While Valorant’s Patch 2.0 brought changes to Omen that were designed to tone down his power, there was another change to the agent that Riot left out of the patch notes.
Riot Games made a significant change to the hitbox of Omen’s teleport ability, Shrouded Step. The ability now requires players move further out from cover than they did before the Valorant 2.0 patch. Now, it looks like Shrouded Step’s hitbox needs an unblocked path as wide as the ability’s on-screen graphic in order to activate.
Prior to this change, the ability’s hitbox extended to about the width of its inner blue circle, shown in the image as the green overlay. After Valorant’s 2.0 patch, testing showed that the ability’s hitbox is now about as wide as the outer red circle. This is a huge change to Omen’s teleport, with the new hitboxes forcing players to take a much wider angle to use the ability. Wider angles mean players will have to leave cover in many cases.
Prior to Valorant’s Episode 2 release, the ability was much more forgiving, only requiring a line of sight to the teleport’s destination to fire. With a smaller hitbox, players could take shallow angles and still be able to teleport. For such a large change to a characters’ ability, it’s surprising Riot didn’t explicitly list this in the patch notes. Any mention of Shrouded Step or its hitbox are missing.
It’s likely that Riot always intended the hitbox to be this large, fixing its size as it took care of Omen’s other abilities during Valorant’s Patch 2.0’s balance pass.
The patch released alongside a new battlepass and the game’s second episode, “Formation.” While fellow Controller agent Brimstone received several buffs to his kit, Riot hit Omen with nerfs, including slowing the movement speed of his Dark Cover ability by 1200 units over its travel time and increasing the cost of his Paranoia from $200 up to $400.
Omen may also be outshined by Valorant’s newest Agent, Yoru, whose abilities feel like better versions of the ghostly agent’s. Yoru’s kit includes some neat options for players who want to approach Riot’s shooter from a different angle. His abilities interact with those of other agents, like Killjoy’s turret, in ways players haven’t seen before. Between Omen’s announced nerfs and the changes to Shrouded Step’s hitbox, there might not be any room for both agents on the servers for Valorant Episode 2’s season.
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