A Sentinel’s role extends beyond stalling and slowing down enemy pushes. Sentinels are often relied upon to provide support to teammates. Teammates count upon sentinels to hold down a bombsite independently. Sage is a Sentinel-class Agent in VALORANT.
Sage supports her allies through her Healing Orb and Ressurection abilities, helps keep her teammates fighting longer, and can even give a second life to fallen comrades.
Barrier Orb is Sage’s most flexible ability in her skill set. Her wall allows her to block off entryways and effectively stop enemies from rushing into her bombsite. However, as an Attacker, Sage’s Barrier Orb is often used for defensive post-plant setups, which block rotational lanes toward the bomb site.
We have compiled a few Barrier Orb setups for Attacking in Ascent you can use to help your team secure and defend a bomb plant. Let’s get started!
Sage: Sentinel Above Sentinels
Sage is a powerful support Agent under the Sentinel class. She embodies what a full-on Sentinel Agent should be; An Agent who can support her teammates to help them stay alive and kicking within the course of the round.
She is a powerful Defender who can stall or even stop enemies from fully entering the site she holds through her barrier and slow orbs. Sage’s skill set allows her to stall enemies enough to the point where Sage’s allies can rotate over to her side of the map to fight and defend against an attacker’s bombsite take.
Perhaps her most powerful abilities lie in her healing and her ultimate ability: Ressurection. Sage’s heal allows her to heal up worn-down allies to keep them fighting longer. Her Ressurection ability completely resurrects any fallen comrade to give them one more chance at winning the round.
Because of her skill set, Sage has become a popular pick for beginners and support-oriented players because of her simpler and more laid-back gameplay relative to the other Agent Classes in VALORANT.
However, Sage can be played beyond the stereotypical Sentinel Agent role with her Barrier Orb as her partner in crime.
Ascent A-site Attacking – Rafters Post-plant One-way Barrier Orb
A-site’s Rafters are the most common Defender rotational lane towards A-site. Defenders from the middle and B-site often took advantage of the Rafters’ high ground. Rafters are also the shortest route toward the A-site if you are coming from the middle of the B-site.
A-site’s Rafters are the most common rotational lane towards A-site for Defenders. Rafters is also the shortest route towards the A-site for Defenders coming from Ascent Middle and B-site. Defenders rotating from Ascent Middle and B-site often chose to take advantage of the Rafters’ high ground.
- Stand next to the middleboxes in the middle of the A-site:
2. Aim for this line on the back wall of the Rafters:
3. Rotate your Barrier Orb by pressing “C” so that it sits vertically:
4. Place the Barrier Orb by left-clicking:
It is tough to mess this up. Remember to keep your crosshair on the line on the wall, as mentioned above.
As you can see, a small gap is underneath the newly spawned Barrier Orb. You can shoot on the rotating Defenders’ legs through this gap.
Ascent Middle Attacking – Middle Barrier Orb Boost to Market
Ascent Middle will always be a crucial space to take control of. Not only does having control of Middle cut-off Defender rotations from either A-site or B-site, but it also gives your team the best chances of taking either site since your team will be entering from multiple angles.
This Barrier Orb setup for Ascent Middle aims to overwhelm any Defender holding Market with sheer numbers and awkward angles. Defenders must simultaneously deal with multiple players coming into the Lower Middle and Market area.
A quick reminder: Ask your Controller teammate to smoke off Short Cubby and Top Middle to block off Defenders holding Short Cubby and stop flankers from pushing up Top Middle.
- Look for this small gap between the black stacked boxes and the Middle Link wall:
2. Rotate your Barrier Orb vertically:
The wall boost should be enough to help you jump on top of the black box:
You can use this Barrier Orb to peek towards Market/Pizza/Defender Spawn.
Tip: Ensure the Barrier Orb does not go through the middle wall. Otherwise, the Market Defender will be alerted of your wall boost.
Ascent Middle Attacking – Top Middle Barrier Orb Boost
This next Barrier Orb boost can give you a great vantage point toward Middle Market. Given the importance of Middle Control in Ascent, your team must aim to push back or eliminate any Defender holding the Middle area.
You can use this Barrier Orb boost to quickly snipe off any player around the Market/Pizza area.
- Look for this Radianite Box at Top Middle:
2. Stand in the corner between the Radianite Box and the wall:
3. Pull out your Barrier Orb and rotate it so it sits vertically on top of the Radianite Box:
4. Now comes the tricky part. You will have to Crouch Jump to create a wall boost on top of this box. At the peak of your jump is when you want to create the Barrier Orb quickly.
It will take some practice, but as soon as you get the hang of it, you can start creating wall boosts for Top Middle and any reasonably tall box on the map.
You can use this Top Middle Barrier Orb boost to peek towards the Market. You can pick off unsuspecting Defenders around the Market/Pizza area.
Ascent B-site Attacking – B-Main Barrier Orb Boost
This next Barrier Orb setup is a common wall boost that has already been used repeatedly. This wall’s bird’s eye view can give Sage players vision over most of the B-Default area, Logs, Market, and even some of the Defender Spawn area.
You must use this wall sparingly as the enemy team will likely quickly adapt to this wall boost angle.
- Look for the Orb box inside B-Main:
2. Get on top of the Orb box. Do not forget to take the Orb, of course.
3. Once on top of the Orb box, place a wall underneath you Horizontally:
This wall boost will give you a great angle to quickly peek toward the B-site, Market, Logs, and some of the Defender Spawn.
Ascent B-site Attacking – Default Boxes Barrier Orb Boost
The last Barrier Orb setup on this list is difficult to pull off. Thankfully, this Barrier Orb setup is also the most rewarding out of all of the Barrier Orb setups on this list.
You can use Sage’s Barrier Orb ability to boost yourself to places that would otherwise be impossible to get on. The stack of boxes inside B-site Default is probably the tallest stack of boxes inside B-site. You can use these boxes to boost yourself further by using Sage’s Barrier Orb.
This Wall Boost will give you an almost unfair angle advantage towards Defender Spawn and B-Main Entrance. With your Phantom, you can tap away with your Vandal or spray down incoming enemies.
- From Lane, running crouch jump towards these boxes on B-site:
2. Once on top of the box, rotate your Barrier Orb so it sits vertically on the topmost box:
3. Like the Top-Middle box boost, you will have to Crouch Jump to create the wall. It will take some getting used to, but keep experimenting until you can consistently execute the wall boost:
This is a handy wall for post-plant in B-site. You get a bird’s-eye view of Defender Spawn, B-Main, and even some Pizza. You might be able to snipe off players around the Market/Pizza area with an Operator.
Sage: Sword
In most situations, Sage might still be better when played as a passive support Agent than an aggressive fragger. Her Heal can potentially give your team’s heavy hitters that little boost they need to frag out. Once Sage fills up her ultimate points, she can resurrect fallen allies to give her team one last chance to win the round.
Although Sage’s skill set deceptively screams “support-agent,” that does not mean players can not play her aggressively.
The walls featured here put “Support Sage” on the bench to bring out “Battle Sage.” This flexibility makes Sage a versatile Agent capable of supporting and entry fragging depending on your team’s needs. These Barrier Orb boost setups will help our Battle Sage score a few easy picks early in the round.
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