Two agents in VALORANT that have made their way back into the meta will be hit with nerfs this week, developers Riot Games confirmed today.
There’s no affection on Valentine’s Day for Raze and Killjoy, with both to be changed in VALORANT Patch 6.03. Also, the new game mode, Swiftplay, is set to keep progressing out of the beta testing period to a full game release soon.
The recent nerfs to Chamber, which damaged his performance in both ranked and professional play, saw other Sentinel agents come back into the fray, including Killjoy and Cypher. On the other hand, duelists have crept their way back up in popularity, with Raze, Jett, and Reyna labeled ‘stable’ picks at all ranks.
In early December, Killyjoy was buffed, with her Nanoswarm’s health increased and her ultimate, the Lockdown, receiving an increase in health from 150 to 200. These changes were a little much, according to Riot, as they are nerfing her ultimate and Turret.
- Turret (E) health decreased from 125 to 100.
- Lockdown (X) point cost increased from seven to eight.
Raze, on the other hand, hasn’t had many major changes over the past few VALORANT patches. But she remains popular, especially at the professional level. Raze’s Boom Bot, which was slightly nerfed in Patch 5.12, saw a decrease in health from 100 to 60, which made it easier to kill. Now it only gets worse for the duelist.
- Boom Bot (C) duration decreased from 10 seconds to five seconds.
These changes will ensure Raze is unable to scout as much information as she used to since her Bot will run out of juice much faster.
Swiftplay, the fast-paced unrated short match mode, will continue to be playable in VALORANT after the beta version was originally introduced in December last year.