The days of seeing a Chamber in almost every professional Valorant match seem to have come to an end as Killjoy has become pro teams’ preferred Sentinel in the North American Challengers Open Qualifier after changes to both agents in recent patches.
Teams in North America battled it out in the first stage of the Challengers Open Qualifier in over 200 best-of-threes. In those matches, Killjoy was picked 70% of the time (the most of any agent), according to vlr.gg, while her Sentinel counterpart Chamber had a pick rate of only 3%. Only Yoru (2.7%) and Harbor (2.6%) were picked fewer times than Chamber.
Both agents have received big changes in recent patches, with Killjoy seeing her equipment buffed and Chamber getting nerfs to his kit. In patch 5.12, one of the final patches before Episode 5 concluded, Killjoy saw improvements to her Alarmbot, Nonswarm and ultimate.
In that same patch, Chamber saw massive nerfs to his Trademark, ultimate, teleport and Headhunter. For pro teams, the changes to his teleport and Trademark, in particular, made the agent a less potent pick in competitions.
Killjoy overtakes Chamber in professional Valorant
Killjoy looks to be the preferred Sentinel for professional Valorant teams as the game moves into a slower meta with the recent patches. On January 10, Riot Games released the first patch of Episode 6, which also introduced big changes to Omen.
With Omen potentially out of the meta, Astra could take his spot and turn the professional meta into a post-plant dominant affair, with Killjoy and Astra setting up traps on-site for enemies to fall into.
In a playtest of the new map, Lotus, former 100 Thieves head coach Sean ‘sgares’ Gares said that the new location feels like a Killjoy map. The three-site map is small enough that the Sentinel is able to set her turret and other abilities on one site and comfortably hold another by herself.
Fans can watch this new trend as the NA Challengers Open Qualifier continues on January 10 with the double-elimination portion of the tournament.
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