Valorant v0.50 Patch Notes: Sage & Cypher Nerf, Viper & Omen Buff, Recoil Changes, Map Changes, Eco Nerf

Valorant received it a huge update - v0.50 - and with it, a ton of changes to the way weapons work, various agents got buffs and nerfs including the all-powerful Sage, and there were tweaks to the economy and maps to make them more balanced.

There is a lot to get through so let's just get right into it.

Sage and Cypher Nerf

(Picture: Sage)

Sage has been one of the most popular agents in Valorant's beta, and easily one of the most powerful. Riot have used this patch to significantly reduce her effectiveness bringing her more in line with the other agents.

Her Slow Orb has been decreased from nine to seven seconds, and it's slowing effect has been brought down from 65% to 50% making it much less powerful.

• Read more: Valorant: Sage Agent Guide - Abilities, Strategies, Tips & Tricks and Lore

Sage's Barrier has also been increased in cost from 300 to 400 creds, which will make buying it a more important decision in the early rounds.

With Cypher his Cyber Cage no longer slows enemies that walk through it, and his Spycam has been given an increased cooldown of 30 seconds to 45.

Weapon & Recoil Updates

The Ares has been reduced in price to 1600 creds. (Picture: Riot Games)

There have been several changes to the weapons in the game including changing the way Assault Rifles work when firing in single-tap and burst fire, with them being more accurate when used in these firing modes.

Deadzone accuracy has also been increased so the time it takes for your gun to reset to 100% accuracy is shorter meaning running, stopping and gunning should be easier to achieve.

The overall recoil of the Vandal, Ares and Odin have been decreased with the latter two designed to make "Machine Guns better at what they do (shoot lots and lots of bullets)".

The Ares has also been reduced in price from 1700 to 1600 making it even more viable than it was before.

Area of Denial attack buffs

(Picture: Riot Games)

There have also been buffs to abilities such as Brimstone's Incendiary, Phoenix's Fireball and Viper's Snake Bite with the ability to bunny hop through them, and take no damage, being less effective.

Now you will take damage much quicker in these abilities with the effectiveness of bunnyhopping not totally negated with damage only taken with you are at the very highest point of your jump.

• Read more: Valorant: Brimstone Agent Guide - Abilities, Strategies, Tips & Tricks, and Lore

There have also been tweaks to the economy with Agents more powerful abilities like Brimstones incendiary, going from 200 credits to 300. Riot has also reduced the total amount of credits you can save from 12,000 to 9,000 meaning teams that are losing should have more chance of coming back into the game.

This was a big patch, and we haven't covered everything so check out the full patch notes below before you jump into the game.

The update is now live across all regions.

Valorant v0.50 Patch Notes

Gameplay and Balance
Weapon Updates

• You will no longer enter the “walking accuracy” state when transitioning from run to stop
• We noticed many players were entering a walking accuracy state during their run-to-stop transition that made it appear as if shots they fired/landed were done at full speed.
• Deadzone accuracy speed threshold increased: 25% >> 30%
• Now that you can’t gain walk accuracy while transitioning from a run to a stop, we've also slightly increased the size of the deadzone (full accuracy state) to make it a bit easier to get an accurate shot out quickly

All Rifles

• Recovery times on all Rifles have been updated, which should make tap and burst firing more efficient. Inaccuracy is accrued any time the weapon is re-fired prior to a complete duration of a weapon’s respective Gun Recovery Time.
  • Base walk accuracy: 0.6° >> 0.8°
    • We felt like walk-spraying with rifles was a little more effective than we'd like, particularly at longer ranges. We're going to pull back on this accuracy slightly and continue to monitor
    • Tap Efficiency Changes (Phantom & Vandal only)
      • Tap Efficiency determines the rate that inaccuracy is accrued when re-firing prior to waiting for the complete duration of a weapon’s respective Gun Recovery Time. The higher the Tap Efficiency, the lower the rate of inaccuracy accrual.
• Vandal:
  • Horizontal (Yaw) Recoil reduced by 15% while crouched and stationary
    • This was intended to be the case and now properly matches the crouch benefits of other rifles
  • Gun Recovery Time: .4s >> .375s
  • Tap Efficiency: 4 >> 6
• Phantom:
  • Fixed an issue where the Gun Recovery Time was higher than intended
  • Gun Recovery Time: .55s >> .35s
  • Tap Efficiency: 3 >> 4
• Bulldog Automatic Fire:
  • Fixed an issue where the Gun Recovery Time was higher than intended
  • Gun Recovery Time: .55s >> .35s
• Guardian
  • Fixed an issue where the Gun Recovery Time was higher than intended
  • Gun Recovery Time: .4s >> .35s

Machine Guns are significantly underperforming other weapons at their price points. Machine Guns are meant to be bullet hoses—powerful once they get going. This is a difficult balance to strike in a game where a single bullet from the Vandal will put you down. Our hope here is to make Machine Guns better at what they do (shoot lots and lots of bullets) while also increasing the power of the Ares relative to weapons at a similar price point.

• Ares
  • Price reduced from 1700 to 1600 creds
  • Firing Error (this value is a curve that has intermediate values between each bullet; bullet 2 has slightly less error than bullet 1, and so on)
    • Bullet 1: 1.0° >> 0.8°
    • Bullet 5: 0.85° >> 0.75°
    • Bullet 10: 0.75° >> 0.7°
  • Reduced the amount and intensity of horizontal (Yaw) Recoil after the first 8 bullets.
• Odin
  • Reduced the amount and intensity of horizontal (Yaw) Recoil after the first 8 bullets

Agent Updates

Sage

• Slow Orb zone duration decreased from 9 seconds to 7 seconds
• Slow Orb slowing amount decreased from 65% to 50%
  • We all know Sage is OP.  We’ve decided to try to reduce some of her stopping power while still allowing her to fulfill her role as the premier staller in VALORANT.  These changes aim to reduce the overall efficacy of her Slow Orb, especially if they are chained back-to-back.

Cypher

• Cyber Cage no longer slows enemies that move through it
  • We’ve always envisioned Cypher as a premier sentinel gathering info on his enemies and picking them off, but the slow on the cage was allowing him to move into Sage’s territory by stalling an entire enemy team. We still think this will be a tool he uses to buy some time, but enemies will now have more options when pushing his defenses, especially when coordinated.
• Spycam cooldown when destroyed increased 30 >> 45 seconds
  • Spycams have been flying into enemy territory like Sova darts at the start of rounds because the punishment for losing one to an enemy is so low. Hopefully this change pushes you to find a safe hiding place for your initial camera (please not inside a box).

Omen

• Dark Cover smoke duration increased 12 >> 15 seconds
• Dark Cover smoke projectile speed increased
• Dark Cover cooldown increased 30 >> 35 seconds
  • Especially at high-tier play, we’ve seen Brimstone become the dominant controller and we wanted to give his peers a boost to make them more viable while hopefully maintaining their unique playstyles.

Viper

• Snake Bite radius increased 350 >> 450
  • We’re increasing Snake Bite’s radius to match other area denial abilities

Brimstone/Phoenix/Viper

• We see you b-hoppers out there, jumping through Incendiary, Fireball, and Snake Bite while taking no damage. We don’t want to completely negate this skill but we also don’t want it to trivialize a whole set of character abilities.
  • Height required to jump out of all damaging area-denial abilities 80 >> 120
  • Snake Bite, Fireball, and Incendiary damage tick speed increased (total damage per second unchanged)

Agent Ability Credit Cost Tuning

• We felt the credit cost of some abilities did not match the impact those abilities brought to a match, and made adjustments for a more accurate reflection
  • Sage Barrier Orb increased from 300 to 400 credits
  • Raze Blast Pack increased from 100 to 200 credits
  • Phoenix Curveball increased from 100 to 200 credits
  • Brimstone’s Incendiary increased from 200 to 300 credits
  • Jett’s Updraft reduced from 200 to 100 credits

Agent Armour

• Armour carried over from prior rounds is no longer destroyed when new armour is purchased, allowing you to sell newly purchased armour and return to your previous armour status (instead of having no armour)

Max Credit Cap

• Total credit cap is reduced from 12,000 to 9,000
  • We’re noticing that players/teams who manage to bank a high amount of credits are maintaining a rich economic state for too long, and it becomes a monumental challenge for the opposing team to dethrone their economy

Character Updates

• Sova's Owl Drone now includes a layer of sound for engine rotors
  • Audio should better reflect thematics, while maintaining how noticeable the previous version of Owl Drone audio was for allies and enemies, as heard in 3rd-person

Map Updates
Split

Attacking teams have been having difficulty finding a foothold in territory control across the map. We’ve made a few changes that should allow attackers better opportunities to contest A Main, Mid Top, and B Tower.

• Barrier locations (those clear blue walls) have been adjusted across the map to provide attackers more of a foothold into territory control across the map
  • Defender barrier in B Mid has been pulled back. New barriers are in the entrance to Vent and atop the staircase in B Tower
  • Defender barrier has been pulled back at A Ramps
  • Attacker barrier has been pushed forward at A Main
  • Attacker barrier has been pushed forward slightly at B Main
• Angled the wall on the left interior of B Tower when pushing up the stairs from Mid
  • This removes a 50/50 angle check when pushing into this space, which should make it more approachable for you to try and gain control of B Tower
• Radianite crate in B has been changed to a metal crate to provide more cover when planting the Spike
• Revised art to improve performance throughout the map

Haven

• A new map exploit system is in effect which will have negative effects on anyone trying to escape the playspace
• Updated several floor sections so that they now have appropriate material sounds

Split/Haven/Bind

• Added fixes for Cypher Spy Camera exploits to all three maps— a huge thanks to everyone who has helped us track these down, including clutch stream’s we lurked in for two days, writing down every camera placement and fixing them in real-time
• Backside of spawn barriers are now opaque to prevent some abuse cases
• Added ability for Spike to automatically fall from elevated boost positions
• Fixed multiple spots where Sova’s Recon Dart could over-penetrate map geometry—another shout out to everyone that helped with these as well!

HUD & UI

• Teammate armour is now shown on the scoreboard
• When the Spike is planted, the Spike icon in the upper middle UI now pulses with the audio beeps
• New artwork for pings to increase readability in the world
• Portraits
  • Re-enabled portrait for player’s minimap icon
  • Reduced size of portraits and icons by several pixels
  • Added colour to the player’s own minimap icon with a slightly thicker border to aid in finding oneself (on the minimap, not in life)
• Added regulation of chat messages when using the radio menu or radio wheel
• Slight increase to broken armour text size to make it easier to notice
• Relocated flyout menu for Titles dropdown so it opens in a more sensible location
• Moved Leave Match button closer to the other “Exit” buttons in the menu
• Made Logout button red to match Exit button, since they both exit
• Shifted location of Skip button on MVP screen so players do not accidentally press Play Again button when slamming the Skip button
• Adjusted radio wheel behaviour so that mouse wheel up and down always select the other wheels regardless of other keybinds
• Icon for Need Help changed from the little bug thing to a flag
• Enabled attack/defend icons in the upper middle game info UI for all players, not just observers
• Hooked up “Ult Almost Ready” VO when character uses the Ult Status radio command and are within 1 ult point of being fully charged

Quality of life

• Cheaters are no longer referred to as “Hackers”
• Profanity filter setting added; when enabled, will filter out profanity from chat
• Added a setting that allows toggling between walking and running
• Viper’s Poison Cloud no longer enters cooldown when picked up during the buy phase
• Added foe colouring for Sova’s Hunter’s Fury
• Added Contract level-up animation when unlocking free characters or purchasing contract levels
• Added tooltips and explanations guiding new players towards activating their first contract
• Unowned skin levels now list their individual cost (in Radianite Points) and description in the collection pages
• Made performance optimizations to address FPS drops when you or allies are shooting
• Various social panel improvements to support better error handling and messaging
• “Keep Player Centered” minimap setting is now a default setting
• Renamed “First Person Enhanced Visuals” graphics setting to “Bloom”
  • As discovered by u/Far_OW on reddit, this setting affects more than just first-person visuals—it’s actually a visual bloom, or glow effect, which primarily affects weapon renders
• Renamed “Shadows” graphics setting to “First Person Shadows”
  • This setting only affects shadows cast on a player’s weapon, hands and arms
• Observer HUD
  • Dead players will now appear greyed out on the HUD rather than hidden
  • Team colours on the HUD will swap when switching sides, rather than the teams on the HUD changing position

Bug Fixes: In-Game

• Cypher and Sova will no longer float in the air if the Sage Barrier Orb wall they are standing on is destroyed while when using the Spycam or Owl Drone, respectively
• Cypher can no longer pick up his trap after an enemy has triggered it.
• Sova’s Owl Drone can no longer rapid-fire darts if the prior one hits an enemy
• Reduced collision size on Sova’s arrows so they don’t get stuck on corners when fired near them
• Removed placeholder mesh from Viper’s Toxic Screen projectile
• When using the ping wheel on the map, right clicking now correctly cancels the action and does not place a ping
• Fixed a bug where the Spike UI would sometimes overlap with the HUD
• Fixed a bug where a weapon’s ammo count on the HUD would disappear if swapping your knife, then back, while on low ammo.
• Removed Spike icon from being visible on enemy player minimap icons
• Spike can no longer be planted partially in map geometry
  • This also fixes cases where the Spike camera was appearing inside the Spike
• Barriers on the minimap no longer adjust positions incorrectly during the buy phase if you open the megamap
• Fixed bug where various issues would occur after multiple players would fulfill a weapon buy request at the same time
• Fixed issue where the game would hitch/stutter when opening the in-game options menu
• Fixed issue where the game would hitch/stutter when opening the in-game shop
• Fixed rare movement bug where resurrected players who were tagged would have jittery movement in 1st-person perspective 
• Fixed a bug where some weapons lost their muzzle flashes in 1st-person POV when tracers were disabled
• Fixed a rare bug where players appeared to be standing, when they were actually crouching 
• Ability details in the combat report will now correctly appear in the buy phase of the round when teams switch sides
• Fixed miscellaneous Observer mode HUD issues
• Spectators can now see weapon inspect animations
• Fixed a bug where the camera could take an invalid position during character select
• Fixed an issue where the combat report would show 150 damage but the enemy player was still alive (in cases where healing was not involved) 
• Fixed an issue where a teammate’s voice activity would incorrectly light up more than their own icon in the above-character UI element
• Selecting a ping on the ping wheel and canceling no longer incorrectly spawns the canceled ping next time the player uses the basic ping

Bug Fixes: Game Client

• Fixed incorrect location of text when hovering rewards in the contracts
• Fixed a bug where purchase refunds were not reflected in client until it was restarted
• Fixed a bug where player cards were cropped on the arsenal menu screen
• Fixed a bug where, in some languages, mission descriptions could appear truncated
• Fixed an issue where the Distortion Graphics setting was not properly enabled
  • Enabling this may have a performance impact on some older graphics cards