Where do YOU keep your crosshair placed on screen? What angle are you holding and where is your crosshair pointing at? Ask yourself these questions and play a few games of Valorant and notice how a winning trade can start with where you hold your crosshair. This guide is a quick way to get you started on Crosshair Placement, so you can start clicking heads and winning rounds.
When you play Valorant, where do you position your crosshair on the screen? Having your crosshair positioned in a certain place when clearing angles and knowing where head height is located all over the map can give you a better chance of winning duels and hopefully the round. Are you getting distracted and letting your crosshair drift? Your wrist or arm not being as fast as your eyes can cause you to fumble when trying to click the enemy’s head. After reading this guide, we hope you can begin to see these kinds of mistakes and opportunities in your own games. Because knowing where to have your crosshair placed can earn you some kills or... get you killed.
In Valorant as well as in most other first-person shooters, there are damage multipliers all over the body. Head, Torso, and Legs each have their own set of stats when tagged with a bullet from a certain gun. The damage values of the Phantom are as follows (at 15m - 30m): Head: 140, Body: 35, and Legs: 29, and this pattern is followed with every gun in Valorant. One headshot is the same amount of damage as four body shots, give or take depending on the gun. This is a simple but very valuable piece of information.
Placing your crosshair at headshot level can lower the time it takes to kill the enemy agent. It can make for fewer mistakes by making it so you worry more about when to shoot then having to move your crosshair, possibly over- or under- shooting your target. Though crosshair placement alone won't net you kills, it can set you up for an advantage when peeking or being peeked.
In Valorant there are boxes everywhere… by design.
The boxes on the map are head height for every agent in Valorant, giving you a clear indicator of where your crosshair should be when clearing these areas.
These and other map landmarks should be kept and drilled into your mind so you can always have your crosshair held at head height.
Look at this example below. My crosshair is just about aligned with the top of the box to my left in A Cubby while I'm holding A Lamps on Bind. This Sage walks right into my crosshair in A Short, allowing me to make minimal crosshair movement, clicking her head and netting me a kill.
In Valorant, there are also different indicators and markers of head level you will notice if you look around the map. Don't let your crosshair float down, keep these markers in mind. Keep your crosshair up by using a few of these examples on different maps.
On some maps, like Ascent, there are these half-painted walls meant to help you maintain crosshair placement, along with boxes and other terrain you can have some sort of idea where head height is normally around. Keep an open mind and an eye out for some of your own markers.
You can always look around the map in a custom game and find places and terrain markers on each map’s hot spots and in different locations where you often find yourself in duels. Here are a few I found to get you started. You can always come back to these photos and refresh your memory or need some inspiration on what and where terrain markers are or could be.
Here in e.g. 2, we are right outside A Bath on Bind. Here I can draw a line mentally from the bottom of the yellow sign into the doorway that falls about head level. Seemingly random things like this in the terrain can help you, objects on the walls and things like graffiti can be little mental keystones helping you keep your crosshair at head height and your head in the game. In e.g. 3, we have a wooden fence in B Short on Bind, the bottom of which falls at about head level with someone exiting from B Window into B Short when looking out of B Link and, in e.g. 4, we have more painted walls all around on B Site.
In e.g. 5, we have these posters on the wall, the bottom half of which line up with someone walking out of the Attacker Side Spawn and another similar poster-like piece of terrain in e.g. 6 at the A Link of the Defender Side Spawn on Fracture. In e.g. 7, we are in B Link looking out towards B Main, here paint on the wall lines up with some walking trying to cross into B Site. In e.g. 8 we have some more terrain markers on the wall where an enemy agent's head would cross if trying to grab the ultimate orb in B Main.
Crosshair Tip: Careful for some boxes and terrain not being exact and messing up your crosshair placement. Intuition and experience are important.
Ask yourself “Where do I keep my crosshair when peeking from this corner?” and “Where is my crosshair pointing at, where will my first bullet go?” for more about peeking and the strategy around it, Dignitas has more articles like this one on peeking by Haam or this one on peeking angles by Micheal Kelly.
Also check out pro players’ Valorant streams and watch how they position their crosshair and how they mentally prepare to peek or hold a position. Making a quick checklist in your mind that you run through when moving through the map can keep you prepared for any engagement you might find yourself in. Is my crosshair at head level? Check. Should I place the crosshair closer to the wall or further, anticipating a wide peek? Check. Am I ready to make any adjustment, or just click heads, reacting to any engagement after peeking this corner? Yes. Am I having fun?
Don't forget, playing Valorant is fun. Get better by practicing and working on your crosshair placement and peeking technique but cut yourself some slack. Remember to have fun and take your time. Practice makes progress and with keeping your mind engaged and your crosshair up hopefully you will start to see some results in your games. Go, have fun and click heads.
