7 Hardest to Use Agents in VALORANT

Valorant’s introduction of various Agents each with their own skills, abilities and playstyle has truly brought some much-needed innovation to the tactical FPS genre. With the roster expanding every year, there are a few Agents that have stuck out amongst the masses for the sheer amount of skill required to play them efficiently.

This begs the question, what are the hardest-to-use agents in Valorant? And, why have they earned that title in the first place?

Side note, if you want a shortcut to unlocking some of these agents, be sure to grab a Valorant Gift Card from OffGamers here today!

 

7. Viper

One of the first Controllers of Valorant, Viper was widely considered the hardest Agent to play in Valorant in the initial year of its release. This Agent is difficult to play due to two reasons. Firstly, her abilities are extremely time reliant. Both Poison Cloud and Toxic Screen, her two signature abilities, can only be used when she has enough fuel available – which is regenerated over time and is expelled quite quickly.

In essence, this means that you’ll need to really time your abilities to ensure their viability. You probably don’t want your smoke to be revealed while you are crossing a busy corner. Secondly, Viper’s entire kit is based on lineups. If you aren’t sure of where to place your smoke or screen on a particular site, you might end up harming your team more rather than helping them.

Therefore, before you even get started with Viper, you’ll have to memorize lineups for each site, both Attackers and Defenders, for one particular map to ensure that you don’t waste your entire kit on sub-par strategies in a round.

 

6. Cypher

Cypher is another Agent whose kit doesn’t provide you with any inherent utility. It is only your placement and understanding of the game that can help you make plays off that utility and information that can be utterly devastating for the enemy team.

Therefore, besides just having innate map knowledge and an understanding of where to place your utility, you’ll also need to be communicative with your team to be able to take advantage of the information you’ve just received from your traps or cameras. Otherwise, Cypher will feel practically useless throughout the entire game.

His Ultimate isn’t that strong either. However, if used correctly, can be absolutely game-winning for your team as knowing the positions of every enemy Agent on the map can lead to some great counterplay even on heavily defended sites.

 

5. Reyna

Reyna has been a staple of Valorant ever since the game exited its Closed Beta stages. Primarily utilised by players who take great pride in their aim, you’ll either be mowing down the entire enemy team or getting headshot 10 seconds into the round.

And, this is where Reyna truly lacks. While she’s great at confrontational engagements, you will need to get the first kill to take advantage of practically all her utility, from her Disengage to her Heal. Her Flash can easily be shot out of the sky which means that you’ll have to solely rely on your aim to win the first firefight, after which the Agent truly opens up.

Unlike other Agents who can use their utility immediately, Reyna can turn out to be a severe bottleneck and detriment if you aren’t able to get early kills on the enemy team.

 

4. Neon

Another Duelist arrives on the list, a pattern, maybe? Neon is an extremely fun hero to play. Her kit revolves around her accelerated movement speed allowing her to close gaps and rotate sites extremely quickly. But, her strength quickly turns into her greatest weakness when placed in the wrong hands.

Learning her movement can prove to be quite difficult, especially for the uninitiated. And, she won’t really be able to grab a lot of kills if she isn’t coupled with a strong Initiator like Breach or Skye, entailing that she requires communication within the team as well to function properly. Otherwise, you may as well be just rushing sites solo. While you may even get a kill doing that, you’ll just get traded out, defeating the purpose of your rush in the first place. 

Even though she’s received a few buffs since her initial release, her movement is still hard to master and can leave players stuck in situations with no backup from their team since they’re still rotating. 

 

3. Raze

Arguably the Agent with the highest skill ceiling on this list, Raze is super easy to pick up but very hard to master. Chaining her satchels, boosting yourself with her ultimate, double satcheling across the map and ensuring that you take picks along the way can turn out to be extremely cumbersome, especially in maps with limited vertical movement.

Her utility isn’t hard to understand at all. However, playing her at a high level requires a great degree of practice. Unlike Viper, Raze can’t rely on preset lineups on every site to remain viable. You’ll often be stuck in situations where you’ll have to innovate and come up with satchel jumps that you can convert into kills thanks to your mobility.

 

2. Chamber

Chamber is an Agent you pick when you are extremely confident with your aim. Most of the Agent’s utility revolves around his ability to use his Ultimate to get a free Operator-esque weapon or a Sheriff if you are feeling too feisty.

His playstyle is similar to Reyna’s. You’ll be a solo fragger for the most part and while your team can set kills up for you, it’ll be you who pulls the trigger for better or for worse. Ironically, Chamber plays more of a Duelist than a Sentinel due to the intrinsic value Riot has placed in going for kills with his kit rather than holding down sites or flanks.

 

1. Astra

Astra is by far the most difficult agent to play in Valorant. With Valorant nerfing her into oblivion in recent patches, it’s clear that Riot found the Agent too easy to play. While quite easy to understand, Astra’s smokes require you to move to a different dimension whilst also being vulnerable in-game.

Moreover, a poorly placed Ultimate can actually end up being detrimental to your team as it completely hinders your ability to listen to audio cues and see the enemy team coming, a staple part of identifying enemies in a tactical shooter. 

You’ll also need to excessively communicate with your team so that you don’t smoke off any viable entry points and will also need to time your utility so that it adheres to enemy movements. While a good Astra can be an absolute menace for the enemy team, the practice needed for a player to get even marginally decent at her leads her to be the hardest agent in Valorant.

 

Conclusion

Amidst all the Agents in this list, Astra is by far the hardest to play. However, with sufficient practice and very understanding teammates, you’ll be able to get some sweet Ults off in absolutely no time.

However, if you think it is your aim that’ll carry you, playing Reyna or Chamber isn’t that bad of an idea. Beware though, you’ll be subject to a lot of flaming when you miss your third Operator shot in a row. But, if it’s utility and mobility that you are truly after, playing Raze, Viper or Cypher will keep you entertained with new lineups and mechanics to exploit for hours on end.