Riot's Vanguard cracks down on League of Legends and Valorant boosting, nearly 300,000 accounts banned

No matter which competitive shooter you prefer, two problems always seem to find their way into the ladder: smurfing and cheating. Some players point to Embark Studios' The Finals as their biggest headache, while Valorant fans complain that ranked matches keep getting ruined. Now Riot Games is taking visible action, continuing its push against boosting and rank manipulation across both League of Legends and Valorant, with close to 300,000 accounts penalized so far.

What Riot's Ban Wave Covers

The crackdown isn't aimed at ordinary players who simply have a bad game. Instead, Riot is targeting the ecosystem around ranked play: boosting services, account sellers, and players who deliberately manipulate their rank or other people's ranks. Boosting — where a stronger player logs into someone else's account or queues with them to inflate their position on the ladder — distorts matchmaking for everyone and undermines the meaning of a competitive rank.

By swinging the ban hammer on such a large scale, Riot is signaling that rank integrity is a priority worth enforcing across its biggest titles, not just one of them.

Why Smurfing and Boosting Hurt Everyone

The appeal for players who buy boosts or use smurf accounts is obvious: a shiny rank badge without the grind. But the cost falls on everyone else in the lobby. A boosted player placed above their true skill level gets stomped match after match, while their opponents face unwinnable games against someone who shouldn't be there in the first place. Matchmaking systems can only work when ranks honestly reflect ability.

Riot's action also sends a message to the commercial services selling boosting and account sales — the company is willing to act at scale, and the accounts involved are being removed from the game entirely.

What Happens Next

Players who've been affected by boosters in their matches should see cleaner lobbies as these accounts get removed. Anyone tempted to buy a boost should note that Riot's enforcement covers both the seller and the buyer, so the risk now extends to the customer's own account.

Riot has not announced an end date for the crackdown, and further ban waves are possible as the company continues reviewing reports and account data. Expect more announcements if the publisher keeps up the pace.

Source: the original publisher