[music]<br>>> Hi everyone. I'm Max and I lead the<br>various teams who design systems and<br>core game mechanics within Valorant. As<br>we head into Act 3 of Season 2026, I<br>wanted to take a minute to check in on a<br>few areas of the game that we know you<br>all care about very much. We've seen a<br>lot of healthy conversation from the<br>community about things like the state of<br>the meta, our ranked and MMR systems,<br>player behavior systems, and our<br>approach to limited-time modes. [music]<br>So, I want to jump into some of that now<br>before I hand it over to Arman, Dan, and<br>Tiffi to chat about modes and live<br>balance.<br>First things first, the competitive<br>[music] experience. Our goal is<br>straightforward. Your rank should be a<br>clear reflection of your skill and the<br>journey to get there should feel fair.<br>We're going to be more proactive about<br>testing and refining different<br>approaches to matchmaking so we can land<br>on a system that truly delivers on that<br>promise. For example, in January, we<br>made updates to our MMR system to better<br>account for individual impact in<br>matches. We're seeing some positive<br>results here, especially around match<br>quality. Games are less one-sided and<br>we're seeing more even contribution<br>across players in the lobby. At the same<br>time,<br>some of the tradeoffs have been pretty<br>clear. We've heard your feedback around<br>visible rank differences in matches and<br>the feeling that RR losses can outweigh<br>RR gains. In some cases, we've also let<br>some tuning exist in game longer than we<br>should have while we evaluated the<br>results. One area we've been focusing on<br>is making sure your effort in each match<br>[music] feels properly reflected in your<br>rank. When that doesn't happen, it can<br>feel like the system isn't respecting<br>your performance.<br>To address this, we recently adjusted<br>how RR gains and losses are calculated<br>so that strong performances are rewarded<br>more, weaker ones cost more, and over<br>time, your wins and losses should feel<br>like they balance out appropriately.<br>We want to be more direct about how<br>we're approaching competitive overall.<br>Matchmaking and ranked integrity are a<br>major focus for us this year and that<br>means we're going to keep iterating.<br>Ultimately, your rank needs to reflect<br>your skill and getting there should feel<br>fair, consistent, and worth the effort.<br>Now, to talk about the top of the<br>leaderboard, we've heard the feedback<br>from Immortal Plus around recent changes<br>to our our thresholds. We want [music]<br>the battle for a spot on the Radiant<br>ladder to be the pinnacle of competition<br>and a reflection of performance, not<br>just pure grind. Additionally, we need<br>to ensure competitive integrity to know<br>that performance is legit on these<br>ladders. In the short term, we've been<br>investing more into anti-cheat and win<br>trading detection methods to make sure<br>the players at the top really deserve to<br>be there. We've already taken action<br>this year on some of the most egregious<br>win traders and we'll continue to do so<br>routinely. But longer term, we're<br>looking at improvements to make earning<br>Radiant act [music] over act more worth<br>it than it is today. And not just with<br>systemic improvements, we're also<br>working on specialized rewards for<br>climbing to the very top. All right.<br>Now, speaking of rewards, let's talk<br>about ranked rewards for all players.<br>I'm happy to confirm that the V26 Act 3<br>and Act 6 rank gun buddies this year<br>will be the last time a gun buddy is<br>your primary reward. In the 2027, you<br>won't need to wait until Act 3 to get<br>your new reward. The next version of our<br>ranked rewards will be distributed on<br>day one of season 2027 [music] and will<br>be an item that evolves with you<br>throughout your ranked journey for the<br>entire year. Yes, we originally hoped to<br>get you all new ranked rewards this<br>year, but we're taking a little more<br>time to make sure we get them right.<br>We'll share more on what you can expect<br>from ranked rewards in September. We<br>want you to feel recognized for your<br>dedication and growth every single act<br>you play. So, there's a lot more we're<br>bringing to the ranked experience that<br>you'll see in game closer to Champs.<br>Competitive Q is the reason the vast<br>majority of you play Valorant. So, we're<br>investing heavily to make every aspect<br>of our in-game systems paint a more<br>complete picture of your ranked journey<br>while giving you the tools you need to<br>improve and flex your mastery. Now, I'm<br>going to hand things over to Arman to<br>talk about our plans for modes.<br>Since the end of 2025, we've been<br>experimenting with new limited-time game<br>modes to learn more about what you love<br>and what you don't. [music]<br>And so far, we've been excited by what<br>excites all of you.<br>You all love Skirmish and Customs. So,<br>we brought it to the queue. And when we<br>took it away, you let us know that you<br>weren't ready to say goodbye. So,<br>>> [music]<br>>> we brought it back. And then, we added a<br>new flavor of Skirmish with an<br>experimental rank ladder. And that's<br>just Skirmish. We also have plans to<br>keep iterating and tinkering with other<br>modes like Knockout, All Random One<br>Site, and even an old fan favorite. We<br>hear all of you Replication fans out<br>there in the comments. So, I'm happy to<br>share that we're currently working on a<br>new mode that blends Replication with<br>All Random One Site. We think it'll give<br>you the off-the-wall moments that you<br>all enjoyed about Replication at an even<br>higher frequency. Replication is a mode<br>that's all about fun factor and<br>hilarious interactions, and we think All<br>Random One Site creates those moments<br>more frequently due to more alts, more<br>abilities, and getting different agents<br>every round all on a single site. After<br>that, we've got plans for a new take on<br>a Spike mode that'll put your skills to<br>the test with shortened rounds and<br>smaller teams. You'll see more on this<br>in a few weeks when Act IV starts. And<br>we might even have one more surprise up<br>our sleeve for Act V. Think KO combat<br>simulation gone haywire. I'll leave it<br>at that for now. Just know that it's<br>super fun and super different from<br>anything we've done so far, and we think<br>you're going to love it. You'll hear<br>more from me and the team about that in<br>September. As always, keep the feedback<br>coming. Now, over to Dan and Tiffanie to<br>chat more about live balance.<br>Hi everyone. Hey gamers. All right,<br>let's talk game balance. We don't want<br>to walk you all through what we've been<br>seeing since our largest set of changes<br>that we shipped late last year and go<br>into why we're making some of the<br>updates you're going to see this year.<br>At a more philosophical level, all of<br>our changes are aimed at supporting the<br>different layers of decisions you make<br>within Valorant. For Valorant, the core<br>game needs to support things like<br>different team compositions, a variety<br>of attacker and defender strategies, and<br>keep a mechanically deep and sound<br>combat system. So, when we make a change<br>to an agent, map, or weapon, it's<br>usually because one of those layers of<br>decisions is no longer impactful,<br>interesting to engage with, or relevant.<br>Toward the end of last year, we<br>rebalanced a huge chunk of the roster to<br>keep in the moment combat decisions<br>easier to process and highlight the<br>importance of gun play. And while we're<br>largely happy with where we've landed<br>there directionally, that said, we do<br>think those updates affected round over<br>round strategy and team play iteration a<br>little bit more than we would have liked<br>for the long term. Moving cool downs<br>above 40 seconds has allowed us to get<br>cleaner fights [music] later in the<br>round. So, that in clutch moments you<br>have fewer variables to account for.<br>But, at 60 seconds, this change hasn't<br>allowed as much room for teams to adapt<br>their strategies each round. So, with<br>patch 13.0, we'll be tuning down the<br>increased cool down on signature [music]<br>abilities for initiators a little bit,<br>from 60 to 50 seconds. And on the<br>weapons front, we're currently looking<br>to ship some buffs for the Bandit in<br>13.0.<br>These are intended to make it a little<br>bit more of a viable option outside of<br>pistol rounds, similar to the Sheriff.<br>Now, onto specific agents. To start the<br>year, we targeted a few that were<br>pushing things a little bit out of our<br>boundaries. Yoru was doing too much on<br>his own, especially with how quickly he<br>could rotate, which made sentinels like<br>Cypher less appealing. And Clove, they<br>were crowding out the controller space,<br>particularly in ranked, having too much<br>impact on spike sites after death. And<br>Reyna was getting away with a little bit<br>too much for her team with minimal<br>planning, commitment, or risk to<br>herself. We've pulled them back in<br>recent patches, and they're in healthier<br>spots. We're also seeing better pick<br>diversity overall, and we think keeping<br>agents unique is key to sustaining<br>long-term diversity.<br>Which brings us to Neon.<br>At the time of filming, many of the<br>changes that Dan and Tiffy talked about<br>in this section were originally<br>scheduled to come out a little over a<br>month from now with patch 13.0. We<br>wanted to take some extra time to test<br>these changes because we believe Neon,<br>shotguns, and weaker sentinels are all<br>wrapped up into one problem space. And<br>also to make sure that any of our<br>changes maintain Neon's ability to zip<br>across the ground at lightning speed.<br>But honestly, we've been killing the<br>shotgun wielding Neons in our own games,<br>and we're hearing it loud and clear from<br>all of you. So, we're bringing you these<br>changes today, even if they're a little<br>rougher around the edges.<br>>> [music]<br>>> To correct the information shared in the<br>video, you might notice some subtle<br>vocal overdubs and visual cues. We<br>apologize for the inconvenience.<br>We've seen a lot of talk and discussion<br>about Neon lately, and while we agree<br>Neon can be hard to deal with and<br>frustrating at times, we also know that<br>not everyone in the game is able to lock<br>in with her and turn into Daddy.<br>We think Neon's role in breaking timings<br>and creating pressure is correct. But<br>right now, her movement and evasiveness<br>pushed too far in our combat space. So,<br>we've got some changes in Today. to<br>bring her back in line. Right now, we're<br>looking specifically at how Neon takes<br>space around the map. Her mobility and<br>speed while bunny hopping aren't really<br>hitting our bar for tactical combat in<br>Valorant. You can expect to see changes<br>that will affect Neon's evasiveness<br>while keeping her ability to shoot and<br>slide. We're mostly just looking to add<br>some additional counterplay for Neon's<br>opponents. In addition to this, we're<br>also shipping some changes to shotguns<br>>> Today. that target their effectiveness<br>while moving and jumping. So, you'll<br>have to work a little harder to pull off<br>those kinds of kills versus playing with<br>them defensively and hunkering down.<br>On the other side of things, we're also<br>looking closely at our Sentinels.<br>Stalling should be a reliable tool, not<br>a situational one. Sentinels should be a<br>clear answer to fast and explosive team<br>compositions. Stalling abilities have an<br>important purpose in the game. They<br>allow players to reallocate their<br>resources around the map to force a more<br>strategic thinking. Forcing even the<br>most mechanically gifted players, like<br>Dan,<br>to engage in round strategy is part of<br>the tactical loop. So, in patch 13.0,<br>we're also making a few changes to some<br>Sentinels we feel need a little bit of<br>love. As just one example, Killjoy will<br>be getting some updates to help solidify<br>his rotational power and his ability to<br>disrupt site hits with Interceptor.<br>We'll continue to monitor how these<br>changes play out across skill levels,<br>and you'll hear from us again throughout<br>the year in patch notes and videos just<br>like these.<br>Now, back to Max.<br>Before we go, we also mentioned at the<br>start of the year that we were working<br>on a way for you all to share your<br>replay files with your friends. That<br>feature is coming in patch 12.10. Now,<br>when you click on a friend's profile and<br>view their match history, you'll see a<br>new button to download and view their<br>replay. Let the bot reviews begin.<br>Okay, that was a lot, but uh don't<br>worry. You can expect to hear a lot more<br>from us throughout the rest of the year.<br>Keep an eye out for the dev team at our<br>different BCT events, some creator<br>content, in the comments and replies<br>online, and most definitely with another<br>dev update closer to champs. We've got<br>some pretty sweet stuff to share that<br>we're hyped about, and we'll be back in<br>early September to let you in on all the<br>fun. Happy gaming, y'all. Hi everyone.<br>I'm Max and I<br>lead the various teams who design systems<br>and core game mechanics within Valorant.<br>As we head into Act III of Season 2026,<br>I wanted to take a minute<br>to check in on a few areas of the game<br>that we know you all care about very much.<br>We've seen a lot of healthy conversation<br>from the community about things<br>like the state of the meta, our ranked<br>and MMR systems,<br>player behavior systems,<br>and our approach to limited time modes.<br>So I want to jump into some of that now<br>before I hand it over to Armand,<br>Dan and Tiffy to chat about modes<br>and live balance.<br>First things first<br>the competitive experience.<br>Our goal is straightforward.<br>Your rank should be a clear reflection<br>of your skill,<br>and the journey to get<br>there should feel fair.<br>We're going to be more proactive about<br>testing and refining different approaches<br>to matchmaking, so we can land on a system<br>that truly delivers on that promise.<br>For example, in January,<br>we made updates to our MMR system<br>to better account for individual impacted<br>matches.<br>We're seeing some positive results<br>here, especially around match quality.<br>Games are less<br>one sided and we're seeing more even<br>contribution across players in the lobby.<br>At the same time, some of the trade offs<br>have been pretty clear.<br>We've heard your feedback around<br>visible rank differences in matches<br>and the feeling<br>that RR losses can outweigh RR gains.<br>In some cases, we've also let some tuning<br>exist in game longer than we should have.<br>While we evaluated the results,<br>one area we've been focusing on<br>is making sure your effort in each match<br>feels properly reflected in your rank.<br>When that doesn't happen,<br>it can feel like the system<br>isn't respecting your performance.<br>To address this, we recently adjusted<br>how RR gains and losses are calculated<br>so that strong performances are rewarded<br>more.<br>Weaker ones cost more, and over time<br>your wins and losses<br>should feel like they balance out<br>appropriately.<br>We want to be more direct about<br>how we're approaching competitive overall.<br>Matchmaking and ranked integrity<br>are a major focus for us this year,<br>and that means we're going<br>to keep iterating.<br>Ultimately,<br>your rank needs to reflect your skill,<br>and getting there should feel fair,<br>consistent, and worth the effort.<br>Now to talk about the top of the<br>leaderboard, we've heard the feedback<br>from Immortal Plus around<br>recent changes to our RR thresholds.<br>We want the battle for a spot<br>on the radiant ladder<br>to be the pinnacle of competition<br>and a reflection of performance,<br>not just pure grind.<br>Additionally,<br>we need to ensure competitive integrity<br>to know that performance is legit<br>on these ladders.<br>In the short term, we've been investing<br>more into anti-cheat and win trading<br>detection methods to make sure the players<br>at the top really deserve to be there.<br>We've already taken action this year<br>on some of the most egregious win traders,<br>and we'll continue to do so routinely.<br>But longer term, we're looking at<br>improvements to make earning Radiant Act<br>over Act more worth it than it is today,<br>and not just with systemic improvements.<br>We're also working on specialized rewards<br>for climbing to the very top.<br>All right,<br>now speaking of rewards, let's talk<br>about ranked rewards for all players.<br>I'm happy to confirm that the V-26, Act<br>III and Act VI ranked Gun Buddies<br>this year will be the last time a Gun<br>Buddy is your primary reward in a 2027.<br>You won't need to wait until act III<br>to get your new reward.<br>The next version of our ranked rewards<br>will be distributed<br>on day one of Season 2027,<br>and will be an item that evolves with you<br>throughout your ranked journey<br>for the entire year.<br>Yes, we originally hoped to get you<br>all new ranked rewards this year,<br>but we're taking a little more time<br>to make sure we get them right.<br>We'll share more on what you can expect<br>from Rank Rewards in September.<br>We want you to feel recognized<br>for your dedication and growth<br>every single act you play.<br>So there's a lot more<br>we're bringing to the ranked experience<br>that you'll see in game.<br>Closer to champs competitive.<br>queue is the reason the vast<br>majority of you play Valorant,<br>so we're investing heavily<br>to make every aspect<br>of our in-game systems<br>paint a more complete picture<br>of your ranked journey,<br>while giving you the tools<br>you need to improve and flex your mastery.<br>Now, I'm going to hand things over to<br>Armand to talk about our plans for modes.<br>Since the end of 2025, we've<br>been experimenting with new limited time<br>game modes to learn<br>more about what you love<br>and what you don't.<br>And so far, we've been excited<br>by what excites all of you.<br>You all loved Skirmish and Customs,<br>so we brought it to the queue<br>and when we took it away, you let us know<br>that you weren't ready to say goodbye.<br>So we brought it back.<br>And then we added a new flavor of skirmish<br>with an experimental rank ladder.<br>And that's just skirmish.<br>We also have plans to keep iterating<br>and tinkering with other modes<br>like knockout, all random one site,<br>and even an old fan favorite.<br>We hear all of you replication<br>fans out there in the comments,<br>so I'm happy to share<br>that we're currently working on a new mode<br>that blends replication<br>with all random one site.<br>We think it'll give you the off<br>the wall moments<br>that you all enjoyed about replication<br>at an even higher frequency.<br>Replication is a mode<br>that's all about fun factor<br>and hilarious interactions,<br>and we think all random<br>one site creates those moments<br>more frequently due to more alts,<br>more abilities, and getting different<br>agents every round, all on a single site.<br>After that, we've got plans for a new take<br>on a spike mode<br>that will put your skills to the test.<br>With shortened rounds and smaller teams.<br>You'll see more on this in a few weeks<br>when ACT IV starts,<br>and we might even have one more surprise<br>up our sleeve for Act V.<br>Think K.O. combat simulation gone haywire.<br>I'll leave it at that for now.<br>Just know that it's super fun<br>and super different<br>from anything we've done so far,<br>and we think you're gonna love it.<br>You'll hear more from me<br>and the team about that in September.<br>As always, keep the feedback coming.<br>Now over to Dan and Tiffy<br>to chat more about Live Balance.<br>Hi everyone.<br>Hey, gamers.<br>All right, let's talk game balance.<br>We're gonna walk you all through<br>what we've been seeing since our larger<br>set of changes that we shipped late<br>last year, and go into<br>why we're making some of the updates<br>you're going to see this year<br>at a more philosophical level.<br>All of our changes are aimed at supporting<br>the different layers of decisions<br>you make within Valorant.<br>For Valorant,<br>the core game needs to support things<br>like different team compositions,<br>a variety of attacker<br>and defender strategies,<br>and keep a mechanically deep<br>and sound combat system.<br>So when we make a change to an agent, map<br>or weapon, it's<br>usually<br>because one of those layers of decisions<br>is no longer impactful,<br>interesting to engage with, with or relevant.<br>Toward the end of last year,<br>we rebalance a huge chunk of the roster<br>to keep in the moment combat<br>decisions, easier to process and highlight<br>the importance of gunplay.<br>And while we're largely happy with where<br>we've landed there directionally,<br>that said,<br>we do think those updates affected<br>round over<br>round strategy and team play iteration<br>a little bit more than we would have liked<br>for the long term.<br>Moving cooldowns above 40s<br>has allowed us to get cleaner fights later<br>in the round, so that in clutch moments<br>you have fewer variables to account for.<br>But at 60s, this change hasn't allowed<br>as much room for teams<br>to adapt their strategies each round.<br>So with patch 13.0,<br>we'll be tuning down the increase<br>cool down on signature abilities for<br>initiators a little bit, from 60 to 50s.<br>And on the weapons front,<br>we're currently looking to ship some buffs<br>for the Bandit in 13.0.<br>These are intended to make it a little bit<br>more of a viable option<br>outside of pistol rounds,<br>similar to the Sheriff.<br>Now, onto specific agents,<br>to start the year.<br>We targeted a few that we're pushing<br>things a little bit out of our boundaries.<br>Yoru was doing too much on his own,<br>especially with how quickly<br>he could rotate, which made Sentinels<br>like Veto less appealing and Clove.<br>They were crowding out<br>the controller space,<br>particularly in ranked<br>having too much impact on spike sights<br>after death, and Walay was getting away<br>with a little bit too much for her team<br>with minimal planning, commitment<br>or risk to herself.<br>We've pulled them back in recent patches<br>and they're in healthier spots.<br>We're also seeing better pick<br>diversity overall, and we think keeping<br>agents unique is key to sustaining long<br>term diversity.<br>Which brings us to Neon.<br>At the time of<br>filming, many of the changes<br>that Dan and Tiffy talked about in<br>the section were originally scheduled to<br>come out a little over a month from now.<br>With patch 13.0,<br>we wanted to take some extra time<br>to test these changes,<br>because we believe that Neon, shotguns,<br>and weaker Sentinels are all wrapped up<br>into one problem space,<br>and also to make sure that<br>any of our changes maintain Neons ability<br>to zip across the ground<br>at lightning speed.<br>But honestly, we've been feeling<br>the shotgun in our own games,<br>and we're hearing loud and clear<br>from all of you.<br>So we're bringing these changes to you<br>these changes... Today!<br>Even if they're a little rough<br>around the edges<br>to correct the information<br>sharing the video,<br>you might notice some subtle<br>vocal overdubs and visual cues.<br>We apologize for the inconvenience.<br>We've<br>seen a lot of talk and discussion<br>about Neon lately, and while we agree<br>Neon can be hard to deal with<br>and frustrating at times, we also know<br>that not everyone in the game is able<br>to lock in with her and turn into Derby.<br>We think Neon’s roll in, breaking<br>timings and creating pressure is correct.<br>But right now her movement invasiveness<br>pushed too far in our combat space.<br>So we've got some changes today<br>to bring her back in line.<br>Right now we're looking specifically<br>at how Neon takes space around the map.<br>Her mobility and speed while bunny<br>hopping aren't really hitting our bar<br>for tactical combat in Valorant,<br>you can expect to see changes<br>that will affect neons evasiveness<br>while keeping her ability<br>to shoot and fly.<br>We're mostly just looking to add<br>some additional counterplay<br>for Neon’s opponents.<br>In addition to this, we're also shipping<br>some changes to shotguns today.<br>The target their effectiveness<br>while moving and jumping,<br>so you'll have to work a little harder<br>to pull off those kinds of kills<br>versus playing with them<br>defensively and hunkering down<br>on the other side of things.<br>We're<br>also looking closely at our Sentinels.<br>Stalling should be a reliable tool,<br>not a situation one.<br>Senties should be a clear answer<br>to fast and explosive team compositions.<br>Stalling abilities<br>have an important purpose in the game.<br>They allow players to reallocate<br>the resources around the map to force<br>a more strategic thinking, forcing<br>even the most mechanically gifted players<br>like Dan, to engage in round<br>strategy is part of the tactical loop.<br>So in patch 13.0,<br>we're also making a few changes<br>to some Sentinels<br>we feel need a little bit of love.<br>As just one example, Vito will be getting<br>some updates to help solidify<br>his rotational power and his ability<br>to disrupt sight hits with interceptor.<br>We'll continue to monitor<br>how these changes<br>play out across skill levels,<br>and you'll hear from us again<br>throughout the year<br>in patch notes and videos just like these.<br>Now back to Max.<br>Before we go,<br>we also mentioned at the start of the year<br>that we were working on a way for you all<br>to share your replay files<br>with your friends.<br>That feature is coming in patch 12.10.<br>Now, when you click on a friend's profile<br>and view their match history,<br>you'll see a new button to download<br>and view their replay.<br>Let the VOD reviews begin.<br>Okay, that was a lot.<br>But don't worry,<br>you can expect to hear a lot more from us<br>throughout the rest of the year.<br>Keep an eye out for the dev team<br>at our different VCT<br>events on creator content<br>and the comments and replies online,<br>and most definitely<br>with another dev update closer to Champs.<br>We've got some pretty sweet stuff to share<br>that we're hyped about,<br>and we'll be back in early September<br>to let you in on all the fun.<br>Happy gaming y'all!