VALORANT Patch 12.06: All Buffs, Nerfs, Changes, and More

VALORANT Patch 12.06 is not one of those giant meta-shifting updates, but it still brings a few meaningful changes that players will notice right away. Riot focused this patch on tightening up agent balance, improving consistency, and cleaning up several annoying UI and gameplay issues across the game.

The biggest gameplay adjustment in Patch 12.06 is aimed at Waylay, while Viper also gets a quiet but important update behind the scenes. On top of that, Riot has refreshed end-of-game visuals, improved Flex movement speed, added performance optimizations for servers, and shipped a healthy batch of bug fixes for agents, Premier, the store, and progression systems.

Waylay gets the biggest nerf in VALORANT Patch 12.06

The headline change in VALORANT Patch 12.06 is Waylay’s Saturate. Riot changed the ability from an instant cast to an equip-based ability, which is a direct nerf to how safely and quickly she could set up plays. According to Riot, the issue was not that Waylay lacked a role, but that Saturate gave her too much low-risk utility when combined with the rest of her kit. It allowed her to hinder enemies too easily while airborne or reactively on contact, creating situations with very little counterplay.

This change should make Waylay players think a bit more before throwing out Saturate. Instead of effortlessly setting up teammates from safety, they now need to expose themselves more and coordinate better with the team. That fits Riot’s design philosophy for duelists, who are supposed to create pressure by taking risks themselves rather than acting as near-riskless enablers. In other words, this is a pretty targeted nerf, but it is one that could matter a lot in coordinated play.

Viper gets a consistency buff, and end-of-game screens are updated

Viper is not getting a flashy buff on paper, but Patch 12.06 does improve how Viper’s Pit spreads around map geometry. Riot says the backend tech for the ultimate has been updated so its behavior is more consistent, especially in tricky spots on maps such as Haven A Tower and Icebox A Pipes. Most casual players may not immediately notice it, but for anyone who has ever had Viper’s Pit behave oddly depending on terrain, this should be a welcome fix.

Outside of agent updates, Riot also refreshed the Victory, Defeat, and Draw end-of-game visuals and sound effects. It is not a massive gameplay change, but it does make the overall presentation feel more polished. Patch 12.06 is clearly one of those updates where Riot is trying to smooth out the full VALORANT experience, not just tweak raw balance numbers.

Flex movement speed and performance updates are a nice quality-of-life boost

One of the more overlooked but genuinely nice changes in Patch 12.06 is that Flex movespeed now matches melee movespeed. Riot said players avoided using Flex as often as they wanted because of the fear of accidentally slowing themselves down during important moments. That should no longer be a concern, and the update applies to both past and future Flex items.

Riot is also enabling Push-model Replication as a server optimization. The developer says players should not expect noticeable client-side differences right away, but the goal is to improve server performance and support future gains. These kinds of backend upgrades rarely get flashy reactions from the community, but they are usually the sort of changes that matter more over time than players realize in the moment.

Bug fixes in Patch 12.06 clean up several annoying issues

Patch 12.06 also includes a long list of bug fixes. Several agent-specific problems were addressed, including issues affecting Veto, Miks, Clove, and Tejo. Riot also fixed a number of UI problems across the end-of-game screens, leaderboards, career match history, and the in-game store. PC players also get Premier fixes and some progression improvements, including paginated Battlepass chapter arrows and corrected scrolling on reward tiers and trackers.

This is why Patch 12.06 feels like a cleanup patch more than a blockbuster update. It may not completely flip the meta upside down, but it does smooth out a lot of rough edges. For regular players, that often matters more than one giant buff or nerf.

Full VALORANT 12.06 Patch Notes

TL;DR:

• VALORANT will no longer be a first-person shooter as we have switched to third-person POV.
  • To better support this playstyle, we have added the ability to go into a prone stance and filled most of our maps with tall grass and shrubs.
• New Weapon: Introducing the Hackerator, a powerful new sniper rifle that will automatically cause enemies who are hit with a headshot to disconnect from the game.
  • Lol, diffed
• New Agent: Welcome, Brainrot, our newest Initiator. Brainrot uses his abilities through voice commands in team chat. The more vocal you are, the more likely you are to apply stacks of Cringe.
  • New Debuff: Cringe. After being affected by more than three stacks of Cringe, enemies die instantly. But be careful, if you miss more than three of his abilities, YOU die instantly of self-inflicted Cringe.
• Tejo Rework: With the recently discovered Tejo exploit, we decided to take another look at his kit. Ultimately, we loved the skill expression that comes with an endless barrage of artillery. So we’ve given him unlimited charges of Guided Salvo and removed the max cast distance. Have fun!

Ok, so obviously those changes aren’t real. HAPPY EARLY APRIL FOOLS! For the real changes, read below!

• Updated End-of Game screens
• Waylay’s Saturate changed from INSTANT to EQUIP
• Backend tech improvements to Viper’s ultimate
• Additional UX/UI bug fixes
• And more!

GL HF GGs, gamers.

ALL PLATFORMS

GENERAL UPDATES

• We’ve updated Victory, Defeat and Draw end-of-game visuals and sound effects.

AGENT UPDATES

While we’re happy that Waylay’s found her role in team compositions, we’ve noticed that Saturate creates situations with little to no counterplay when used with the rest of her kit.

In particular, we’re seeing Waylay combo her abilities to safely target players with Saturate for her teammates with almost no risk. We think Duelists play best when they are using their kit with some risk, and when that risk falls primarily on the Duelist themselves.

By changing Waylay’s Saturate from an INSTANT cast ability to an EQUIP, she can no longer Hinder enemies instantly while airborne or reactively on contact without greater risk to herself. This incentivizes Waylay to coordinate with her team to mitigate risk for herself, rather than using it as a setup piece for a teammate to capitalize on.

• Waylay
  • Saturate changed from INSTANT to EQUIP.

We’re making some changes to the backend tech for Viper’s Pit. While most players likely won’t notice a big change, we’re hoping it gives Viper’s Pit more consistent behavior and removes any possibility for failure to cast, especially on certain sections of some maps. You’ll see some examples of that improvement in places like Haven A Tower or Icebox A Pipes.

• Viper
  • Viper’s Pit chemical cloud has been updated to be more consistent in the way it spreads around map geometry.
• Yoru
  • Added new voice lines

COSMETICS UPDATES

Since the launch of Flex over a year ago, we’ve gotten a lot of player feedback that while Flex are cool, it doesn’t feel optimal to use them because they use Ability movespeed rather than Melee movespeed (Ability Movespeed is 90% of Melee movespeed).

Specifically, we’ve gotten feedback that players are less likely to equip Flex because they’re afraid of accidentally equipping them mid-round due to a misclick, thus nerfing their movespeed during a critical moment. After lots of testing, we’re ready to roll out this change with some guardrails (namely, make sure that all Flex follow all competitive integrity guidelines in 3rd person).

• Flex movespeed is being increased to match Melee movespeed. This will apply to all past and future Flex.
  • Big thanks to all of you for feedback and special shoutout to Grim, Ethos, Tokibbi, Ellum, Joshiwashi, and LakiEats for sharing their feedback with us personally!

PERFORMANCE UPDATES

• We’re enabling Push-model Replication as an optimization for our game servers and to unlock future performance gains. We don’t expect anything to change with your game client, so let us know if you see anything weird!

BUG FIXES

• Agents
  • Fixed a bug where Veto’s Crosscut icon was missing on the minimap when the Enemy Highlight Color setting was set to red.
  • Fixed a bug where some of Miks’ Harmonize 1P VFX were disappearing early.
  • Fixed a bug where Miks’ Harmonize targeting UI could overlap with an ally’s loadout.
  • Fixed a bug where Miks’ Waveform ability placement UI would persist briefly in 3P after he placed a smoke.
  • Fixed a bug where Miks’ M-pulse could be stuck in certain spots on the map and could not be destroyed.
  • Fixed a bug where Clove’s post-death Ruse could not be unequipped without casting it.
  • Fixed a bug that allowed Tejo’s Guided Salvo to be cast three times.
    • Thanks to @billyvlr for the flag and report!
• General
  • Various spacing and sizing fixes across End of Game.
    • Adjusted the spacing around the sub navigation across all pages so elements aren’t squished together
    • Reduced the overall text sizes in summary, scoreboard, timeline, and performance
    • Timeline
      • Adjusted the sizes of the match round boxes to fit more across the screen
  • Leaderboards
    • Fixed the spacing between rows
  • Career Match History
    • Fixed alignment issues in the left buttons and dropdown
    • Adjusted the text sizes within each match row
• Store
  • Numerous fixes across the overall store experience
    • Fixed a bug where skin names in the rotational store had clipped text in Japanese.
    • Fixed misaligned text on the accessories shop, rotational store tiles, radianite point store, and when selecting a gifting recipient.
    • Fixed misaligned subheader text when purchasing a skin.
    • Fixed an issue with squished bundle images in the gifting center.
    • Fixed an issue where weapons were too high on the purchase complete screen.
    • Added a hover state when mousing over offers in the featured store.
    • Adjusted opacity of offer tile when gifting a flex in the gifting center.

PC ONLY

 BUG FIXES

• Premier
  • Fixed an issue where the View Team modal would sometimes incorrectly display the zone icon as a blank white box
  • Fixed a bug where the tournament queue timer wasn’t properly showing the time to queue up by
  • Fixed a bug where “Make Captain” and “Transfer Ownership” options were not disabled during a tournament

PROGRESSION UPDATES

• Battlepass has added paginated arrow buttons to ease selecting between the chapters.
• Scroll issue has been fixed and you can now scroll forwards and backwards on reward tiers and tracker.