Riot has revealed major updates to Tier 2 Valorant for the 2024 season, starting with news that Ascension will be played after Champions, along with plenty more structural changes as well.
Valorant’s Tier 2 system has long been a point of criticism for Riot as, since the start of the partnership leagues, many in the scene have felt the publisher was not helping develop the Challengers circuit enough.
But now on August 13, Riot has shared its updates for the Challengers scene and the looming 2024 season, promising to extend the season to a year-round calendar, leaving room for more viewers to watch, while ensuring the Challengers scene avoids schedule clashes with VCT, not to mention moving Ascension after Champions as well.
Today we want to share our philosophy on Challengers and how we will evolve for the 2024 #VCT Season.Read more: https://t.co/fYQzWeqDrA pic.twitter.com/Zkg2jWIqBo
— VALORANT Champions Tour (@ValorantEsports) August 14, 2023
The Global Head of Valorant Esports, Leo Faria, penned an article released by Riot, containing a plethora of sweeping changes to the Tier 2 ecosystem and the integration of the Premier system to the Challengers scene.
He first explained the changed Challengers calendar, saying “Instead of limiting Challenger Leagues to run from January to June, we will transform to running them year-round, including in the back half of the year when the Tier 1 ecosystem is in the off-season.”
Included in the calendar shake-up is the scheduling of the Ascension tournaments, which determines which teams will be joining tier 1 VCT. This has now been moved to September, after Champions.
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Secondly, it has now been confirmed that teams in the Tier 1 International Leagues will be allowed to build affiliate relationships with Challengers teams. This will allow exchanges among players much easier with resources from the Tier 1 space being used to develop Tier 2 talent.
Next up, Premier teams can also now qualify for the Challengers circuit as Riot seeks to integrate the system with Tier 2. “Those tournaments will eventually qualify teams into Challenger Leagues, creating one clear path to pro that starts in-game.”
Faria added this will effectively make Premier the Tier 3 scene of Valorant as Premier would give a chance for upstart teams to make it into the Challengers circuit.
He concluded the update by saying there will be more changes to the Tier 2 scene as Riot receives more feedback from the community.
