The VALORANT ranked experience can often feel exhausting, with most players pouring hours into it only to walk away with either little RR gains or huge losses. If you’re tired of the same old grind and want some fun bundled with mechanical practice, it’s time to turn to Skirmish, VALORANT’s newest custom game mode.
The popular tac shooter by Riot already offers multiple unranked game modes—Unrated, Spike Rush, Swiftplay, Escalation, Team Deathmatch, Deathmatch, and Custom—for anyone who seeks a break from the grueling ranked battles and play some casual VALORANT. Skirmish, however, is quite different from the modes we’ve had all this while. The most exciting part? You can recreate the iconic Replication mode within Skirmish.
Here’s everything you need to know about the Skirmish mode in VALORANT.
How to play the Skirmish mode in VALORANT
Skirmish isn’t a standalone game mode in VALORANT; it’s available under the Customs mode. Here’s how to start a Skirmish lobby:
- Launch VALORANT and hit the Play tab.
- Go to the Customs mode tab and then select the Mode drop-down. Select Skirmish. Choose a map out of three: Skirmish A, B, and C.
- Add friends to your lobby or start as a solo player.
Since it’s a Custom mode, you can enable cheats too: Hit Options and then toggle the “Enable Cheats” option to On.
VALORANT Skirmish mode features and rules, explained
As a multiplayer mode, Skirmish supports up to 10 players in a lobby. You can load into a Skirmish game in any team ratio from 1v1 to 5v5. While you can technically play it solo, there’s no point: You need to kill enemies to win rounds and end the game. The maps are unique too—separate from the main pool of maps—so you can’t practice lineups either.
There are three different Skirmish maps, each designed with tight layouts to offer intense battle experiences. By default, players can only use weapons to eliminate opponents and win a round. If you enable cheats, however, you can toggle the “Enable Abilities” option. When both weapons and abilities are in play on such tightly packed maps, expect things to get very chaotic and unpredictable. To make things worse, you can also enable infinite abilities and magazines.
The best part is that Skirmish lets you revive the retired Replication experience as agents aren’t limited to a single lock per team. So, you and your teammates can all pick the same agent, or go for any oddly genius combination. For example, you can go five Omens—or two Omens, two Brimstones, and one Clove—whichever suits your team’s plan.
By default, the first team to score 10 rounds wins the game. But you can increase the win condition to 20 or 30 rounds with cheats enabled.
Best agents to play Skirmish mode in VALORANT
Since it’s a casual mode, I recommend choosing whatever VALORANT agent you like and enjoy the experience your way. There’s no RR to gain or lose, so have all the fun you can before you decide to grind ranked again.
That said, if you’re looking for fun suggestions, enable abilities and go for a Replication-style team comp. I’ve had the most laughs in a match where we went all controllers. With never-ending smokes and everyone camping, it felt similar to a hilarious hide and seek gun match.
You can also go for multiple Sages and Cloves for a combination of endless revives and smokes. Or, pick five Yorus and send out all your clones while you and your teammates act like fake clones too—let the enemy figure out who’s real.
While you can always play 1v1 in Skirmish, to enjoy the mode to its fullest, try to gather at least four players for a 2v2 lobby. The sweet spot is six players in a 3v3 lobby, which is enough for action without tipping into chaos. Too many players with enabled abilities can overwhelm the small maps, while too few can make things dry.
