Frokat
The first major event of the year, VCT Masters 2022 treats us with the familiar views of Iceland as 12 teams enter the Thunderdome once more. With all the pieces in place – the teams, the schedule, and even the opening matches and casting talent have all been revealed – all we can do is wait.
2022 Reykjavík Stage 1 MastersIceland
OpTic Gaming
LOUD
ZETA DIVISIONKicking off on the 10th of April, the grand event with a venue in Iceland’s capital returns – bigger and better than ever. Although the arena’s name hasn’t been disclosed yet by the organizers, it will most likely be the familiar seats of Laugardalshöll Indoor Sporting Arena – the one that hosted the previous year’s event.
As the first big event of the VCT 2022 season, Reykjavik Masters features the best pool of international talent you could hope for – with one unfortunate exception. Despite their stellar performance in VCT CIS Challengers and VCT EMEA Challengers, FunPlus Phoenix is forced to skip the event due to the regrettable circumstances regarding Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the consequential travel restrictions imposed on the organization’s players.
— VALORANT Champions Tour EMEA (@valesports_emea) April 2, 2022
In an attempt to compensate for their effort, Riot Games automatically award the team with 200 VCT Points, as well as a share of the event’s prize pool. Team Liquid, who was invited to compete in place of FunPlus, will receive the full share of VCT Points earned by them.
The event is scheduled to feature two stages: a group stage in the double-elimination GSL-style format played in a series of best-of-3 matches and a playoff stage featuring a double-elimination (with higher and lower brackets) with the finals of both brackets played as a best-of-5.
Now is the time of kingmakers, old rivalries, and new names. Masters Reykjavik has them all! With the breadth of international talent featured in the event, there’s enough place for everyone’s story. So let’s familiarize ourselves with the participants.
The Masters
G2 Esports
After the news about FunPlus Phoenix being forced to skip the event broke through, G2 Esports have automatically upgraded their station to become the European favorites. However, some would argue the same even with FunPlus attending – as G2 Esports’ 2022 roster have proven themselves quite the fighters throughout VCT Challengers.
While the team’s shuffling of keloqz and mixwell earlier this year has left some fans light-headed, the team seemingly hit their stride after the unfortunately low results in January’s Closed Qualifiers. No doubt that mixwell’s return played a large part in that resurgence – the team’s captain is a titled and experienced competitive FPS connoisseur. No wonder G2 were cautious about burning bridges too early – and their patience paid off.
We better hope this roster shows up big on the international stage – or else it would mean G2 Esports poaching talent from yet another team, annihilating it in the process. Just kidding – or am I? Still, as we’ve seen their moves against Team Liquid and especially M3 Champions in the Challenger stage, this time, G2 has a real clear shot on making it.
Paper Rex
At the beginning of this year, Paper Rex made a vow to qualify for every single Masters event – and eventually, for the Champions – of the year. As we see their name among the participants of Reykjavik Masters, it seems their goal is now at 33% complete.
Dedicated to their goal, Rex breezed right through the local and regional Challengers event, only meeting resistance at the very end of APAC Challengers 2022 – and eventually breaking it in a 3:2 victory against XERXIA. The entirety of the APAC region is looking extra spicy in 2022 – which makes Paper Rex’s triumph all the more impressive.
The ancient proverb says, “he who plays Jett better, rushes plant harder.” And Paper Rex can boast of having the greatest duelist in the world right now – f0rsaken. As the Singaporean player proved his reputation to be accurate by dropping astonishing 99 kills over the course of a single best-of-5 match, some parallels could be drawn with his Indian Counter-Strike: Global Offensive counterpart. I’m just kidding, of course!
But, as we all know, winning is only half the deal – the most important part is having fun. Thankfully, Paper Rex got us all covered by combining the best of both worlds.
THIS IS APAC CHAMPIONS COMMS ?? pic.twitter.com/MJDs0ZhNlv
— PRX Jinggg (@Jingggxd) March 29, 2022
God knows I didn’t understand a single word, but it’s clear these boys are sure having fun.
LOUD
The Brazilian esports organization washed upon the shores of competitive Valorant in early February. Since then, the newly-formed roster proceeded to smash their competition for a ticket to Iceland, performing a flawless run in Brazil Challengers 2022.
Image by: Riot Games.
You’ll recognize the team’s core – Sacy and saadhak – as formerly Team Vikings members. During their time in the Vikings, these guys summarily terrorized their region, claiming golds in nearly every regional series of 2021. Joined by the fresh blood: aspas, Less, and pANcada, the team seemingly found the perfect balance between potential and experience.
The roster’s raw mechanics are unmatched – the entire lineup sits pretty at the top of the KDA leaderboards of their respective region. Yes, all five of them.
Looking at the team’s raw performance reminds Counter-Strike: Global Offensive’s SK Gaming’s 2016 run. For sure, it’s too early to draw conclusions before the event even starts – but if LOUD is to make their names heard in this event, they’ll have to repeat the way SK did it – through sheer dedication and mechanical prowess.
XERXIA
Another piece in the APAC region’s success story puzzle, XERXIA is a brand new organization in the fields of competitive Valorant. The team’s core consists of formerly X10 Crit members: foxz, sushiboys, sScary, Crws, joined by a fresh talent under the name of Surf.
The X10 core represents the level of dominance the roster exerted on the Southeast Asian scene in 2021: standing tall as the #1 in VCT SEA Standings. Surf remains an enigma – a very young player (wait, he was born in 2004 and is already 18? I think I’m getting old). Well, he’s still a young player on the professional scene, with XERXIA being his first serious organization, and VCT 2021: Stage 2 Masters – Reykjavík marking his first big event. Talk about making an impressive debut!
XERXIA ;VALORANT esports team
Official LINEUP ?
– Surf
– Crws @Crws_vlrt
– sScary @sScaryOfficial
– foxz @foxzfoxzfoxz
– sushiboys @ImSushiboys
– Yuttanagorn "Zeus" Kaewkongyai (Coach)
– Jirawat "HeadHawk" Kalumpanun (Team Manager & Analyst)#XERXIA #XERXIAVALORANT pic.twitter.com/ILcLb4k5Qf— XERXIA (@XERXIAESPORTS) January 17, 2022
Now that’s what I call announcing with style.
XERXIA must be either crazy to put so much faith into a young and unknown player, or they must really know something about this upcoming talent. After all, he’s proven himself to be a solid pickup in the match for the first place in the VCT APAC Challengers. There, he and the rest of XERXIA reached the Finals and almost put the currently #1 team of the region in the dirt in a grueling best-of-5 series.
Still, the pressure of an international event – especially one of Reykjavik’s scale – is not easily withstood even by the most experienced. If XERXIA is to show results, they’ll need to do so as a coherent 5-stack.
ZETA DIVISION
The favorites of the Japanese region, ZETA Division failed to perform in VCT 2021: Masters Berlin. Seeing the team’s immediate elimination in the group stage, the team willingly gave up their spot in the Last Chance qualifier to better focus on the deep restructuring required to prepare the team for the international stage.
These changes were the acquisition of Northeption’s core consisting of TENNN and SugarZ3ro, as well as Dep, who is hailed by the fans as the best Jett of Japan.
While the team continued to once again rise up as the #1 team domestically, Reykjavik will mark the turning point in lineups’ future. The team has a lot to prove after a massive restructuring effort. With the region as a whole improving compared to its 2021 form, it’s fair to expect improvement from Zeta, as well: the question is by how much, and will it be enough?
KRÜ Esports
The stars of the LATAM scene, KRÜ Esports have earned the honor to represent their home region in Masters Reykjavik 2022. During the 2021 season, KRÜ made legend as one of the main challengers for the scene’s ultimate prize, yet their opening matches of 2022 left them looking a tad shaky.
One of the few teams to greet this year in one piece, KRÜ immediately has the advantage of not worrying about team chemistry. As the Argentine team displayed impressive results throughout 2021, culminating in reaching the third place in VCT Champions, it seemed that things would continue looking up for the team. Yet, their first games of 2022 proved to be much less dominant than expected.
En tu cara, Oscars pic.twitter.com/7AJH5dDvhT
— KRÜ Esports (@KRUesports) March 29, 2022
“In your face, Oscars.”
As such, KRÜ Esports had to claw their way into Iceland after immediately dropping into the lower bracket of VCT South America Challengers. The huge international competitor had to blast their way into Reykjavik past their domestic rivals – Leviatán. As KRÜ have already tasted defeat by their hands in VCT LAS Challengers just before, it was clear this wouldn’t be easy. And the competition was indeed stiff – a grueling five maps for a ticket to Iceland were won by KRÜ through sweat and blood.
And all that for a rematch against Team Liquid in the first round of groups – the team that wasn’t supposed to be in the first place! As Team Liquid has previously managed to take KRÜ Esports down in each of two of their outings, the challenge isn’t over yet for the Argentine team.
Ninjas in Pyjamas
The European organization hasn’t had the best of times entering the Valorant pro scene. The Swedes had to press the reset button so many times they got sent to Brazil – literally. However, that was quite a blessing: picking up players from FURIA and KRÜ Esports allowed the organization to build a healthy roster worthy of qualifying for massive international events. After all, the news wasn’t that surprising, given that NiP has already established itself as a presence in the Brazilian esports scene – in Rainbow 6: Siege in particular.
Taking down KRÜ Esports’ nemesis, Leviatán, in a clean sweep during VCT LATAM vs. BR Challengers was a powerful statement issued by the spanking new roster. Unfortunately, the resounding defeat – a makeshift “best-of-9” loss against LOUD Esports holds NiP back from claiming the #1 spot in the region.
It’s also fair to note Ninjas in Pyjamas’ latest addition to the team: Vinícius “FLUYR” Menegatti joined the organization some days before their match against Leviatán due to the team’s coach, RoY, having health issues and needing to stand in. It seems that FLUYR is here to stay for the time being. It seems that Vinícius perfectly complements the roster’s aggressive mechanics with his timings and map control knowledge – as well as his great usage of tactical timeouts.
Fnatic
Representing Europe and headquartered in London, United Kingdom, Fnatic fields a very international roster as it boasts a decades-long history across many esports titles. It took some titanic effort for the team to earn a ticket to Reykjavik – and now they must perform a miracle once again to make it all worth it.
As no team escapes the great end-of-the-year shuffle, Fnatic took the opportunity to swap out Domagoj “Doma” Fancev for Andrey “BraveAF” Gorchakov. The Russian player is most known as a solid initiator player. The organization is fairly known to find amazingly promising players where any other org would miss them – and not just in Valorant, but in League of Legends as well. After all, who are we to doubt Fnatic’s godlike scouting after the Derke incident?
Unfortunately, misery always comes uninvited as Fnatic’s BraveAF got caught up in a bit of a scandal regarding his comments towards Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Following that, Fnatic immediately suspended the Russian player indefinitely, pending investigation. It’s unclear whether he’ll be available in time for the Reykjavik tourney even if cleared.
Speaking of Derke – the team has taken another hit in that department as the player has contracted COVID-19 ahead of the series. As Reykjavik Masters looms ever closer, the prospect of losing not one but two players at once is terrifying for the Fnatic fans out there. Hopefully, it won’t come to that.
There’s a big chance I’ll go, just relax and believe guys – Derke.
UPDATE: Derke is cleared to go to Iceland as the player posted a negative COVID test on his Twitter account. Here’s to Fnatic!
— FNATIC Derke (@derkeps) April 6, 2022
Team Liquid
Making an unlikely entrance, Team Liquid joins the tournament due to the regrettable circumstances that hold back FunPlus Phoenix from attending the event. Despite falling to G2 Esports in the Lower Bracket Second Round of the VCT EMEA Challengers 2022, the lineup is given a second shot as the last slot of EMEA Challengers.
— VALORANT Champions Tour EMEA (@valesports_emea) March 28, 2022
That’s not to say they don’t deserve it: quite the opposite. Historically going toe-to-toe with the fiercest regional and international competition, Team Liquid boasts a time-tested roster. Liquid’s roster went as far as to claim third place in VALORANT Champions 2021 – and, as the team survived the great end-of-the-year shuffle in one piece, the problems with the team’s chemistry are out of the question.
Despite all that positive stuff, the question about the team’s performance still remains. A resounding 2-0 defeat against G2 in VCT EMEA Challengers has left many fans questioning the team’s current form. Still, it seems early to say whether it was Liquid’s inflexibility or G2’s amazing adaptability at work, but, given the miraculous second chance given to Team Liquid, we’re about to find out just the answer to that question.
OpTic Gaming
The American esports club renowned for its influence on the Call of Duty professional scene (and the flood of memes it spawned), OpTic Gaming recently decided to hop on the Valorant hype train by acquiring Team Envy’s roster. Under the new fresh banners, the team proceeded to win a trip to Iceland immediately, only narrowly missing out on the chance to advance as a top-seeded team after losing a grueling best-of-5 series against The Guard.
OpTic was regarded as the best team in the region prior to that. To be honest, the optics don’t really change much even after their defeat in VCT NA Challengers Finals – after all, they’ve put up a hell of a fight.
Even though the roster (back then playing under the tag of EnVyUs) demonstrated quite poor performance during VALORANT Champions 2021, their run in the event was clearly impeded by some unfortunate circumstances regarding a player on their team contracting COVID-19. As we all know, even the slightest distraction can prove fatal on the highest stage – let alone a Covid infection.
Now OpTic has a chance to prove that was indeed merely a setback back then. Their results in the Challengers series looked promising as they took down Group A favorites Cloud9 and defeated the soon-to-be champions The Guard on their way to the finals.
The Guard
Guard enters this series as a dark horse success story. Going from muddling about in C-tier events in 2021 to suddenly handily qualifying for the second most prestigious event in the Valorant esports ecosystem sounds crazy – but The Guard made it real. What’s even more spectacular was the way they achieved that: the way to the golden ticket lay through defeating their enemies in a series of rematches, starting with Group A favorites Cloud 9, and ending with OpTic Gaming, who previously defeated The Guard in the event’s semi-final but received their comeuppance in the Grand Final.
Image by: The Guard.
The young team already made history was before departing to Iceland as they were the ones to throw down the reigning champions, Sentinels, into the pits of VCT NA Challengers’ lower bracket in the very first round – even going as far as squashing Sentinels 13-1 in the second map, Icebox. It’s hard to think of a better way to make your names heard than that.
However, high results inevitably create high expectations: and there’s no profession harder than that of a kingslayer. The Guard’s #1 priority as of now should be cementing their reputation by proving that it was not a fluke. The community’s support is on their side, however. It’s not hard to get excited for the rascals with their top-tier banter. #StandGuard
DRX
Although historically leaning more heavily towards genres like MOBA and RTS – and being an overpowering force in them – South Korea as a region isn’t a stranger to competitive FPS titles. DRX, previously known as Kingzone Dragon X and then simply Dragon X, is an established organization that is most known for the accomplishments of their roster in another of Riot Games’ titles, League of Legends.
Reykjavik, here we come.#GoDRX #DRXWIN #VCT #VALORANTMasters pic.twitter.com/fFTxX4gOU0
— DRX VS (@DRX_VS) March 31, 2022
Supporting one of your favorite South Korean teams in multiple disciplines? Sign me the hell up!
As DRX fielded a roster in Valorant in early 2022, it quickly proved its combat capabilities by blasting its way through VCT Korea Stage 1 Challengers. Despite being one of the youngest rosters in the series, the team handily defeated their competition, ending the Group stage in the first place. As for the Playoffs, DRX torpedoed towards the grand prize – and a ticket to VCT 2022: Stage 1 Masters – Reykjavík – by dropping just a single map throughout the entire stage, as well as defeating the top-2 team of the event on five maps in a row.
This can be explained by one simple fact – despite DRX as an organization entering the scene in a royally late fashion, the way they’ve entered it couldn’t have been better as they’ve picked up one of the – if not outright the best – established rosters in Korea. That roster formerly played under the banner of Vision Strikers. Established by the former Counter-Strike: Global Offensive pro players, this lineup ripped and tore through their local competition for two years straight, acing in every regional tourney.
There’s little doubt that a combination of a promising roster and an established organization with capabilities of developing it will do wonders for DRX and South Korea’s standing on the international scene as a whole.
