Riot planning to add Valorant stream-sniping countermeasures next patch

The latest Valorant update has allegedly laid the groundwork for new methods of combating pesky stream-snipers in the tactical First Person Shooter.

Stream-snipers can often ruin the experience of any competitive game. Whether they’re targeting a popular personality so that they can intentionally lose, or they’re on the enemy team tracking every movement of an internet celebrity.

It can be extremely frustrating and even enough to turn people away from certain titles. Many of the biggest names on Twitch have resorted to their own methods in order to combat these pesky players. However, Riot is seemingly preparing a few new settings to counter the issue directly in Valorant.

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As the August 20 patch came online, it was quickly torn apart by prominent dataminers in the community. While it was a relatively small update, a few big changes appear to be on the horizon. Here’s how Valorant will soon be targeting stream-snipers head-on.

If players notice a big name on the enemy team, there’s a chance they focus entirely on hunting down the streamer. It’s a common problem but Riot has a new method on the way to nip it in the bud. A few new lines of code were spotted in the 1.06 update by ‘ValorLeaks.’ These strings hint that new stream-sniping countermeasures are almost ready to go live. 

One such countermeasure is the ability to “hide [your] name from players outside of [the] party.” If players aren’t on your friends list and in your squad directly, your name will be outright hidden. When popular streamers load into a game, no one in the match will know it’s them if they’re solo-queueing. 

Valorant isn’t the first game to implement such measures — Fortnite has had a similar system in place for quite some time — though Riot appears to be taking things one step further. There will also be a feature to safeguard others in the lobby. “Use generic names for players outside of party,” an additional line of code reads.

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If you choose to enable this feature, every single game will be filled with anonymous players. There will be no way to identify who is competing across either team in the lobby.

These streamer-friendly options should create a far less frustrating environment for those playing while live. There’s no indicating when these settings might come online. Though the groundwork has clearly been set in the August 20 update.

From shotgun nerfs to flash changes, here’s everything you need to know about the latest Valorant patch.