March 27 marked one year since the end of the first North American VCT event in which Chamber was played.
With his two Rendevous anchors, space-sealing Trademark, bargain-bin Headhunter bullets, and round-reversing Tour de Force ultimate, Chamber saw a 51-percent pick rate throughout the NA VCT Stage One Challengers playoffs while setting a new standard for how esports teams should play VALORANT. This was only a precursor of the results to come, as the French sentinel continued to be at the forefront of the VCT 2022 meta for the rest of the year.
Heading into the inaugural VCT Americas 2023 season, VALORANT’s newest agent Gekko is set to make his pro debut within the region, once again opening up the realm of possibility for the meta to shift. Despite NAVI having a rocky opening map with Gekko in his first-ever VCT showing, the new initiator wasted little time becoming an established pick in ranked matches and receiving praise from prominent names in the scene.
Since Gekko’s official release on March 7, the initial impressions of the six pros we spoke to about the Angelino ranged all the way from “he’s not that good” to “he’s really good.”
Players and coaches from 100 Thieves, Cloud9, NRG, and Sentinels spoke to Dot Esports last week about how impactful they think Gekko will be during the upcoming VCT Americas split. Perhaps the clearest takeaway for fans is that a number of the teams seem eager and willing to run Gekko out there, which oftentimes isn’t the case for new agents. Teams have been beaming about how good they think Gekko is, what they’re seeing from him in practice, when they expect others to use him, and what they believe will determine his value to the league.
Of the bunch, Sentinels Tyson “TenZ” Ngo was the least keen on Gekko, particularly due to his ability kit potentially being more flash than substance. While Gekko brings some new layers to VALORANT that other agents haven’t—namely a scanning flash, recyclable abilities, and a “sixth player”—it’s going to be a serious debate among pros as to whether the character can do just as much, if not more than the long-established initiators.
“I don’t think the character is that good,” TenZ said. “It’s more of a niche thing. It’s kind of like a Yoru, where he has [utility] that you can definitely surprise people with or outplay them with. But in terms of being meta, I mean only time will tell.”
NRG Pujan “FNS” Mehta was among the pros who felt Gekko has been a notable factor in scrims, where a lot of teams have been finding “hit-or-miss” results.
“When we’ve played him in scrims and played against him in scrims, a lot of it is just the Wingman planting and defusing,” FNS told Dot. “Mainly the planting. That’s probably his key ability that I think will be abused the most, but it’s not even that crazy. Compared to last year’s Chamber, Gekko is a decent add.”
In terms of when audiences could see Gekko picked during the VCT Americas split, Cloud9 Matthew “mCe” Elmore and Sentinels Don “Syyko” Muir shared similar views.
MCe believes fans are definitely going to see Gekko have plenty of play in the first couple of weeks as teams try to “catch people off guard” before they “shy away” from him toward different things as the season goes on. For Syyko, that opportunity to proactively strike opponents on their back foot should especially inspire those lower in the power rankings to lock in Gekko.
“Especially with new agents, running them early, trying to get ahead of the meta, and crafting gameplans that other teams haven’t seen or gotten the opportunity to practice against is really valuable,” Syyko explained. “So I would expect a lot of teams, especially like low to [middle of the] pack teams who are looking to strike upwards, to try to utilize the new agent in order to catch their opponents off guard.”
There will likely never be another VALORANT agent that comes in and dominates the pro meta from day one like Chamber did. But if teams believe they can be creative enough to build new comps and strategies around Gekko, particularly over other established initiator picks like Skye and KAY/O, it seems no one in the league will be batting an eye at them for doing so come this April and May.
“For ranked, you can look at agents at an individual level and say, ‘Is this agent gonna be good or bad in ranked?’ just based on their abilities alone,” Syyko said. “But for pro play, it’s much more of, A: How they synergize with the agents around them and, B: Who are they replacing? What are you losing by putting them in? And it’s really hard to say this early on, especially with an agent like Gekko.”
VCT Americas play is set to begin on Saturday, April 1, at 2pm CT with a best-of-three series between 100 Thieves and Sentinels.
Published: Mar 28, 2023 08:32 am