Renegades’ Roy explains the value of Tier 2 VALORANT tournaments

May 21, 2021

by Mitch Reames

Throughout the first month of Nerd Street Gamers’ Summer Championship qualifiers for VALORANT, Renegades have dominated. The team won three out of the four weekly opens in April and then took home the April Monthly to be one of the first two teams to qualify for the $20,000 invitational in August. For Renegades in-game leader (IGL) Roy “StrongLegs” Ahad, aka Roy, his goal is to get the team as many reps as possible to break into Tier 1.

“We’re a team that's on the cusp of Tier 1 right now, slowly making our way out,” Roy said. “The No. 1 barrier we have to overcome is this mental block that we have during high-pressure games. Winning has been the result of us grinding with the drive to be a top 10, top five team in North America. I can’t say we are confidently there yet, but we’re definitely working towards it, and our progress has been unquestionable.”

Tiers are hard to judge in esports. Depending on the person responding, the top tier break can come after three teams or after ten. On VLR.gg, Renegades are currently ranked 13th in North America as of writing. In Summer Champs, up until this point, there has been no team who can seemingly touch Renegades as the team reached 20,000 qualifying points before any other team reached 10,000.

“We’re in these tournaments because we need the reps. Grinding these tournaments helps us get desensitized to the pressure of high-stress games,” Roy continued.

Roy, a long time CS:GO veteran as both a caster and player, was signed to take on Renegades’ IGL role in February. Prior to Roy joining, Renegades had found some success, most notably being one of the eight teams to qualify for First Strike North America. Roy was brought in midway through the VCT Masters 1 qualifiers. Although the change didn’t create results immediately, Renegades seem to have found a better flow lately.

“When I first joined, there were some structural issues,” he explained. “There wasn’t a solid voice making those executive decisions, not even like a dictatorship but just someone getting everyone on the same page. The missing thing between us winning consistently and flopping out in quarterfinals or semifinals was everyone finding that identity within their roles. There’s also been an improvement in our work ethic and how we approach the game.”

The IGL role in VALORANT is one of the toughest in all of esports. Rounds move quickly, metas change frequently and ability coordination adds a new level to the decision-making that’s not a factor in CS:GO. Beyond the tactical responsibilities, the IGL’s most difficult challenge is understanding your teammates to a degree that keeps everyone playing their best at all times. The balance between making decisions and trusting the group is a tough one to strike.

“There’s always a balance between giving players freedom and having them play within a structure,” Roy said. “It can be a fine line. Freedom is important, but if a teammate isn’t feeling it that day and isn’t hitting the shots they normally do, then we need to play less free, play together and use our utility to bully people.”

Nerd Street Gamers’ Summer Championships, which include competitions in Apex Legends, Rocket League, League of Legends, Rainbow Six: Siege and VALORANT, are an interesting mix between open teams looking to prove themselves and established orgs getting reps. In VALORANT’s Summer Champs series, more recognizable orgs are filling up the bracket with Renegades developing a rivalry with the Susquehanna Soniqs over the last month of competition.

“The Australians, I love those guys,” Roy said. “We’ve been running into them so much, it’s almost a meme now. When you keep matching up against the same teams, there are more layers to the games. It pushes the evolution of both teams because I know what they do and they know what we want to do. You can’t keep running the same things because they expect it, so you are forced to evolve.”

Renegades and Soniqs met up in the first two open finals and in the April Monthly with Renegades winning each time. Still, the Soniqs’ runner-up finish at the monthly made them the second team to qualify for the main event. After qualifying, both teams skipped the fourth open, which other teams must have been happy to see. Rise took that one, beating SoaR in the finals.

“There’s not even a proper sentence I can form to explain how important these tournaments are,” Roy said. “I’m not even trying to boost NSG too much but, truthfully speaking, these tournaments are where future champions are created. All the top Tier 2 teams are here. You have Soniqs, you have Rise, Built By Gamers, SoaR, Noble, Pittsburgh Knights, all these teams that really want to break into the top 10.”

The Summer Champs qualifiers have become one of the most consistent homes for Tier 2 VALORANT competition. While the VCT continues with Stage 2 Masters next week, Summer Champs will keep rolling every week until August.

“The way I see it, the entire VALORANT competitive scene is like a tree,” Roy said. “At the top of Tier 1 you have the beautiful leaves and flowers, but you need to be grounded in something which allows it to grow -- that’s the Tier 2 scene. Tier 2 is the Wild West meta. Tier 1, teams are afraid to take risks, you end up seeing cookie-cutter comps. In Tier 2, you run into teams running new-gen VALORANT comps that just have so much utility, it’s like an entirely different jungle out here, and that’s what’s crucial to make the scene grow.”

Beyond the established orgs, there are also plenty of orgless teams getting their shot as well. In the fifth open, where Renegades were upset in the first round, the finals came down to two unsigned teams in Goofy Goobers and Sum 2 Prove. It was the first time any of the Summer Champs open qualifiers finals came down to unsigned rosters with Goofy Goobers taking the win.

Goofy Goobers aren’t unheard of, as the team is led by Timothy “Zk” Ly formerly on Luminosity and Brandon “Brando” Parker formerly on XSET. But for current free agents and aspiring pros, these tournaments are the proving grounds.

“I have hundreds of DMs from aspiring players asking how they can get their name out there,” Roy said. “I tell them to play, to be a part of the community, to interact and engage. Where are you going to do that? It’ll be at these NSG events, if it wasn’t for NSG, we wouldn’t have these kinds of circuits right? Someone else may have stepped up, but the reality is NSG is the only place promoting these kinds of active circuits where players and teams can showcase themselves.”

Lead image credit: Riot Games