Valorant's Season 2025 is set to start on January 8/January 9 with the release of the year's first act, which is expected to last a few months.
While the new update will bring a tone of new content, including the brand-new VCT Team Capsules and Valorant's new item FLEX, the fans are mostly excited about the release of the new agent Tejo.
Valorant's new agent, Tejo, is an Initiator from Colombia. It's the first Initiator released to the game since Gekko. Unfortunately, the hype around the agent's arrival has quickly faded away as it has now been transformed into fear: Tejo is broken and his reign of terror could be just around the corner.
Tejo's abilities
Tejo has a wide range of abilities that make him extremely dangerous, especially if combined with other agents.
His Stealth Drone ability allows him to play as an intel-gathering agent. He can control his targeting system to scan and concuss enemies with the drone's ability. As an intel-gathering tool, it can also be used to detect traps and other enemy devices, which can be combined with Tejo's second ability: Guided Salvo.
Tejo's Guided Salvo is a device that allows the agent to launch projectiles at previously selected locations. This ability can be used to move opponents from their positions and to destroy enemy utility, just like Raze's grenades. Therefore, he can collect information with his Stealth Drone and, then, use his Guided Salvo to launch projectiles to clear the enemies and their utility.
However, Tejo's Guided Salvo isn't his only throwable device as he also has access to Special Delivery, a stickable gadget that concusses enemies. Last but not least, Tejo's ultimate, Armaggedon, is his most lethal ability. This ability allows him to unleash a wave of explosions that can kill his opponents.
Why is he so broken?
Individually, Tejo's abilities don't seem so special. However, Tejo becomes overpowered once he's combined with other agents, especially those with flashing abilities.
Once he has information on the opponent's locations, it's game over: he only has to use his Guided Salvo on specific locations to force the enemies to expose themselves, which, combined with Reyna, Gekko, or Yoru's flashing abilities, should lead to free kills.
Plain and simple, it feels like Tejo can do too much of the good stuff and enemies can't do anything to counter his abilities. It only takes a well-coordinated push to get site control with not much skill involved.
However, while his normal abilities already make him a problem, it's his ultimate what truly looks overpowered.
Similarly to Brimstone, Tejo's Armaggedon creates a striking area where missiles are shot and can easily kill opponents. Right now, Tejo's ultimate is almost unavoidable and, just like his Guided Salvo, forces players to move from their comfort positions. So, Armaggedon isn't just deadly but also covers a big surface.
But, let's get back to Tejo's abilities. While Armaggedon has stolen the show, it's Tejo's Guided Salvo what actually makes him so strong.
The reason for that is that Riot Games has given the Colombian agent remote-controlled grenades. Just like if he was deploying smokes, he could choose where to send his grenades. If that wasn't enough, Tejo's Guided Salvo is his Signature ability, which means they are free.
In other words, playing Tejo's Guided Salvo doesn't take much skill. You get them automatically in every round and you just click on the locations to hit not just your targets but the enemies' gadgets and traps, all of this from a safe distance. Kinda cracked, isn't it?
Overall, Tejo feels like Thanos. The fate of the round lies in his hands, literally. The Colombian agent will quickly become a menace, especially in teams where players coordinate themselves. However, is it too late for Riot Games to nerf Tejo? Let's explore some potential changes that would stop Tejo from inevitably shaking the game's meta.
How could Riot nerf Tejo?
First of all, although we think Tejo's nerfs should come as soon as possible, Riot Games should players use the agent in his current shape first and then decide how impactful should the changes be.
As of now, here's a look at how we think Tejo's abilities could be nerfed:
- Stealth Drone: Tejo's Stealth Drone is the least of our concerns. If we had to nerf it, we would only reduce the duration of the drone by 1 or 1.5 seconds.
- Guided Salvo: Tejo's Guided Salvo desperately needs a nerf. We think Tejo's Guided Salvo could be nerfed by applying one of the following two, with the latter being our most preferred tweak:
- Reducing the number of Guided Salvos from two to one.
- Eliminating the rebound feature by reworking Tejo's gadget.
- Special Delivery: Special Delivery feels alright at the moment. Future changes could be applied:
- Armaggedon: We find Armaggedon too much right now, so here are the changes we would make to Tejo's ultimate:
- Slightly reduce the area covered by Armaggedon.
- Each Armaggedon hit to deliver 45 damage (from 60), Armaggedon would require four hits to kill a player who's full health with a Heavy Armor.
While all of these changes may feel like a lot, Tejo's current state makes him a one agent army. He's definitely too much.
The most crucial change of the ones we have just mentioned would be to eliminate the rebound feature from Tejo's Guided Salvo, which would drastically reduce Tejo's versatility. However, for that to happen, Riot Games would probably have to rework the ability — and that's not something you can do in a couple of days.
Tejo will be available starting from January 8. It will be then when players will be able to fully see Tejo's abilities on the battlefield.
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