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Riot has nerfed the Classic in VALORANT (again)

VALORANT's latest patch dropped a few days ago, and among the tweaks and changes Riot Games made was something that has caught the eye of the community — the Classic pistol is getting nerfed, again.

As any VALORANT player would and should know, the Classic is the pistol that has (had) the right-mouse-click of the gods.

The right-click fires an alternate burst shot of 3 bullets that, when aimed correctly, can be an instant-kill (yes, even with full armour) if 2 of the shots hit the target's head at close range.

The Classic (Screenshot: Riot Games)
The Classic (Screenshot: Riot Games)

For a free gun (you start off every round with the Classic if you don’t possess any kind of secondary firearm), it is actually decent because it packs some serious firepower if you hit your headshots and, god forbid, the right-click burst.

The classic Classic

In pistol rounds, I have never entertained the thought of buying a “better” pistol, because the Classic is so versatile.

At long ranges, you can outgun a Frenzy or a Shorty user, and you are definitely on a par with a Ghost user if you decide to invest in some light armour.

At close ranges, you could just right-click all players to death. If you face a Sheriff player at close range, just make sure you’re close to some cover to avoid getting shot in the head, then burst them down with a right-click when you’re much nearer to them.

That’s right, the burst is quite accurate and deadly for plays that are less than 10 in-game meters.

To make matters worse, jumping and firing with the alternate fire at these ranges also felt pretty accurate, and personally, I have had many instances where I successfully killed my opponents while right-clicking and jumping around like a monkey. (I also have had that done to me, so there is no love lost there.)

The Classic has been nerfed previously in patch 1.04 for being a little too accurate. But, even with the walking and jumping spread increased in that patch, it did feel like it wasn’t enough.

The nerfed Classic

After facing the terror of the Classic for almost a year and a half since then, Riot has finally decided to nerf it again in the recent patch 3.09.

These changes to stats are taken from Riot’s patch notes:

Walking firing error changed .05 to .6 (total error is 2.5 when walking, up from 1.95)

Running firing error changed .2 to 1.3 (total error is 3.2 when running, up from 2.1)

Jumping firing error changed from 1.1 to 2.1 (total error is 4.0 when jumping, up from 3.0)

As you can see, running and jumping with the Classic has some serious bullet spread now.

This is not to say that you can’t do the running and jumping shenanigans anymore, but you will be gambling with some high RNG with the bullet spread in order to pull off the same feats again.

However, note that accuracy while standing still hasn’t changed one bit. You are still able to burst down enemies if you are standing still around 10 in-game meters away from them. It is just that running or jumping while doing that at this range now will yield less than favourable results.

The Classic right-click at 10 in-game-meters still packs a punch while standing still in Patch 3.09 (Screenshot: Riot Games)
The Classic right-click at 10 in-game-meters still packs a punch while standing still in Patch 3.09 (Screenshot: Riot Games)

Despite this nerf, I don’t see myself moving away from the Classic during pistol rounds, or buying anything else as a secondary weapon during gun rounds.

This nerf still doesn’t change the Classic's usefulness in pistol rounds when duelling with other players at longer ranges.

For the shorter ranged battles, I’ll just have to keep in mind that I cannot pull off the nutty jump-right-click plays anymore, and I will probably get mowed down by a good Frenzy user head-on.

As for gun rounds, I will never pull the Classic out anyway, unless I am really out of bullets on my main gun or in close proximity to my enemy.

All in all, this nerf is definitely for the best.

To be honest, I personally wonder why Riot took this long to implement this change.

It is a much-needed adjustment to keep the game in line with the “precise gunplay” element that Riot has been trying to promote with VALORANT.

But at least it’s here now, and we’ll hopefully see less of the silly jump-right-click kills that the Classic has been infamous for.

Dominic loves tech and games. When he is not busy being headshotted in VALORANT or watercooling anything he sees, he does some pro wrestling.

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