InitiatorTurkish bounty hunter Fade unleashes the power of raw nightmare to seize enemy secrets. Attuned with terror itself, she hunts down targets and reveals their deepest fears - before crushing them in the dark.
CEQUIP a prowler. FIRE to send the prowler forward. HOLD FIRE to steer the prowler towards your crosshair. The prowler will chase down the first enemy or terror trail it sees, and Nearsight the enemy on impact.
Bought with credits at the start of a round, and lost when you die.
QEQUIP a knot of raw fear. FIRE to throw. The knot drops down after a set time. RE-USE to drop the knot early. The knot ruptures on impact, holding nearby enemies in place. Held enemies are Deafened, and Decayed.
Bought with credits at the start of a round, and lost when you die.
EEQUIP a haunting watcher. FIRE to throw. The watcher drops down after a set time. RE-USE to drop the watcher early. The watcher lashes out on impact, Revealing enemies in its line of sight and creating terror trails to them. Enemies can destroy the watcher.
The signature ability — free every round, and on some agents it recharges through play rather than being bought.
XEQUIP the power of nightmare itself. FIRE to unleash a wave of unstoppable nightmare energy. Enemies caught in the wave are Marked by terror trails, Deafened, and Decayed.
Charged by ultimate orbs, kills, deaths and planting or defusing the spike.
They clear the way in. Reveals, flashes and displacement let a team enter a site without walking blind into held angles.
Two of Fade's abilities are bought with credits each round and lost on death. Haunt is the signature ability, so it's free every round, and Nightfall is the ultimate — it can't be bought at all, it charges through play.
Fade is a Initiator. They clear the way in. Reveals, flashes and displacement let a team enter a site without walking blind into held angles.
Fade's ultimate is Nightfall, bound to X. EQUIP the power of nightmare itself. FIRE to unleash a wave of unstoppable nightmare energy. Enemies caught in the wave are Marked by terror trails, Deafened, and Decayed.
Haunt. EQUIP a haunting watcher. FIRE to throw. The watcher drops down after a set time. RE-USE to drop the watcher early. The watcher lashes out on impact, Revealing enemies in its line of sight and creating terror trails to them. Enemies can destroy the watcher.
Fade has 4 abilities in total: Prowler, Seize, Haunt, Nightfall.
No. Fade was added after release — only 5 of the current agents shipped with the game at launch.
Fade has to be unlocked, like every agent beyond the starting few. You do that with Kingdom Credits earned by playing, or with VALORANT Points if you would rather not wait. Unlocking is permanent and no agent is ever sold as a stronger option — the roster is balanced, not tiered by price.
There are 7 in the Initiator role: Fade, Gekko, Breach, Tejo, KAY/O, Skye, Sova. Roles are the game's own grouping, not a community one, and they describe the job an agent does for the team rather than how strong they are.
How often professional teams actually pick Fade, measured across 1,820 tournament games played between 2026-05-22 and 2026-08-20. This is professional VALORANT, not ranked — the two behave differently, and a pick rate at this level says more about map strategy than about what wins games in a solo queue.
| Map | Pick rate | Win rate | Times picked |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lotus | 17.3% | 51.1% | 548 |
| Summit | 13% | 49.5% | 95 |
| Pearl | 11.9% | 45% | 169 |
| Fracture | 10.6% | 55.2% | 105 |
| Split | 8.9% | 52.5% | 240 |
| Sunset | 6.5% | 51.5% | 66 |
| Haven | 2.6% | 48.1% | 81 |
Pick rate is the share of the ten player slots in a game that this agent filled. Win rate hovers near 50% for almost every agent because professional matches are between evenly matched teams — a figure far from 50% usually means a small sample rather than a strong agent. Maps with too few games to be meaningful are left out entirely rather than shown with a warning.
Two of every agent's abilities are bought with credits at the start of a round and lost when you die. The signature is free on a cooldown, and the ultimate cannot be bought at all — it charges from kills, deaths, spike plants and orbs.
Fade was added after launch. Only 5 of the current roster shipped with the game, and the agents added since tend to carry more conditional or setup-heavy abilities than the originals.
During development Fade went by the internal codename BountyHunter, which is the name that still appears in the game files.
There are 29 playable agents in total, 7 of them in the Initiator role.
The other 6 agents who fill the Initiator role. If you like how Fade plays, these are the closest thing to a lateral move — same job on the team, different tools.
Interactions involving Fade, from either side — what their abilities do to other agents’ utility, and what other agents can do to theirs.
Fade Haunt reveals Omen Shrouded Step
The eye reveals agents in line of sight when it lands, so an Omen who teleports into its view is marked. Teleporting is not concealment — it moves you somewhere that may be watched.
Fade Prowler reveals Omen Dark Cover
The prowler follows trails into smoke and nearsights whoever it reaches inside — one of the few ways to punish a player holding inside their own smoke.
