The developers shared how the agents were designed to fit their roles, but the roles have not been pinpointed.
VALORANT gets another Duelist Neon with Patch 4.0 and adds another exciting agent for players to use. However, players have noticed that Riot Games is challenging each agent's specific roles and blurring the lines between Duelists, Controllers, Scouts, and Initiators. The developers shared insights on how they balance agents and how assigned roles may evolve and change in the future.
VALORANT character producer John Goscicki recently shared his thoughts on current agent categories and how they might change in the future at a developer Q&A session.
“I think most of these categories are broad terms and rules and ways of thinking about what these characters should and could be, like strengths and weaknesses. And we're constantly trying to push the boundaries of that, and you've seen that lately, not just with Neon but with Chamber," said Goscicki. “I think as the game evolves and continues to grow, we're probably going to come back to many of these characters and sharpen their identities or develop those roles towards the different outputs of these roles. We always talk about potential, 'Hey, maybe there's more than four we have right now.'”
Character reworks are not uncommon in online games, especially if a character has been out of the game for a significant amount of time. VALORANT's agent roster has grown steadily over the life of the game, and agent changes are common. As Goscicki points out, some legacy agents may be adjusted further to fit more into their established roles, but players may see new roles emerge.
VALORANT game designer Ryan Cousart also explained how agents fit into the different "quarters", allowing the team to follow guidelines and make sure they fit their specific roles.
"So you're going to have very natural relationships with fumes like docking and distraction, and being able to take control of the map that feels like a sentry and a controller can have those similarities and it will live in a small place like the quadrant, that's really sharp capitalization windows, taking over the floor or X and unlike starters and duelists who do it to make Y,” Cousart said. “Living within this quadrant helps us create these scarecrows.”
This does not mean that VALORANT players are guaranteed to see a new agent category anytime soon. But as new agents are added, the lines between each category will continue to blur, keeping the game fresh and exciting.