Near the end of last year, VALORANT players who frequented Skye for her powerful flashing abilities were surprised to find out she was receiving a plethora of changes that made it harder to flash for yourself in a straight-on fight. But popular VALORANT content creator Jakub “Lothar” Szygulski has a useful strategy that allows this strong initiator to pull off some duelist plays of her own.
In his new video posted today, Lothar explained Riot Games’ most recent Skye changes, including an increase to her weapon equip speed after activating her Guiding Light flash. In Patch 7.04, she even got another nerf to her flash after the developers reduced the cast time to two seconds, making it a bit harder for her to clear out farther sight lines.
Lothar does, however, know one specific way that allows Skye to efficiently use her flash, pull out her gun, and swing as her bird pops and blinds her enemies. It’s simple: You don’t control the bird when it is cast.
Usually, players guide the bird by holding down fire after it goes forward, allowing them to move the bird while it flies. This can be a useful way to flash around a corner or into the sky, but it is also very hard to follow up quickly with your weaponry since Skye’s re-equip time has been increased.
As a result, Lothar doesn’t control the bird at all, and instead, finds the right angle or line to cast the bird so it will still appear in front of his enemies. This also allows the player to pull out their weapon while the flash is still moving and reposition so that when they activate the ability, they are ready to swing around the corner and take advantage of the momentary pop of light.
This way, Guiding Light works more like a duelist’s flash, like Phoenix’s Curveball, Reyna’s Leer, or Yoru’s Blindside, where Skye can quickly peek an angle after her flash to grab a couple of kills on some unsuspecting enemies.
Lothar also showed off some unique angles for one-way flashes on Lotus. With so many maps in the rotation, this tactic could become a menace for solo queue players who might run into some new Skye tech soon.
