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Reyna
Flash, kill, devour, repeat. They will cower. Image via Riot Games.
Flash, devour, repeat. Most of the duelist VALORANT agents are pretty friendly to beginners, and you’ll be seeing another in this guide real soon. Reyna arguably has the most basic ability kit of any agent. On top of that, it’s perfectly designed for a beginner player that gets themselves into tough situations.
Reyna’s flash, called Leer(?), may get more criticism compared to other blinds because it’s breakable, but it’s criminally underrated. By peeking right when it deploys, it’ll force players to retreat, focus fire on the eye, or try and win a duel blind. Against other new players, either the second or third option creates a scenario most beginners should still win. Even having your eye broken reveals information about your opponent’s location.
Her devour charges are perfect for new players, letting players choose between healing or fleeing after winning a fight. This is great for players still learning when to push or peek, giving them a chance to recover if they get too aggressive. Reyna’s ultimate is perfect for a new player building confidence, as it rewards the player on each kill. While Reyna may not be the most viable agent from a team’s perspective, she’s great for a beginning player.
Omen
The go-to controller agent for beginner players. Watch them run. Image via Riot Games.
One of the most popular picks is also one of the simplest VALORANT agents to use: Omen. Even new professional players began by using Omen, including 100 Thieves’ Ethan and Cloud9 Blue’s floppy soon after switching over from CS:GO. Not only is Omen a useful agent for any team on virtually any map, but he’s also arguably the easiest of the controller agents to use.
For the controller agents using smokes, virtually all of them are pretty easy to deploy, and Omen’s no different. He deploys his smokes one at a time with extreme precision, and even has an arrow that helps with placing smoke at different elevations for one-ways. In addition to his smokes, which recharge over time, he has a short-distance teleport (Shadow Walk) and a blind (Paranoia).
The rest of Omen’s ability kit is best suited for beginners because it gives players some escapability compared to the other controllers. His Paranoia leaves enemies near-sighted for a pretty hefty duration, letting an Omen player get a few seconds of advantage to get a kill or two, or escape. The same can be said for his teleport, letting you swap hiding spots for something more favorable. Against other beginners, his ultimate teleport should help you surprise opponents. And even if you teleport amongst a group of enemies, you cancel out safely.
Phoenix
Burn them up. Super high-level tactics, yeah? Image via Riot Games.
With an ability kit that can create opportunities, protect yourself from flanks and rotations, and heal yourself, Phoenix has one of the most complete kits of the VALORANT agents Additionally, it’s pretty easy to learn and master in just a short amount of time. Like Reyna, Phoenix has a kit that’s great for blinding opponents and keeping you alive after dicey fights.
Phoenix’s Curveball flash is pretty easy to use, and it’s not destructible like Reyna’s or easy to avoid looking at. His Blaze wall lets you wall off angles as you move forward to take a site, or slow down retakers after a plant. Hot Hands has multiple uses, either to choke off entry points, chase opponents out of hiding spots, or to heal yourself.
Having all these tools at your disposal is an ideal kit for beginners. Being able to shut down the number of angles you can be shot from is vital at any level, so learning to do so with either Hot Hands or Blaze is a great skill to learn early. For a beginner player, learning when to pop the ultimate will be the biggest challenge. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen players use it on a retake, only to win the duel but lose the round because they got sent back to their starting location.
Sage
Slow down the enemies, heal the allies. You are both shield and sword. Image via Riot Games.
It’s really easy to get overwhelmed in VALORANT, at any level, especially when the whole team is rushing into the site you’re defending. If you’re new, and you’re looking for an answer to that start when you first play, then Sage’s ability kit is tremendous for slowing down and stopping a rush. She’s also useful to the team as a whole.
Sage’s Barrier wall and Slow orbs are perfect for stopping or slowing down rushes, letting you retreat to a safer spot and giving your teammates a chance to rotate. If you’re playing more passively, behind your allies, Sage’s Heal is obviously super valuable. Just make sure you don’t get tunnel vision when it comes to healing, because you risk getting caught with your gun down.
Over time you’ll learn cool tricks you can use Sage’s wall for, like jumping on it while it rises to take a quick peek, or rotating it and placing it in a small corridor to really annoy the enemy. The biggest piece of advice I can give you is not to get stressed by the responsibility of healing and resurrecting.
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KAY/O
The more you suppress, the more you impress. Execute. Image via Riot Games.
Hear me out here, I think KAY/O is the easiest/most useful initiator of all the VALORANT agents. Yes, Sova is extremely popular in ranked and in pro play, but he’s best used for his arrow lineups, which is something I wouldn’t recommend beginners start out with. I’ve seen too many people send arrows flying out of the playable map to recommend Sova to beginners.
So, I would recommend beginner players put some effort into unlocking KAY/O as soon as possible. His suppression knife is great for revealing enemy players, and forcing them to either push without abilities or delay themselves. Like the other agents with flashes, KAY/O’s can be used to create opportunities for himself, and his grenade can be used to force opponents out of corners.
I’m also a fan of ultimates that don’t require much attention dedicated to them, like KAY/O’s that pulses a suppression aura as he moves. Given that he’s relatively new, there’s likely to be other players experimenting with KAY/O as well, so have fun.
