u/sadboi_2000

Elimination games:

PRX vs T1: PRX should be heavy favorites, but you never know with regional matchups. The last time these two met in Stage 2, PRX lost in an incredibly close game.

NS vs 100T: A tragedy that either of these two teams will get eliminated so soon. APAC has generally struggled against Americas this Champs, so 100T are probably marginally more favored. But also, the fate of first seeds in this tournament has not been great, and 100T are famous for being serial chokers when it matters. Could go either way, especially since NS have been steadily improving while 100T looked slightly disjointed against G2.

Upper bracket games:

NRG vs LOUD: Banger matchup, a rematch from the infamous and questionable Americas lower bracket final that LOUD qualified through and as a consequence eliminated LEV. I think NRG have a slight edge as they can ban Sunset and are probably the best overall team on most other maps. LOUD can definitely step up at the right moment.

G2 vs Vitality: How long will the dead team buff last? These two might be the most inconsistent good teams of their respective regions. G2 actually look good, but Vitality have been on a hot streak in Champs so far. They are also an incredibly clutch team. Again probably a 50-50 matchup.

We are truly blessed with another day of potentially banger matchups. The most lopsided on paper in PRX-T1, but since its a regional normal analysis no longer applies.

As someone not so "in" with the NA Valorant scene, I do see PROD show up in games with former pro-players occasionally, and more often than not people just flame him? His playstyle also seems strange, he appears to be clip-farming most of the time? But then there are older videos calling him the "savior" of NA Valorant? Is that a tongue in cheek thing? His stats on vlr are nothing amazing, and the most notable game I have found of his is when he goes up against C0M, Kanpeki and Paincakes and doesn't do too great.

https://preview.redd.it/8k1x8kmjwloh1.png?width=696&format=png&auto=webp&s=d3aa804ca5109a965590b4b0360240de9d68942c

I keep finding aim montages of him all over Youtube. Liquipedia tells me he is 25, so he's not up and coming, and VLR tells me he spent a lot of time in Tier 2 across a bunch of teams. He was in EG back in 2021 (playing with Potter on the team, incidentally), so he has been around a while. Did he leave the game to go to college or something? I also found this cool little relic from Challengers 2024 where he had the same rating as brawk.

https://preview.redd.it/o6hgok2ftjoh1.png?width=397&format=png&auto=webp&s=92e2e5fc7f1f6b6110ba688cde393bfe812f952a

I think several people (Sliggy, Achillios, Paperthin) pointed this out, but PRX, through the latter stages of Stage 2, were genuinely getting aim-diffed by teams, especially VARREL (twice) and Nongshim. Sure, both those teams are on absolute heaters right now, but its extremely jarring to see PRX of all teams get aim-diffed when a huge part of their legacy is built around being the team that outaims everyone else (except maybe LEV).

There could not be a better redemption storyline as Karmine Corp go into Champs as one of the favorites to win it all.

A lot of discussion revolves around how EMEA GMing is bad for leaving good players in Tier 2, but Japan has not been to an international since 2023 Champs. The last Japanese team of 5 to make it to an international by qualification was Laz, crow, dep, sugarz3ro and TENN. Laz retired back in 2024, Dep, crow and TENN have since been grinding Challengers and sugarz3ro might retire soon.

The closest a Japanese team has been to an international since has been, I think, DFM with their current roster, finishing as high as 5th in Pacific and a few wins away from qualification. Their only hope is that Meiy is still cracked and going strong, and now he has shooters in Caedye and yatsuka. DFM and/or ZETA would most likely keep one or both slots next year, considering how popular the orgs and players are in Japan, and one can hope with some infux of Korean talent, we might get a Japanese org back in the international stage in 2027. One can hope.

I know at their core they are meant to be chaos sandboxes presented in a somewhat realized political setting, but they look insanely good, have a lot of dynamism that even modern games still lack (like animals getting into fights with one another, or human factions fighting, or animals hunting humans), and have a general sense of narrative and setting cohesion. Like, never once while playing a Far Cry game have I thought, this doesn't make sense. A lot of modern open world games I have played in the past few years (Ghosts of Tsushima, Horizon) don't always feel that way.

I hope Ubisoft never stops making them. While I did not personally enjoy Far Cry 6, 2 through 5 are still, and probably will remain, some of my favorite games of all time.

Watching neT play on GIANTX struggling to win against the worst T2 qualified EMEA team made me think, this guy was on The Guard core for a long time, and while he did also join G2 alongside everyone else, he was replaced and then spent the last 2 years pingponging around NA Tier 2 before getting another T1 opportunity for GIANTX. All the while G2 have spent at least one full year dominating NA with the same core.

Another big example is MaKo (probably the biggest), who was a part of the original Vision Strikers core way back in pre franchising, and while Buzz, stax and Rb all left to join various teams that won internationals, MaKo was left behind as the last surviving Korean pathfinder to keep struggling through DRX's various roster issues.

A tangential example would be yay, who did decide to join Cloud9 and not follow the Optic core into NRG. NRG was still fairly competitive, and the core did stick around in Tier 1 for a fair bit (and crashies is still going strong), but yay just kept getting pulled into disastrous projects (DSG, Bleed), before finally getting some stability in EG (although his Tier 1 career is probably finally over).

It really took 5 proper tier 1 players, including a Champs winner and MVP to truly show “ranked” Valorant lmao. Everyone peeking one by one, taking fights individually, playing old ass comps with barely any understanding, non-existent coordination or set plays, really takes me back to my Plat lobbies. It really feels like 4 people with fat contracts phoning it in while n1ghtzz (or however his name is spelled) is trying his best to make a case for some other team to pick him up.

At least the original Rankers core had some plans, some actual ideas. They weren’t the best in their roles but they understood their roles and how the team construction worked with their agent pools.

This current ENVY team is a sad excuse of a team, you really could replace them with any top tier 2 team and get better performances.

Here in the US, I bought the game + DLC for 34.99 USD, and now it is up for sale for 29.98 USD. Its not a lot, and I have already put 130 hours in it so I have passed whatever ROI those extra 5 dollars would have cost me, but it still feels scummy. I know the developers don't have much say in Steam pricing, but I might be wrong.

Since like 2025, some of the best players in VCT China have been European, like vookashu, rarga and f4ngeer. I feel like its conceivable that they could easily fit into some EMEA or even APAC teams. Is this a case of players making so much money that they would rather stick to their region instead of chasing glory? Surely these guys could have much more success inside better teams, like imagine FNC Vookashu playing senti while alfajer becomes a permanent secondary duelist.

Team Heretics put together what might be one of the saddest performances I have ever seen in an international. One map won out of 5, one pistol round won out of 10, all five of their players under 1.0 rating and Wo0t being the second worst rated player in the tournament, and worst in the playoffs. Their highest rated player was their rookie duelist.

These guys were EMEA champions by the way.

G2 has lost their first game at every international event starting from Masters Toronto 2025.

Toronto 25 -> 0:2 vs PRX (finished 4th)

Champs 25 -> 0:2 vs Heretics

Santiago 26 -> 0:2 vs PRX (again) (finished 4th)

London 26 -> 1:2 vs XLG

Seems like they really need to get one bad game out of their system.

Also, in both Masters, they finished 4th overall, losing out in lowers round 3 (just before the lower final). Considering they play FUT and then PRX/Vitality in their next two games, it seems highly likely they don't even make top 4 this tournament.

I am genuinely confused. The comments almost always directly address whatever situation was talked about, irrespective of how insane the situation itself is.

Like someone posted about their rich fiancee leading a triple life with another lover and a whole ass family, and not a single person in the comments wants any form of clarification, or no form of "Wait how the fuck did you never find out?" It genuinely feels like some form of psyop.

The only game they have won against a non-Chinese team at a non-Chinese event was against Sentinels at Champs 2025.

This includes off season tournaments and “that tournament” as well. Counting just VCT internationals they have made it to every single inte starting from Toronto and yet have only one that one game, going 1/8. Whats even crazier is that all of those losses are 0-2s.

Now to be fair, they have played a ton of really strong opposition (G2, NRG, PRX). But surely one of the strongest Chinese teams being this consistently bad doesn’t bode well for the region.

Now, Pragg is outside the top 20, Gukesh is barely hanging on (at 19). Only Erigaisi still remains, but that could also be due to the fact that he peaked so high that he even though he has lost a lot of rating his overall rank did not drop a lot (and he has regained some form recently).

Did the Indians burn themselves out playing too much too often? Seems like Nodirbek and Sindarov are taking more breaks in between tournaments to avoid similar fates.

China has been the punching bag region for the last few internationals, but this time around there seems to be some sliver of hope.

For one, the meta has shifted back to Jett/Raze comps, which Chinese teams were historically good with. EDG have looked great in the current meta with Smoggy being a prodigy with Phoenix.

DRG might also be able to play with vookashu on their team, who has looked incredible individually.

They still haven't really cleaned up their anti ecos, which has been a big problem for them. As a region they have a significant tendency towards getting ecoed all the time.

I do have a guarded amount of faith in a possible top 3/top 4 finish, especially as the neon nerfs come in and none of the qualified Chinese teams were particularly good with neon.

Watching MIBR vs 100T you will realize just how poor mazino's (and MIBR's) understanding of Harbor on breeze is. Considering that most other teams that play Harbor comps (especially Lev) on Breeze, make it look broken. Ideally you would expect the almost-Harbor main mazino (who played Harbor consistently, and was one of the world's best on Icebox, especially) to thrive on the agent, and yet he plays it like pre-change Harbor.

And this, on a more general note, sums up MIBR right now. A composition of some really good players that still feel disjointed. Watching other, better double duelist pairings (something/jinggg, or woot/koshmaras) vs zekken and aspas feels like two worlds, where zekken always goes too early, and aspas' whole job is to go second, making the one-two double duelist punch feel non-existent.

And then add on the inconsistency of mazino and the floor-lowering performances of Tex, and you get a team that I don't think will succeed until something major changes soon.

I was rewatching that Ascent map, and holy shit was it bad. Like, I think we are lucky to be in an era of relatively high quality Valorant overall. Just watching Urango gravnet himself, or palla miss every single op shot, or Furia getting owned by Kayo ults while playing double sentinel.

The quality was so incredibly poor it bears disbelief.

Edit: I forgot to mention that the Furia even messed up dying to the spike on round 2.