VALORANT Patch 12.09: Riot finally moves against shotgun meta

19 May 2026

The VALORANT Masters London 2026 is about a month away, at the moment of writing, and Riot Games has just released a major update. Under the name Patch 12.09, the developer has added much-needed balance to the game by nerfing Neon and the wider shotgun abilities in the game. Over the past few months, the aggressive, fast-paced playstyle facilitated by shotguns exceedingly dominated ranked games and professional matches, so Riot decided to reintroduce some balance, just a few weeks before the start of one of the major upcoming events for VALORANT and wider esports in the UK.

All about Neon

Well, it is not really ALL about Neon, but a lot of it is. That is because her combination of speed, entry power and the ability to pair with shotguns turned her into one of the most dominant, if not the most dominant, Duelists in the game. It came to such a point that the community started to complain about Neon’s dominance and Riot seems to have taken those criticisms to heart with the most recent Patch 12.09.

As a result, Neon has been nerfed considerably, resulting in a slower character with less explosiveness in close-range combat. The changes to Neon include the removal of a speed bonus while in the air after jumping with High Gear and an improved slide VFX to make her somewhat easier to read for opponents. Also, fuel will now only generate for Neon when her ultimate is active, with passive regeneration limited. It is the removal of the High Gear speed bonus that is expected to have the biggest impact, as it will reduce the number of fights in which she feels impossible to track.

Changes to shotguns

When we said it was not really ALL about Neon, this is what we meant. Because Neon had indeed become too powerful over the past few weeks, but that was made possible by the shotguns in VALORANT. When held by a high-mobility agent, shotguns like Bucky, Shorty and The Judge acutely turned into weapons with which to chain aggressive play after aggressive play together, often making opposition close to useless.

With Patch 12.09, Riot wants to return shotguns to the status they were once meant to have in VALORANT, namely the weapons of choice for a deliberate, defensive playing style meant to hold tight angles and clearing close-range spaces. Run, walk, crouch-walk and jump accuracy, for example, were standardised across all shotguns. Also, accuracy is multiplied by 15% when crouching, up from 10% (for Bucky) and down 10% (for the Judge and Shorty), and rope accuracy was significantly reduced for all three guns. On top of that, Riot also introduced a few nerfs specific to each individual shotgun.

VALORANT London Masters 2026

As you can see, Patch 12.09 is no small change, and it will be exciting to see how the changes to Neon and the shotguns will affect wider gameplay during the events and tournaments to come. One of the first up in that category is the VALORANT London Masters 2026, which will take place at the Copper Box Arena from June 6th to June 21st. The twelve best teams in the world will compete for a share of the $ 1 million prize pool in our capital.