Post-plant Guide: How to Play Post-Plant in Valorant

Can you secure the site and plant the Spike but somehow always end up losing? Here's our post-plant guide to help you out.

Photo of author

Anwell Patdu

post-plant guide valorant title card

Post-plant Guide: Key Takeaways

  • Post-plant refers to the stage of the game where the Spike has already been planted.
  • Our post-plant guide will focus on the different strategies and things you should be doing on both sides.
  • During the post-plant, the goals shift. The Defenders try to take the site while the Attackers try to prevent them.

Post-plant is a whole other phase of Valorant that most people tend to struggle with. Defending and Attacking can be easy, but post-plant play is just different because of the tight time constraint.

Most rounds get decided during post-plant. This is why it’s important to keep your head in the game and focus on closing during post-plants. To help you out, we have a couple of tips in our post-plant guide for Valorant.

Make sure to check out the Z League App to earn rewards by playing your favorite games, connecting with a friendly gamer community, or joining a Valorant tournament within minutes!

Post-plant Guide Tips for Attackers

These tips are meant for Attackers, who essentially turn into Defenders during the post-plant stage.

Play for Lineups

Playing for lineups as Brimstone.
Image via Riot Games

The first tip in our post-plat guide for Valorant is to play for lineups. This is a core post-plant rule and has been the go-to ever since it became meta. Lineups are hard to counter and eat up a lot of the enemies’ time. This forces them to either push their way to find you or wait for the mollys to finish and play with the time they have left.

Brimstone, Killjoy, KAY/O, Gekko, and Viper are some of the best agents for post-plant lineups.

Aggressively Push for Control

Now, I know this sounds a bit contrasting to the main goal of post-plant. But trust me; this can definitely work if you do it right. This is mostly great for Duelists who can set their selves up and get frags. Pushing deep into the map allows your team to get more map control. This will make it harder for your enemies to regain control of the site.

Aggressively pushing also puts you in a position where enemies won’t expect that much. This gives you the advantage and might get you a few kills in the process. However, this is best done alone, and make sure that the other members of your team are playing more passively.

Play for Trades

The final tip for Attackers in our post-plan guide is to simply play for trades. Play in positions where you can easily trade your allies whenever they or the enemy peeks. You can choose to stack and use the high-low strat, where one player is positioned higher than the other. You can also simply use crossfires and stay within line of sight.

Playing for trades is crucial and can easily win you rounds, especially if you have the numbers advantage. Not too many players will play for trades in Competitive, which definitely gives you a huge advantage.

Post-plant Guide Tips for Defenders

The next set of tips in our post-plant guide is meant for Defenders. These are geared toward retaking the site and playing for the defuse.

Push With Your Team

This is an essential and core mechanic that most players should already know. Unfortunately, this is often forgotten, mostly because most players play for stats or kills instead of trying to win the game.

The main reason why you should push with your team is so that you can play for trades. Playing for trades puts you in a position to get kills even if your allies aren’t.

Tap the Spike Early

Defusing the spike early
Image via Riot Games

I can’t stress this enough. Tapping the Spike early puts crazy pressure on your enemies. This will keep them on their toes and use up any remaining utility they might have. This includes things like ultimates, lineups, and smokes, allowing you to waste it early on during the post-plant stage.

Use Your Smokes

The final tip in our post-plant guide is to use your smokes. You can use your smoke to cover sight lines or use it to cover the Spike. Just use it in anyway you can that will greatly benefit your team. It forces enemies to peek or use their abilities to find your location. It also provides your team with much-needed cover.