How To Make The Most Of Yoru In Valorant
Riot Games introduced Yoru to Valorant at the start of Episode 5 Act II as the game’s fifth Duelist. The Japanese Agent is equipped with plenty of utility to play with and flanking abilities that will really stump your enemies.
You might not find an Agent like Yoru in Valorant. Although there might be some arguments for some Agents playing out like others, Yoru is a truly unique addition to the game. He was released right when the line-up needed some fleshing out since the game’s release.
Yoru should be your go-to option if you love playing on the flank and sending enemies on a wild goose chase while your teammates take all the objectives they could want. The fact that he can teleport, blindside enemies, and send out fake footsteps makes him a dangerous hero to go up against.
We have compiled some of the best tips and tricks from professional players to help you make the most of his abilities. So, if you are eager to learn all about it, the following are some helpful suggestions to experiment with in your game.
Yoru’s Abilities
Here is a rundown of Yoru’s abilities:
C Ability – Fakeout (100 Creds)
Ability Description in Valorant: “EQUIP an echo that mimics footsteps when activated. FIRE to activate and send the echo forward. ALT FIRE to place an echo in place. USE the inactive echo to send it forward. Mirror images explode and cause a blinding flash whenever destroyed by enemies.”
Fakeout is a creative ability, which if used smartly, allows you to sneakily flank an opponent and rotate the action in the direction of your choice.
It also gives you the opportunity to gain the high ground if your team is being suppressed or backed into a corner. This ability can easily allow you to take your opponents off-guard if you are clever, deceitful, and smart.
Moreover, Fakeout can also be activated on a delay, which can come in handy during sneakier plays and while establishing fake rushes.
Using this skill before entering the Site where the Spike is situated is one of its most popular uses. Reflexively, most players kill the Yoru clone, especially if other skills preceded it, and get flash-banged hard.
It should also be noted that some people prefer calling this ability “Decoy” instead of “Fakeout,” so remember that when someone asks you to “use your Decoy.”
Q Ability – Blindside (250 Creds)
Ability Description in Valorant: “EQUIP to rip an unstable dimensional fragment from reality. FIRE to throw the fragment, activating a flash that winds up once it collides with a hard surface in world.”
The Blindside ability is effectively a flashbang that is more useful as a distraction than a damaging projectile. This flashbang ability only bounces off once before exploding and is very similar to Phoenix’s grenades due to its short windup time.
This ability is especially useful when you have managed to get behind an enemy engaged in a firefight so you can blind them and let your teammates finish them off. When used wisely, this ability can even the odds in one-on-one engagements.
Using Blindside after your clone from the Fakeout ability dies to deceive the enemy team with double flashbangs is one useful tip you must keep in mind, as it will greatly help you in a match.
E Ability – Gatecrash (Free, 30s Cooldown, 2 Kill Recharge)
Ability Description in Valorant: “EQUIP to harness a rift tether. FIRE to send the tether out moving forward. ALT FIRE to place a tether in place. ACTIVATE to teleport to the tether's location. USE to trigger a fake teleport.”
Yoru sends out Gatecrasher as a rift tether in order to teleport within a limited time window. This ability can be used in two ways, either by teleporting normally or by faking your teleport. By teleporting normally, you might want to use this ability to infiltrate deep behind enemy lines.
However, the ability has some other utilities as well. For example, it can be used as a lure since enemies can enter and shoot through it or, to put it in simpler words, “faking your teleport.” Initially, the enemies might think they've stumbled on a passage you have created into your backline, but once they approach the rift, you can use your whole team to eliminate them.
When you encounter fights you know you can’t win, this ability can be very handy at that time.
X Ability Or Ultimate – Dimensional Drift (7 Points)
Ability Description in Valorant: “EQUIP a mask that can see between dimensions. FIRE to drift into Yoru's dimension, unable to be affected or seen by enemies from the outside.”
Yoru’s Dimensional Drift is an excellent way to play mind games with the enemy team and get into their territory while fully invisible. You can move around the entire map without the enemies detecting you.
This ability masks both his visual and aural presence until they are extremely close to a player, upon which they will see a blue aura, and they will be able to hear your footsteps. You can easily walk past Sova and Cypher gadgets while in this state, as you are invulnerable during the infiltration.
Discuss and communicate with your team to figure out if you are best used to open up new aggressive pathways to flank or drop on opponents or as a mere distraction.
Something that makes this ability a unique and extremely powerful one is the fact that you can also use the rest of your abilities while in your Ult form. A common thing that Yoru players are doing with his Ultimate Ability is throwing double grenades right before they get out of it.
Tips And Tricks On How To Play Yoru
Let’s have a look at some tips that will help you get more wins in the game with Yoru now that we know how his abilities work!
Learn Your Lineups
As Gatecrash is your most important ability, you must know the lineups for it as well as the outplays for your entire ability kit. Consequently, most players consider Yoru as one of the hardest Agents to play because his strategies usually counter the metagame, meaning that there are nearly no universal lineups for his abilities.
It is, therefore, important for Yoru players to keep up with the latest trends to succeed. Apart from that, it would be best to spend your spare time thinking about countering the most popular strategies with your kit.
For that, you should watch the most recent tournaments to see what you can expect later in your Ranked Games.
Place Your Teleport In A Safe Spot
First of all, try not to place your teleports in any random spot. You want to place your teleports in a place where it will not be destroyed and in such a position that you can throw your grenade immediately.
That alone can take a great deal of practice on your part, especially considering how much range Yoru’s teleports have. Regardless, it is worth it all, as this helps you get the most out of your abilities.
All in all, Gatecrash is probably your most crucial ability, so avoid throwing random teleports.
Make Good Use Of Your Teleports
The key to being a good teammate as a Yoru player is to get attention away from the rest of your team. You should put pressure on one side of the map and send your teleport in the direction of your teammates on the other side of the map.
This mess you caused drags the attention away from your teammates, thus making their execution of a play just a bit easier.
Another side to this smart repositioning is that, as it turns out, Yoru and the Operator (Valorant’s most expensive and powerful gun) are an amazing match and make a catastrophic pair. In other words, set up your teleport, get a kill at the beginning of the round, and then teleport to wherever your beacon is.
In case your opponent decides to aggress on your new location, they will likely be surprised to find themselves staring down the barrel of an Op. But if you miss that, Yoru’s long-distance flash is perfect for re-peeking an angle.
Use Your Ult For Camping From Time To Time
Yoru’s Ultimate Ability, Dimensional Drift, has more potential than one would think. With the Ultimate Ability, you are invisible, so you can use this to counter a group of enemy players that decides to push together.
The only thing you have to do is to hide in a corner, activate your Ultimate Ability when you hear enemies’ footsteps approaching, and exit your Ultimate when you find the right time to grab a few kills. Even if you die right after, it is alright if you manage to pick up at least two kills.
Yoru’s Ultimate Is Not For Hero Plays
Most of the players use Yoru’s ult to sneak behind the enemy team and attack a few from behind. However, as players grew to anticipate Omen’s teleports into spawns, they will also learn to watch their flank after a Yoru ult.
Dimensional Drift is most useful on attack, especially during bomb site hits. A Yoru player can ult into the site, clear every corner, and back out, giving the team a wide opening to gain tons of information. He pairs well with Breach players in this regard.
Similarly, if you are coming out of the Yoru ult and you see an enemy, Breach can easily concuss that player, giving you plenty of time to exit the ult animation and kill the opponent. Just remember to ping players you see in your ult as they do not show up on your teammates’ minimap while you are ult-ing.
Don’t Wait For Your Team To Do Something To Lurk
Don’t be scared to set up plays for your team with Yoru, especially at higher levels. Most players think the lurker role is about sitting in a corner, and you start doing something only when your teammates initiate something. His versatile kit allows Yoru to be effective at any point in a match.
Many players in Ranked are afraid of taking the initiative due to the fear of dying in the match. However, with Yoru, there are a lot of safe ways to flash off angles, put pressure, and then teleport back safely.
Mix Flashes With Other Flashes To Execute
Yoru’s flash can easily be dodged on its own, and its arc is slow once it hits a wall as compared to some other flashes. This trick is to combine flashes, so your opponent has nowhere to turn. Yoru’s flash can also travel great distances, which can slow down retakes once you have planted the bomb.
For example, on A Site of Haven, you can catch any defender who is trying to retake from there. However, your team will be safe once the flash happens behind the box.
Combining Yoru's flash with other utilities isn't limited to just flashes. When timed right, you can send a flash ahead with a Sova recon dart, making it difficult for the enemy team to destroy the dart and giving your team at least one ping of clear, uninterrupted location data.
Use Footsteps To Slow Down Opponents
The decoy footsteps might seem like the hardest to use right as compared to other abilities of Yoru. If you know that your enemy team also has a Yoru and you hear loud footsteps around the corner, you may assume that it is a fake out.
However, other compelling ways exist to put the seemingly-obvious utility to good use. The fake steps are good at broadcasting noisy, fake information to the enemy team. The steps trigger most utilities, thus helping to track real players such as Cypher Traps and Killjoy Turrets.
So, if the combination of utility and footsteps tricks your enemies into believing that there is a player nearby, that might change how they play.
For example, by now, it is common practice for Raze players to send a Boom Bot into hookah (a location on the map Bind). Boom Bots are triggered by fake steps. Thinking that there are agents nearby, the enemy team might waste a lethal utility such as shock darts, grenades, a Molotov to finish them off. But there is nobody actually there.
This ability is also good at pulling away agents when your teammates are attacking, even when it might seem really obvious. On defense, you can place your footsteps in deep corners and set them off right before the enemy team executes onto the site.
It might not be much, but any disciplined enemy will feel compelled to clear the area, giving you a chance to kill them when they aren’t looking.
