In Valorant, the Sentinel role can be extremely useful on a team, especially when defending. Often, we see this position filled by Chamber, Killjoy, and sometimes even Sage, leaving poor Cypher behind. When the game was first released, Cypher was the go-to option for players to fill that spot. While Cypher is not a particularly bad character by any means, he certainly is lackluster compared to his other Sentinel counterparts. Let’s take a look at the Moroccan Information Broker and see what may need to be changed to help revive his pick rate.

Cypher As An Agent

At his core, on paper Cypher sounds like a very solid agent to have on a team. Information gathering, vision denial, some crowd control, all of this is nice. However, compared to other Sentinels is where Cypher’s weaknesses start to show. Chamber and Killjoy both provide great information gathering with their abilities, and do so in a way that makes picking them over Cypher a lot better most times. While Sage lacks the information aspect of the other Sentinels, she makes up for that with area denial and team support in her kit.

Cypher is not a bad agent by any means, he just struggles to compete with the other Sentinel Agents for a spot on a good team that has a solid composition. Most times when people consider locking in Cypher, they may think to themselves “Why would I just not pick Killjoy or Chamber?”. So, let’s take a look at Cypher’s kit to discuss what can be done to help him join the conversation when looking to lock in a Sentinel for your team!

Spycam

Cypher’s Spycam is his signature ability that he gets for free every round and it is not weak by any means, but it definitely could be looked at for some quality-of-life changes. Cypher’s Camera allows him to provide valuable information for his team, as early as right when the round starts on defense. On attack, the camera can be used for post-plant scenarios or watching the flank which is also useful in its own right. The ability to mark enemies with your camera is also a nice added feature, allowing you to punish enemies for playing too carelessly and not respecting the utility that Cypher provides.

Where Cypher’s camera falls short is the fact that you must be actively using the camera to get the full value that it offers. If we compare this to Chamber and Killjoy. Killjoy’s Turret only requires you to be in range, while it does the rest, and as for Chamber, his Rendezvous allows him to get valuable information with the option of teleporting to safety. Chamber can also get picks with this ability, then safely regroup or settle back down on site, making it more useful than Cypher’s Camera.

Changes That Could Be Made

So, what can they change about Cypher’s Spycam to make it a little more useful for his team? For starters, they could give the camera a little more health. If you think about it, Chambers Rendezvous anchors and Killjoy’s Turret both take multiple shots to destroy, so it’s not completely farfetched to suggest that the same should go for Cypher’s camera. Another thing they could do is slightly lower the cooldown on the marking ability that the camera has, making it slightly more useful in a pinch when Cypher is getting pushed aggressively or when retaking a site. Overall, those would be good changes to start with. Spycam is a good ability that just needs to be tweaked slightly to help Cypher keep up with the other information-based Sentinels.

Cyber Cage

Up next, we’ll take a look at Cypher’s Cyber Cage ability. The problem that this ability has is that while blocking vision and providing one-way angles is good, there is not much there outside of that. As a Sentinel, there should be more of a payout when using an ability like this against an enemy. One upside to the Cyber Cage is that they only cost 100 credits, but at the same time, sometimes they are just not worth the buy when your team’s economy is in a tight spot. The Cages do slightly slow enemies and also trigger an audio cue when enemies pass through them, but other than that, a lot of the time they are a worse smoke that cannot be moved and that must be remotely set off.

If we compare the Cyber Cages to the other Sentinel abilities like Sage’s Slow Orbs or Killjoy’s Nanoswarm Grenades, the Cyber Cages pale in comparison. The issue is that while the vision denial of the Cyber Cages is nice, they do not provide enough area denial compared to the damage output of the Nanoswarm Grenades or the crowd control of the Slow Orbs. Even Chamber’s Headhunter can be more threatening to an enemy team’s push than Cyber Cages if it is used correctly.

Changes That Could Be Made

So, what can be done to help aid Cypher’s Cyber Cages? Well for starters, the slowing effect could be better. Half the time, people do not even realize that the cages slow them when they are passed through, so making this slow stronger or giving the slow a stacking effect each time someone walks through it could make the ability better.

Another option is to give the Cages information gathering other than the audio cue that plays. Perhaps when someone walks through the cage, they are revealed for a split second. This is a very dangerous buff as it would be very strong, so perhaps giving him one Cage or making the price increase a bit steeper would help balance it.

Trapwire

Next is by far Cypher’s most iconic ability- Trapwire. What Trapwire has going for it is the ability to completely catch and stall an enemy when they are not playing carefully enough, as well as the creativity the ability provides. Some pretty crazy Trapwire spots can catch a lot of people off guard. However, if they are placed in the same place over and over enemies can play around them. Not to mention that they require a physical activation from the enemy by walking through or shooting the Trapwire.

Comparing Trapwire to the other Sentinel abilities shows its flaws in some places. Chambers Trademark and Killjoy’s Alarmbot both have a range to them where they set off when an enemy gets too close. Sage’s wall can completely shut off an area completely preventing a push in the first place, or requiring it to be shot through, thus providing information. The biggest flaw that the Trapwires have is that they need to be interacted with directly, they can also be jumped over, crouched under, or completely bypassed if the enemy has the utility to get past it such as an Omen Shrouded Step or a Jett Updraft. They can also be easily triggered with utility like a Raze Boom Bot or a Sova Owl Drone.

Changes That Could Be Made

The best way that Trapwire can be buffed is to make the stun set off faster after the wire is walked through giving the enemy less time to destroy it after it is triggered. They can also make the radius for the trigger itself bigger, to compensate for the fact that the ability has to be physically set off in the first place. This would also make it, so it is more difficult for the enemy to go around the wire. Since destroying it notifies Cypher, it will still help provide some info, to avoid the wire completely going to waste since once it is placed down it must be purchased the next round.

Neural Theft

Finally, there is Cypher’s Ultimate ability, Neural Theft. Words cannot explain how bad this ability is. For something that requires multiple kills and ultimate orbs to gain access to, it is completely underwhelming and is arguably the worst Ultimate Ability in the game. Not to mention, it requires an enemy to die for Cypher to even be able to use it. For an ability to have such a requirement for something that already requires getting kills to access, it does not do nearly enough.

Comparing this with the other Sentinel Ultimates is really where you notice the gap between Cypher and the other Agents. Chamber essentially gets the best gun in the game, which can come in handy in a pinch like eco rounds. Killjoy can shut down an entire area that can help take site and stop pushes, and Sage can revive a teammate from the dead, which is extremely good in a Tactical Shooter like Valorant. Comparing Neural Theft with those abilities makes Cypher seem like a bad agent, which isn’t true. This ability, however, does need some changes badly.

Changes That Could Be Made

For starters, while knowing the location of enemy players is useful, requiring a kill to use the ability is annoying. If this is going to remain how the ability is activated, there should not be a window where you must use the ability on an enemy after they die. Letting Cypher use Neural Theft on any corpse regardless of how long it has been there would make the ability a lot better. The amount of time the enemy is revealed could also be longer. Perhaps when Cypher uses Neural theft, there is a window of time where enemies blink on the map a few times instead of once, allowing this ability to retain the charm of Cypher’s ultimate while also making it a lot better.

Conclusion

Cypher is not where he once was in the meta. While not a horrible pick, it’s become apparent that, as the pool of Sentinel Agents grew larger, how far behind Cypher is from the other agents in that class. Cypher does need to see some more love from Riot to get back up to speed with the others. What do you think? Are these changes enough to bring Cypher back to popularity in the meta? Or should Cypher receive a complete overhaul?