Gaming
Esports
EU pros’ best tips on how you can become a professional VALORANT player
Want to become a pro VALORANT player? Then check out these essential tips from the best of the best on the European scene.
Red Bull Home Ground is over and done, and during the event we saw a tremendous amount of top-level play from all of the professional teams and players – but what’s the secret to getting this good? The European pro scene has only been around for nine months but plenty of players have risen through the ranks and set the benchmark for high-level competition. Some of the best players at Red Bull Home Ground have spoken out and given their best advice on how to become a pro, and what it takes to get to their level.
01
Communicate, communicate, communicate - G2 zeek
VALORANT is a tactical team shooter game so it comes as no surprise that G2’s new signing, zeek, says that the most important thing to do is learn to communicate. If you don’t have a team yet, learning to communicate in ranked games can be crucial to your development.
Zeek said: “There’s a lot of mechanical talents in VALORANT who are super good, especially in Radiant ranked games. All you have to do is to improve your teamwork and game sense. It’s important to find a good team close to your level and play a lot of scrims to improve your calling and communication.
“Communication is the most important thing in this game, you have to take that seriously and learn how to communicate if you want to win.”
02
Be a good team-mate - NiP Ex6TenZ
VALORANT
© Riot Games
Not everyone has the ability to totally solo carry every single round, so it’s more important to be able to contribute to your team instead of playing for solo glory. Moreover, the best players aren’t necessarily the top fraggers, and having five people work together as a team is going to bring you far more victories than every man for themselves. Ex6TenZ believes there are plenty of ways to get noticed but if you want to get signed, you have to be a good team-mate.
“If you are at a level where you are good enough, there are many ways you can also catch the attention of teams and orgs. For example, you can play VPD, you can stream and show people what you can do but the most important thing is to learn to be a good team-mate. You need to trust yourself because if you work hard and you’re good enough it will come with time and you will get your chance one day.
“Being a good team-mate means having a good attitude, mentality and putting the team first. I’ve seen so many players in VALORANT play Raze and Jett and not play for the team. They get a lot of frags and they think just by doing that is good enough and they don’t have to change anything but you have to learn to play for the team first if you want to be a good team-mate.”
03
Master of your main Agent - Futbolist marqnue
Valorant Breach
© Riot Games
With more than enough agents to choose from, players will naturally gravitate towards having a main agent they can grind and become comfortable with. However, marqnue insists that there is more you can do if you want to get better and it’s imperative not just to get good with an agent but to learn and master everything there is to know about your main agent.
He said: “First of all, you should never stop believing in something. If you lose one tournament, maybe you played badly, that’s not important because VALORANT has a huge future – the game is growing day by day. You have to also keep watching official matches and VODs and learn from those.
“If you want to main an agent, for example Sage or Cypher, you have to master these agents, you need to know and learn all the tricks, where to place their abilities and the best positions to win with them”
04
Don’t be toxic - Guild BARBARR and SUMN FC Boaster
Jake "Boaster" Howlett is a British player who currently plays for SUMN FC
© DLC Studios Limited
There is nothing worse than playing with toxic players: you get them all the time in solo queue and it’s even less attractive when it comes to teams and orgs. You might get heated and want to flame someone for performing poorly, but you have to weigh up the negatives with the positives. Feeling relieved for a few minutes could cost you a potential opportunity with a top team or org so make sure you get in the habit of being a positive person.
Guild’s coach BARBARR said: “Try to work on your attitude, don’t try and burn your bridges early. I’ve seen a few players who are doing this and it’s proving to be damaging to them. There is no need to make a storm over things every time because people remember that. Everyone at the top is close to the same skill level so if you compare two players and they have the same skill level, you have to then start comparing personalities. In solo queue people can hide their player names right now which means you don’t know who you’re potentially being toxic to, it’s better to just try and stay positive. You could be playing against people you don’t really want to be toxic towards especially if you want to get on a team or get signed so don’t blow your changes like that.”
SUMN FC’s Boaster also emphasises this point: “You need to be friendly and have a nice attitude and vibe about you, don’t be toxic because nobody wants to have a toxic team-mate or play with someone who is toxic," he explains. "Let’s just put it this way, if SUMN were playing an official and someone is being toxic, that really hinders us and we will probably lose the game because of it.”
05
Don't stop believing - Monkey Business TviQ and FrenzyGoKill vakk
Which Agent will you choose?
© Riot Games
The path to any professional esports career is a grind, it’s not an easy thing to achieve and while the player base for VALORANT is massive, not many of them can actually make it to the top. Both TviQ and vakk stressed the importance of not giving up, especially when you’re feeling down about the lack of opportunities in the scene.
“I’d say hang in there as much as you possibly can (or you can afford to) because eventually someone will take notice of you.," TviQ said. "If you keep playing ranked, even if it sometimes might not be the best place to be, it’s still a place where you can show off. Keep adding people to your friends list and ask them if they want to play tournaments here and there, you can try and get noticed that way.
“It’s not something that’s going to happen overnight, unless you know the right people, it’s going to be a big grind, it’s not going to be easy because you can’t just get picked up straight away. Of course, the chances of going pro at the top level isn’t very high but I’d say to just keep at it because if you are good enough you will be noticed eventually.”
Vakk has been playing in the top-tier scene ever since the VALORANT beta and although he’s finally been linked with a big-org signing, the former Nolpenki player has been non-stop grinding to try and make it for eight months straight.
He said: “I’ve been in the same situation of grinding for months and years and feeling like you have everything it takes to be competing with the best teams but just not getting the opportunity. Sometimes you need to be a little bit lucky, I did but you also need to grind and know what you’re grinding for. You need to create goals for yourself, realistic goals that you can keep achieving. There are a lot of ways you can help achieve your goals, you can play VPD for example, I remember AvovA was grinding and playing VPD where he won a few seasons and got picked up by Heretics - that’s a perfect example of his grind and goals paying off.
“There are places where you can dedicate your time to and get spotted one day. Sometimes you have to be lucky where you get noticed straight away by top orgs but sometimes you’re going to have to spend a lot of time grinding and feel sad because you believe you have what it takes but you’re never getting the time. I was in that situation and a lot of players are too, you just have to push through that and if you really believe in yourself it will come eventually.”
