This guide is a work in Progress, rebuilding a former guide I had written and lost in the aftermath of a motorcycle accident in 2018 which broke both of my legs and put my head through a windshield when someone violated my right of way in a sedan. Needless to say it means a great deal to me to put this back together and I thank all of my friends and former team mates for their support.

This was made from information found on the steam guides community as well as reddit info, youtube and other such resources. If there is any information in this guide which needs to be updated, or that you feel should be included, please leave a comment below so that I can work to improve this guide.

Found yourself stuck in the same rank and can’t seem to get out of it?
Just browsing and dont have time to read a whole guide?
Here Is a quick mini guide with tips to help you focus your training.
This quick guide is not an exact answer for all your problems, but it might be a good place to start

Silvers and Gold Novas: Try to improve your hand-eye coordination and general aim. This can be done by playing a lot of deathmatch for example. Remember to buy armor, it is crucial, especially at this level where a lot of people won't immediately hit their headshots. If you are low on money and not on Eco, buy body armor and then you can decide which gun you can afford. Armor > gun.

Master Guardians (AK’s): Your aim is probably okay at this point. Important thing is map design, get to know the maps you play. The flow, timings, layout. Study strategies for Terrorist play, as this is often the weaker side for most where you have to play offensive.

Distinguished Master Guardian (DMG): Most people in this rank could really improve by getting positioning right. Learn to hold your angles and get positioning right. Also have confidence in Eco rounds and learn the economy in CS:GO.

Eagles: Trust your teammates, you are not in Silver anymore. What really tends to be a problem on this level is inconsistency, sometimes you play like a god, other times you think that your place should be in the Silvers. NaToSaphiX made a good video about consistency in CS:GO.

Once you hit DMG and above, teamplay really becomes a big factor in winning. In the lower ranks, it is not as important and it is easier to get carried. Lower ranks is where you benefit the most for self improvement (below DMG). I think this might also be why people used to refer to a “DMG hell“. People feel like they are stuck forever in this rank no matter what they try to improve, it doesn’t get them in higher ranks. It could be because teamplay gets more important at this level.

First, sometimes you can’t. People can be d**kheads and there is nothing to do about it.
Second get a mic, and use it.

What you can do to improve the overall teamplay, is promote good behavior and encourage your teammates. Tell them they did a good job when they did, and nice try if they failed. Everybody fails sometimes anyway. Never begin to argue with teammates, don’t be a troll and don’t feed trolls. Try not to get emotional, it is only a game after all. When people begin to rage or get emotional, tell them to calm down without being angry yourself. If they continue being toxic, for gods sake, just ignore them.. Remember you can always mute them. Don’t be toxic yourself, this will almost certainly not improve the overall performance of your team. Also ignore taunts from the opposite team. If you think one from the other team is cheating, silently report them and play on. Overwatch will take care of them. Often times the other team is not cheating, and calling them hackers will only boost their confidence.

• Play DM or workshop training map.
  
• Always play Prime Matchmaking.
  
• Learn crosshair placement.
  
• Learn callouts on all maps you gonna play.
  
• Learn how to anticipate your enemy.
  
• Stop talking in clutch situations.
  
• Never flame or rage at your teammates.
  
• Never underestimate your enemy, even if you're winning 10-0.
  
• Never reload your gun if you're not sure you're safe.
  
• Don't expect to do well on every match.
  
• If you're tired just stop playing.

• Don't call "A/B" simply because you have been flashed or smoked on a site.
  
• If you see 3 enemies at "A" or "B", don't call "All A/B" or "It's A/B".
  
• Always buy grenade/smoke/flash when possible.
  
• Never forget to buy defuse kit if you have enough money.
  
• Play passive if you're CT, unless you're on eco. If T don't play way too passive, being passive requires a knowledge of some team strats.
  
• Make sure you're not covering the same spot as your teammate.
  
• Always cover someone who is planting the bomb. If you're carrying the bomb always say where you gonna plant it.
  
• If you're rushing site as T, never go all the same way. Try to lurk in order to kill someone from their backs.
  
• Try to avoid camping all on bomb site when bomb is planted.
  
• As CT if you spot the bomb don't call to rotate, unless it's a full rush.
  
• Always check your teammates economy, never buy unless everyone can. The only exception is when someone is saving for AWP.
  
• If not all can buy, eco, drop if possible or ask for drop.
  
• Always eco together.
  
• If you are in retake situation, always go different ways.
  
• If you're CT in 2v1 situation, always try to stay together.
  
• If bomb is dropped, try to defend from different positions.

The first two rounds are crucial to your teams economy, please play smartt so that your team does not suffer due to a lone wolf buyer, buy as a team.
Click here to check out an in depth buying guide![www.metabomb.net]

Counter-Terrorist
1st round:
USP/P2000+kevlar.

2nd round:
If you won 1st round, buy UMP+kevlar/helmet+smoke/flash/HE+defuse kit.
If you lost 1st round, buy P250/Deagle+kevlar+defuse kit.

Terrorist
1st round:
Glock+kevlar.

2nd round:
If you won 1st round buy mp7+kevlar/helmet+smoke/flash/HE.
If you lost 1st round with plant then full eco.
If you lost 1st round without plant, buy p250+kevlar/helmet+smoke/flash/HE.

Headphones and headsets are far better suited than speakers to play CS:GO because they will give you a more accurate acoustic representation of distance and location (headphones make it easier to hear where exactly an enemy is, unless you have a proper 5.1 or 7.1 setup installed in your room). What's more, when using speakers, your in-game sound will be recorded every time you communicate with your teammates, creating an annoying feedback for the team.

Then you'll need a microphone.
This game requires you to communicate with your teammates and you need to be able to do so.
You should start an empty server (Play -> play with bots -> no bots), use the command "voice_loopback 1" and talk. The game will play your voice back and you can hear what your teammates would hear in a real game.

PLEASE adjust your volume setting so that your microphone actually transmits your voice and not just loud noise. People will mute you because you're annoying and you lose the ability to communicate, usually resulting in a lost game. When you're done, use "voice_loopback 0" to turn it off again.

Also, you should make sure to have a large mouse pad so you have enough space to move your mouse. The problem with small mouse pads is that you need to lift and reset your mouse a lot because you reached the border. This makes movement and sometimes even aiming a chore. I personally recommend the SteelSeries QcK Heavy or any Magic the Gathering Playmat.

Increasing the Digital Vibrance (Nvidia) / Colour Saturation (AMD) setting in your GPU driver panel will make the game have more saturated colours which allows you to spot players more easily so I recommend doing that.

Most players play on 16:9 stretched. This makes bodies bigger in size and makes them easier to hit and give you more fps then normal 16:9. If you more of 4:3 type player your advantages will be better fps performance, 4:3 is the best for AWPers, the downside of this is that you won't be able to see 180ˇ like on 16:9.

Make sure you have AT LEAST 60 FPS if you have a 60Hz monitor and 120/144 FPS if you have a 120/144 Hz monitor. If needed, turn all the details to low, turn off anti aliasing, lower your resolution, play in 4:3... Whatever is needed. You want your game to run as smoothly as possible because it's harder to hit an enemy when he's teleporting around on your screen. Yes, your precious skin might look ugly on low settings, but this guide is about getting better at the game, not about looking pretty. If you can, leave shadows on high because it also increases the shadow draw distance (depending on the spot, you see shadows from enemy players before they peek. With shadows on high you can see these shadows even when the enemy player is further away).

Here's a video from Eric "adreN" Hoag (who is a professional CS player in NA) explaining how exactly it works:
https://youtu.be/MsDQDbh5lQM
Here's another video. This is 3kliksphilip talking about the best settings for anti-aliasing and how it can make it easier to spot enemies:
https://youtu.be/uUmRKryhS8A
Disable Auto weapon switch.
When this is enabled, you will automatically switch to a primary weapon when you pick one up - and for the time until you switched, you won't be able to shoot. This will almost always get you killed when it happens while you're fighting someone so I highly recommend disabling this.

Set up your max-ping
You should set your max-ping to something around 50-100 in order to avoid laggy high-ping servers. The lower your ping is, the better - but keep in mind that when you set your limit too low (for example 10), the game will have trouble finding a match for you because there are no servers giving you that ping.

Finding Your Sensitivity
The first thing you should do here is to turn off mouse acceleration and turn on raw-input.
Mouse acceleration changes your sensitivity based on the speed you move your mouse with. Without acceleration, you move your mouse twice as fast and your crosshair moves twice as fast, like it should be. With acceleration enabled however, you could move your mouse twice as fast and your crosshair moves three times as fast. This messes with your muscle memory which is why you should turn it off.

Raw-input makes it so the game ignores any sensitivity or acceleration settings outside of the game (e.g. Windows settings) which is why you should turn it on.

The lower your sensitivity is, the more precise you'll be able to aim and make small corrections,but it also means you'll need to do bigger swipes to turn around. On the other hand, playing with a higher sensitivity will make it harder to pin down heads at further distance but it makes it easier to move around the map. Most players play with something around 400 CPI and 1.5-4.0 in-game to give you a starting point.

This is again a video from Eric "adreN" Hoag about finding your own sensitivity:
https://youtu.be/RwT5fXEloxg
The most important thing is that you need to find a sensitivity that feels right for you. There's no "wrong" setting here, it's all about what you like best. However, if you find yourself constantly under- or overshooting (moving your mouse not far enough or too far) when you want to aim at targets, you might consider changing your sensitivity to counter that.

You need to have the crosshair that suits you and not copied from some pro player. To get your crosshair go to this workshop map choose a crosshair that you most like.

This is entirely up to you. Some people prefer the classic crosshair, other people play only with a dot (dothair), others change the variables so they have a small rectangle (boxhair). If you feel like it, you could even make it look like a hashtag.

Dynamic crosshairs (the ones that change size depending on what you're doing) can give you an advantage because they show you when your weapon is accurate and when it isn't - yes, this is for you, dear "I move and shoot at the same time" people! However, a lot of people are annoyed by the crosshair moving around and after playing for a while, you get a feeling for that anyways so it's really about preference.

Does a crosshair make me better?
No. A crosshair is there to show you where the middle of your screen is located (and where your bullets go). As long as your crosshair is practical and not something ridiculous that covers half of your screen and makes you unable to see enemies, that is.

You can use these Workshop maps for everything that is related to crosshairs and viewmodels:
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=308490450
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=365126929
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=156711606

Downloading and Starting Training_Aim_CSGO
To download the map, first you need to go to the Play Tab in your game, select OFFLINE WITH BOTS, click Workshop, and then click View Workshop. After that, A Steam window will come up with the CS:GO Workshop. Search for Training_Aim_CSGO and hit enter or click the search button. Put your mouse over the first map by AddictedPro and click the icon with the plus sign. If you do not see the plus sign, you can easily click on the map, and click the subscribe button so that it states Subscribed. Now you can go back to the game and the map should be available in the map list.

Click on the map and click go. Make sure you assign the first bullet to No Bots, click GO and wait for the map to load. Once you are in the map, you will spawn under it. In order to get on the training area, you need to make sure console is on, and then open it.

You can open the console using the tilde key, usually beside the “1” key on your keyboard. Once its open, type “sv_cheats 1” hit submit. Then type “noclip 1” and hit submit. You should be able to look up, press W and go to the training area then type “noclip 0” to return to normal state.

Testing Your Accuracy
Okay, you are now in! To the right there are various weapons. Pick either M4A4, M4A1-S or AK-47 (since the map is not updated, in order to get an M4A1-S you need to open console again and type "give weapon_m4a1_silencer", without the quotes). To your left will be the control panel. Do not move anything yet. There are various training types to use but you only need the default one today, the one called Classic Fast Aiming.
https://youtu.be/ZrLbm5xJhdA
Face the shooting range and get ready to shoot. Once ready, go up to the start button, and press E. Step back, and try to hit as many targets as you can. Every time you hit a target, try to go back to the middle before continuing to the next one.

Afterwards, check how you did. How many did you hit? If you hit more than 20 out of 25 then you did good. If you did not, you might need to find your appropriate sensitivity.

You can use these training maps to develop muscle memory:
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=213240871
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=647772108
When you feel comfortable with your sensitivity and muscle memory, you should start playing headshot deathmatch. Click the "Play" tab, then "Community Servers" and search for "headshot". Refresh the list.

You will find a lot of headshot deathmach servers. Play a lot of that, preferably every day. The difference to regular Valve deathmatch is that people can only be killed by landing headshots, the average skill level is higher than in Valve deathmatch and there is no spawn protection.

Focus on getting the kill with the first bullet. Don't spray EVER. The max you should do is short bursts of 3-4 bullets. The goal of this whole game mode is that you drill yourself to aim at the head first and shoot second, not the other way around. Why? Because getting headshots is a very crucial part in this game! They deal WAY more damage than body shots. If you are very good at shooting people in the head, you're going to win a lot of duels. That's how simple this game can be.

The only exception from this rule is the AWP. Because it is very powerful and kills a player in one shot even when you hit the body, you should go for the body shot because it is much bigger and easier to hit.
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=303916990

I’m not going to go into an in-depth guide to each weapon. In CS there are certain viable options and others never will be. In CS:GO we have way more viable options, but most roles are perfectly filled by the ones mentioned below.

The Deagle was the most powerful pistol in the game. I just realized I never updated this section after the dawn of the 2 day deagle. The 1.23.13 update made the deagle amazing, but it has since been nerfed. The Deagle is too inaccurate and it is not worth trying to use. A player with a Deagle is shooting a random number generator at his opponent. Better to go with the p250/CZ or FiveSeven.

The CZ I'll admit, I hate the CZ. Maybe it's because I'm old fuddy duddy but I do not feel like a fully automatic pistol is appropriate for CS, but while it's currently broken we might as well abuse it. Abuse it so hard Valve has to change it! Think of the CZ as a combination AK/Shotgun. You need to get up on your opponents, and gank them. Play close, hidden positions, and surprise your enemy.

The P250 was my new Deagle replacement. I find it to be infinitely more accurate and enjoy how rapidly you can fire it with minimal recoil. Pretend you are playing Quake with this gun. It’s almost always perfectly accurate, even at full speed, and when aimed accordingly can definitely win rounds. It’s not as effective as the Deagle, but cheap enough that you can also buy a grenade. With the recent boost in glock and p2000 power I'm not sure what role the P250 will fill.

The FiveSeven Is kind of like a P90. It excels at close range, and can destroy people as you run around on roller skates. The p250 and p2k are better at long range, but if you are holding a site by yourself, such as B on D2, I cannot recommend this enough.

The Dualies are like an MP5, 30 bullets and deadly accurate. Against opponents lacking head armor this gun will ace rounds. If you want to do a pistol round buy and don’t fancy yourself in need of a grenade go with the dualies and rock faces.

The Glock is awesome. I prefer it over the USP. Many players disagree, but I like having the back up ammo in the clip to make multiple frags. Just shoot it fast. 9 times out 10 on T side pistol round I go glock armor. Just shoot it at the face as fast as possible while juking and hope for the best.

The USP is kind of a jerk. Why? You’re holding a site as a CT and every one of it’s 12 bullets is critical. Shoot the USP slowly and don’t panic. If you panic, you’ll only get one entry frag. It is your responsibility to get at least two.

On eco rounds, those rounds when a team is saving, you should always go for an SMG or shotgun because they give you more money per kill. If you win pistol, you want to use rounds 2 and 3 to build up a money bank. Players who buy AKs on second round are idiots and should be scolded appropriately. The SMGs are better against opponents lacking head armor than rifles. The P90 is the Jesus of the SMG family. If you can afford it, do it. If you didn’t get a kill, or are saving for an AWP, an MP7 can be a good choice. The MP7 doesn’t hit as hard as the P90, or have the back up reserve of ammo, but it tears through attackers at close range fairly well for its cost.

I highly recommend using the Mag7 (CT) or the Sawed off shotguns (T). Basically the shot guns are designed for you to steal a gun on eco rounds. Buy one of the two listed above and hit up a close corners encounter point. The best example I can possibly give you is inside lower on train. If you turn the corner after jumping the rail you have a 75 percent chance of 1 shotting a CT getting into position. This will grant you with a free M4. Grab the M4, win the rounds.

Oh yeah, never buy the Bizon. Ever. I’m not joking, unless you are European. Those guys seem to make it work.

Alright. Here’s the meat of it. I used to tell new players, there’s not as much recoil as you think there is. It used to be the golden rule of CS. Nowadays, this isn’t very true. CS:Go rewards timing control more than direction control. Yes, you can still predict a spray, however it is widely more unpredictable than before. For this reason you are better off firing in incredibly small controlled bursts. With the AK always try for 2-3 shot bursts at long/medium range, and with the m4 you can get away with 3-5 shots.

Check out n0thing's amazing, hyper informative
https://youtu.be/G3jAOcjIBfk
When spraying notice the “T” shape to the spray. After it moves down a bit it then starts introducing horizontal sway. Use this to “cut” off an opponents head when you’re in a jam. A lot of new players start off spraying at the feet, and eventually wait for the tip of the “T” to eventually grant a miraculous head shot. Don’t be this kind of stupid. Start off aiming at the neck, and then pull down slowly while accelerating your recoil mitigation as you go. Pull down slow, finish fast and to the left. If you need to compensate right for leftward drift, you've been spraying too long. The recoil becomes exponentially more inaccurate as you go. Study this detailed website for recoil patterns[twowordbird.com]

Remember, your recoil also decreases exponentially. This means an insanely brief delay in firing equates to almost complete recoil depletion and an accuracy reset.

Now in CS:GO the Sig and the Aug are viable options due to their new found reduced recoil, high damage output, and improved scope.

The AWP is a special beast and I could write an entire column on it. Basically, a lot of the advice written here goes out the window when using an AWP. The peekers advantage is reversed. A defending player watching a corner with an AWP has an extreme advantage. I’ll go deeper into depth with peekers advantage in a little bit. When AWPing, defensive positioning is key.

When running around the map with your awp leave it unzoomed. Obtain a target, zoom, and shoot, all in one motion. Flip back to your pistol to unzoom the AWP and repeat the process. When you master the flick shot technique you’ll be able to kill anyone instantly who dares to disturb you. Remember, zoom and shoot all in one motion. Some people put a marker on their screen so they can see the crosshair unzoomed, but I believe this is for scrubs. Once you get good at centering you won’t need a marker. When aiming the AWP aim it from the hip, center your target, and in those few frames between zooming and shooting make your final corrections. With practice it will look like one fluid motion.

Or you can just camp a corner, pick your mouse off the pad, and fire when someone crosses your screen. Seriously, this actually works.

Use your walk key when stutter-stepping with the AWP to break yourself with more control. For some reason the AWP floats more in CS:GO than in Source and by using walk when stutter stepping you can help reduce it and ground yourself more firmly when firing.

The walk-peek is an AWP technique to gain an entry frag. When you walk with an AWP zoomed, you actually see players around corners before they see you. This is the only time you want to walk around a corner.

Now the Negev is probably worth the money. Imagine a fully automatic shotgun that never needed to take breaks between shots or reload. That’s the Negev. In close quarters it makes for a hilariously good time. Feel free to invest in this bad boy and put the fear of God into your opponents. Just shoot it. Don’t worry about the recoil so much. With 150 bullets coming out a second in point blank range focus on quantity over quality. The other machine gun is terrible.

Now let us talk about Shooting. I get many questions on how I get headshots. In addition, the answer is easy. Just aim for the head. If you are constantly aiming for the head, there is less chance of you having to waste precious seconds adjusting your crosshair for a headshot. Sure, you can kill with body shots, but they take longer, and risk you losing precious health. For example, if you are holding an inside angle, and you want an advantage over the enemy, ANTICIPATION will help you like no other. Anticipation is giving yourself enough reaction time to see the enemy and letting them across your crosshairs, making it easier for yourself to eliminate him. My students and I use this constantly and it leads to many hackusations, when all we really did is give ourselves reaction time and just click whenever an enemy crosses our crosshair. It does not get any easier than that. Moreover, that simple headshot just created an abundance of opportunities and advantages that could help win the round.

Shooting Techniques: Introduction
There are three different shooting techniques in this game - "tapping", "bursting" and "spraying". All of them have advantages and disadvantages, as well as different purposes and using the right technique in the right situation will make you much more effective at killing people.

Shooting Techniques: Tapping
Tapping is the easiest way to shoot your weapon - as the name already suggests, you tap your fire button to shoot single bullets in quick succession. This technique is most useful to shoot at further distances or small targets (e.g. enemies hiding behind cover where you can only see their head). Quick tip: when you know an enemy crouches behind a box, you can put your crosshair where his head would be and start tapping - he's now forced to stay crouched and can't shoot at your teammates! If he decides to stand up anyways, you're shooting there and can grab an easy kill.

It is very important to know the spread reset speed - basically the "rhythm" - of your gun. If you fire faster than your spread resets, your shots will become less and less accurate because the spread couldn't fully reset before you fired your next round and there is still some "leftover" spread from your last shot.

Shooting Techniques: Bursting
A burst is a middle ground between tapping and spraying. You hold down your fire button for a short time and shoot a few bullets but then you stop and let the recoil reset, so you can keep up your accuracy. This technique can be used at all distances but it's most effective when you're fighting at medium distance. Depending on the distance, you can do shorter bursts of 2-4 bullets or longer ones of 5-8 bullets. Whatever suits the situation best - which is why bursting is the most popular shooting technique, it's very versatile.

You don't even need to know the full recoil patterns of most weapons to do very accurate bursts. In general, you can get away with it if you just pull down a bit with your mouse as you begin the burst. (how much you need to pull down depends on the weapon you're using. You'll need to pull down further when shooting an AK compared to an M4A1-S).

Shooting Techniques: Spraying
Full sprays have one advantage - this is the fastest way to shoot a lot of bullets. Usually, this is not very accurate unless you're REALLY good at controlling spray patterns. It is however very effective when a lot of enemy players are grouped up (for example against the infamous Dust2 B-Rush) or you're fighting at very close to medium distance and you just want to deal as much damage as quickly as possible.

Here, you can see every weapon, their respective spray pattern and the mouse movement needed to counter it:
http://csgoskills.com/academy/spray-patterns/

Shooting Techniques: Prefire
Every map has some spots that are very popular.
Spots like the plateau box on the B site of Dust2, Coils and connector on the B site of Inferno or Heaven and the rails above squeaky on Nuke.

When you're attacking a bomb site, it's usually worth to fire a few bullets at these spots just in case. When someone was playing that spot, you just rekt that guy and possibly won your team the round. When there's none playing that spot, you have now cleared it, know there's no enemy and your team can focus on the other spots.

Shooting: Distance Shooting
In order to shoot accurately, you must learn to shoot appropriately based on distance. You are not going to spray at a person over miles and hope to get a shot. What you need to do is control those shots accordingly. For example, if an opponent is far, you should try shooting one bullet at a time, so that your shots stay precise and lead to a kill. If the opponent is at a medium range, bursting, or holding the fire button for a second or two, is appropriate, as it leads to a short burst of 3-5 bullets over a medium sized area and can do high amounts of damage. Only when an opponent is at touching distance, only then, is it appropriate to spray, and even so, controlled with the help of recoil patterns.
https://youtu.be/bOlTnc3UsnI
Every single gun has a recoil pattern. An unaffected pattern, unlike the previous Counter Strikes. I would recommend researching the recoil patterns of your most used guns, or the guns you want to learn how to use better. Knowing recoil patterns can lead to more accurate bursting and spraying at medium to close ranges.

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=243468228
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=200670434
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=601983527

Crosshair placement is a huge factor in winning your duels because it allows you to start fighting an enemy the moment you see him without having to make huge flicks across your screen. That'll make you faster and more consistent, you'll get caught less often and overall kill more poeple while dying less often yourself. When you move around a corner, the enemy player is already aiming at your head and you're still aiming at a wall, you'll have a hard time winning that duel.
Have you ever move around a corner and been shot in the head instantly? This is why.
https://youtu.be/3XSLVlZLMdU
https://youtu.be/U9mvXfnY8wU
You always want to have your crosshair at head level at the corner where the enemy player is most likely going to appear on the spot you're checking.

Also, look at what your teammates are doing.

When two of your teammates watch the same door, don't watch that door too - watch another angle instead so the enemy players can't flank your teammates and kill them for free because no one was there to stop him.

When you play Dust 2 and your teammates are all out on A long, shooting at the guy in A site: watch the double door for a CT rushing in behind you. This can make the difference between you getting a kill and being up 5v4 or the other guy coming up behind you and totally wreck your team. Don't be that guy who lets his teammates die because none watched the flanks!

Grenades
Decoys are dumb. Decoys are only useful in such specific situations that you would be better off spending the money on a flash which ALWAYS has utility. The order of priority for grenades ALWAYS should be
1. Smoke
2. Flash
3. HE

Smoke over flash? ARE YOU MAD? No, and I'll tell you why. Flashes win encounters, but smokes win rounds. Controlling space is VERY important. It's so important I cannot properly articulate it. Always go for a smoke over a flash. Hell, when you're backed against the wall you can always fake flash with your smoke. It's more important to die for an awesome smoke and take a site than it is to flash and make a frag.

Also, defensive smokes are God's gift to CT side eco rounds.

If you want to get really tricky throw your nades while running backwards for extra floating. This way you can drop some awesome flash bangs.

What about Molotovs?

At our level, molotov grenades are priced out of our general tool kit. They require high level team play to be highly effective, as you can use them to zone out your opponents and push them into your team mates' loving embrace. For 800 bucks, you better not screw it up. For example, using molotovs at B on inferno you can zone players out of new box or oranges. I don't recommend using them unless you are playing with organized players who understand how to combine them with team play to secure sites.

If you're playing defense you'd be better off stopping a rush with a smoke, because armored attackers can run right through a molotov with only 20-30 hit points of damage. No one survives running through a smoke grenade.
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=359458939
Smokes and Flashes can control a game, here are some maps to help you practice:
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=496123922
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1079988970
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=644518351
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=707984520
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=765936384

Retakes
Once the Terrorist side has planted the bomb, then comes time for the CT's to re take the site.
Practice retakes with these maps:
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=751710579
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=762717180
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=694731018
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=793135607

Get aggressive. The peeker in CS has an advantage. Peekers advantage means you’ll see the defender before he’ll see you. This is true in all situations except when peeking against an AWP already in position. Make people react to you. You never want to be reacting to others. By playing aggressively you get to dictate flow. Now, if someone knows where you are you need to readjust immediately or push them. Think of it like Judo, you need to use your opponent’s momentum against him. So let’s say I unpeek a corner, and you’re coming after me. I’m going to wait until the very moment you step in and begin to come around the corner, then, the very moment you’re moving to engage, I’m going to come out on you. By sweeping into someone’s turn I’ve now caught them flat footed and can finish them off. This is a very important lesson. Aggress into aggression.

To gain peeker’s advantage as a defensive player stutter step back and forth while covering an area. This way, you’ll be peeking into an advancing player granting you an advantage, and even more importantly it reduces the probability you will be prefired! If you aren’t peeking 75 percent of the time, that’s 75 percent more time you aren’t getting prefired in the face.

means to begin shooting into a location before you’ve peeked the corner. It’s basically moving and shooting in a single action. If someone’s location is known, they cannot out-react a prefire, and they will perish. Do not be afraid to prefire known hiding spots.

Learn the encounter points. They’re obviously specific to each map. Once you figure it out learn how to flash push into encounter points so you can take extra ground and set yourself up for a play.

When playing a defensive angle, it is infinitely valuable to play a passive angle. What does this mean? Alright, let me set up a scenario. You’re on A site as a CT on dust2 watching catwalk. You’re behind the food crates. You should not be peeking at the catbox. Instead, position yourself so you are aimed a little bit to the right of catbox. This way, a T player peeking the catwalk corner will not see you in the site. It is only upon him stepping up catwalk and beginning his approach that you are visible. Now, he has no where to go, and he is caught by surprise. Even better, you didn’t get peeked. A passive angle is one where you do not engage corner to corner, but rather let your opponent clear his peek spot before engaging. This is easier to demonstrate in video and perhaps I will set up some video tutorials later.

Let your team mate fire from one corner while you set up an ambush on the other. Your team mate goes passive, and then when your opponents charge him you can pick up the frags. This is the easiest play to set up and the most effective.

Let me set up a scenario as an example. The bomb is planted on A site on inferno. You and your team mate are CTs trying to retake the site against a single terrorist. Should you split up and one person go attack from truck side and the other player from arch side so you surround the site? Or should you both pick a side and go together?

9/10 players will choose the first option. They are all wrong and bad. See, people believe that surrounding your enemy is the appropriate response. Unfortunately, Sun Tzu never played CS. If you chose to surround your opponent you have now granted him two 1v1 scenarios. Each engagement happens independently and he has a high chance of victory. If you chose the second option you’re now engaging at the same time. This is a 1v2 scenario at the point of engagement. In the worst case scenario your opponents kills your team mate and you kill him. This is known as an effective trade.

If you are the terrorist in this scenario you need to push out, get aggressive, and kill one of the rotating players before they can link up. Ideally, you can force a 1v1 engagement on each one of them.

I am writing this addition because I see good players make this mistake all the time. Even I, on rare occasion, make this single stupid error. When in a 1v1 situation you should virtually never, ever, throw a grenade. You need to have your gun out and make a frag. A lot of people panic and start throwing flashes, forgetting that this is Counter-Strike GO and you have no idea if that flash was successful or not. 90 percent of the time flashes do not work in this game. Your opponent will either turn away, dodge it, or it will just straight up fail to blind. By throwing grenades you have now given away your position. The most important parts to winning a clutch situation are surprise and aggression. Put the 'nades away and shoot them in the face.

Positioning is about what spots you play, how and where you engage enemies from, when and where to take cover and so on.

You should almost never have to engage multiple enemies at once (especially on CT side) because they can both shoot you while you can only shoot one of them at a time, making your chances of even getting one kill very slim. Instead, you should use cover to your advantage and engage enemies one by one, only being visible to the enemy you're shooting at yourself.

When a teammate is going to peek, you shouldn't sit on his lap and block his movement. You can very easily get him killed because he can't get back to cover. Also, don't go off and engage enemies without your teammates being there. If you get killed, there's nobody there to trade the kill and your team is down a man. On the other hand, when your teammate is engaging an enemy and gets killed, you should be ready to step in and get that kill instead. After all, a 4v4 is better than a 4v5.

Switch it up! When you're playing the same spot every round, a smart enemy will see that and the next time they attack your site, you will just get prefired. When you switch it up however, they'll need to be careful and check every corner and angle, because they have no idea where you are, giving you an advantage.

Also, don't put yourself in a spot where you can only win or die. If you need help, you should wait for that help from your teammates. You're not going to defend that site alone against four Terrorists. You're not going run in and just kill these two CTs.

Movement is an essential part of the game, and peeking is the intermediary between movement and shooting. Peeking is the act of coming out of cover to engage or to observe an area. However, as great as peeking may sound, it can lead to your team losing or winning the round depending on how properly you peek. Have you ever noticed that people tend to hug the wall in long when they rush into A site in Dust 2? Do you ever ask why? It is because they are using the INSIDE LANE. The inside lane is the inner side of a wall or angle. When you use the inside lane, because of the angles of the walls, it can be used as a defensive advantage.




When using the inside lane, you get to see your opponent first before they see you. You see their shoulder and can ready up for a shot, giving you an advantage. The opponent must completely reveal himself in order to catch a glimpse of your head, but by that time, it is too late. Now, you can counter an opponents' inside lane, by traveling the inside lane as well, and surprising your opponent.

An example of an inside corner is hugging the left wall as a T pushing A long on Dust2. The reason you always hug the inside corner is that a peeker has to fully expose his body to peek you. This gives you more time to make the frag. A lot of newbies run up the outside lane thinking they can see a defender first, but they're just going to get shot by a peeker’s left eye ball.

As well as an inside lane, there is also a wide lane. A wide lane can be useful for attacking, as it gives you the control of the angle and lets you split the angle into sections, like a pie; carefully checking the corner, without exposing yourself too much. Wide angles are also why the usual spot near the A site is also used. Wide angles and inner angles, and their use, are a common sight in professional esports gaming.

Movement is more important in Counter-Strike than your ability to aim or react. Nine times out of ten when a player makes a shot, dies, and starts screaming into his mic “But I was right on him!” he failed because his movement was off. All the rifles have a movement penalty. You need to trick the game into believing you are completely still when you fire.

Everyone needs to watch this video from Adren. It's really an impressive piece of work.
https://youtu.be/U9mvXfnY8wU

The stutter step, also known as the stop shoot, is a technique that pro players use to own everyone. A lot of pros I know use it, and don't even know they are using it because it is so built into their habits. Basically, when you are strafing to peek a corner, you tap the opposite directional movement key to completely halt your momentum. Think of it as cancelling out your momentum. This is a very quick tap. If you hold the key down too long you’ll start momentum in the opposite direction instead of coming to a complete halt. If you do it fast enough it looks like you're not even stopping. Go into a server by yourself and practice stop shooting at walls. Shoot a square into a wall, and focus on getting your stutter step shots into that square. When you master the technique you will be able to juke back and forth with ease while firing perfectly accurate shots.
https://youtu.be/LNKPhq-1U6g

Never, ever, walk around a corner. If you walk around a corner your opponent will see you infinitely sooner than you will see him. The only exception to this rule is when you are AWPing. Always use full speed to check a corner. CS won’t play a foot step sound until you reach a certain speed. When you do this technique properly you can peek at full speed without making a sound.
https://youtu.be/DfMvtrc8Ntk


As a new player unbind crouch. A lot of newbies over use this as a go to panic button. You need to practice your stutter step peeking and evasion. Just completely unbind crouch for a month or so to get over this bad habit. Now, in the future you use it when you have NO OTHER OPTION. Imagine you are caught completely flat footed, well crouch is there to save your life. Also, when peeking a corner always start off standing. When someone pushes you immediately crouch. This way, you have an opportunity to throw off someone's head shot. Granted, this isn't as practical as using mobility to peek/unpeek, but when caught in a jam this can be a very effective way of defending.

Mobility is more important!

Expansion on this concept

"Now, Phi", you may ask, "Why do I see Pros ducking constantly? Should I not do what the Pros do?" Well, first of all, we're not pros and we suck, so yes and no. There's currently a bug in CS:Go where crouching is not lag compensated. This means that if I shoot your face off, and then you duck, when the server goes back in time to calculate my head shot, it does not appropriately factor in your crouch/standing position. Crouching can literally save your life. This is why every single time one of you newbs runs around a corner, crouch slides, and kills me on a 64 tick match making server, a single tear trickles down my face. At the professional level these highly trained nerd gods DO NOT MISS VIRTUALLY EVER. So lateral movement will only carry them so far. None of them miss head shots, so they're constantly crouching against each other.

Watching C9 Hiko[www.twitch.tv] move is a beautiful experience. Notice how he perfectly pixel peeks corners for momentary frames, perfectly shoots, and immediately slides laterally to a new position. His play pretty much is the perfect example of how to use these movement concepts.

It goes without saying but run with your knife out when leaving spawn. In Source, pistols had the same run speed as knives and grenades, while the scout moved even faster. This is no longer true in CS:GO. Even with a flash out you run slower than with a knife. If I see you running with a gun out in spawn I will TK you.

Economy And Buying Things
You should always communicate with your teammates before you buy anything. TAB opens the scoreboard, where you can see how much money each player in your team has. This is something you need to know because you should always buy as a team, not as individuals.

You can watch WarOwl's economy tutorial series (this is Part 1 of 3) for a general overview:
https://youtu.be/JyPKqovdNqI
Buying Things - Kevlar
When you have a buy round, you should ALWAYS buy at least Kevlar. Not only does this make you more durable (you can take more damage), it also reduces aim punch so even when you get hit, your crosshair won't fly all across your screen.
On the Terrorist side, you should always buy a Helmet too. Without the Helmet, the CT rifles are a one hit kill to the head - with a Helmet, none of them are! Even when you catch a bullet to the head, you will survive instead of being dead instantly.
On CT side, you can get away with Kevlar only under certain circumstances: when you 100% know the enemy team has full AKs and AWPs (when your team lost a few rounds in a row for example), you don't need that helmet - both the AK and the AWP will kill you anyways when you get shot in the head. You can save these 350$ which allows you to do something more useful with it (grenades, defuse kits, drop a P250 for your AWPer or just save the money for later).

Buying Things - Your Weapon
You're going to need firepower to kill enemy players. For a full buy round, your weapon of choice should be a rifle (AK, M4) or an AWP. On a "light buy", you might be forced to buy a Famas or a Galil. When you know the enemy team will be on a save round, you can also buy an "eco weapon" (as stated in the Youtube video) in order to build up reserves. Again, you should buy as a team - this sometimes requires you to drop weapons for your teammates. If you have a teammate with 3000$, think about that AWP you just wanted to buy - sometimes, it's better to "just" use an AK and drop a second one for your teammate so he doesn't have to play with a pistol.

Buying Things - Grenades
Grenades are essential in this game. If your team is buying, you should always get a few grenades.

You can find a never ending stream of grenade tutorials on Youtube. You should go and watch these tutorials, practice what they teach and apply that in your games - a good smoke can win the round single-handedly!

Smoke grenades deny vision. They are absolutely vital for both sides as they allow you to block choke points, attack and defend sites and so on. There is an enemy AWPer in the site? Throw a smoke and lock him out! Keep in mind that you can still shoot through the smoke! Also, smoke grenades can be used to extinguish Molotovs or Incendiary grenades. Overall, smoke grenades and Flashbangs are the most important type of grenades.

Flashbangs blind enemies and teammates (so be careful where you throw them!) for a short period of time. These are very useful when attacking or defending sites, peeking corners and so on. Use this to your advantage! When you throw a Flashbang so it pops right at the moment it flies around the corner (a so-called pop-flash), the enemy players usually can't react in time and get hit by the full effect, making them very easy targets for you and your teammates.

If you see a Flashbang, you can turn around for a moment to avoid being flashed - they only fully blind someone when they go off in their vision! When you manage to turn around before the flash pops, it won't affect you! Use this to your advantage!

HE-Grenades are useful for clearing spots you can't directly shoot at. Usually, you and your teammates use HE-Grenades together (double nade) so two grenades go off at the same time on the same spot.

Molotovs/Incendiaries can be used to block off a small area of the map. This can be a choke point, a spot you want to clear (imagine an enemy behind a box in a corner, you can push him into your crosshair by simply throwing the molly at him) or even the bomb so CTs can't defuse it. Keep in mind that they damage your teammates too so use with caution!

Buying Things - Defuser
Don't be a loser, buy a Defuser! They cut the defuse time in half, giving you an extra 5 seconds once the bomb is planted. You should always have at least one Defuser on each site, it will win you many rounds. However, when your teammate on the site already has a Defuser, you can get away with that one and use the 400$ for something else.

The Minimap at the top left corner of your screen gives you a lot of free information. You can see your own teammates, enemy players and even the bomb on your radar as soon as one of your teammates has direct vision of them. Instantly. That means even when your teammates are not communicating at all, you can still spot enemies they see on your radar, see where your teammates are and if anyone spotted the bomb.

You should force yourself to have a quick look at least every 5-10 seconds. I personally take a quick look every few seconds and often find myself reacting to spotted enemies or the bomb before my teammates even make a call. That means better teamwork, quicker rotations, more awareness of the current state of the game, you will be less prone to flanks and so on.

When you know what's going on, you can set yourself up for it before your enemies even know what is going on. When you see the bomb on A, they're not going to plant on B even when some Ts tried to fake a B take, right?

Keep in mind that while checking the minimap, you're distracted so you're an easy kill for anyone who peeks you!

Map Knowledge
You need to know all the common spots on all the maps you play (so you can check them and not get get killed easily). Yes, you should check them. With your crosshair aiming at it and you should always assume that there actually is an enemy!

You also need to know the callouts for every map so you can tell your teammates what is going on - and vice versa when they tell something, you know what they mean. When you play Cache and one of your teammates calls a guy in NBK, you need to know where to throw that molotov to get him out.

You should know at least a few default grenades for each map and site (this is where the "classic" viewmodel comes in). There's a ton of Youtube tutorials for that, you can find them yourself. Practice them until you know them by heart.

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1317099199&searchtext=map+callouts
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=611694900&searchtext=map+callouts
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=481516875&searchtext=map+callouts

When entering a bomb site, you never want to run in and search for enemies once you're in the site. Don't ever do that, you're putting yourself at a huge disadvantage! You need to check multiple spots at once, react to what you see, correct your aim and shoot while the defending player is already aiming at you - he just needs to step out and shoot. It's obvious who will win that fight.

What you want to do is this: Instead of running in and making yourself visible (and killable) from multiple spots, you peek out just enough to see one spot at a time - now you can pre-aim and pre-fire this spot (requires some map knowledge) and suddenly, you're in a favourable 1v1 situation. Now, that guy needs to react to what you're doing, not the other way around! Repeat that until you have checked every spot on the site or every enemy player is dead.

This is what people call "clearing spots" - you check them one by one - without exposing yourself to the other spots - and fight the enemies one after another in a series of favourable duels instead of giving them the chance to kill you from multiple directions.
https://youtu.be/7NE5CamsX3E
In a real site take, you can make this a lot easier by using teamwork and grenades but the concept is always the same - only check one spot at a time and only expose yourself to the spot you're checking.

Don't immediately rotate when a teammate sees an enemy player or a few grenades on the other site (unless he's their last player of course). The other team could have sent him in just so you all leave the other site, then they move in with nobody there to defend.

Instead, wait for the bomb to be spotted or for signs of an obvious take.

Do not rotate through "hot" areas of the map running with your knife or a grenade out! Enemies will hear you coming, set up a trap and catch you out! Always go through "safe" areas when possible and check your corners when you're forced to go through "hot" zones or run past "hot" corners. The enemy team might have a lurker setting up a trap for rotating players so always be ready!

A "safe" area is a part of the map where enemy players can't possibly be (for example because your teammate is watching the only entrance to the area).
A "hot" area is the part of the map where enemies can be at that moment. Basically every area that is not confirmed to be "safe" should be treated as a "hot" area.

To give you an example for Dust2 - when you have one CT watching middle, one CT watching Cat and one CT watching long, the entire area around A site is "safe" because unless Terrorists kill one of the CTs, they can't possibly access this area. When the mid CT dies, Cat and A site are still "safe" but the entire connector from A site to B site becomes "hot" (because nobody is there and Ts can move in).

Be aware that these areas can also change based on how much time has passed in this round!

Some General Words About Communication
Your calls need to be precise and quick to be useful. By precise I mean they need to transmit all the relevant information and nothing more. By quick I mean you need to call as soon as you see something so your teammates won't get caught because you hesitated.

Things you should always relais to your teammates:
Grenades you see (where from, where to, how many etc.). This allows you to locate the enemy - e.g. when you see two HEs, it means there must be at least two people because a player can only hold one.

When you throw grenades (especially flashbangs) yourself

When you spot enemies

When you don't spot enemies - when they're not coming to you, chances are they're coming to your teammates, right? Give them a heads-up so they are ready.

When you kill an enemy, so your teammates know they can focus on another spot

When you spot the bomb

What spot you're covering

When you switch positions - so your teammates know that you're not watching your spot anymore

When and where you rotate

Here's an example:
When you play Dust2 CT side and see a T player on long, you call exactly that and nothing more. If you know what weapon he has (e.g. because he took a shot at you), communicate that too so your teammates know what they're up against.

YES:
"One on Long, has AWP/AK/Whatever".
"One AWP/AK/Whatever on Long, probably some Mid"

NO:
"A A A A A A A A A A IT'S A HELP ME FAST!!!!!!!!!!!!!".

First of all, your teammates will hate you. It's really annoying and distracting to have someone shout in your ear. Nobody likes being shouted at.

Second, you sound like every single T player is literally about to swarm you and probably force your teammates to panic rotate, leaving the rest of the map open. Then they get shot in the back, you're suddenly down two players and the round is lost - all because of your call spreading panic.

Third, you block the voice chat for your teammates - If your teammate sees something important (e.g. CT doors being smoked off and Ts rotating to lower), he simply cannot tell you because you're shouting useless stuff and people won't be able to understand what your teammate has to say.

One last thing:
When you're dead, shut up. If you see something on the screen or on the radar, you can call that in the way I stated but apart from that, you should stop talking. You're distracting the remaining players.

Now, I am going to introduce a new section that is never been talked about but is of extreme importance when playing. Psychology. Psychology, unbelievably, is a constant and dominant factor in casual, competitive, and professional matches.

Just like any other game, (whether that is chess, checkers, soccer, football, or Counter Strike) the point of the game is to beat an opponent. To outsmart him. To be better than him. To get an ADVANTAGE that could help you in the future. First, there are many kinds of advantages: There are KNOWLEDGE, SKILL, EXPERIENCE, and SITUATIONAL ADVANTAGES, as well as something called INTUITION. I am going to talk about each individually. If you get the advantage over the other team, you WILL win. The solid point of counter strike is to get as many advantages over the other team and defeat them by utilizing those advantages.

Let us start with KNOWLEDGE ADVANTAGE. Knowledge advantages are advantages gained through either sound stimuli, sight stimuli, or team/communication stimuli. Sound stimuli is when you hear something, such as an enemy gunshot, footsteps, or other sounds that help you gain knowledge of what the other team is doing, or is about to do. An example is you listening to enemies running in tunnels about to head into the B site in Dust 2. The sound of the footsteps give you knowledge that the enemy is about to go into B site, and that you should prepare yourself for the incoming rush. Sight stimuli is seeing something: an enemy in tunnels, a thrown grenade, flashbang or smoke. You can get knowledge based on seeing things as well. Bunches of flashbangs usually lead to a rush. Seeing the entire enemy team running on catwalk on Dust 2 usually means that they might be heading to A. Knowledge advantages gives you information about where the other team is and what they are doing, to help you come up with a way for your team, and you, to stop them based on what they are going to do. For example, a full 5-man rush into A site leads to most of the team rotating to that site to defend. Sometimes, sight and sound knowledge might not come from you personally, sometimes a teammate will call out something they saw or heard. Which can help you to think about how to use that piece of information.

I like to use the following situation to explain an extremely good, yet unfortunate, unused knowledge advantage that is extremely useful. When a CT in Dust 2 crosses double doors, and sees two awpers, who shot a bullet each, and two enemies going behind the awpers going to their left, what do you think? “Well I almost escaped those two AWP shots, whatever.” No, you should be thinking: “Okay, Two awpers, two rifle players going towards long, and one probably either got a close spawn towards long and is on his way or he is moving to tunnels because I did not see him cross behind the awpers. The awpers will not be playing close quarter combat with the AWP unless they have to, they will probably watch long ranges such as mid, long to A site, or tunnels to B. The two rifle players are on their way long, but they could also be taking the long way to cat, and rushing it. There was a third guy with an unknown gun who is probably heading tunnels.” Look at how much information I obtained from the first 3 seconds of the round. In addition, the only advantage the other team got was that two CTs crossed to B. That is it. Just by those advantages alone, you have a greater chance of winning already.


Along with effective communication, there is also MISINFORMATION. In order to help create tactics and increase the chances of winning, a team must use EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION. “The last 2 guys are B, one is 30hp and the other one is 16hp with the bomb. Both have AWPs.” that sentence alone contains an abundance of accurate information to be used: The last two people are B, one is 30 health-points with an AWP, the other is 16hp with a second AWP and has the bomb, he might plant or not. MISCOMMUNICATION or INEFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION sounds something like this: “THOSE ♥♥♥♥ING SONS OF A ♥♥♥♥ING ♥♥♥♥♥! LOOK AT THEM WITH THEIR ♥♥♥♥♥♥ FACES. HOW DID THEY KILL ME? HAX! NICE HAX BRO. FIGHT ME 1V1 LAN”
…
Now what kind of information did you receive from that sentence? Not a lot in comparison, huh? Even if it is the same situation, effective communication can lead to your team winning or losing the round. Even when the communication sounds like its solid, it might have loopholes.

I was in a match where the other team had two people left, one had three health-points and the other had six health-points. They planted the bomb and waited for my last teammate alive with 70 health-points to attack. The teammates said, “There are two in B, one has the bomb.” This sentence contained a lot of information, but missed a crucial piece that led to us losing the round: The enemy’s extremely low hp. The last person was so scared thinking he was against two 100hp rifle players, when in reality; one shot of his P90 to both could have killed them. He slowly approached window and died.

The same situation happened five rounds afterwards, but this time, I told the two teammates to call the health-points of the two enemies that rushed them. “One is 16hp and the other 28hp”. That simple sentence created confidence into the mind of the last teammate who died five rounds before. In the same situation, just knowing that he had a chance, allowed him to go to window again, take some damage before killing one enemy, then turning and killing the other one with 50 health-points and more than enough time to defuse the bomb. That is a perfect example of how simple communication, a few words, can lead to a win or a loss of a round. Therefore, now you know, KNOWLEDGE ADVANTAGE is advantage that gives you knowledge about what is happening or what will happen to help you win.

Next up is SKILL ADVANTAGE. Skill advantage really needs no explanation. Its skill. Some people have better reaction than others do, some have better muscle-memory, some know recoil patterns and know how to shoot accurately better than others. They are natural advantages, advantages that come from the player and his talents. You can earn SKILL ADVANTAGES with time and determination, over time and training.

Afterwards, we have EXPERIENCE ADVANTAGE.
Sometimes considered knowledge advantage, EXPERIENCE ADVANTAGE gives you knowledge about the game and its details through previous interactions over the years. EXPERIENCE ADVANTAGE comes from playing many, many games and knowing what most people would do in certain situations. I know, for example, that if there is an awper in the enemy team on Nuke, they will either go outside, or radio to peek ramp. Why? Because I have played so many games that almost 98% of awpers on nuke will go outside to boxes, outside to Twinkie, or inside and peek ramp. Always. EXPERIENCE ADVANTAGE can come from a couple of rounds before too. If a team has saved three times, rushed squeaky each time, and now they are saving for a third time, where is a good chance they might go? That is right, Squeaky. They could also trick you into thinking they go squeaky and end up going somewhere else, but I will talk about this mental game later.

SITUATIONAL ADVANTAGE comes from making five different 1v1 situations instead of a single 5v1 situation. I have seen many teams rush in 1-by-1 into a site, and slaughtered by a single player. Why? Because he created various 1v1 situations as they were coming in, instead of a single 5v1 situation. Another example is when you are clutching, instead of rushing in site and taking all five of them as they all shoot at you; try taking them out 1v1 by peeking effectively and playing smart.

When people start to go on tilt, the game is basically over. They'll start doing stupid stuff that'll work out even less than what they did before and so the circle continues until everyone is mad and starts throwing the game. You need to prevent that at all costs - but how?

It's absolutely crucial to keep up the good mood. Don't EVER go in on people when they screw up. Neither in voice chat, nor in text chat. No, not even a little. Just don't. It gets people mad and that's exactly what you don't want to happen.
Instead, cheer them up, drop the occasional "nice", "nice shot" or "gj" when one of your teammates does something (e.g. gets a kill, throws a good nade or what ever).

Treat your teammates as equals. They're on the same rank as you are which means their average performance is about the same as yours. Always keep that in mind, you're not "better" than them. Your aim might be on point this game while your teammate has an off-game - but do you really think an "omg ♥♥♥♥ing boosted trash noob git gud" will magically make them better for the rest of the game?

Take the blame whenever you can. "Sorry mb, I was greedy and got picked." "They came up connector, I should've watched that, sorry." It might be absolutely stupid and you were in fact the only one not screwing up - but you're giving people a chance to vent their frustration instead of building it up.

Okay, now we reach the most useful factor that will make EVERYONE call you a hacker. No, it is not located on a specific site on the internet; it is located, unbelievably, deep inside your brain. INTUITION as complicated as it sounds, is basically, guessing. Yes, guessing. What? How can guessing help me? Well, let me introduce you to INTUITION.

INTUITION is the hardest thing to teach, as it is very hard to explain. However, the best way to explain is to show it to you. When you use all the advantages mentioned before, you can use that to come up with a hypothesis or educated guess about what the other team is doing or will do, and gain an advantage over them. By doing so, you hack your brain into thinking that the hypothesis will happen, and when you do so, you gain a massive boost in confidence to help. One can usually come up with a guess and use that, but intuition is a kind of gut feeling that you HAVE to be confident in. Don’t think “They will be going tunnels right?” rather think “Based on what has happened in the round, I KNOW, I AM SURE that they are going tunnels” and setup as if they are on their way there and they are running in, imagine them running in and execute. This confidence is your guess will help you so that if they do come, you were already ready physically, and most important, mentally, for the opposing team members. To the other team it will seem as if you knew EXACTLY what they were going to do, but you didn’t, it was all just a very well thought guess that you believed in. Let me show an example of what intuition looks like in-game:
https://youtu.be/pwuC1bYCTt8
The round starts normally. I pick up my gear and head to A site. I see my teammates watching B and A long, leaving mid exposed on purpose. I imagine I am a T and I am moving to CAT, I time the grenade and throw it. Then, I peek and catch a glimpse of one Terrorist. I call it out whilst I move to the right of the box and take him out. I see that my teammate mid and long are dead. Because of this, I move to watch Long and CT Ramp if they try to go CT Spawn to A. I peek, put my crosshair ready for the reaction, and I land a shot on someone going Pit. It was the bomb. From here on, I reevaluate the situation. Bomb is priority. There might be coming Middle to CT Spawn, Long, or Cat. I see my teammate going B tunnel and gain a little bit of confidence. I flash CT Spawn to see if I can catch a Terrorist whilst vulnerable. I now move to Short and lower my angles. I only have to watch two (CAT and Long. If the CT goes to A, I can see him first). Sometime passes and I see my teammate looking at CT Spawn, it must be clear. I then move to watch the next two spots they could come from (CAT and LONG) I do not have to worry about CT anymore. I think, "If they are smart, they will try to corner me by one going long and one cat. Therefore, I set my crosshair in the middle so I can facilitate a shot for each direction. I GUESS that CAT will go first then long, I peek CAT...and sure he was on his way to throwing a grenade. I then think that the other person would probably back off CAT, if he was there, or go and continue long to try to get the bomb. I then set in the middle and wait for him to come. I am so sure he will come long that I ready myself for the shot, and as I do, he comes in and I take him out. That last flick shot, although lasting a second, to me lasted 3 seconds due to me being so into the game that I caught the information faster than usual. I call this "The Matrix Effect" and I will talk about it later in the guide. I calm down after the amazing shot I claim, and ready for the next round.

The second guide (link at the end) talks into more detail about an “intuition-based” technique called “Area of Potential Hostility” that facilitates the practice and use of intuition and many of the advantages.

Whenever you play games, your time divides into three zones. First, we have the Warmup Zone, then “The Zone”, then we have the Fatigue Zone. During the Warmup zone, you are trying to regain the muscle memory, memory, and knowledge of the previous times you have played. You are warming up, easy as that. During this zone, you should be deathmatching, and going into the map, I mentioned earlier, to train (Training_Aim_CSGO). Next zone is “The Zone”.

Have you heard athletes say, “Man, I was just in the zone today, that’s why I did better than usual”? Well that zone actually exists. “The Zone” is when your muscle-memory, memory, and reactions are at their best potential. You play exceptionally well because of your focus, energy, and reactions. This zone is perfect to play.

After the zone, you reach the fatigue zone. Have you ever been so tired, in the middle of the night, and you are so tired that you are actually doing worse? That is a clear sign you are in the fatigue zone and that you should stop playing. You are tired and fatigued because you have wasted all your energy staying focused in “The Zone”. If you are tired, and in the fatigue zone, it is better to stop playing and save your energy. Playing when you are tired and unfocused, will not help you win and will definitely not help your teammates win since they have one less person in their team.

Now the cool thing about the three zones is that they vary from player to player. I have students who tell me they only have to warmup a little before they are in the zone for quite some time, and then later reach fatigue and stop playing. Some have told me that they have to warmup a lot to reach the zone, and that the zone lasts a game or two, and then reach fatigue fast. I had one student who told me his zone seemed to be the first game after warmup, and then reached fatigue. He for example, adapted to his zones, and later told me he would warmup, play one game, reach fatigue and stop playing, then 3-4 hours later when he wasn’t fatigued he would warmup again, then play one more game, and repeat the process every day. That helped him reach the rank of Legendary Eagle Master and helped his recruitment into a team. Research your zones, and adapt to them, don’t try to prolong “The Zone” because you could be in danger of getting into fatigue, and don’t try to prolong warmup, because you could be in “The Zone” when you’re warming up in Deathmatch instead of in competitive matches.

If you do want to make your zones last longer, I recommend to do so in a safe and healthy manner. You see professionals drowning in energy drinks in competitions, and while this is a good “artificial” way to gain more energy and make your zone last longer, long-term use of caffeine can lead to serious and undesired side effects. If you do want to improve your zones the good way, you can do so by living a healthy lifestyle. Sleeping 6 hours a day, exercising 1 hour daily with cardio and strength training, eating a well-balanced diet of carbohydrates, proteins and fats (along with various micronutrients) will do the work and will also keep you looking healthy, and feeling healthy with more energy to use when gaming. Even if you cannot do everything in a healthy manner, any change will result in you having more energy. The more healthy changes you apply to your body, the more of a result and change you will get in your game.

Oh and a couple more things, if you don’t have any friends or people who are online, most people say that solo-queueing is a definite NO, but I like to think otherwise. I got from Master Guardian II to Legendary Eagle Master by solo-queueing after all. In addition, I learned that if you go to a match and someone in your team is playing well, effectively communicating, and seems like a good person, you should add him. Moreover, ask him if you can play again with him. Now you have another person, and you are not solo queueing but you are queuing with one more person. If you find two in one match, nice, add them both. Sometimes you may not find a person worth of adding in some matches, but it is okay. Try again. If you start solo queueing, and you find one person every match, in four matches, you should have a full party of good players, who all communicate, and you will not be solo-queueing.

If you want to meet other Silver to Eagle students who have read the guide and are just as determined to improve themselves, you can also consider joining the SilvertoEagleStudents Steam Group (link at the end). You can go to the discussions tab, click on your perspective rank, and post some quick info for others to add you or for you to find people to play with.

Unlike other games, the amount of kills you get in CS:GO doesn't always have to correllate with the amount of game impact you had - this game is about scoring round wins, not about topping the scoreboard.

Because the superior goal is to win the round, different kills can have different importance which is why kills are usually divided into "high impact" and "low impact" frags.

A high impact frag is a kill that changes the dynamic of the round heavily in favour of your team - that can be an opening pick at the start of the round, forcing the other team to play 4v5, entry frags in a site take or even killing their AWPer before the round ends so they can't have an AWP in the next round.

These are the frags that win you games.

A low impact frag on the other hand is a kill that doesn't make much of a difference. When your team lost the round, you're the only player alive against three players of the other team and you kill one of them, you're not getting anything out of it - the other team will win the round anyways and the player you just killed will not be forced to save thanks to the money he just got from the round. All you get from it is the kill reward and a bit of eco damage.

These frags don't really do anything except adding +1 to your kill count.

Depending on how the game plays out, a player with an end score of 15-4-23 can have a higher impact on the game than someone with an end score of 24-3-14 because the first guy made the frags that won you the rounds while the second guy could just clean up some kills after the round was already decided - so don't be too quick in calling someone useless because he has a worse Kill-Death-Ratio than you. He might have had more impact on the game than you did!

steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1325659427&searchtext=crashz
https://youtu.be/dR6J0fbnFo0
Here are some console commands I personally use. Feel free to copy. :)

How to use it:
Open a notepad file
copy the commands in there
The last command (after everything you want to use) needs to be host_writeconfig
When you save the file, select "any file"
Call it autoexec.cfg

You get a config-file. Copy it to this folder:
Steam\SteamApps\common\Counter-Strike Global Offensive\csgo\cfg

That's it already. Copy/paste the binds you want into this file, save it and you're done, they work.
https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1892672693
This is a bind that allows you to do jump throws perfectly every single time. Just hold down your fire button, press KEY and you will get a perfect jumpthrow.
alias "+jumpthrow" "+jump;-attack"
alias "-jumpthrow" "-jump"
bind "KEY" "+jumpthrow"


net_graph allows you to see a bunch of game info stuff (like what ping you have, if you have packet loss and so on). You might have used it already to find out why you're lagging or whatever.
This one makes it so net_graph only appears when you TAB to the scoreboard and while you're playing, it's invisible!

net_graph "1"
net_graphheight "9999"
bind "TAB" "+scorenet"
alias "+scorenet" "+showscores; net_graphheight 0"
alias "-scorenet" "-showscores; net_graphheight 9999"
net_graphproportionalfont "0"


This one allows you to toggle voice chat on and off. Replace KEY with a key you want to use (I use v).
bind "KEY" "toggle voice_enable 0 1"

This one allows you to remove decals (bloodstains, bullet holes and so on) immediately. You're holding a corner and blood is making it hard to see enemies? This command removes it instantly.
bind "KEY" "r_cleardecals"


These are the buy binds I use (so I can buy with my numpad instead of scrolling through the buy menu):
bind "LEFTARROW" "buy hegrenade"
bind "DOWNARROW" "buy smokegrenade"
bind "RIGHTARROW" "buy flashbang"
bind "UPARROW" "buy molotov; buy incgrenade"

bind "KP_INS" "buy vesthelm"
bind "KP_DEL" "buy vest"
bind "KP_ENTER" "buy defuser"
bind "KP_END" "buy famas; buy galilar"
bind "KP_DOWNARROW" "buy m4a1; buy ak47"
bind "KP_PGDN" "buy awp"
bind "KP_LEFTARROW" "buy p250"
bind "KP_5" "buy fiveseven; buy tec9; buy cz75a"
bind "KP_RIGHTARROW" "buy deagle"
bind "KP_HOME" "buy mp9; buy mac10"
bind "KP_UPARROW" "buy ump45"
bind "KP_PGUP" "buy mp7"
bind "KP_MINUS" "buy p90"
bind "KP_PLUS" "buy ssg08"

I read the guide. I made DMG. Now what?
Great job! I knew my guide alone would make you a Distinguished Master Guardian. You're welcome. Welcome to the top 80(?) percent! How do you increase your talent further?

1. Do the work. Get on Youtube and learn two sick set nades per day. Can you rush hut on nuke and bounce a pop flash into site every single round? Are you a match making hero who throws a smoke over T spawn into window on mirage (if you are, I love you)? Even my talented friends, who play this game every single day, can't smoke anything in any bomb site. We play all the time and yet they still wonder why we lose rounds. Well, it doesn't help that I'm the only player buying a smoke every single round.

2. Play death match constantly. Bro, do you even DM? Think of it like pumping iron. You need to constantly practice your recoil.

3. Death match is awful practice. "But I thought you said..." no shut up. You need to play constantly. Only competitive matches will make you a better competitive player.

4. Learn to communicate. I call plays for my team and friends, and let me tell you it's awful. 99 percent of the time it's me asking to people to use their microphones. Individuals need to set up plays together, and that requires quick bursts of communication. Tell your mates 1) Where you are, 2) what you are doing, and 3) what you need. An example of effective communication:

"I'm lower B, pushing cat, smoke mid for me"
"We took long, go back to cat and double nade site"

Status updates are valuable. Did your opponents force you out of position? Are you playing a passive angle? Let people know. Give reminders if you think it is important. If you call "Catwalk is open" during a fire fight at B, chances are your mid player has no idea the terrorist are five seconds from dropping CT spawn on him. Casually remind people if something is open. If you do not know, ask!

Communication is more than death calls. I know this is novel, but you need to express your intent. Are you going make an awesome play with a CT push? You better tell someone so they can support you.

5. Join a league!

Once you reach global, the best thing to do is to go on alt sites such as FaceIt, ESEA, and Gfinity.

If you are from EU, most people will recommend you to go to Faceit[www.faceit.com].
To play with pros you need to qualify for FPL (Fantasy Pro League).

You probably saw some NA players such as Moe, Dazed, Stewie2k playing on ESEA[play.esea.net] There you have ranks from A, B, G, S etc.

These services are known for:

Better Anti-Cheat system
If you are very good, some teams can notice You
People who will troll will receive worse punishments than in normal MM

https://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=169698044

• The first rule of Counter-Strike is: Everyone is bad

Anyone who ever utters the phrase “Shut up I know how to play,” should immediately be cut from your team because they will never improve as a player.

• The second rule of Counter-Strike is: There’s not as much recoil as you think. Granted, this used to be more true, but still you can control it better than you believe.

• The third rule of Counter-Strike is: When in doubt, let a team mate go first.

Okay, lastly, I want you to know that this is only a game. No one can win all of the games. It is okay if you lose, and there is no need for that to affect your daily life. Video games exist for entertainment purposes after all. In the end, it is just a game, and you are supposed to have fun. So, enjoy it.

Quickly, I would like to thank the people who helped me test this guide and thank my students who have now succeeded and have joined successful competitive teams. I also want to thank everyone for supporting the guide over these couple of years. The people I have met and the support I have received has been amazing and I am eternally grateful. The least I could do is try to give back the same amount of support, time, and energy I have received. Therefore, answering every single message, even if it means taking 5 hours a day to answer every single one, is something I am willing to do.

Thank you for reading this guide! I hope to have improved your gameplay and hope to see you game better in the future. You are welcome to add me and ask me any questions or even game with me from time to time. I made this guide to help improve the Counter Strike community and help make it an even better community than it is. Stay awesome, stay smarter.
Thank you. Sincerely, and wholeheartedly.

phi
cynix
addictedpro
fearless