VALORANT players agree one agent is struggling but every possible buff is super unbalanced

Not all VALORANT agents are built to dominate the meta—and Iso is a blaring example of this. Considering his underwhelming pick rate across VCT and ranked, players are now highlighting Iso’s incompetency compared to his agile and self-sufficient peers. Unfortunately, there’s not much to fix either. 

In a Reddit thread on April 15, several players got together to discuss potential ways to buff VALORANT’s latest duelist agent—but none of the ideas seem balanced enough to make the cut.

Interestingly, multiple players tried visualizing a rework for his bullet-bending Contingency wall, which includes making the wall stick to his hit box instead of letting it move in a line—kind of like the shield he gets when using Double Tap. The idea isn’t necessarily bad because it’d let Iso isolate fights and enter or retake sites more easily. But most players were convinced it’d make Iso more overpowered than balanced, especially when defusing the Spike.

Another suggestion that caught my eye was to let Iso stop the wall like Harbor can for his Cascades. While it sounds like a good gamble, players were quick to point out how broken it’d be if we can’t break the wall. 

While most suggestions played with the possibility of buffing his wall, players mentioned his ultimate being too unrewarding at this point. “just buff his ult, he should get something after winning 1v1 like extra gold, full health back or at least come back alive if failed. The ult name is KILL CONTRACT so after completing it we should get something back no?” one popular comment reads.

While the ideas are worth working on, none of them are actually going to fix Iso’s limitations as a duelist in VALORANT. His limitations are by design. Why would players opt for a movement-restricted duelist when they can choose ones like Jett, Neon, and Raze, who can dash, slide, or fly into sites? Even contact duelists like Reyna, Phoenix, and Yoru boast more space-taking powers than Iso at this moment.

Iso was designed for VALORANT players who love taking risky one-vs-one fights, so he was never meant to be self-sufficient or selfless. While the pro play scene will likely continue to ignore him, his pick rate in ranked can definitely improve—that’s if Riot Games decides to fix his flaws.