Riot Developer hinted at their intention to possible add a pick/ban system to VALORANT sometime in the future.
During a livestream on April 6th, VALORANT developer Nicholas Wu Smith was asked at how many Agents released would a pick ban system be considered viable. Smith answered that close to 30 but also stated “It also really depends on if we get as much good competition out of banning stuff versus other games.”
Riot’s other triple A title, and most popular esport in the world, League of Legends, popularized the pick and ban system and integrated ‘drafting’ as an essential part of competitive play. There are plenty of pros to adding a pick/ban, as it would force players to diversify their Agent pool.
Though VALORANT has largely avoided the issue of mirror matchups, many players have gravitated toward specific picks with some Agents, like Omen, have a near constant presence across all games. Star players such as Nicholas “nitr0” Cannella has played an overwhelming amount of one Agent, 75% of his games being on Omen.
There are obvious obstacles to this path however, as it stands there are only 15 Agents in the game currently with a disproportionate amounts of Agents in the Duelist category. Since launch, Riot have added 5 Agents, a relatively much slower pace than League Of Legends that would put VALORANT up to 30 Agents in 3 or so years.
With VALORANT’s 2 year anniversary coming up and more regular patches hitting live servers, there is a potential that Riot speeds up the amount of Agents added at a time if this is truly their intention. Much like every game with a wide array of playable characters, the balancing act for VALORANT devs will be difficult however thankfully this is nothing new for Riot.
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Image Credits: Riot