The Valorant Ignition Series is long gone, First Strike’s Regional Finals are coming in early December and Riot just announced the Valorant Champions Tour. We can't wait for!
Riot Games made a big announcement regarding Valorant yesterday. The next big event in line will be the Valorant Champions Tour.
What is the VCT?
An answer to that question was given directly by Riot. The company even created a separate Twitter account dedicated entirely to the tour.
Find out what's in store for esports in 2021 with the introduction of the VALORANT Champions Tour. @RiotMagus shares the details of the new competitive global structure. pic.twitter.com/m1Gd7HjRsk
— VALORANT Champions Tour (@ValorantEsports) November 24, 2020
"The Champions Tour is our effort to grow VALORANT into a global esport worthy of your fandom. The expanded competition calendar will provide the framework for stars to rise and teams to make a name for themselves - on both the international and regional stages. Fans will get to see how their local talent stacks up against each other, and then how they measure up on the global stage." - Riot
The Valorant Champions Tour will be coming in 2021. It’ll be split into three tiers – Challengers, Masters, and Champions.
Challengers will be events on a local, regional level where amateur teams will have the chance to go big. Masters tournaments will be happening only three times per year and will have the best from each region go against one another. The Champions event will be annual and last for two weeks, featuring the top 16 teams from around the world. Riot also revealed a timeline for the events but given the corona pandemic is still ongoing that might change.
According to Riot, the VCT season will kick off in late January with open qualifiers for the Challengers series. In order to qualify for Champions, teams will have to earn enough points and 11 squads will receive a direct invitation that way. The 12th team will be the one that wins the third Masters event as it will get a guaranteed spot at the Champions tournament. The final four teams will be determined by last chance qualifiers
"After the third Masters event, a series of Last Chance Qualifiers will provide teams with one final chance to qualify into Champions. Four LCQ tournaments will take place, creating a gauntlet from which one team per continent will qualify into Champions. The season will conclude with Champions, our version of Worlds." - Riot
You can find the full announcement on the official Valorant website. It’s clear that this will be Riot’s Valorant equivalent of League of Legends’ Worlds. Will it be as successful though? We’ll know the answer in a year. Are you excited about the new Valorant season? We are!
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