core playing together today is like seeing inter miami sign all of the ex-Barcelona players

not necessarily saying any one player is washed, but the meta has changed so much that i genuinely think the 2022 optic core wouldn't qualify for 2024/25 champs as it stands

small indie company can't afford gold-plating

i remember how much he struggled when chamber was running the game and he was forced off jett onto kayo. now he's a pretty reliable flex player. real growth

Isn't that what most sports do though? At least in football the winners aren't allowed to keep the "real" World Cup, instead they get a gold-plated replica of it

Apeks goes undefeated but loses in the grand finals again

no one on vlr has common sense. DRG winning Champs Paris

I'm firmly on the Ascent hate train again, this time with some stats.

Why do I hate Ascent so much? Well, the fact that it hasn't left the rotation literally ever. But also, this comp: Jett/Sova/Omen/Kayo/Killjoy. It's such a boring, boring comp for a solved map. Call it BC for short.

I see it 90% of the times I play the map in ranked and I see it in pro play too. Some stats:

In APAC split 2, only DRX, PRX, and Talon ever varied the comp. Literally every other team played BC only.
In China split 2, only Trace, Nova, and DRG didn't play BC every game. EDG and JDG permabanned this map.
In EMEA split 2, there was a little more variety. That being said, the most popular comp by FAR was the BC except with Cypher instead of KJ.
And in Americas split 2, every team played the BC or a small variation of it, except for FURIA because it was permaban
And finally, in Champs Seoul, only Talon, SEN, and LEV played a different comp than anyone else. SEN and LEV pulled out the Deadlock and Talon played a unique Clove/Phoenix/Sage comp.

It's just so stale. And I'm not saying that other maps have this similar problem of a Boring Comp being the hard meta for multiple episodes or even years, but the fact that Ascent has NEVER left the map pool just makes it feel even more stale. Only a handful of teams (notably PRX and Talon) have played more than 6 different agents on this map.

Idk, just venting. Rito please remove this snoozefest of a map next rotation please and i don't want to see it for 2 years after, and only then will I maybe miss it.

MaKo being the only APAC player on this list and appearing twice speaks volumes. my goat

(for the record I know yay plays/played in APAC this year but his entries are from the EnVy/OpTic days obviously)

If any Riot devs read this... could I get a buddy pls <3 much love

G2 is literally the only promotion team that has done well. Gentle Mates and Bleed have both sucked terribly. Changing the roster would be a top 5 stupid decisions ever IMO just let the roster cook one more year

Every team in Top 4 has something to be proud of this tournament

TH: proof of a successful rebuild with a strong roster
SEN: proving everyone wrong after an abysmal split 2 + missing shanghai
EDG: best performance in a LAN ever after qualifying for basically every one and fumbling early
LEV: matching KRU@Champs2021 as the best LATAM team placement in any LAN, also proof of a successful rebuild

yeah i noticed that after i posted my comment, you're correct there. this is the best chance for someone to earn their second Champs though. LOUD 2023 was the only team in the top 4 with any potential 2x Champs winners but they fumbled.

if the final is SEN vs LEV then we're guaranteed to have the first ever two-time champs winner. i think that'd be hype

i don't think he's ever been rated badly, he's just not seen often in the pro scene anymore

when he starts popping up on VCT streams as a player again he'll be in the conversation again

3 players that have won a Champions before are competing to become the first to win two Champions, since that's never happened before

aspas - 2022 with LOUD (2024 with LEV)
C0M - 2023 with EG (2024 with LEV)
Sacy - 2022 with LOUD (2024 with SEN)

literally just a guy asking how to get to the airport or something

that's what it reads like. like a breach flash except you can activate it remotely like a KJ molly. great for double peeking with a teammate etc

that's definitely your opinion (which is fine), but my chronically online ass only saw the craze that the DL ult reveal caused, because we didn't fully know at the time (since it was just leaks) that you could shoot the cocoon to break it or that if you angle it wrong the cocoon can break on its own. it just looked like a free kill ability if it lands. Vyse disabling weapons also reads like it'd be a free kill ability but it's probably not

just commenting on everyone already jumping on the "this ability is super broken" train without it actually being revealed yet

Some random guesses as to how this might work:

• The ult only disables your primary weapon, meaning that you can still use pistols
• The ult only disables the weapons you have equipped, so if you have a second weapon to switch to (like those that buy a vandal + op) then you can just switch to it (super unlikely but a guess)
• The ult only disables your weapon for like. 3 seconds, not like a full KJ/Gekko ult

willing to bet that if revenant does okay in ascension but doesn't win, 3/4 of their players will be signed by GE

few can achieve the rare title of VLR Certified Baiter, whose only perk is that you get downvoted no matter what you say

So if Vyze is on defense and the attackers hit her site, she can just pop ult and kill whoever entries for free since they can't shoot back?

Seems a little much, but then again Deadlock ult also sounded insanely busted when leaked. It's definitely good but not gamebreakingly OP -- maybe it'll be the same here we'll see

If I speak

Ascent - Omen/Sova
Bind - Brim
Icebox - Viper
Lotus - Omen/Astra
Sunset - Omen/Clove
Haven - Omen/Astra
Abyss - Astra

guess what role i play

i too can make up information on the internet

Masters Buenos Aires
Masters Manchester
Champions Beijing

VCT commentary should just always be in Spanish just so we get more moments like this one https://x.com/sevvn/status/1558866376454012930

wp

dude i live in the midwest US and a flight to Toronto is like an hour and cheap if I plan ahead. if i can snag a ticket i'm absolutely going. so hype!!!

This all reads like the MLS system and not in a good way. Eventually there will be no Ascension path and instead an org just needs to pay Riot X thousand/million dollars to get into VCT.

I'm actually Colombian-American lol, but from the Colombian side, yes absolutely. My parents were half-hoping that I'd stay living with them in the city they're in, but I've always wanted to fly the nest so they can hopefully retire and return to Colombia soon without ever needing to worry about me. I think they'll actually do that once my sister graduates too in a couple of years.

In Colombian culture it's very normal and common for at least one sibling to live with their parents their entire lives, as a dependent and then as the caretaker. My grandma has been living with my aunt since well before I was even born. Before my grandpa (other side) passed away he was living with an uncle. That being said, since I'm very Americanized and they're not, it's probably easier on everyone that my parents go live peacefully in Colombia and either visit me in the US often or vice-versa, so having the financial freedom was very important for me.

Thanks for the kind words <3

thanks bro <3

I graduated college, moved cities, and have started working. No longer need my parents for financial support on anything. In a couple years, I'll be able to help them instead

HS% is a bad metric to measure IMO. I'm diamond/ascendant and have like an average of 17% HS rate

I agree with you on the rest though. I solo-queued my way out of bronze, silver, and gold and enjoyed none of it. Started 3-stacking and 5-stacking with friends in plat and had a lot more fun

I also think agent select is a little long. 30s may be a little too fast though. Maybe 45?

Just out of curiosity. If you could fix/change one thing in any gamemode, what would it be?

IMO:

• Unrated: have options on game length. Some people don't want to q swiftplay, but they also don't want to play a mode that's as long as ranked. length options (for example, giving an option to queue unrated as first-to-9 or first-to-13) would be good for those that want a mid-length game
• Competitive: a timeout feature. sometimes there's an adult on the team that has to take care of their kid so they have to afk. sometimes people have to take a shit. sometimes there's just a disconnect. a timeout feature would help with that a LOT
• Swiftplay: honestly nothing. it's fine as is. maybe integrate it with Unrated as the first-to-5 option instead of it being its own mode
• Spike Rush: remove the golden gun. it's just a little silly
• Escalation: I genuinely feel like giving Escalation the TDM treatment (in this case, giving Escalation its own separate maps) would make the game a lot of fun. Most Escalation matches I've seen/played in just resort to camping a choke point on the map (Bind TP/hookah, Split mid/mail, etc)
• Deathmatch: remove the minimap and remove the spawn sounds. a headshot-only mode would also be good
• TDM: fix Drift. It's honestly a really bad map even by TDM standards. the rest are fine though
• Replication: it's fine as is. great mode for pure chaos
• Snowball fight: again, a snowball fight-exclusive map would be fire. maybe a super-modified Icebox for the theme?
• Premier: give better rewards for playing premier. For me personally I see no benefit to playing premier vs playing 5stack ranked. At least with ranked there's RR to play for. If my prem team gets eliminated it's just whatever go next. If Premier gave more exclusive cards/titles/buddies/etc just for playing the game mode I'd feel a lot more inclined to play it