Valorant Patch 13.04 Opens Act 5 With an Abyss-Breeze Map Swap and Four Agent Fixes

Riot rolled out Valorant patch 13.04 on August 18, opening Act 5 with a map pool swap and four agent bug fixes. The official patch notes confirm Abyss returns to the Competitive and Deathmatch queues while Breeze rotates out, alongside a stability fix and new Premier scheduling for the season's fifth stage.

Map pool:

• Abyss enters Competitive and Deathmatch queues.
• Breeze exits Competitive and Deathmatch queues.

Agent fixes:

• Cypher: the Spycam minimap icon no longer rotates incorrectly.
• Viper: Snake Bite's equip animation now displays correctly from an enemy's point of view.
• Deadlock: GravNet visual effects no longer disappear after a player disconnects and reconnects.
• Clove: repeatedly switching between Meddle and Ruse no longer freezes or disconnects players.

Cosmetics (PC only):

• Transforming melee weapons like Kuronami 2.0 and Nocturnum now animate correctly during their inspect sequence.

Premier (PC only):

• Stage V26A5 begins August 18 with a five-week match schedule instead of seven.
• A Premier Score of 450 or higher qualifies teams for Playoffs on September 20.
• Contender and Invite divisions run their own playoffs across September 19 and 20.

Act 5 follows a stretch of patches that leaned on competitive integrity as much as agent balance. Patch 13.02 raised Phoenix's ultimate cost and shelved the AROS: Replication mode indefinitely, and the patch before that imported League of Legends' rank-manipulation detection tools to flag boosters in ranked queues.

I read 13.04 as Riot clearing the decks rather than making its move. I'd guess the balance changes are being held back for the September Dev Update the patch notes already flag, not skipped for this cycle by accident.

Riot said more announcements are coming alongside that update, so Act 5's opener reads as maintenance ahead of the season's real news.