From problem to cause

When something is wrong, you usually feel it as a symptom: "I always die first", "I lose clutches", "I arrive late". The symptom is real, but it does not say what to change. The same symptom can have very different causes.

Take "I die in the first ten seconds". It can mean your aim is slow, but much more often it means that:

• you play an exposed position, always the same one;
• you peek held angles without an ability;
• you are far from your teammates and nobody trades you;
• you run into corners, making noise.

Each of these causes has a different fix. Training aim does not fix a positioning problem; changing position does not fix an aim problem. That is why you need to get from the symptom to the cause before choosing what to do.

The problems page gathers the most common problems, written the way you feel them: "I lose one-on-one duels", "my smokes do not help", "I tilt". For each one you will find:

• a summary sentence: the direction to look in;
• the most common causes, each with a short fix;
• the chapters to read, in the order worth reading them.

The list is free and does not require reading the whole guide: it is designed as a way in. Start from the problem you feel most, read the causes and ask which one sounds like you.

Often more than one cause will seem true. That is normal: pick the one that seems most frequent in your games and start there.

To find your cause, not just a possible one, follow four steps:

• describe the symptom precisely. Not "I play badly", but "on defense I die before the attack enters the site". The more precise it is, the easier the cause is to find;
• collect three concrete examples. Three rounds where the symptom showed up, from a recording or your notes. For each one write what you knew and what you chose;
• compare with the causes in the list. Which one shows up in at least two of the three examples? That is your candidate;
• test it with a one-week trial. Change only that one thing, with a drill or a habit, and see whether the symptom drops.

If after a week the symptom has not changed, the cause was something else: go back to step three and try the next one. It is not wasted time: you have ruled out a possibility.

The problems in the list fall into a few families. Recognizing the family helps you look in the right place:

• duels and deaths: you die early, lose duels, the enemy sees you first. The cause is usually in your position, your crosshair or your choice of duel;
• time and decisions: you arrive late, you run out of time on attack, you do not know when to rotate. The cause is almost always information read late or a decision made late;
• utility: your smokes do not help, your flashes blind teammates, you die with abilities unused. The cause is when or why you use them;
• economy: you never have money, you lose ecos, you lose to ecos. The cause is almost always a choice made alone instead of with the team;
• team: the team does not talk, you do not know who to play with. Often someone just has to start;
• mindset and practice: tilt, aim that changes, practice that does not work, stuck at a tier. The cause is often outside the match: tiredness, unclear goals, too many things at once.

Sometimes the round is lost because of teammates' choices: someone entering alone, a missed rotation, a split economy. That is true, it happens. But there are two good reasons to look for your part first:

• it is the only part you can change. You do not control your teammates' choices; you do control yours;
• there is often a part of yours too. A teammate who went in alone may be a teammate nobody followed; a split economy may be an economy nobody called.

When the problem really is the team's, the fix goes through communication: proposing a plan in the buy phase, calling the economy, asking "who is with me?". The solo queue chapter explains how to do it with people you do not know.

Not every loss is a problem to solve. In VALORANT a match depends on many things: teammates, opponents, the map, a couple of duels decided by a hair. A bad evening, or even two, says nothing about how you play.

A problem is a problem when it repeats: the same symptom in many matches, for weeks. If it shows up once, note it and move on. If you keep finding it in your notes, then it is worth following with the four-step method.

This applies to your mindset too: chasing every loss as a problem to solve is tiring and leads to tilt. The mindset chapter explains how to keep the right distance from results.

Over time it pays to keep a personal list of your problems, with three columns: the symptom, the cause you found, what you did. A few lines are enough.

It does two things. First: it shows progress. Rereading, a few months later, the problems you used to have and no longer do is one of the best ways to stay motivated. Second: it helps you spot relapses. Some mistakes come back when you are tired or when you change agent or map; if you have already written them down, you recognize them straight away.

When the list runs out of problems from one family, it is often a sign you are ready for the next tier. The typical mistakes of each tier tell you what to expect next.