Valorant tier list: Best Agents for each role

Valorant Agent Tier list: Best characters in each role

Role	Agent
Controller	Brimstone, Clove, Viper
Duelists	Raze, Jett, Iso
Initiators	KAY/0, Sova, Gekko
Sentinels	Sage, Cypher, Vyse

Controllers

Brimstone (Easy)

Brimstone is the Agent to pick if you’re coming from another tac shooter like Counter-Strike and are looking for a lot of the same basic tools you’d have in one of those games. He’s got 3 smokes, a molly to deny space with fire, an AoE fire rate buff, and a massive orbital laser for an ultimate.

He’s simple, straightforward, and good at pretty much every team composition. Don’t mistake that simplicity for a lack of strength, though. Good Brimstone players dictate the pace of the game. More than that, he’s also great if you’re still grappling with Valorant’s mechanics and want to focus more on gunplay than abilities.

Clove (Medium)

Clove is one of Valorant’s newer Agents, and they’ve got a pretty well-rounded kit that’s got one key benefit: You’re still useful even after you die.

Between their ultimate letting them self-revive and their smokes being usable from the grave, Clove has a ton of options alive or dead to help the team. As a result, they’re really great for getting comfortable with being a bit more aggressive.

Granted, you’ll have to take the fight to the enemy if you want to find success. One of Clove’s abilities is entirely reliant on sapping the energy out of someone you just took down, meaning they really have to get in and fight to fully utilize their kit.

Viper (Hard)

Viper from Valorant coming out of a a Vipers Pit

Viper arguably has the most control over the map of any controller, with her toggleable smoke screens and area denial making her a nightmare to play against. However, it is absolutely essential to learn lineups with this character.

In order to take advantage of her kit, you’ll want to study high-level players and figure out where you should be throwing your smoke, placing your wall, and planting the bomb to make it nigh-impossible for your enemy to win once you’ve got control.

If you’re willing to put some time and effort into researching the best way to play her, Viper is incredible. But she’s not the type of Agent you can hop into a game with and start carrying games with.

Duelists

Raze (Easy)

If the idea of shooting doesn’t appeal to you – well, you may have picked the wrong game to play. But Raze is the Valorant agent who has the most ways to do damage outside of just shooting.

Every single one of her abilities does damage, making her a major threat. Her grenade especially does great damage and is a zoning tool that can chunk people down, if not outright kill them. The same goes for her Boom Bot. And, while her satchels do damage, they’re better used to propel yourself forward and right into the face of the enemy.

Aggressive, damage-focused, and pretty easy to pick up, Raze is exactly what you’d want out of a damage carry. She doesn’t offer a whole lot of utility, but that doesn’t matter much if you just take out every other player yourself.

Jett (Medium)

Jett is arguably Valorant’s best all-rounder. With her having high mobility and smokes, she’s got everything you need to showcase raw gun skill. In other words, she’s kind of the polar opposite of Raze.

This Agent is a lot harder than she was at release considering her smokes only last a few seconds and her dash now has to be primed rather than it just being instant, but she’s still a solid choice and a favorite of many Duelist players.

Although, unlike Raze, she does have a lot more to offer than just raw damage. Her ability to reach high areas lets her get some really sneaky angles, and she functions just as well on defense as she does on attack.

Iso (Hard)

Iso’s entire kit is all about gun skill. Every ability he has gives him a slight leg up in 1v1s, with his ultimate literally isolating him and another player in a duel.

Everything about him pushes you forward and helps you stay in the fight, with Double Tap in particular letting him snowball fights by giving him a shield that blocks one bullet. That may not seem like a lot, but it really counts in higher-level play. Or against an Operator.

Iso doesn’t work unless you’re better than your opponent. But, if you are, he’s got the sauce and is a much more consistent Agent than someone like Reyna if you’re looking for some real hard carry potential.

Initiators

KAY/0 (Easy)

Like Brimstone, KAY/0 is an easy recommendation for people who have played other tactical shooters, mainly because of the way his flashbang works. He’s got two different throw strengths on it, but can also bounce it off of walls and even toss it in the air before quickly turning his back. It’s one of the most flexible flashes in the game.

He’s also got an ability that essentially functions like a frag grenade that explodes a few times and a few different ways to silence the enemy, preventing them from using their abilities.

He’s not the most popular pick, partially because his kit isn’t too flashy in comparison to a lot of other Agents in Valorant. But KAY/0 gets the job done.

Sova (Medium)

Sova is advertised as an easy starting character, but he requires a bit of finesse and map knowledge to really shine. His drone does what it says on the tin, but all of his arrow abilities have a bit more going on.

His scouting dart benefits from some map knowledge, with there being a few lineups to get your arrow in the prime spot to scan the enemy. But his electric dart really, really wants for lineups. If you memorize where to plant the bomb and are able to deny bomb defuse, Sova is instantly a better character.

He’s good without needing to learn Valorant on a deeper level, but benefits greatly from doing a bit of studying and watching some high-level players.

Gekko (Medium)

Gekko is basically the Valorant version of a Pokemon trainer. He’s got a bunch of little guys who do all sorts of things from blinding the enemy to creating piles of lethal poison goop and even planting the bomb.

He’s fun and pretty much always useful, though he definitely requires some game knowledge to use well. Nothing he does is instant, everything requires a bit of windup and planning to get right. You can’t really panic with this Agent and expect to do well.

That said, Gekko isn’t too complicated once you get the hang of him, and he doesn’t require lineups or a whole lot of map knowledge to be effective. And, considering just how much utility he’s got, it’s hard to picture a meta where Gekko wouldn’t be a good pick.

Sentinels

Sage (Easy)

Sage is about as close to a support character as you can get in Valorant. If you’re just getting into the game, you should try and play some Agents who rely on gun skill at some point to try and improve. But, if you’re feeling a bit intimidated, Sage will let you feel useful even if you aren’t able to get many kills.

The ability to heal allies, block off areas with her wall, and create a huge slow field make her both easy to use and effective. Not to mention that her ultimate allows her to bring an ally back from the dead to give them another chance at taking the round.

Sage is a great character to learn on, but it’s not like she falls off super hard in high MMR, either. She’s one of the most popular Agents in Valorant for a reason.

Cypher (Medium)

Information is one of the most valuable things you can have in Valorant, and Cypher’s great at gathering it. He can place tripwires that stop you from getting flanked, put up a camera that’s easy to conceal and has a tracking dart you can fire at enemies, and a sort of “smoke” that creates a deployable screen that can be toggled at will.

He’s one of the only Agents in Valorant whose ultimate is arguably the weakest part of his kit. But, considering it instantly gives you the location of every enemy on the map, it’s certainly not a bad ability.

However, none of Cypher’s abilities do damage or CC the opponent outside of his tripwire. And, even then, those are visible. They’re often more useful because you can track the enemy by keeping tabs on when they get shot out rather than anyone getting caught in them.

Vyse (Hard)

Strong yet unwieldy, Vyse has a ton of great tools and one of the most well-rounded kits in the game. She’s also an absolute pain to learn.

Everything she does outside of her ult has multiple steps. She can’t just use her flash, she has to place it, let it deploy, and then use it. She can throw a huge tangle of barbs that deny an area, but you have to toss it and activate it to make it actually work. Her wall doesn’t immediately deny areas. Rather, it goes up after someone walks by, locking them in.

She’s one of the best Agents in Valorant, but also one of the hardest. She takes some getting used to and really requires strong teamplay to shine.

That’s the best Agents you can play for every role in Valorant! If your favorite character wasn’t mentioned here, it’s not because they aren’t good. They just may be either too niche to do well without the hands of a specialist, or they just may not fit the meta.

That said, with how many different Agents there are in Valorant, don’t be afraid to try whoever catches your eye. After all, PC Game Pass will let you try anyone you want, giving you the flexibility to try out new characters rather than having to grind through the process of acquiring them or having to buy them individually.

If you want to know how we’re celebrating the rest of PC Gaming week be sure to check out the full schedule here.

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