VALORANT, a tactical first-person shooter game developed by Riot Games, has been annually hosting the Valorant Champions Tournament since its launch four years ago in 2020; this year, the world’s most skilled players of the game are gathered in Seoul, Korea to compete over a prize pool of 2 million USD. The tournament has been underway since August 1st, 2024, and with its finale taking place on August 25th, I really wanted to discuss the team Sentinels; they’re the team I saw the most potential in, and the team I harbored the most attachment for. However, because Sentinels actually lost their semifinals match and cemented their rank in 4th place, I wanted to instead discuss everything I saw during the final match they played against Heretics, and the possible reasons why they might’ve lost.
VCT provided live professional commentary throughout the match, and I noticed they used the loss of momentum to rationalize the Sentinels’ weaker performance as the game went on. The way the tournament works is that the teams play on three different maps, and first to two map wins will take the match. Considering they won their first map 13 to 8, this would make sense; the entire match itself, which consisted of three games total, was about three hours long. It’s a long duration of time for players to not only stay consistent with their gameplay, but to also continuously adapt to the other team’s increasing skill level. I feel like Sentinels is typically exceptional at doing this; for example, they played against the team Generation Gaming earlier in the season and lost without winning a single map, yet later in the tournament when they had to rematch them, Sentinels was able to win without losing a single map. However, during their game against Heretics, there was no room for adaptation like that. And, as I watched the match, there was one player on Heretics that caught my eye as Sentinels’ biggest obstacle in regaining that momentum: Boo.
In order to understand Boo’s value to Heretics’ team composition, you’d have to know about the VALORANT role system. Every playable agent has a role: duelist, initiator, sentinel, and controller. I personally believe Boo shined most playing the controller character Viper during the second map they played, Icebox. A controller’s job is to make sure the enemy team doesn’t get onto the site. Many times during the match, I felt like Boo used his utility to efficiently accomplish this. Especially considering Sentinels chose to play on Icebox because it was a map they felt confident in, I thought it was incredible how Boo’s defensive walls and smokes completely took that map control from them. I might be exaggerating, but I really do believe his performance on this map was what won Heretics the match.
As a very enthusiastic VCT watcher and an even more enthusiastic Sentinels fan, I hated to see them lose the tournament’s semifinals; but I can’t deny that the way that Heretics outplayed them made for an incredible face off. Seeing all of my favorite agents being used in ways I never would have imagined was such a treat to watch, and I highly recommend those with an interest in esports to perhaps give watching VCT 2024 a try.
