Big CS:GO March Update

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive or CS:GO, has had a lot of interesting changes in the past few months. The most notable update though was the scoped rifles’ cost reduction in October of last year, and the latest update brings even more changes.

In this latest update the biggest change was towards the economy mechanics as well as a debuff to the AUG which I’ll write about later on. In Counter-Strike, you have to buy your own equipment with in-game money which you receive after winning or losing a round. Depending on whether or not you won or lost the round determines how much money your team gets.

Previously if your team won a round each player would get around $3250-$3600 depending on how your team won the round, and that stays the same. However, whenever you lost a round your team would get only $1400 each, and for every round you lost in a row you would get $1400 plus a $500 loss bonus for the number of rounds lost in a row. The maximum amount of money you could receive while losing is $3400 by losing four or more rounds in a row. This was to help the losing team to potentially make a comeback later on in the game if they were losing really badly. If you won a round after having a losing streak then immediately lose the next round; your loss bonus completely goes away bringing your team’s income back to $1400. In Counter-Strike it typically takes around $5000 for a full rifle buy with utility.

Keeping track of your team’s economy as well as the opposition’s can prove useful in winning certain rounds and determining what purchases would be in your team’s best economic interest. (If you survive the round you keep your current equipment and receive income for the next round. However, as a terrorist, you will not receive income for the next round if you survived and the round was lost due to the timer running out.)

The new change makes it easier for losing teams to have a better chance. With the economy update, losing rounds in a row still grants an extra $500 per round lost. However, losing the first round now gives you $1900 instead of $1400. Additionally, if your team had a accumulated a loss bonus, won a round, and then lost the next round; your income for the round lost would only be brought down by $500. For example, if my team had lost four rounds in a row our income would be at maximum loss bonus of $3400. If we won the next round by eliminating the enemy team we would receive $3250. With the new economy system instead of getting reset back down to $1400; my team would get an income of $2900 which is $500 less than $3400. This gives us a chance to have an improved loadout for the next round or potentially save for a full buy the round after.

Before the October update CS:GO and all previous Counter-Strike games have had the whole AK47 and M4 META (Most Effective Tactic Available). Whether you liked it or not these two rifles were the main weapons throughout the games’ generations. However in October, Valve released an update that reduced the two scoped rifles’ prices considerably. The AUG was made $3150 and the SG553 was made $2750. This was just $50 more than the main rifle for each team. Players used them more and people started to notice how effective the scoped rifles were. During the 2019 Katowice Major even the professional teams started to use the AUG in particular more than the M4. For a few months, the AUG was the main rifle of choice for the Counter Terrorist side.

With the economy change, Valve brought the price of just the AUG back up to $3300 which was its original price as well as bringing down a few of the shotguns’ prices by a few hundred dollars. Without changing the actual statistics of the weapons, Valve is trying to get players to use a larger variety of weapons instead of just the standard M4 and AK47.

Those were the main changes to the gameplay for this update. I think that the game is changing in a good way and provides players with more options towards what weapons they play with each round. In the past few months I think Valve has been doing a pretty decent job with their game.

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