VALORANT Patch 1.08 released – Guardian buff and Map rotation

Riot Games has released a new Patch for their FPS VALORANT. Patch 1.08 is smaller in size but brings a much needed buff for the Guardian, while also delivering quality of life changes.

The last patch 1.07 had been a major patch, bringing plenty of balance changes to the game. For 1.08 Riot wants to wait and see the full impact of the prior changes before working on the meta again. Max “Orcane” Grossman, Riot’s Lead Agent Designer also said that they are keeping an eye on the Operator, but are still testing internally how to properly adjust the gun.

Main focus of Patch 1.08 are a buff to the Guardian, some slight adjustments to Raze’s Blast Pack as well as bug fixes and quality of life improvements.

Guardian buffed

Riot wants to make the Guardian more viable and has decided to give out plenty of buffs to the weapon. A price reduction of 100 Credits (down to 2400) as well as higher rate of fire and better weapon recovery should see increased usage of the weapon.

Raze’s Blast Pack adjusted

Raze’s Blast Pack has been tweaked quite a bit to enable more counter-play opportunities. Players can now shoot the Blast Pack from a safe distance to remove its threat without exposing themselves to danger. In exchange the max damage of the ability has been increased.

Better Map Rotation

Patch 1.08 will also improve the map rotation for VALORANT players. Fulfilling their earlier promise to look into the matter. Instead of strict randomization, the map rotation will now feature “pseudo-random” chance to deprioritize maps you just played on.

More bug fixes and quality of life changes can be found in the full Patch Notes below:

VALORANT Patch 1.08:

RAZE

Blast Pack

  • Initial damage reduced to 15 with a .2 meter inner radius, falling off to 5 minimum damage
  • Once the satchel lands, it arms after .5 seconds, increasing it’s max damage to 50
  • Shooting the blast pack causes it to detonate, dealing its current damage amount
  • Satchel no longer does damage allies

Raze’s Blast Pack has been dishing out damage without giving enemies much counterplay. This change should help make it very clear when Blast Pack’s damage poses a threat while maintaining the utility aspects of the Blast Pack that players have begun to master. The blast pack now does not ‘fizzle’ when shot and will still do damage, meaning it should still be approached carefully if in lethal range.

 

WEAPON UPDATES

Guardian buff

  • Price reduced from 2500 >>> 2400
  • Improved Rate of fire from 4.75 >>> 5.25 RPS (rounds per second)
  • Improved weapon recovery from .35 after 3 bullets to .2925 after 3 bullets
    • We don’t think the Guardian can (or should) compete directly with the Phantom or Vandal but we’d like it to have a place where players can feel good opting into the gun at the new price, is a competitive purchase in certain economic circumstances or map scenarios, and isn’t as punishing when an enemy gets close!

 

MAP ROTATION CHANGES

It’s happening! The possible pool of maps you can get placed on is now ‘pseudo-random’ rather than pure random. What that means is if you just played, say, Haven, the matchmaker will deprioritize that map in your next game.

  • Matchmaking queue for all modes has been updated to measure all your recently played maps, throughout all modes, so that for any given queue you:
    • Have a better chance of playing on a map you haven’t played recently
    • Are much less likely to play on the same map several games in a row

 

QUALITY OF LIFE

  • Observers will now see a timer rather than their screen being obscured when observing a player who is blinded
    • Full screen blind for observers can be turned back on in the options, for all you masochists
  • Minimap performance improvements
  • The social panel will now pause sorting while you’re hovering or interacting with it
  • Updated verbiage in the All Ranks modal in the Career page to be more consistent with Competitive overtime rules

 

BUG FIXES

  • Prime Classic VFX fixed
    • There was a bug in which upgrade Prime levels (2–4) were not playing the correct tracers, sound fx, and other VFX
  • Fixed a bug where the End of Game screen would display a “Still processing” message, and then wouldn’t show that match in your Career tab
  • Fixed a bug where “High Skill Disparity” would display in Custom Game Lobbies

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Image Credit: Riot Games
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