# VALORANT 1.14 — VALORANT Patch Notes 1.14

- Product: VALORANT (https://whatsnew.fyi/product/valorant)
- Vendor: Riot Games
- Date: 2020-12-08
- Version: 1.14
- Original notes: https://playvalorant.com/en-us/news/game-updates/valorant-patch-notes-1-14/
- Permalink: https://whatsnew.fyi/product/valorant/releases/1.14
- Labels: Platforms: Windows, PlayStation, Xbox

What's New is an index, not a publisher: every entry below links to the vendor's own release notes, which are the authoritative source. Entries are labelled where they are hand-curated sample data, pre-releases, or drawn from a secondary source such as a developer blog.

Reuse: the summaries, labels and curation here are © What's New. Quote freely with attribution and a link back; wholesale republication of the corpus is not permitted — terms: https://whatsnew.fyi/terms. The vendors' own release notes remain their publishers'.

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- **changed** — Barrier Orb can no longer be cast during Buy Phase
- **changed** — Fortified Barrier no longer loses health over time and only starts to deteriorate a few seconds before it expires
- **changed** — Reduced the height of the A Belt area on Icebox and connected it via a ramp to the platform below
- **added** — Added a see-through gate on Icebox A site that cannot be passed from ground level
- **changed** — Sloped the wall on Icebox A site and replaced the double stack of Radianite crates with a smaller object
- **changed** — Reduced the height of the yellow container on Icebox
- **added** — Introduced limited Snowball Fight mode available for two weeks starting December 15
- **added** — Players who complete Snowball Fight matches receive a themed Gun Buddy at a later date
- **changed** — Requirements to unlock Competitive play changed from winning 20 Unrated matches to winning 10 Unrated matches
- **changed** — Rank distribution has been updated to make it easier to climb out of lower ranks
- **changed** — Act Rank Badge display has been re-enabled on in-game player cards
- **fixed** — Fixed performance issues such as hitches and on death performance optimizations
- **changed** — Career page Match History and Act Ranks have been split into their own specific sections
- **added** — Introduced Night.Market feature offering 6 chances to receive random Select, Deluxe, or Premium weapon skins at a discount, opening December 10th
- **added** — Added text field to Report Player menu allowing players to provide more information on their reason for reporting
- **added** — Players can now add friends in-game via the player list in the escape menu
- **added** — Added manual Game State Recovery tool for tournament organizers to remake tournament matches from a given round
- **added** — Added cinematic camera locations across all maps for observers to use with Shift + player number hotkey

Hey, we’re back with Patch 1.14, if you’re wondering what happened to Patch 1.13, we used it to roll out some Unreal upgrades. So there’s that.
This one’s light on the Agents, big on Icebox. This round of Icebox changes is focused on getting the A site and verticality just right.
To help combat smurfs/AFKers, you must now win 10 Unrated matches before you can unlock Competitive. Speaking of which, the slew of Observer additions should make it better to follow the competition. Rank distribution has also been adjusted to help those at lower levels in their climb.
The limited Snowball Fight mode arrives and the Night.Market is open.
AGENT UPDATES
Sage
Barrier Orb
- Barrier Orb can’t be cast in Buy Phase
- Although this was a hotfix solution intended to prevent an exploit with Omen, this change is overall a solid one that we believe creates cohesion across what can and can’t be cast in buy phase. Most of the abilities cast during buy phase are meant to set up more permanent utility.
- Once fortified, Barrier no longer loses health over time—Barrier only starts to deteriorate a few seconds before it expires
- Overall, we’ve been happy with how the fortified barrier has been playing but wanted to make some changes to prevent the mitigation of the fortifying counterplay, while rewarding Sage players that successfully fortify their walls. By removing the mitigation of the counterplay, we are able to investigate future opportunities to reward players that succeed in getting their barriers to fortify.
MAP UPDATES
Icebox
The changes to Icebox in this update are centered around simplifying the A Site and reducing the height of some of the most vertical areas on the map.
- Reduced the height of the A Belt area and connected it via a ramp to the platform below
- This puts the upper A Belt area more in line with the rest of the verticality in the site
- Acquiring targets up top also requires less vertical movement of the crosshair
- Added a see-through gate here that can’t be passed from the ground level
- Pathing should hopefully be more predictable from attackers approaching the site and defenders retaking the site
- Sloped the wall (first image) and replaced the double stack of Radianite crates in the site with a smaller object (second image)
- This should allow attackers to approach the site more safely, and a quicker retake of the site for defenders
- Reduced the height of the yellow container.
- This allows the top of the container to be fully cleared from several angles as well as reduces the amount of crosshair displacement required when aiming at targets on top of the container
MODE UPDATES
Ready to have a Snowball Fight with your friends (and likely your foes)? The limited mode goes live on Dec.15 and will last for two weeks, on Dec. 29. Play a match of Snowball Fight and you’ll also nab a themed Gun Buddy, delivered at a later date.
- 5v5: Team Deathmatch
- The first team to 50 kills wins
- Respawns are enabled, so get back in there
- The snowball launcher is your weapon of choice
- Killjoy has rigged a custom version of Brimstone’s molotov launcher
- Projectile based snowballs have travel time and an arc (make sure to lead that shot!)
- Infinite snowballs—don’t stop shooting!
- The gift that keeps on giving: Power ups!
- Gifts spawn around the map, sometimes a portal appears and gifts come pouring out
- Each gift contains a power up when opened (shoot to open)
- You can only have one of each power up at a time, so make sure to share with your teammates
- If you die, you drop your power ups and someone else can snag them
- Gift types
- Rapid Fire: fire even faster
- Growball: grows over time while traveling in the air
- Ricochet: for all those snowball trick shots off the ground and walls
- Skates: skate around quickly and in style. Jump higher!
- Maps
- Week 1: Check out the festivities on the newly updated holiday version of Icebox (Snowball Fight only!)
- Week 2: Snowball Fight can be played on all current maps
- Progression
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_[Truncated at 4000 characters — full notes: https://playvalorant.com/en-us/news/game-updates/valorant-patch-notes-1-14/]_