way too short of a prime, 2 years and then he disappeared. Like relevancy bias for me plays a role as well, I rank donk being a solo carry in this competitive scene way more than cold's reign, like he fallen and fer were top 1, 4 and 6 in one year I think

stewie is an HM for sure, I would put him behind cold/fallen/kenny, like A tier player. IMO what stopped him from top 10 is his rapid decline since 2019. So in 2017 he was just a great player on a mid team, in 2018 he won the major then went to mibr for some reason, then he was vital for liquid to have that mini era but they choked, and then he just disappeared.
Twistzz is a weird one cuz he was always the 2nd/3rd best player on faze and liquid, never the main star, and his current liquid stint is just a disaster. great player, crucial to both teams, but for me he has to prove himself on liquid, again. If the rumours are true and they are getting siuhy, I would love to see him shine again.

I would say one more year of dominance from donk and he jumps forest to be like right behind niko and dupreeh. He is solo player, no team around him like astralis were a packed unit of 5 top 20 players. monesy is a strange case, he has been top 7 since his tier 1 debut but he is yet to prove himself without niko. Right now he is struggling with consistency cuz g2 are shit. I feel like his bet to be climbing the ladder is to go to navi. Main star with 4 support cast players.

cs2 is way too early imo, donk is great but spirit might let him down by being shit

I would say s1mple cuz I am biased, but give a few years to zywoo and a few major wins and he is the goat. Dupreeh and device are disqualified from the debate cuz they never got top 1 at hltv, can't be a goat if you haven't been the greatest in one year.
I would put:

1. S1mple
2. zywoo
   GAP.
   device
   . niko
   olof
   dupreeh
   magisk
   forest
   get_right
   coldzera/fallen/kenny

sh1ro is good enough to outclass w0nderfuls or torzsis, but he just can't put up an equal fight to monesy or zywoo. magixx either is a third coming of xyp9x (after perfecto) or just shit. honestly if i were spirit management i would try to get perfecto and kyou in, give kyou zont1x's spot, perfecto fills perfectly into magixx. More experience in perfecto, more raw power in kyousuke, 2 play makers (donk and kyou) and 2 round finishers (perf and sh1ro), basically turns into a navi 2021 archetype with an agressive rifler in elec/donk, a hs machine in b1t/kyou a clutch minister in perfecto and a flex awp in sh1ro/s1mple

vitality too good I am afraid, they outclass them in all positions but entry (and even still flamez is just elite in his role)
zywoo >> sh1ro
ropz >>>>> zont1x
mezzi >>>>> magixx
apex>>>>> chopper
donk >> flamez

probably not, donk kinda skipped the staying in academy stint and just went into spirit during the time which russian cs was very shit (c9 super team failed, VP were a meme, Spirit just got 0-3'd at RMR, best russian team at the Paris Major was fucking forze). He basically was the messiah in a region full of despair, so not comparible

I mean I like his personality, he seems like a chill guy, a bit egoistic (which is good), as he doesn't really want to share one team with donk, he would prefer to leave for another team

a lot of them afaik.

max 6k? when you host only 3 events in a year? wtf

do you even realize how weird it sounds?
active on oxygen comms
goes to nrg
apparently suddenly goes full dead inside
gets kicked for being mute
goes to a Portuguese speaking team like month after getting dropped
learns the basics of a new language
active communicator
something doesn't add up

my val understanding is very basic, but just trexx+nats igl + 3 russian elite players and we are talking about master/champs contender

mix any russians until you stumble into a world beating team, ez

sit out the season and hit up nats shao suygetsu and chronicle after liquid, navi and fnatic and kcorp underperform. might as well force riot to kick giantx just so they would get spirit into franchising

maps are too small

pretty sure it was
DRX
T1
GENG
TALON (with ban and governor who are ethnic koreans)
NSM
DFM (With 2 koreans)

wasn't last top 5 of apac at kick off like 22/30 korean?

I wonder if we have a player with multiple champs appearances who has a better average finish, hmmm

why can't it be both? then you can pronounce it like a pirate, PiERRRREKS

emea is shit, americas is 1-team region, it's joever western bros

can't you just be both at the same time? these type of players are worth more than just some cracked duelists

fns is just ass lmao

teams have no risk of dropping, swapping players doesn't lose you ranking, you can afford it. in cs for example, dropping a player means dropping a share of your points, therefore you can only go for the upgrade if A.: Situation is getting worse and worse B: The player you want to get is a clear upgrade

I mean internal issues are a real problem, especially with how small VAL circuit is in terms of events compared to your LOLs CSs and Dotas. IN those games you can spend time finding balance, but in val, you can't. You have like 1 month of prep before kick off, then if you are out you have like 1.5 months before stage 1, and then you need to be at your best after stage 1 to make the push for champs? When do you train and resolve those issues?

try locking in like a support role, but just master it. In order to rank up you need to be a master of one role, not the jack of all trades. Just commit to playing one role, ace it, perfect it, and become heads and shoulders the best senti/smokes/any other position on your rank. You basically say to your team ''Look, I KNOW I will do my job, and I will do it perfectly, you 4 just need to do your part as well''. IF your team is ass? Well then you lose regardless of what you do. If your team is at least decent then having an S-tier player in one role already makes it way easier to win

''feel like if i just instalock (any role) someone ends up playing an agent they absolutely suck ass at (or just picks someone like chamber/clove and can’t aim)''
And you also forget about the times you filled for someone who instalocked a duelist and that said duelist ended up going 3/15?

zeus coming back to navi in 2017 actually forced ange1 to leave for valorant in 2020
Short chronology which led to ange1's valorant career
-2017 gambit cs shock the world and become major winners, with zeus as their IGL
-because of the in-team conflicts and the other 4 players wanting to kick their coach, kane, zeus and kane leave gambit
-navi failed their major, finishing at top 14, kicking guardian and seized and their coach and1
-navi were initially looking to bring on ange1 as the IGL, as he has proven himself with hellraisers before, but because zeus suddenly became available, they went for him instead
-ange1 was forced to stay in hellraisers, who went thru a lot of team changes and a few financial problems, which forced them to settle for a tier 3 CIS stack with ange1 in 2019
-Val released, hellraisers went bankrupt, ange1 made the switch
All of this happened just because the gambit core wanted to kick their coach for ''being bad at the game management''

scream is searching for cs2 options now i think

Jetstream Sam's Murasama blade

Andrea ''Verno'' Maustinho Brazil's last hope

what part of this agent is skilled?

how the fuck people enjoy this shit

he was too stupid, in cs you make a dumb mistake you are almost guaranteed to die. guess what, S-tier teams like Liquid 2019 would fucking obliterate him for even the smallest mistake

look at blade in cs, dogshit level player, absolute mastermind as a coach. He was so bad as a player that s1mple, who was his teammate at the time, went on twitter after the game and called him out saying he can't believe players like this can be pros.

who would have thought that this would happen in a league where teams have 4 years of guaranteed stay no matter how bad they are, hmmmmm

young upandcoming prospect forced to change teams after 3 games, sounds like a great atmosphere to improve

I still dislike this trend, like why would a prospect join someone who tanks for 3 years like KOI if someone like liquid offered him even 3 months to prove himself?

just grind your favourite activility bro, diamons are made under pressure

wouldn't getting a one-for-one improvement make them get at least a few more wins?

oh i have thought he was toxic or racist or something

trexx
chrono
shao
suygetsu
nats
russian domination, signed to spirit, Yet another game for dragons to claim

just wondering what was the issue, I don't follow val that closely

i mean they still clear players of apeks, koi, giantx, navi. Thing is that this pre-stage 1 shuffle almost always takes part within the top, not within the bottom, so the serviceable players leave and the subpar players remain cuz bottomfeeders don't make shuffles

I would argue that all of those who got kicked after kickoff/bangkok are better than 70% of players of their role across all leagues, so it isn't the worst of the worst getting kicked, rather A-B tier players in their role

All victims of too few events, had there been more tier 1 events teams would have more time to gel and figure out issues, meanwhile with 3 regional stages and 3 international LANs you can have your season last just 2 months, sadge

crazy how eu is so shit knowing that the closest fps to val is completely dominated by EU

ange1 cuz unc wasted s1mple's potential before 2016

navi not signing russians :) yes it is zellsis word, but that is because navi's management is zellsis word

he brings da vibes