Riot has promised more Valorant balance changes in 2022 after a slowdown in updates ahead of Episode 4. The developers admitted team restructuring led to a lack of updates, but more priority will be put on the game’s meta next year.
Valorant’s meta has sat largely unchanged for most of 2021, especially in the last half of the year. Riot hasn’t been too keen on implementing major balancing changes — aside from a rogue Jett nerf that was reverted after being shipped accidentally.
The recent Valorant patch 3.12 had a few quality of life changes. Riot finally introduced Agent-specific keybinds — a long-requested community feature — as well as player card changes and friendly fire detection to stop players sabotaging their teammates.
However, there hasn’t been a gameplay balancing change since Valorant patch 3.09 (excluding Chamber’s release on patch 3.10) when Riot nerfed the Classic. Agent-wise, you have to look back to Valorant patch 3.07 for some changes to Agents with Viper bug fixes.
Riot wants to up the pace of this in 2022, promising more Valorant balance changes in Episode 4 and beyond that should shake up the meta.
“You can expect patch notes with more gameplay changes coming up fairly soon. We’re trying not to shake things up too much during Champions but we’ve got some changes we’re excited to ship after it’s over (spread out over a few patches),” developer Coleman ‘Altombre’ Palm said on Reddit.
The developer appreciated players’ patience during the lull of changes, stating Riot have been putting in new structures to help with balancing.
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“We’ve been doing some team restructuring to get balance changes prioritized and better supported going forward, and I think we’re in a much better spot now. We’re excited for you to see what we’ve been working on,” he said.
Riot made a similar promise after Valorant Episode 3’s launch in July. With players having to wait months for new Agents and maps, and Riot dropping skin bundles to tide players over, the excitement was quick in dropping off.
Developers admitted content was “lighter than [they] would like right now”, but now the focus has shifted to rebalancing the game’s meta.
- Read More: All Valorant skin bundles
A Yoru rework is still on the cards for Valorant, although that has been delayed indefinitely. A new progression system is also reportedly in the works for Valorant Episode 4. While the cogs are seemingly turning behind the scenes, players are hungry for more, and Riot is getting ready to deliver.
