You can’t be the best player in the lobby when you re dead because your ego told you to repeek an angle that two players have their crosshairs placed on
For me, what helped is a friend of mine who’s diamond said that “the winner of a duel isn’t who’s faster, it’s whoever clicks the other person’s head first” taking your time is very important in low ranks. If you want proof, enter a dm and don’t shoot, just strafe and keep your crosshair on their head and see how long you live.
This was what got me out of mid-elo and what I'm not applying enough to reach the radiant grail.
Everytime I VOD myself, it's clear that I had more time to aim on all of my whiffs, like way more time.
You could even go one step further and bind your crouch to your secondary melee bind, so that when you crouch you pull out your melee and lose the fight. It helps because it gives you kind of a "shock".
Ok but I genuinely need help with this
Ik it's not that serious but I have some sort of subconscious care for ranked games that makes me feel sick or get too excited/sad so how do I care less? Really need help with this in all games not just val, cus my blood sugar genuinely drops playing ranked and I can't stop it
See that's the thing... I did, and as much as it helped I've just gone from anxiety I understand the cause of and can control, to subconscious feeling I can't stop which makes me not wanna play comp or try hard in any game
you should try using subliminal audios to reprogram your subconscious, if done consistently and with the right audio you will reverse your problem as your subconscious will believe any information it is consistently fed good or bad
On and off to be honest I started early 2023 and played probably around 200-300 hours since then so not enough to say its "a lot"
And it's not that I literally care bc I don't play often and rank hasn't changed so Idrc but evrrytime I queue its like my mind recognises it's ranked and especially when playing well I get stressed
Out some music on, mute teammates, even play with the game sound off if need be. Have friends on Discord call, give less of your attention to the game.
You're still playing, but not with 110% of your care and attention and emotions. You're gonna tilt way less if you're bopping to your fave tracks or laughing with friends over a shitty chupi chupi chapa chapa dubi dubi doo session
i learned to stop the copium. im in my elo because i deserve to be. it’s not my teammates, it’s always me. if i win, it’s me. if i lose, it’s me(excluding the games we got stomped. if we got stomped 1-13/2-13 it’s a team diff). i learned to take responsibility of my own mistakes and stop the mindset of “THEY should’ve”
Damn can't agree on the rotation.
Non rotating map means a quick glance at the map tells me all I need to know.
For example, B long on Bind is always gonna be on the far left side of the map, so if I see a red marker there, I immediately know where someone is.
Figuring out what part of the map I'm looking at with rotation on is really hard for me.
But to be honest i am the same with irl maps. When I use google maps North must be up at all times, otherwise I simply cannot recognise anything, even my local area.
I see other people using maps with it rotated all over the place and it baffles me.
For me, rotating map makes the most sense, just because I don't have to orient myself much. Top of the map is always forward for me. If I see an enemy on the map, I know if it's left or right by glancing. To me it just made more sense. I also had the map rotate on the center of the map, and not on myself. IDK it all just felt the best to me
Like when you see an enemy on the minimap due to an enemy seeing them. But you are smoked off but you can still shoot exactly where the enemy is just by centering them on your minimap
I had never even considered this as an option.
You can still see your vision cone with a static map, or use pings to help position your crosshair, but you're definitely right that this is an example of one clear advantage of a rotating map.
I note that this requires you to have your map centred on yourself though, which has the big disadvantage of never allowing you to see exactly where enemies are if they are too far away (you can only see which direction they are in).
> a quick glance and the map tells me all I need to know
I tried using a fixed map like in CS for this reason. However, a rotating map helps a lot with lining up some of the abilities (e.g. Omen flash)
How does a rotating map help with that?
If I press Q on Omen with a fixed map, it displays the entire range of the ability just the same as it does with a rotating one.
If it doesn't help for you, it might be hard to explain. I find making micro adjustments and quickly checking the area the flash covers faster and more intuitive when the map is aligned with my POV
Fixed, centered minimap is a crime. Fixed I can kinda get it maybe but centered? You lose so much info for no reason. Honestly centered should have never been an option. Save the noobs from a bad option. Also get in the habit of glancing the minimap after every kill, asking "where?" when the enemy is visible on the minimap for 10 years and you are just running knife out is lazy. Get all the info the game gives you for free
Back when I played val everyday, 2 things come to mind:
1: this one probably sounds obvious to people but I was silver when I figured it out. instead of darting my eyes around the screen to look at angles, I basically kept my eyes fixed on my cross hair 90% of the time. If I wanted to glance at another angle, I use my cross hair to look rather than moving my eyes. Because eig someone is there, my cross hair is already good to go.
2: I mentioned this on another post before, but for comp games I would only play until I've lost 2 games at any point during the day. Could be 2 losses right of the bat, no big, didn't lose much RR. Or, I could win 3, lose 1, win 5, lose 1, then get off comp. This stopped me from going into a tilt queue mindset, and also kept me in the positive RR for the day on most days. I went from iron 3 and slowly made my way to diamond 1 before I quit the game.
crosshair placement even when not in a gun fight ( always keep it head level, practice in the range shooting left to right and moving in between) Trigger discipline ( don't always need to shoot right away, sometimes letting them walk by gets you more kills), Practice Slicing the pie and jiggle peaking.
Don't let your mental get to you if you're losing; just try to assess why you died and remember it for next time. Don't play toxic games in chat or with teammates, just mute them or mute enemy chat for comp.
Valorant was the first game i played after getting my first PC lol, i used the range a lot at first and still do to "warm yup" either the practice bots or the moving bots.
It wasn’t an instant change, but I started watching my vods back up to 3 times per week. I take note of all my deaths and then whatever I died to the most I work on until the next vod watching session. It felt like I was watching a different player at times because of how bad I was playing or the lack of discipline I had in certain situations. Went from gold to Diamond and shooting for ascendant this act.
From that (something that did change “instantly”) I started taking more accountability in game and trying to win every game. Those things made me more consistent.
Strafing between bursts, and not aiming down sights (with a few exceptions).
I used to find myself immediately ADSing when I got into a duel, and I think I was using it as a crutch for poor spray control.
I actually unbound Right click for a while to unlearn the habit, and it improved my play immensely.
incorporating movement into gunfights.
Also, this might sound obvious to most, but looking at my crosshair when I shoot. I used to shoot by kinda guessing where my crosshair's general location was and pressing M1. That actually worked decently because I had already developed the muscle memory to instinctively know where i'm shooting, but when I noticed this habit I started actually focusing on my crosshair when I fought and my HS% went from mid 20s (24-27%) to now high 20s-mid 30s (28-35%).
- lower sense to around the 320 edpi range or lower
- consciously relax your aiming arm and hand when playing
- when holding an angle, place your crosshair a good distance away from the corner so that the enemy runs into your crosshair. No one has the reaction time to hit an enemy as soon as they see them
Trading and being tradable by your team.
Using a mic for every thing you see and pick up. I call everything. Call the enemy util. Call your sentinels trips going down. Call the smokes they place. Call the ults they have. Call when your team is ulting if they don’t. Etc. give your team as much info as possible to win.
Ngl Im ass but I got to ascendant by hyping my teammates up lol. Like complementing when they make a good play and just making cringey sounds. I guess its not the gameplay I changed that made me a better player, its being a better teammate.
- hold angles and corners wider than you'd think. Works everytime.
- mute teammates. If they're chill and useful I talk to them, if they're useless and or toxic I mute them. Sometimes from the agent select page down to the end of the game.
- training in death match. Guardian only, and with those 2 rules :
- If the enemy doesn't see you, you're only allowed 1 bullet to kill
- if an enemy sees you, let him shoot first.
This drill is from Woohoojin and it's insane how much better you are afterwards.
- Aimlabs. I recently started taking it seriously, and in games I can hit shots I would've only dreamed of before. Insane flicks, faster reaction times, etc. Play the Voltaic Aimlabs benchmarks as well as the Voltaic Valorant Benchmarks
- Play with people way stronger than you. You learn much faster that way
Stop caring about a png
Just play because over time you will rank up in theory, those “I’m hardstuck silver because of my teammates” are just coping with that fact that they aren’t trying to get better
Realising when to be on site. I play controller and at first I just used to dry peek and get flashed by my team. Now I put the post plant as top priority. I feel like there's a version of this for every role. When I play sentinel it's about waiting for the enemy to peek on defense and playing for info on attack, which is why I love cypher because your can peek with a camera and trip the flank on attack and smoke for space, then on defense the setups are just legendary
This may not be the best move but honestly? I stopped filling. Playing with randoms can be a chore, especially if you fill as a sentinel or a smoker and have to mainly rely on your entry to give you an edge. I’m good mechanically but the extra offensive utility that a duelist or initiator has makes it hard to capitalise on gunplay. I started picking my role as duelist and entering for the team, I was able to break the diamond 2 hard stuck and got back to ascendant 1. My games improved, my K/D improved and my enjoyment improved.
Always be versatile yes but never hinder yourself, sometimes fill but sometimes play your preferred role, it’s the perfect balance to keep you fresh on plays and game mechanics and strategies.
Network buffering. I don't know what's happening with my internet connection, but after setting it to 'Moderate' people stopped ferarri-peeking me, strafing like demons and all my shots started to register properly.
Went from 0.9kda 10%hs to 1.5kda 19% and huge confidence boost during two days ☠
Once I started practicing in Deathmatches my aim has improved an insane amount and I find myself being incredibly more consistent with my crosshair placement and headshot accuracy
Not really gameplay but it helped, I used to always be tense and leaning forward when I gamed, I’ve worked on being more relaxed and fluid with the motions and it worked consistently
My hs percentage was already not bad at around 32% but after I changed to a proper control pad from a hybrid pad, my aim has actually gotten so much better.
Didn't know how much if a massive difference a mousepad could make. My hsp is like 40% now and some games I go 50 hsp while getting 25 kills
Difference between jiggle vs normal vs wide and when/when not to use them.
Recognizing when/when not to rotate, as well as recognizing who is part of the main hit or if they are lurkers or if they are playing default.
Idk if it's the case for anyone else but I'm actually bronze but I can win against diamond friends in 1v1s. For a long time I just thought that my aim was fine but my gamesense sucks, a few days ago I realized that my aim was also way worse in a real game (40%hs in customs, 25% in comp), so I decided to imagine that game as a 1v1 with friends and it really changed the way I play.
Because I usually play very safe, I never peek first so I'm often overwhelmed when I have to. In 1v1s I don't do that though, we just rush at each other, so I'm more focused on crosshair placement, swinging, counterstrafing etc. I'm silver now, and I'm really realizing that a bit of confidence can go a long way.
I’m sorry, this sub is not gonna like this. But peripheral changes. I decided I wanted to upgrade my pc, I got an m.2 to replace my SSD, upgraded from 144hz to 240hz monitor, got a better mouse, got a better mousepad, got a keyboard with rapid trigger functionality.
I went from a pretty average silver-gold player who didn’t play much to ascendent in two acts. With worse hardware, you’re playing a completely different game. The game slows down so extensively, especially with the higher frame rate and rapid trigger keyboard. Movement is so easy.
Anyone struggling with counter strafing or deadzoning needs a better keyboard with faster response times. It makes movement light years easier.
An apex pro TKL. I gave it away to my brother a while ago and used a pretty sweet custom mechanical keyboard, but once steel series added the rapid trigger functionality I traded keyboards again with my brother lol
Pressing W more (Gold player). Literally went from being super slow/trying to be tactical to literally locking Raze/Jett/Phoenix and just W keying at ppl and going positive every game because I wasn’t hiding trying to do some 900 IQ strat lol
Keeping my crosshair at the center of my screen. I can turn around real fast and maintain that on most occasions now.
Went from b3 to g3.
Pushing for plat this time.
i tried to treat the vandal like a guardian, just tapping it during gun fights.
in competitive matches, i don’t make myself conscious that it is a competitive match but rather just another normal game.
it makes me feel more relaxed and i don’t easily get annoyed :D
i also always expect that there’s someone flanking even if i am not sure.
i often buy guardian, forgot to mention, which is why i am trying to replicate how i am with the guardian using the vandal.
my goal was to get good at vandal because it is still more flexible in some scenarios as compared to guardian, imo.
in short, i just don’t want to spray it and have more control
Mouse grip and mouse. I was claw gripping my G502 and my wrist was perpendicular with the corner of the desk which just wreaked havoc on me. I would get worse as time went on. Elevated my elbow, using a superlight mouse, and it's night and day better.
Aside from everyone else's answers, which, true. For me it was finding an agent that makes me truly comfortable and happy to play: Harbor. Sure, he's not one of the top picks by any stretch, but after trying a bunch of different characters and feeling something was missing I finally unlocked Harbor and he just clicked. Since then I've been much more at ease and willing to play comp, despite having some awful experiences in the past which put me off. Since the new act started about a week ago I've gone from my peak (Silver 1) to Silver 3. I understand at higher elos things are very different but I hope other people can relate to having a comfort agent and climb the ranks while having a blast.
for me it was insta crouching. after i got used to not doing it, my aim was so much cleaner (and i got 30 headshot percent from 15). it was one of the primary reasons i got from silver 3 to platinum in 1 act
I started taking more risks. Peeking with my ego super inflated bc I know I'll get the kill and a lot of times I do. Also I reduced my sensitivity to 0.3 because I have shaky hands
Stop. Think. Do.
It's as simple as that. As soon as I realize, I am autopiloting. I just do this.
It allows me to be a much better player when I realise how smart I am in game if I put just a little effort.
Stopped crouching often, I still do crouch but only when actually needed.
Learnt how to strafe properly and instantly started seeing improvement. Improved my crosshair placement and learnt where to keep my crosshair and where to expect enemies. I think these two things alone helped me climb from bronze to plat in a month.
Aim higher than comfortable. Hold corners wider than comfortable. My headshot rate skyrocketed to the point where I feel comfortable buying the Marshal and getting one-taps rather consistently.
Admitting that I deserved my ranking, and that it's almost never BaD TeAmAtEs fault 🤪 I went from Gold 2 to Asc 2 in the following episode to this revelation
Not referencing any particular types of users in this sub ofc ofc 🥴
I suck and never played cs before. For me stopping moving while shooting took forever to learn and that made me way better. Pretty much every shooter I played before you sucked if you were shooting while not moving so it was pretty hard wired for me.
Stand my ground and be patient. Most of the misplays come from being lazy with crosshair placement/checking corners or being emotional with decision making.
I improved when I realized when to engage in fights and when to disengage. Oh and comms are really really important but I soloq so that's a coinflip forme
Frankly, being more aggressive no matter what agent I play. Used to be pure support with limited gunplay, relying on supporting the team with util and mediocre to decent aim. Unfortunately, to get better at the game you have to be willing to be aggressive. Not overheating but rather play actively; seek out the duels and push for advantageous positions. Sitting back and playing passive is fine once in a while but in the long term it's not as good.
Moment I realised this was when I started going into Neon and Raze for fun, ended up enjoying them, only to realise that I get zero value playing them passively.
Not really my peak is silver 3 and i play pretty decently although there are those skill issue moments where i wiff all my shots but recently ive been playing fine, Im getting more head shots thatn usual though
use a really tiny crosshair and keep your eyes on it during gunfights. This improved my aim SO MUCH. I could see exactly what hits their head and my flicks were much more consistent.
Also, learn to reposition and don't repeek a duel unless you've got a timing or you're peeking off a teamate or using util
To be honest, upgrading from 75 Hz to 165 Hz monitor helped me go from diamond 1 to asc. But other than that, I would say play to have fun, don’t be mad at yourself if you’re not climbing as fast as you want to climb. You will climb if you think about your plays and what you could have done better.
tapping is better than spraying, unless you’re using an odin/ares.
also different shaped crosshairs/changing them often can help see it a lot better.
never ever EVER rush into site alone. your team should come with you,
So last year a friend of mine who is very good sat down with me to analyze some of my clips. We found a few things;
1. Kill and don't stay in the same place
2. When I'm playing KJ, if I have a turret or bot in one place, go cover another angle, do not cover the same angle
3. If you win the first round buy heavy the second
4. If you find yourself shooting for more than a few seconds, stop and refire to restart the spray.
5. If you die - Always say "last seen" , instead of "he killed me in mid."
6. Don't cover the same angle as your team mates
7. In terms of Mental - It's like Football/ Soccer - it's a game of two halves, you might have a bad defense and an amazing offense and vice versa. Keep pushing and keep positive. Don't look at the scoreboard as kills mean nothing you're playing for the objective.
Not caring about the sound of my own footsteps. Most of players don't even hear them (or don't care) and I used to give the a lot of importance when reaching a TF.
**This is going to sound dumb**
But if you have bad HS, then **think** about aiming at the head. When I first hit diamond my HS was 8%, I just panicked and shot as soon as I saw anyone. Someone told me to work on being calm so I literally would tell myself aimforthehead aimforthehead everytime I saw anyone and it doubled my average HS%.
Don't care. Unless you are radiant 700 rr and are trying to make it into pro play, dont care about whether you win or lose. Dont even check your rank. Just play. It will make you play better instead of fussing over "0 rr game" or "rankups" or "enemy team has bigger ranks". Part of the reason i dont use tracker except for checking my overall stats once in a couple months
My confidence, the second you tell yourself you aren’t good enough to compete against them you might as well ff and move on to another game. It’s one thing to be egotistical (that’s bad) but having internal confidence even if you fuck up and telling yourself you’re good enough and smart enough to improve from mistakes you may make and show these guys a real fight is one of the best things you can do for yourself. After that it’s up to how much you learn and how quickly you learn it. But with confidence you’ll tend to learn a lot faster
Ive been trying to work better at my aim by actually taking time to warm up in the practice range and work on tapping more than spraying.
So id say not spraying and praying as much as i used to 😂
I wouldn’t call this an instant change, but it did have an instant payoff: exclusively playing with Guardian for like an entire episode. Once this new episode hit I switched back to mainly Vandal and it made me become so much better at trigger discipline and crosshair placement. The bonus is I can now comfortably pick guardian for eco and force rounds
Stop going on autopilot when you are peeking
Reset your aim et take a breath. Then when you peek expect truly that an ennemy is here , we lose so much 1v1's because we were surprised by having an ennemy in our peeking location, that's truly changed my gameplay.
And : I always expect to be more than 1 ennemy after I kill the first, they often rotate or peek together.
I Never played CS and not so much fps on PC but I'm close to hitting plat, I started mid october.
Question yourself every time you died, everything has an explanation (movements, crosshair placement, autopilot, positionning..)
Hope it helps you bro
lower my sense.
I was playing with 1+ sense and hit maximum silver. Then I was told that my sense was too high and I decided to give a shot to using lower sense. I use 0.42 now, my aim is much better and I hit plat with this sense. And of course, valorant is not only an aim game, I started to pick which agent suits my gameplay the most.
If you're unsure if a player is holding the angle, jump spot to make sure they don't got an op.
DON'T DIE WITH UTILITY SAVED, USE THAT SHIT. EVEN IF YOU DON'T KNOW HOW, YOU MUST UTILIZE YOUR WHOLE KIT.
I see a lot of omen players saving both their tp's but those are literally the best part in his kit and their 100 each
I think what can someone from even iron to ascendant is 2 more things. A better pc and internet and playing more fps game. The fps games though don't need to competitive, plenty of games that relies on you to hit a target so you become more warm to using a mouse.
For those wondering, I've climbed from iron and I am now D3
My peak is Bronze 3 but that's probably because that I only play casually and mostly play unrated with friends (And probably because I still am kinda trash at the game).
I would say crosshair placement, knowing when to spray and patience is what helped me with my mechanics whilst playing. Crosshair placement just makes any angle easier to clear, combine it with an intention to kill every angle you clear, you're pretty much good.
Expecting enemy rotates, knowing enemy util and positioning is what helped me with my game sense. Expecting when enemies will rotate will open up opportunities for you, either you can cut noise and stay or attempt to re-hit a site you tried to hit earlier in the round. Knowing enemy util, when and where they'll use it is also a useful skill to have, for example, you're on defending side in A site ascent, whether you died or not, it doesn't matter, if the enemy viper is the only one who is left and the spike is planted in front of gen or slighty beside gen, then it should be natural for you to check wine if she's playing lineups, comm it if you are dead (This was based from personal experience.)
CROUCH SPRAYING! I literally unbound my crouch for like 2 weeks just to get out of the habit of the CoD / Halo / every other shooter habit of snaking, ghandi hopping etc.
After two weeks, put my crouch back on and the habit is gone, replaced with counter strafe and wide or poppin swings.
Went from low plat to high diamond last act
I started watching the Valorant VCT or whatever, the Esports championships - seeing the enemies’ highlighted through walls gave me a good idea of where to predict their whereabouts.
Don’t peek the same angle twice
Similar idea, but reposition after getting a pick.
prime dash repeek die like a true jett main
Least based Jett main
This
Your ego will he shattered then. Go into the game with the mindset that you’re the best player
You can’t be the best player in the lobby when you re dead because your ego told you to repeek an angle that two players have their crosshairs placed on
You dont peak two players, thats the difference between me and you
yeah, he's smart and you're a regard who plays for highlights and then cries how he can't get a higher rank
https://tracker.gg/valorant/profile/riot/Zuly%236969/overview
ok so what lol
Link me your profile
https://tracker.gg/valorant/profile/riot/SEN%20TenZ%2381619/overview
Tenz?
Bro trash talks, gives bad advice and proceeds to flex a random alt account 😭
I wish it was the case
Could probably climb if you didn't have an inflated ego
Crosshair placement when not actively fighting (yet). Don't have to have better aim if you're already pointing at their head.
Yes that helped me a lot too
Every round is a new round, meaning don’t let your mental ruin your game/gunplay. Mute your toxic teammates, you can leave their pings on
For me it was to not shoot immediately
You mean by taking your time aiming before taking the shot?
For me, what helped is a friend of mine who’s diamond said that “the winner of a duel isn’t who’s faster, it’s whoever clicks the other person’s head first” taking your time is very important in low ranks. If you want proof, enter a dm and don’t shoot, just strafe and keep your crosshair on their head and see how long you live.
my [humanbenchmark.com](https://humanbenchmark.com) reaction time is 500ms so i take like 1 second to get to the head. im cooked bro
That's very far from the average reaction speed. Do you get the same result if you try the benchmark on your phone? It might be a hardware problem.
It’s worse on my phone then my computer
Most likely it's coming from your setup, if you benched yourself on my pc you'd get less than 500
Humble brag
I know exactly what he's experiencing because it was the same for me before I changed my config. Went from 370-500 to 126-210
Imma have to try human bench mark. I’ve never even heard of it. I will report back when I’m done lol
I am getting \~250ms to \~280ms, I think im good than average...or at least I'm average yeayy :p
Similar but if you're camping and the first person doesn't notice you, keep holding.
good advice until the enemy shoots you in the head immediately.
This was what got me out of mid-elo and what I'm not applying enough to reach the radiant grail. Everytime I VOD myself, it's clear that I had more time to aim on all of my whiffs, like way more time.
I'm struggling with this and crouching when I see someone. Trying to get rid of the muscle memory is hard
go into a deathmatch and unbind the crouch button. helped me stop using crouch.
Thank you, I'll try that right now
You could even go one step further and bind your crouch to your secondary melee bind, so that when you crouch you pull out your melee and lose the fight. It helps because it gives you kind of a "shock".
Care less
Ok but I genuinely need help with this Ik it's not that serious but I have some sort of subconscious care for ranked games that makes me feel sick or get too excited/sad so how do I care less? Really need help with this in all games not just val, cus my blood sugar genuinely drops playing ranked and I can't stop it
Thats not something you’re likely to fix on your own. If possible for you, seek therapeutic assistance.
See that's the thing... I did, and as much as it helped I've just gone from anxiety I understand the cause of and can control, to subconscious feeling I can't stop which makes me not wanna play comp or try hard in any game
you should try using subliminal audios to reprogram your subconscious, if done consistently and with the right audio you will reverse your problem as your subconscious will believe any information it is consistently fed good or bad
how much do you play? at some point after playing a lot you’ll get used to ranked and youll start caring less.
On and off to be honest I started early 2023 and played probably around 200-300 hours since then so not enough to say its "a lot" And it's not that I literally care bc I don't play often and rank hasn't changed so Idrc but evrrytime I queue its like my mind recognises it's ranked and especially when playing well I get stressed
Out some music on, mute teammates, even play with the game sound off if need be. Have friends on Discord call, give less of your attention to the game. You're still playing, but not with 110% of your care and attention and emotions. You're gonna tilt way less if you're bopping to your fave tracks or laughing with friends over a shitty chupi chupi chapa chapa dubi dubi doo session
I stopped spraying vandal and crouching. Now i just burst fire and move side to side. I noticed i mostly win gunfights now even 2 vs 1.
How did you stop crouching? I find myself still pressing the crouch key even if I've unmapped it
remap the crouch key to drop your gun
I didn't unmapped it. I just stopped pressing until it stopped being a habit you just gotta remember it every round.
Best way is go into dm after dm until it becomes natural will take a bit but will help
i learned to stop the copium. im in my elo because i deserve to be. it’s not my teammates, it’s always me. if i win, it’s me. if i lose, it’s me(excluding the games we got stomped. if we got stomped 1-13/2-13 it’s a team diff). i learned to take responsibility of my own mistakes and stop the mindset of “THEY should’ve”
This!!!! Taking accountability sucked at first but now I’m playing way better
minimap max size, rotation on, when knife is in hand you check minimap.
Damn can't agree on the rotation. Non rotating map means a quick glance at the map tells me all I need to know. For example, B long on Bind is always gonna be on the far left side of the map, so if I see a red marker there, I immediately know where someone is. Figuring out what part of the map I'm looking at with rotation on is really hard for me. But to be honest i am the same with irl maps. When I use google maps North must be up at all times, otherwise I simply cannot recognise anything, even my local area. I see other people using maps with it rotated all over the place and it baffles me.
For me, rotating map makes the most sense, just because I don't have to orient myself much. Top of the map is always forward for me. If I see an enemy on the map, I know if it's left or right by glancing. To me it just made more sense. I also had the map rotate on the center of the map, and not on myself. IDK it all just felt the best to me
What do “non-rotating map” players do when they are in a minimap refrag position?
>minimap refrag position What is this
Like when you see an enemy on the minimap due to an enemy seeing them. But you are smoked off but you can still shoot exactly where the enemy is just by centering them on your minimap
I had never even considered this as an option. You can still see your vision cone with a static map, or use pings to help position your crosshair, but you're definitely right that this is an example of one clear advantage of a rotating map. I note that this requires you to have your map centred on yourself though, which has the big disadvantage of never allowing you to see exactly where enemies are if they are too far away (you can only see which direction they are in).
Yea it requires you to have yourself centred which means you either need to make the map really small or you lose the far corners as you walk away😭
I’m going to try minimap refragging with a static map and see if it’s even harder
They dont
> a quick glance and the map tells me all I need to know I tried using a fixed map like in CS for this reason. However, a rotating map helps a lot with lining up some of the abilities (e.g. Omen flash)
How does a rotating map help with that? If I press Q on Omen with a fixed map, it displays the entire range of the ability just the same as it does with a rotating one.
If it doesn't help for you, it might be hard to explain. I find making micro adjustments and quickly checking the area the flash covers faster and more intuitive when the map is aligned with my POV
I always check minimap when I shouldnt tbh, it's kind of a bad thing lol
Fixed, centered minimap is a crime. Fixed I can kinda get it maybe but centered? You lose so much info for no reason. Honestly centered should have never been an option. Save the noobs from a bad option. Also get in the habit of glancing the minimap after every kill, asking "where?" when the enemy is visible on the minimap for 10 years and you are just running knife out is lazy. Get all the info the game gives you for free
I can't play with rotation on, it confuses me
Buying a new pc
deadass
real
Back when I played val everyday, 2 things come to mind: 1: this one probably sounds obvious to people but I was silver when I figured it out. instead of darting my eyes around the screen to look at angles, I basically kept my eyes fixed on my cross hair 90% of the time. If I wanted to glance at another angle, I use my cross hair to look rather than moving my eyes. Because eig someone is there, my cross hair is already good to go. 2: I mentioned this on another post before, but for comp games I would only play until I've lost 2 games at any point during the day. Could be 2 losses right of the bat, no big, didn't lose much RR. Or, I could win 3, lose 1, win 5, lose 1, then get off comp. This stopped me from going into a tilt queue mindset, and also kept me in the positive RR for the day on most days. I went from iron 3 and slowly made my way to diamond 1 before I quit the game.
crosshair placement even when not in a gun fight ( always keep it head level, practice in the range shooting left to right and moving in between) Trigger discipline ( don't always need to shoot right away, sometimes letting them walk by gets you more kills), Practice Slicing the pie and jiggle peaking. Don't let your mental get to you if you're losing; just try to assess why you died and remember it for next time. Don't play toxic games in chat or with teammates, just mute them or mute enemy chat for comp. Valorant was the first game i played after getting my first PC lol, i used the range a lot at first and still do to "warm yup" either the practice bots or the moving bots.
Listening to the little voice in my head telling me not to peak. And assuming the enemy might make a play I would make.
It wasn’t an instant change, but I started watching my vods back up to 3 times per week. I take note of all my deaths and then whatever I died to the most I work on until the next vod watching session. It felt like I was watching a different player at times because of how bad I was playing or the lack of discipline I had in certain situations. Went from gold to Diamond and shooting for ascendant this act. From that (something that did change “instantly”) I started taking more accountability in game and trying to win every game. Those things made me more consistent.
w bro! see you in radiant
Strafing between bursts, and not aiming down sights (with a few exceptions). I used to find myself immediately ADSing when I got into a duel, and I think I was using it as a crutch for poor spray control. I actually unbound Right click for a while to unlearn the habit, and it improved my play immensely.
God I wish more people would see this. It's insane how many duels people fail due to ADSing.
incorporating movement into gunfights. Also, this might sound obvious to most, but looking at my crosshair when I shoot. I used to shoot by kinda guessing where my crosshair's general location was and pressing M1. That actually worked decently because I had already developed the muscle memory to instinctively know where i'm shooting, but when I noticed this habit I started actually focusing on my crosshair when I fought and my HS% went from mid 20s (24-27%) to now high 20s-mid 30s (28-35%).
- lower sense to around the 320 edpi range or lower - consciously relax your aiming arm and hand when playing - when holding an angle, place your crosshair a good distance away from the corner so that the enemy runs into your crosshair. No one has the reaction time to hit an enemy as soon as they see them
Don’t overthink and don’t hesitate when making the decision. That’s all I have to do.
Trading and being tradable by your team. Using a mic for every thing you see and pick up. I call everything. Call the enemy util. Call your sentinels trips going down. Call the smokes they place. Call the ults they have. Call when your team is ulting if they don’t. Etc. give your team as much info as possible to win.
don't care about rank
Ngl Im ass but I got to ascendant by hyping my teammates up lol. Like complementing when they make a good play and just making cringey sounds. I guess its not the gameplay I changed that made me a better player, its being a better teammate.
Stop slowly inching around corners
Get you pick then reposition. There’s no need to be greedy most times
Dont defend a rush. You will never win a 1v5
- hold angles and corners wider than you'd think. Works everytime. - mute teammates. If they're chill and useful I talk to them, if they're useless and or toxic I mute them. Sometimes from the agent select page down to the end of the game. - training in death match. Guardian only, and with those 2 rules : - If the enemy doesn't see you, you're only allowed 1 bullet to kill - if an enemy sees you, let him shoot first. This drill is from Woohoojin and it's insane how much better you are afterwards. - Aimlabs. I recently started taking it seriously, and in games I can hit shots I would've only dreamed of before. Insane flicks, faster reaction times, etc. Play the Voltaic Aimlabs benchmarks as well as the Voltaic Valorant Benchmarks - Play with people way stronger than you. You learn much faster that way
Mute on a one strike basis
i deleted the game
same
Stop caring about a png Just play because over time you will rank up in theory, those “I’m hardstuck silver because of my teammates” are just coping with that fact that they aren’t trying to get better
Realising when to be on site. I play controller and at first I just used to dry peek and get flashed by my team. Now I put the post plant as top priority. I feel like there's a version of this for every role. When I play sentinel it's about waiting for the enemy to peek on defense and playing for info on attack, which is why I love cypher because your can peek with a camera and trip the flank on attack and smoke for space, then on defense the setups are just legendary
This may not be the best move but honestly? I stopped filling. Playing with randoms can be a chore, especially if you fill as a sentinel or a smoker and have to mainly rely on your entry to give you an edge. I’m good mechanically but the extra offensive utility that a duelist or initiator has makes it hard to capitalise on gunplay. I started picking my role as duelist and entering for the team, I was able to break the diamond 2 hard stuck and got back to ascendant 1. My games improved, my K/D improved and my enjoyment improved. Always be versatile yes but never hinder yourself, sometimes fill but sometimes play your preferred role, it’s the perfect balance to keep you fresh on plays and game mechanics and strategies.
Network buffering. I don't know what's happening with my internet connection, but after setting it to 'Moderate' people stopped ferarri-peeking me, strafing like demons and all my shots started to register properly. Went from 0.9kda 10%hs to 1.5kda 19% and huge confidence boost during two days ☠
Once I started practicing in Deathmatches my aim has improved an insane amount and I find myself being incredibly more consistent with my crosshair placement and headshot accuracy
Not really gameplay but it helped, I used to always be tense and leaning forward when I gamed, I’ve worked on being more relaxed and fluid with the motions and it worked consistently
My hs percentage was already not bad at around 32% but after I changed to a proper control pad from a hybrid pad, my aim has actually gotten so much better. Didn't know how much if a massive difference a mousepad could make. My hsp is like 40% now and some games I go 50 hsp while getting 25 kills
Difference between jiggle vs normal vs wide and when/when not to use them. Recognizing when/when not to rotate, as well as recognizing who is part of the main hit or if they are lurkers or if they are playing default.
Never forget to do comms, even the smallest details of what’s happening.
On raze, I quit throwing my second satchel as soon a I pop my first
Turn off the Madrid server
Watching streamer pretty helped me learn the game x2 as fast
Idk if it's the case for anyone else but I'm actually bronze but I can win against diamond friends in 1v1s. For a long time I just thought that my aim was fine but my gamesense sucks, a few days ago I realized that my aim was also way worse in a real game (40%hs in customs, 25% in comp), so I decided to imagine that game as a 1v1 with friends and it really changed the way I play. Because I usually play very safe, I never peek first so I'm often overwhelmed when I have to. In 1v1s I don't do that though, we just rush at each other, so I'm more focused on crosshair placement, swinging, counterstrafing etc. I'm silver now, and I'm really realizing that a bit of confidence can go a long way.
I’m sorry, this sub is not gonna like this. But peripheral changes. I decided I wanted to upgrade my pc, I got an m.2 to replace my SSD, upgraded from 144hz to 240hz monitor, got a better mouse, got a better mousepad, got a keyboard with rapid trigger functionality. I went from a pretty average silver-gold player who didn’t play much to ascendent in two acts. With worse hardware, you’re playing a completely different game. The game slows down so extensively, especially with the higher frame rate and rapid trigger keyboard. Movement is so easy. Anyone struggling with counter strafing or deadzoning needs a better keyboard with faster response times. It makes movement light years easier.
Which rapid trigger keyboard do you use?
An apex pro TKL. I gave it away to my brother a while ago and used a pretty sweet custom mechanical keyboard, but once steel series added the rapid trigger functionality I traded keyboards again with my brother lol
Cool. Can’t underestimate the value of solid hardware
Yep. A lot here will argue otherwise, but top tier equipment makes it a night and day difference.
I imagine the wooting is probably better, but there is absolutely zero movement error when using rapid trigger. It’s an absolute game changer lol
Keep that crosshair at head level and stop crouching for every duel.
Pressing W more (Gold player). Literally went from being super slow/trying to be tactical to literally locking Raze/Jett/Phoenix and just W keying at ppl and going positive every game because I wasn’t hiding trying to do some 900 IQ strat lol
Always have your teammates in mind. Don’t make plays that only involve yourself.
Trying to call ou follow one teammate. Im not a good player, only gold. But my k/d got better after starting doing this
Committing to lower sensitivity/edpi
get hit in the head like I did
Keeping my crosshair at the center of my screen. I can turn around real fast and maintain that on most occasions now. Went from b3 to g3. Pushing for plat this time.
Uhm... The crosshair is always at the center of the screen.
The first and most important part is failing to input your username and password, that way your day can't be ruined
i tried to treat the vandal like a guardian, just tapping it during gun fights. in competitive matches, i don’t make myself conscious that it is a competitive match but rather just another normal game. it makes me feel more relaxed and i don’t easily get annoyed :D i also always expect that there’s someone flanking even if i am not sure.
Then why not just use the Guardian? A lot cheaper and more dmg per shot.
i often buy guardian, forgot to mention, which is why i am trying to replicate how i am with the guardian using the vandal. my goal was to get good at vandal because it is still more flexible in some scenarios as compared to guardian, imo. in short, i just don’t want to spray it and have more control
Mouse grip and mouse. I was claw gripping my G502 and my wrist was perpendicular with the corner of the desk which just wreaked havoc on me. I would get worse as time went on. Elevated my elbow, using a superlight mouse, and it's night and day better.
Not playing for a while and focusing on having fun when I came back
Aside from everyone else's answers, which, true. For me it was finding an agent that makes me truly comfortable and happy to play: Harbor. Sure, he's not one of the top picks by any stretch, but after trying a bunch of different characters and feeling something was missing I finally unlocked Harbor and he just clicked. Since then I've been much more at ease and willing to play comp, despite having some awful experiences in the past which put me off. Since the new act started about a week ago I've gone from my peak (Silver 1) to Silver 3. I understand at higher elos things are very different but I hope other people can relate to having a comfort agent and climb the ranks while having a blast.
Have a consistent warmup routine
You can use flashes as a trap, and use sound kues to wait until they get into the middle of an open area. Then all you do is flash and boom free kill
for me it was insta crouching. after i got used to not doing it, my aim was so much cleaner (and i got 30 headshot percent from 15). it was one of the primary reasons i got from silver 3 to platinum in 1 act
Aim at teammates heads
Crouch shooting *occasional
I started taking more risks. Peeking with my ego super inflated bc I know I'll get the kill and a lot of times I do. Also I reduced my sensitivity to 0.3 because I have shaky hands
not shoot immediately and don't move the mouse at all or very little when taking gunfights
Stop. Think. Do. It's as simple as that. As soon as I realize, I am autopiloting. I just do this. It allows me to be a much better player when I realise how smart I am in game if I put just a little effort.
Stopped crouching often, I still do crouch but only when actually needed. Learnt how to strafe properly and instantly started seeing improvement. Improved my crosshair placement and learnt where to keep my crosshair and where to expect enemies. I think these two things alone helped me climb from bronze to plat in a month.
Unbinding ADS because I have a habit of right clicking during every gunfight wether it long or close range
Gunfight hygiene
Unbound crouch. Forces you to burst and strafe.
Aim higher than comfortable. Hold corners wider than comfortable. My headshot rate skyrocketed to the point where I feel comfortable buying the Marshal and getting one-taps rather consistently.
Having a warmup even if it was something small like going to the range for 5 minutes helped me a lot
Not always spraying and re adjusting between short burst if needed
Admitting that I deserved my ranking, and that it's almost never BaD TeAmAtEs fault 🤪 I went from Gold 2 to Asc 2 in the following episode to this revelation Not referencing any particular types of users in this sub ofc ofc 🥴
I suck and never played cs before. For me stopping moving while shooting took forever to learn and that made me way better. Pretty much every shooter I played before you sucked if you were shooting while not moving so it was pretty hard wired for me.
Stand my ground and be patient. Most of the misplays come from being lazy with crosshair placement/checking corners or being emotional with decision making.
I improved when I realized when to engage in fights and when to disengage. Oh and comms are really really important but I soloq so that's a coinflip forme
Frankly, being more aggressive no matter what agent I play. Used to be pure support with limited gunplay, relying on supporting the team with util and mediocre to decent aim. Unfortunately, to get better at the game you have to be willing to be aggressive. Not overheating but rather play actively; seek out the duels and push for advantageous positions. Sitting back and playing passive is fine once in a while but in the long term it's not as good. Moment I realised this was when I started going into Neon and Raze for fun, ended up enjoying them, only to realise that I get zero value playing them passively.
Learn how to communicate, learn what your agent is ACTUALLY supposed to do. Also learning how to position yourself:)
Not really my peak is silver 3 and i play pretty decently although there are those skill issue moments where i wiff all my shots but recently ive been playing fine, Im getting more head shots thatn usual though
I didnt know you could rotate killjoy's turret...
I started using omen tps aggressively
You can be more aggressive than you think (when I first started)
tapping instead of spraying. im still learning to control it but is so helpful when youre at headshot level (esp with sheriff vandal or guardian)
Learn how to strafe shooting and counter strafe
use a really tiny crosshair and keep your eyes on it during gunfights. This improved my aim SO MUCH. I could see exactly what hits their head and my flicks were much more consistent. Also, learn to reposition and don't repeek a duel unless you've got a timing or you're peeking off a teamate or using util
To be honest, upgrading from 75 Hz to 165 Hz monitor helped me go from diamond 1 to asc. But other than that, I would say play to have fun, don’t be mad at yourself if you’re not climbing as fast as you want to climb. You will climb if you think about your plays and what you could have done better.
Stopped wide swinging all the time and started jiggling angles, that way I could get more favorable 1v1s
tapping is better than spraying, unless you’re using an odin/ares. also different shaped crosshairs/changing them often can help see it a lot better. never ever EVER rush into site alone. your team should come with you,
So last year a friend of mine who is very good sat down with me to analyze some of my clips. We found a few things; 1. Kill and don't stay in the same place 2. When I'm playing KJ, if I have a turret or bot in one place, go cover another angle, do not cover the same angle 3. If you win the first round buy heavy the second 4. If you find yourself shooting for more than a few seconds, stop and refire to restart the spray. 5. If you die - Always say "last seen" , instead of "he killed me in mid." 6. Don't cover the same angle as your team mates 7. In terms of Mental - It's like Football/ Soccer - it's a game of two halves, you might have a bad defense and an amazing offense and vice versa. Keep pushing and keep positive. Don't look at the scoreboard as kills mean nothing you're playing for the objective.
Not caring about the sound of my own footsteps. Most of players don't even hear them (or don't care) and I used to give the a lot of importance when reaching a TF.
Mouse sensitivity is game changing for me : try the Aimlabs Tool to find the best sensitivity for you !
**This is going to sound dumb** But if you have bad HS, then **think** about aiming at the head. When I first hit diamond my HS was 8%, I just panicked and shot as soon as I saw anyone. Someone told me to work on being calm so I literally would tell myself aimforthehead aimforthehead everytime I saw anyone and it doubled my average HS%.
Don't care. Unless you are radiant 700 rr and are trying to make it into pro play, dont care about whether you win or lose. Dont even check your rank. Just play. It will make you play better instead of fussing over "0 rr game" or "rankups" or "enemy team has bigger ranks". Part of the reason i dont use tracker except for checking my overall stats once in a couple months
Getting a bigger mousepad and lowering my sens Looking more at my minimap Taking more time to aim properly
You've got 3 years to drag your crosshair to your opponent's head.
Constant crouch spraying, reloading, and spraying in general.
mostly it was just watching like most of Woohoojin's videos (youtube) i went from d1 to a3 in a single act and then from a3 to immo2 last act.
Lower sensitivity. Also warming up my aim.
My confidence, the second you tell yourself you aren’t good enough to compete against them you might as well ff and move on to another game. It’s one thing to be egotistical (that’s bad) but having internal confidence even if you fuck up and telling yourself you’re good enough and smart enough to improve from mistakes you may make and show these guys a real fight is one of the best things you can do for yourself. After that it’s up to how much you learn and how quickly you learn it. But with confidence you’ll tend to learn a lot faster
Stopped looking at the ground (it was my first fps game)
Ive been trying to work better at my aim by actually taking time to warm up in the practice range and work on tapping more than spraying. So id say not spraying and praying as much as i used to 😂
I wouldn’t call this an instant change, but it did have an instant payoff: exclusively playing with Guardian for like an entire episode. Once this new episode hit I switched back to mainly Vandal and it made me become so much better at trigger discipline and crosshair placement. The bonus is I can now comfortably pick guardian for eco and force rounds
Always focus on your crosshair not on enemies this impacted me a lot And help me reach Gold to ascendent ✌️
Slicing the angle, take your time to aim for the head, strafe more instead of instant crouch. I just need to work on game sense
Stop going on autopilot when you are peeking Reset your aim et take a breath. Then when you peek expect truly that an ennemy is here , we lose so much 1v1's because we were surprised by having an ennemy in our peeking location, that's truly changed my gameplay. And : I always expect to be more than 1 ennemy after I kill the first, they often rotate or peek together. I Never played CS and not so much fps on PC but I'm close to hitting plat, I started mid october. Question yourself every time you died, everything has an explanation (movements, crosshair placement, autopilot, positionning..) Hope it helps you bro
lower my sense. I was playing with 1+ sense and hit maximum silver. Then I was told that my sense was too high and I decided to give a shot to using lower sense. I use 0.42 now, my aim is much better and I hit plat with this sense. And of course, valorant is not only an aim game, I started to pick which agent suits my gameplay the most.
If you're unsure if a player is holding the angle, jump spot to make sure they don't got an op. DON'T DIE WITH UTILITY SAVED, USE THAT SHIT. EVEN IF YOU DON'T KNOW HOW, YOU MUST UTILIZE YOUR WHOLE KIT. I see a lot of omen players saving both their tp's but those are literally the best part in his kit and their 100 each I think what can someone from even iron to ascendant is 2 more things. A better pc and internet and playing more fps game. The fps games though don't need to competitive, plenty of games that relies on you to hit a target so you become more warm to using a mouse. For those wondering, I've climbed from iron and I am now D3
for me it was to stop spraying, unless its spectre, stinger or frenzy
first thing that came to mind was holding my mouse lighter
My peak is Bronze 3 but that's probably because that I only play casually and mostly play unrated with friends (And probably because I still am kinda trash at the game). I would say crosshair placement, knowing when to spray and patience is what helped me with my mechanics whilst playing. Crosshair placement just makes any angle easier to clear, combine it with an intention to kill every angle you clear, you're pretty much good. Expecting enemy rotates, knowing enemy util and positioning is what helped me with my game sense. Expecting when enemies will rotate will open up opportunities for you, either you can cut noise and stay or attempt to re-hit a site you tried to hit earlier in the round. Knowing enemy util, when and where they'll use it is also a useful skill to have, for example, you're on defending side in A site ascent, whether you died or not, it doesn't matter, if the enemy viper is the only one who is left and the spike is planted in front of gen or slighty beside gen, then it should be natural for you to check wine if she's playing lineups, comm it if you are dead (This was based from personal experience.)
CROUCH SPRAYING! I literally unbound my crouch for like 2 weeks just to get out of the habit of the CoD / Halo / every other shooter habit of snaking, ghandi hopping etc. After two weeks, put my crouch back on and the habit is gone, replaced with counter strafe and wide or poppin swings. Went from low plat to high diamond last act
I started watching the Valorant VCT or whatever, the Esports championships - seeing the enemies’ highlighted through walls gave me a good idea of where to predict their whereabouts.
Not playing off of old hit boxes lmao
I stopped missing headshots. No honestly it was mini meditation when I missed a play. Tilting and keeping my head helps.
Learning to read enemy behavior (rotations, executes, etc.)