How do I get a Riot Gun Buddy? Who is the next VALORANT break-out star? VALORANT Mail Room

Twitter has their say.
Screengrab via Riot Games

This is the first installment of the George Geddes’ Mail Room for Dot Esports, a weekly article series that will answer questions from Twitter regarding VALORANT news. 

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It’s a tale as old as time; VALORANT players looking to get their hands on a Gun Buddy with a small Riot logo situated on a boring background. 

Many people have approached me for a Gun Buddy without realizing journalists cannot provide Gun Buddies nor have anything to do with the game. We are here to tell the news and the stories of those embedded in the industry.

But in my first edition of the Mail Room, it’d be best to answer that question to ensure players have the best shot at getting a Riot gun buddy.

If you would like to send in your question to be answered in the next VALORANT Mail Room, be sure to follow me on Twitter and I’ll answer the most relevant questions.

How do I get a buddy? 

This player has got their head screwed on correctly, to start. They know the only way to get a Riot Gun Buddy is for a Riot employee to provide one to your account. There’s no Night Market, there’s no shop, you’re just given one.

The best way of meeting a Riot employee is by sheer luck. But there are some tweaks you can make to try and find one. 

Firstly, in Riot’s sister title League of Legends, a list of Riot employees’ account ranks was aggregated by a Reddit user. It found barely any of these Rioters were in the highest ranks like Challenger or Grandmaster. Instead, they mostly hovered around the low to mid-tier ranks like Gold and Platinum. 

But this information is heavily outdated and there’s no real way to figure out the ranks of Riot employees. They likely hang around non-competitive modes when they’re trying to unwind for the day, so take a shot at Spike Rush from time to time.

Who’s the next break-out star? 

There are a few up-and-coming players that have begun to prove themselves at the VALORANT Challengers level in North America.

For example, Oxygen Esports’ Logan “skuba” Jenkins has consistently proven he has what it takes to hang with the best. Statistically, he’s accrued a 153.5 average damage per round on Astra over the past 60 days, according to VLR.gg.

While most are pretty familiar with skuba, BreakThru player Tyler “sym” Porter has had an impressive showing in Challengers. The 17-year-old boasted a 245 average combat score in his team’s victory against Oxygen Esports on Feb. 3. Keep an eye on this kid. 

How does Ascension work? 

The details of the process to Ascension was revealed by Riot in August 2022. Essentially, each international territory will have one Ascension tournament at the end of the circuit. For North America, for example, the top teams at the end of the circuit will qualify for the Ascension tournament to face off against Latin America and Brazilian teams that secured qualification through their Challenger leagues.

Both Latin America and Brazilian teams are included in the Americas territory, while Europe and Asia will hold their own VALORANT Ascension tournaments.

Three teams from across the three Ascension tournaments will qualify for their respective international league in the following year.

We do not know how many reps will qualify for Ascension at this time. 


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Author
George Geddes
George is an investigative journalist from the United Kingdom.