Valorant Act 5: Abyss enters, Breeze exits — the map rotation of patch 13.04 and everything it doesn't touch

Valorant's 13.04 patch has been live since Tuesday, August 18, 2026. Riot released it at 1:00 PM UTC, and it kicks off Act 5 of the 2026 Season. All of its gameplay content fits in two lines: Abyss joins the Competitive and Deathmatch queues, Breeze leaves the Competitive and Deathmatch queues.

There's nothing else. No other map comes in or out, no agent gets a balance adjustment, no weapon is touched. Outside of the rotation, the official notes contain only four bug fixes, a cosmetic fix limited to PC, and the Premier mode update. That's information in itself: preparing for Act 5, this time, means brushing up on maps, not adapting to a new meta.

The practical consequence is immediate. Everything you had reviewed on Breeze before August 18 will no longer be of use to you in Competitive, and you probably don't have any up-to-date notes on Abyss, which has been absent from ranked queues for five months. If you're still relying on a map guide published in late July, its Breeze section is dead, and none of it covers Abyss.

What patch 13.04 changes, and nothing else

The official notes list the rotation under the heading "Map Pool Updates," in the "All Platforms" section. The two entries read as follows: "ABYSS JOINS the Competitive and Deathmatch queues" and "BREEZE LEAVES the Competitive and Deathmatch queues." The change therefore applies to both ranked and Deathmatch, on both PC and console.

The summary signed by Emily "ghoulies" Hu at the top of the notes says nothing more: "Act 5 is here, along with a few fixes to ensure the consistency of your progress in ranked matches." No new agent, no new map, no overhaul. The last brand-new map remains Summit, which arrived with patch 13.00 on June 23, 2026.

Another point many will be looking for: patch 13.03 doesn't exist. The numbering jumps directly from 13.02, released on July 28, 2026, to 13.04. The URL for the 13.03 notes returns a 404 error on playvalorant.com, in both French and English, and the list of related articles for 13.04 goes straight from 13.02 to 13.01 to 13.00 without interruption. Riot has not published any explanation for this skipped number.

Abyss: what Riot says about the map

Riot doesn't publish detailed layouts or map statistics in its patch notes. The only official description is the one on the Valorant website's Maps page, and it fits in three sentences: "Gaze into the abyss: a secret base rests deep within a bottomless, impenetrable chasm. Use your utility to send enemies plummeting to their deaths, but watch your step so you don't fall victim to your own traps. High risk comes with high reward, so it's up to you to come out on top."

Two elements are worth remembering, because they're the only ones the publisher commits to. The first: on Abyss, falling is a fully-fledged elimination method. The second: Riot explicitly presents movement utility as an offensive tool — pushing an opponent into the void is an intended game plan, not an accident of play. The corollary appears in the same sentence, spelled out in black and white: the trap can turn against whoever sets it.

For a ranked player, this shifts the hierarchy of risk. On a classic map, a poorly engaged duel costs a life. On Abyss, a poorly chosen position near an edge can cost the round without a single shot being exchanged. Until you've refreshed your memory of the edges, hold open angles further back than usual, and be wary of your own repositioning utility.

Abyss is nothing new. The map had left the Competitive and Deathmatch queues on March 17, 2026 with patch 12.05, along with Corrode. Its previous return dated back to August 19, 2025 and patch 11.04, which had brought it back into these same queues by removing Icebox. Give or take a day, Riot is putting it back into rotation a year later.

What Breeze's departure removes from the pool

Breeze had entered the Competitive and Deathmatch queues on January 6, 2026, with patch 12.00, which opened Season 2026, removing Sunset. It arrived following what Riot itself had presented as "the biggest map rework to date": softened angles, reduced open spaces, revised rotation timings for defenders. Four acts later, it's out.

What the pool loses is the type of gameplay Riot itself describes on its Maps page: "you'll have plenty of opportunity to admire the historic ruins and sea caves, but be sure to bring cover; you'll need it in the large open areas and for long-range engagements." Translated into match terms: long angles, ranged duels, and smoke used to cross open spaces.

If your personal comfort relied on the Operator on Breeze's main lanes, Act 5 takes away your most favorable terrain, and you'll need to rebuild your value elsewhere. Conversely, if you suffered through those long-range duels, the pool has just gotten easier for you. No return date has been announced for the map.

The Act 5 pool: our reconstruction, not an official list

Riot does not publish the complete list of maps in rotation. The publisher only announces additions and removals, patch by patch. The list below is therefore a reconstruction on our part, obtained by chaining together the successive rotations published in the official patch notes. You can verify it in thirty seconds: launch a Competitive queue and look at the maps on offer.

At the end of this chain, the Act 5 competitive pool contains seven of the thirteen maps in the game: Abyss, Ascent, Haven, Lotus, Split, Summit, and Sunset. The other six — Bind, Breeze, Corrode, Fracture, Icebox, and Pearl — remain outside the Competitive and Deathmatch queues. Let's repeat it: this is our own calculation, not a Riot publication, and it's up to the reader to judge.

Bug fixes shipped with the rotation

Just four fixes, all filed under "All Platforms." The labels below are those from the English version of the patch notes.

• Cypher — Spycam: Fixed an issue where the Spycam icon on the minimap was oriented incorrectly.
• Viper — Snake Bite: Fixed an issue where the equip animation displayed incorrectly from an enemy's point of view.
• Deadlock — GravNet: Fixed an issue where third-person visual effects could disappear after a player disconnected and reconnected to the game.
• Clove — Meddle and Ruse: Filed under "Stability," fixed an issue where repeatedly swapping between the two abilities could cause a player to freeze and disconnect.

The Clove fix is the heaviest of the four, because it wasn't about a display issue but about the game itself: a freeze followed by a disconnect in Competitive means a round played four-versus-five and a risk of penalty for the ejected player. Added to that, on PC only, is a cosmetic fix: the animation of transforming melee weapons, such as Kuronami 2.0 and Nocturnum, wasn't triggering when inspecting them.

The notes also include the Premier mode update for the V26A5 phase, which we covered separately.

What Riot didn't publish

The absence is almost as telling as the content. The 13.04 notes give no details on the Episode 5 battle pass: no tiers, no rewards, no end date. They announce no new agent and no new map. No agent or weapon balance changes accompany the start of this act.

Riot does, however, tease what's coming, without giving any dates: "stay tuned for more news coming in September," with "a new dev update on the horizon" and other unspecified announcements. Until that dev update is published, any detailed Episode 5 timeline circulating elsewhere is speculation.

Your priorities for entering Episode 5

1. Play your first matches on Abyss outside of ranked. The map has returned to both queues: use Deathmatch to relearn the edges and drop zones before bringing it into Competitive.
2. Set your Breeze notes aside. They won't be useful in Competitive again until the map is brought back, and no date has been announced.
3. Don't touch your agent settings or your buy habits. No balance changes shipped in 13.04: a weapon or agent tier list from before August 18 still holds up on that front — only its per-map section needs updating.
4. Don't build your schedule around the battle pass. Nothing official has been published about it.

Everything else will have to wait for September and the dev update Riot has announced. Until then, Episode 5 comes down to one map to relearn and one map to forget.