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Valorant's Astra could be one of the game's most powerful controllers

By Hoots the Owl - 3 Mar 2021

Valorant's Astra could be one of the game's most powerful controllers

Image Source: Riot Games

To the stars

At last, you'll be able to pick something other than Brimstone or Omen for smokes in Valorant. Riot Games has revealed Valorant's 15th Agent, Ghanaian Controller Astra, and her abilities literally add a whole new perspective to the game. 

Astra harnesses the power of the cosmos to control the tide of battle, but her abilities work quite differently from any other Agent in Valorant. Instead of simply pressing the button of a corresponding ability to use it, all her abilities stem from a common interface that is accessed by pressing 'X', which is normally bound to your ultimate. This allows her to astral project and ascend over the map – in astral form, Astra can view the entire map and place down "stars". These stars don't do anything, until you apply an ability to them when you return to the mortal plane. 

You'll need to be careful when astral projecting though. Astra's body is still vulnerable and can be killed, so you'll need to do so from a safe place. You can see your position on the map as well when you're hovering above it – a useful reminder of where you'll be on the map when you return.

Here's an overview of what Astra can do: 

  • Gravity Well - This ability pulls in players caught within its radius, and then explodes, adding a debuff to affected players that causes them to take extra damage. Like many of Valorant's abilities, there's huge potential to pair this with other abilities as well, such as Raze's paint shell grenades. Gravity Well has a 12-second cooldown. It is triggered by hovering over a star and pressing 'C'. 
  • Nova Pulse - Triggered using 'Q', Nova Pulse stuns players standing in range. It has a brief charge time before exploding. However, it doesn't seem to last as long as Breach's Fault Line. 
  • Nebula - This is Astra's smoke and is activated by using 'E'. It's most similar to Omen's smoke – it's hollow as well and lasts about 15 seconds. However, you can only trigger two Nebulas at once, and there is a cooldown of 15 seconds before you can trigger the next one, so you won't be able to set down too many simultaneous smokes on the map. 
  • Cosmic Divide - Astra's ultimate requires seven charges and is probably one of the most unique in the entire game. As its name suggests, it places a yawning divide that is capable of bisecting the entire map in half. While in her astral interface, you can place the barrier by setting two points that will decide which way the barrier will cut the map. This barrier is massive and is capable of obscuring vision, dampening sound, and blocking bullets. It will, however, allow players to pass through. 

Astra can have an impact on the game and help her teammates anywhere on the map, no matter where she is. This sets her apart from Brimstone and Omen, and she can even help clear commonly held corners with Gravity Well or Nova Pulse from a safe location, and crucially, put down smokes from across the map. She'll be able to use her Gravity Well and Nova Pulse in a similar manner to Killjoy's Nanoswarm in post-plant situations as well. 

In addition, Astra's abilities are not limited by the number of charges the game assigns them, but by how many stars she has and the cooldown period of each ability. She can have a total of five stars, and each star costs 200 credits. Stars can be recalled at any time by pressing 'F', but these will not carry over into the next round. Recalling a star creates a brief Nebula that dissipates quickly – a fake smoke of sorts that might further confound players. Stars are visible to the enemy too, so they'll be able to evade your abilities, but they won't be able to destroy them.  

However, there are nuances to using Astra that you'll want to take note of. For example, to balance out Astra's map-wide reach, Riot has deliberately implemented a slight delay when it comes to activating a star. According to the developers, they wanted to build a "commit time" into Astra while activating her abilities. This is a fine balance between making her too overpowered and her feeling sluggish, but I can see why Riot wouldn't want players to be able to activate a rapid succession of abilities too quickly.

In short, Astra looks like the sort of Agent for someone who enjoys predicting enemy plays and thinking strategically. She's less about the flashy outplays than she is about a smartly placed star, and she looks like she could prove very strong when it comes to locking down sites and supporting her team.

Valorant has been sorely lacking in terms of another smoke Agent for a while now, and Astra's addition could potentially shake up the meta and unseat Omen as the go-to pick for smokes. Her kit is shaping up to be superbly versatile, capable of not just anchoring a site on defence, but also setting up her team for success on attack with some strategic stars to flush out enemies that may be hiding in corners or holding pesky angles. 

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