Unlike many of its counterparts in the tactical shooter genre, VALORANT puts an emphasis on its various unique characters and their wide array of abilities. As the player, your job is to make sure you’re able to find a solid balance between every aspect of your mechanical ability. With a steady combination of gunplay and ability usage, you’ll be able to utilize whatever character you feel most comfortable with on the VALORANT roster effectively.

In this guide, we’re going to go over everything it takes to use your abilities effectively in VALORANT. Whether it’s for damage, reconnaissance, or pure utility, VALORANT’s roster of agents supplies each player in the game with a plethora of tools to make each game feel balanced in a way that puts an emphasis on the characters that are present on the battlefield, in addition to the players that are controlling them.

Making the Most Out of Recon

If there’s one distinction that VALORANT has over its competitors - namely CS:GO - it’s that players have the ability to scout out areas prior to engaging on offense or holding down a choke or corner on defense. Abilities like Cypher’s Spycam, Sova’s Recon Bolt, and Sage’s Slow Orb can be used to detect enemies from afar or around corners.

With this in mind, it’s best to use your reconnaissance abilities as quickly as you possibly can. If you’re on Cypher, you should ideally be setting up your cages, tripwires, and camera before the round even starts. With characters like Sova and Sage, you should be dropping your Recon Bolts and Slow Orbs at the first sight or sound of an enemy approach. The fact that many recon abilities can be used around corners is a significant advantage to the defending team as they have the chance to get a view on any encroaching enemies prior to a gunfight.

Additionally, if the pushing team is spotted out by a Cypher camera or blocked off by a Sage orb or wall, you, as a defender, could potentially reroute the attackers and force them to take a different path to site. Of course, you serve as a line of defense with your weapon when you hold down a site, but having an extra safety blanket made up of recon abilities before the enemies even push onto that site is definitely an advantage that you’re going to want to utilize as soon as possible.

Using Your Abilities for Damage

And while there are, of course, many abilities that put an emphasis on utility, VALORANT also makes prominent use of DPS abilities. Agents like Phoenix, Viper, and Raze make significant use of damaging moves and, as a player, you should be definitely using them in tandem with controlling abilities and situations in order to maximize DPS.

If there’s any major mental note you should be keeping in the back of your head whenever you’re playing a duelist and using a DPS ability, it’s that your abilities should almost always be combined with someone else’s utility abilities. On their own, abilities like Raze’s Paint Shells and Phoenix’s Hot Hands are strong enough to deal damage to an unsuspecting enemy, but when combined with an effective smoke or barrier wall to obscure vision or prohibit movement, grenades and AoE abilities are certainly much more deadly.

Additionally, your damaging abilities should never be “in your hand” as you approach a gunfight or turn a corner. Always remember that holding your gun is much more effective than prepping an ability when approaching an enemy. Considering your reaction time with your weapon is practically instant and your reaction time with an ability will take a second or two with cast time in mind, it’s always going to be advantageous to have your weapon out with enemies on your radar.

Considering you only need at least three shots with a standard rifle to take out an enemy, which can easily be done in a split-second, while an ability takes upwards of 5 seconds between cast time and a slight delay, you’ll most definitely want to keep your weapon out whenever possible and only use your abilities when you know you’re in a safe position to do so - despite the amount of the DPS that they can potentially pump out. Of course, Raze’s Paint Shells can one-shot a poorly positioned enemy player, but they’re effectively useless when you’re holding them and peeking around a corner, coming face to face with an opposing player equipped with a Vandal.

Abilities Surrounding Utility

The final major sector of abilities that VALORANT has to offer are moves that deal in the department of utility. Agents like Jett, Omen, and Breach are all about abilities that revolve around blocking off sectors of the map, exposing weak points in the enemies’ positioning, and obscuring vision for pushers or defenders.

When playing a character with utility-focused abilities, you’re going to have to serve as the anchor point for your team in the vision game. Holding down a site revolves around the mechanic of obscuring vision and keeping the enemy team in the dark, so with a plethora of smokescreens and movement abilities that you can use to not only give your team the advantage, but also disable the enemy team’s push or defense, you’ll almost always have the upper hand if you make solid use of these abilities.

The main piece of advice you can utilize when taking advantage of utility abilities is going to be to play around your smokes and let your natural advantages intermingle with your obscured vision. For example, if you smoke off one entryway onto site, and cover another with your weapon’s sightline, you want the third possible entryway to site to also be covered within your line of sight or another player.

Additionally, you never want to be staring directly into a smoke head on. Always be sure to hold some sort of angle when watching a smoke. Players, regardless of whether or not they’re on offense or defense, will occasionally shoot into a smoke hoping for an easy kill. Don’t be the person to give up a blind kill in a scenario like that. On top of that, you’ll want to have as many sightlines as you can covered - especially on defense. If you’re caught walking through a smokescreen, you’re most likely going to get cut down the second you emerge, so be sure to have as much space covered as possible.

On offense, utility is everything as the defending team will usually have a solid setup in place before the round even begins. Once you’re off to the races and the round kicks off, you’ll want to establish a solid frontline of utility to counter the defending team’s preparations.

Additional Thoughts Regarding Abilities

VALORANT is by miles one of the most unique games to grace the tactical shooter genre, and it’s mainly due to the way it utilizes the vast array of abilities given to each character on the roster.

Unlike other shooters, VALORANT’s character-based model is a key component of the game that allows players to feel a sense of individuality and unique gameplay on a game-by-game basis. No two games of VALORANT are ever going to be identical, largely in part to the playerbase’s usage of the character roster and the abilities that come along with it.

While your core mechanical ability is surely going to be a defining factor when it comes to winning gunfights, rounds, and eventually, games, the usage of abilities is a key part of what makes a strong VALORANT player.