Riot Games has revealed the information for VCT Challengers 2024, detailing what players can expect from VALORANT Esports next year.
Overview
Riot Games is focusing on Challengers and its role in helping aspiring professionals in the upcoming season. They have previously shared some initial details in their Season 2024 Announcement and subsequent deep dive into Challengers. Now, they want to provide a clear roadmap for this layer of the ecosystem.
Challengers and Ascension Tournaments are evolving with the goal of creating opportunities for players to reach the highest levels of the VCT. Challengers also serve as a regional showcase, offering competitions that identify the best players from various VALORANT communities around the world.
Riot's strategy of inspiration, aspiration, and participation is reinforced with Premier, which will be closely integrated with Challengers. Riot plans to share details on Premier in early November 2023.
Cross-Tier Collaboration: Affiliate Teams, Two-Way Players, and Player Loans
In 2024, the Challengers competitions will be held throughout the year, providing a steady pace of competition within the Tier 2 framework. The next season will consist of two distinct stages that will offer consistent opportunities for organized play, starting in January and qualifying teams for the Ascension tournament in September.
- At the beginning of Challengers in January, most leagues will conduct Open Qualifiers, while some will welcome back familiar teams from the 2023 season. Each stage will culminate in a playoff, celebrating the best teams of the season. Specific information regarding each league will be rolled out through regional channels.
- Next year, Riot will introduce the first Promotion and Relegation event between CL and Premier teams at the end of Stage 1. In this event, Premier teams will compete in a bracket for the chance to face CL teams and earn a spot in Stage 2 of the CL Season. Teams who aspire to qualify for Challengers should keep an eye out for region-specific information, which will be released in early November.
After the 2024 Ascension Tournaments in September, the Challengers 2025 season will begin in October. This earlier start date will help Riot by minimizing gaps in the calendar while also giving Ascension winners enough time to prepare for the start of International Leagues.
Riot will introduce new policies with the 2024 Challenger Season to build deeper connections and more opportunities across the different levels of their ecosystems. Their primary goal is to improve talent development by providing more flexibility for teams to deploy players in competition.
- Affiliate Partnerships will enable teams from the International Leagues to develop partnerships with Challenger and Game Changers teams. Teams that establish an affiliate partnership will be able to collaborate more closely on content and other commercial partnerships. Affiliate partnerships with Challenger teams must occur within the same region, but affiliate partnerships with Game Changers teams have no regional restrictions. These partnerships will also allow for the implementation of Two-Way players.
- Two-Way Players are intended to address a problem frequently observed by Riot Games in the International Leagues. Last year, substitute players signed to IL rosters were not receiving playing time and were thus losing out on building relevant experience within the competition. With the introduction of Two-Way Players, players who may not be seeing full-time play on the starting roster of an International League team may play down on the Affiliate Partner Team's roster in Challengers and Game Changers, giving those players valuable competitive experience instead of being relegated to the bench.
- Player Loans will also be introduced to help bolster player development opportunities. In 2024, International League Teams will be permitted to loan players on their roster to other teams outside of the International Leagues, such as Challengers or Game Changers teams. Unlike Two-Way Players, these loaned players will not be eligible to compete for their parent team until the loan expires. However, these player loans will not be tied to the Affiliate Partnerships system, providing a wider range of destination teams for the loaned player.
Riot Games is excited for the upcoming 2024 Challengers season, which promises to bring about a period of fierce competition, plentiful opportunities, and a celebration of regional strength. Stay tuned for more information regarding regional specifics and global announcements to keep you updated on all the action that awaits in 2024.