Fade has insane win rate after launch, are nerfs coming?

William Davis Published 04/05/2022

New Valorant characters usually have a low win rate, but Fade is already showing signs of being overpowered.

According to Valorant stat tracking website Valorbuff, Fade currently sports a win rate of 50.6%. That makes her the fourth-most winning character in the game. Such a high win rate so close to her release indicated that Fade could become a major problem once players get comfortable with her. Will Riot Games respond with a nerf?

Is Fade too OP in Valorant?

50.6% may sound reasonably balanced, but Fade is a fairly complex character with lots of tech to develop. The fact that she’s performing so well just a week after her launch means that her win rate will most likely rise over time.

For reference, Chamber had a launch win rate of under 48% and is now deemed overpowered enough for a massive nerf. Fade also performs better in immortal and up compared to silver and gold, which indicates that top players are very interested in her unique kit.

Fade’s strengths lie in her incredibly powerful initiation and information tools. Her terror system reveals enemy positions for a very long time, and clever setups make them difficult to avoid. She’s also incredibly good at applying status effects.

By combining abilities, Fade can apply nearsight, terror, and deafness all on top of 75 health decay. Those terror trails last 12 seconds, which is plenty of time to storm a site. All of those effects help Fade boast such a high win rate right after launch.

High win rate could end with a nerf for Fade

Fade could get hit with the nerf bat soon if her win rate doesn’t mellow out, and Riot left plenty of knobs to turn in her design.

Fade’s status effects are the most likely part of her kit to get nerfed. The duration of Terror Trails could get reduced from 12 seconds down to a more reasonable duration. Haunt and Nightfall currently have the same trail duration, so making the Haunt easier to destroy could work as well. There’s also always the straightforward nerf of reducing Fade’s Prowler charges, but the current 3.5second nearsight could also take a hit.

Even with a high win rate, Riot Games will probably leave Fade alone for a patch or two to settle. Complex characters require time to develop, but that also buys time to figure out counterplay. Fade’s win rate could even out over time after more testing from both sides.

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