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Essential Tips for Smokes in VALORANT
You’ve decided to play smokes but can’t seem to make the same impact others make. Here are some quick tips to improve your smokes game and make your teammates love you.
Smoke players are the unsung heroes in the VALORANT world. It’s arguably one of the most impactful tools in the game, but it’s also one of the least popular roles. It’s not flashy, and you’ll often get no thanks for doing your job, despite the fact it’s extremely important.
You’ve chosen to bear this burden though, so let’s go over some tips to make sure your teams really appreciate you as you divide the map up and cut off the enemy angles with efficient smoking.
Tough to attack when this is all you see
© Riot Games
Learn Your Lineups
It may be the most basic thing, but you need to learn it. Take the time before you hop into matches to learn where the default smokes are for every site and every map. You can narrow this down a little by only looking at the maps currently in rotation, but that means you’re still learning smokes for seven different maps. If you need to quickly find out what maps are in rotation, check out the wiki.
Once you learn the default smokes, you need to make sure you understand why those smokes are default. Players smoke default spots because they’re the spots defenders will most likely be due to the ease of defense from that area. Think about where you’ll force the enemy to go once you smoke off default and make sure to look there whenever you enter the site.
After you’ve learned your default smokes and understand what they’ll force the attacker or defenders to do, you can move on to more advanced smoke techniques and more unusual smoke positions.
Get the jump on enemies with good smoke placement
© Riot Games
Learn your timings and uses
There are two areas you need to look at for timing smokes. The first is when you put them down. This will apply to both offense and defense. If you lay down a smoke at the start of every round on C site, but the enemy hasn’t been to C site yet, you’re likely wasting your smoke and credits.
On attack, you’ll want to throw down your smokes as you approach a site. If you coordinate the smokes with your push onto a site then you’ll be forcing the defenders to move as you move into the site. This will remove the defender’s advantage and allow you to take more even duels as they reposition. There are also situations where you’ll want to throw smokes down on a site you aren’t attacking in order to trick the enemy into thinking you’re attacking that site. Experiment with that at your leisure.
On defense, the goal is to delay the enemy as much as possible until you can get reinforcements. This can often mean trading a few bullets with the enemy as they come around the corner and then smoking off that site entrance. With the site entrance smoked off, it’s easier to delay the enemy/the enemy will slow down their push.
The second thing you’ll need to learn is how long your smokes last. Brimstone, one of the most popular smokers, has smokes that last 19.25 seconds. Omen’s smokes last for 15 seconds, Astra’s for 14.25 seconds, and Jett is down at 4.5 seconds. Each agent is different, so you’ll need to learn your timings and when to resmoke for each Agent.
One Way Smokes
One way smokes are not as widely used by players, but they’re extremely useful in the right situation. A one way smoke is a smoke that is positioned to give the defender vision while the attacker has extremely limited or no vision. Below you can see some examples of one way smokes. Notice how the Viper smoke allows the defender to see the feet of the enemy while the attacker won’t have any information until they push through the smoke.
Omen one way smoke
© Riot Games
The Agents that can easily do one way smokes are Omen, Jett, and Viper. Astra, Brimstone, and Cypher can also do some, but they aren’t nearly as easy to set up. If you master these smokes it becomes much easier to anchor a site.
Special Smoke Effects
Not all smokes are created equally, that much is obvious by how long each of them last. But a few smokes also have different properties that you should be aware of.
First up, Cypher’s Cage ability. While not technically a smoke, it functions just the same as a vision blocker. When an enemy passes through a Cypher Cage there will be an audio cue telling Cypher’s team that an enemy passed through it.
Next up, Viper’s Poison Cloud ability. One, her deployable smoke can be picked up mid-round and repositioned. Two, enemies that pass through her Poison Cloud (and her Toxic Screen and Viper’s Pit abilities) will be affected by Decay, instantly reducing their HP by 30 and then gradually reducing it every second they stay in the Poison Cloud. HP cannot be reduced below 1.
Brimstone's Minimap
© Riot Games
Lastly, you need to realize how smokes are deployed by each Agent and what information that can provide you. Jett and Omen smokes originate from wherever the Agent is, so the enemy can gather a little information on where you are. Brimstone and Astra, however, bring up a minimap to deploy their smokes so it’s harder to pinpoint where they may be.
Also, if you’re playing Brimstone on a large map that has three sites, it’s often a good idea to play in the middle at the beginning of the round. It will allow you to easily smoke any site.
Watch your team’s loadouts
Finally, make sure you regularly look at your team’s loadouts. There’s nothing worse than smoking off Long on a map only to hear your teammate yell at you because they had an Operator and were watching that path. You’ve completely neutralized them now and put your team at a disadvantage.
Instead, ask them to call out for a smoke after they’ve taken their first shot or two and need to retreat.
Once you’ve mastered these tips, you can start moving on to more advanced one way smokes, unusual smokes, and off angles that will catch the enemy off guard. In the meantime, your teammates will thank you for making their lives easier by being the crucial smoke player.
