This VALORANT player mastered Sage to fight annoying trend, and it’s inspiring

As a VALORANT player, you don’t have to look twice to spot an instalocking Jett or Reyna in your daily games, but an instalocking Sage sure isn’t common. 

An Ascendant player named u/Eastern_Badger_3357 on Reddit mastered Sage for the sake of their high Elo games. Not just because they liked her kit, but they were so tired of “throwing sages, pocket sages, just any sage tbh,” that instalocking her seemed the only way to prevent throwers from wasting her potential.

“[I] began to instalock sage in Swiftplay, and mastered her for my skill. I now instalock sage every match just to prevent people from pocket healing, and I feel good about it,” Eastern_Badger_3357 wrote in their post. In fact, they also managed to trigger a couple in one of their VALORANT matches with their pledge, and it sounds like nothing less than a win. 

“Anything that upsets edaters is the morally correct thing to do,” the most liked comment under the post read. 

As much as romance brewing in video games isn’t a crime, players have always complained about “cringe e-couples” plaguing the VALORANT experience, and what Eastern_Badger_3357 did will undeniably inspire the victims.

Another player highlighted the importance of playing agents you’re comfortable with, rather than worrying about whether the agent is good in your rank.

The post also started a debate on whether Sage is good enough in Ascendant and high Elo, and I think she is. 

Is there a better sentinel? Yes, you can always bring more value to the team with Killjoy and Cypher because they are better site anchors and can offer a lot of crucial intel. But just because an agent’s utilities are impactful doesn’t mean the player can offer godly support just by choosing the agent—they also need to know how to play the agent to their fullest potential.

There are a lot of factors here, and the most important one is to know an agent well—this is going to have the biggest impact on your match’s outcome. 

Sage is a great pick from Iron all the way up to Radiant, provided you know how to play her to her strengths. I believe I speak for the entire VALORANT community when I say please stop using her as a pocket healer to fulfill your e-dating dreams. She deserves better.