Counter Strike Weapons Guide

The Counter-Strike series’s gameplay revolves mainly around weapons, which players employ to reduce their opponent’s health and eventually kill them to earn kill prizes, get tactical advantages, or advance to team elimination round victory.

Number of Allowed Weapons

Most games in the series let players carry only one primary weapon, one secondary weapon, and a melee weapon.

Only in Deleted Scenes can the player carry multiple primary and secondary weapons. Unlike in Half-Life, though, should the player already possess that weapon and seek to acquire the same weapon, it will not provide ammo unless the first same weapon does not have maximum ammo. In such circumstances, the player will get the same new weapon with whatever ammo is present.

Weapons Each Player Begins With

All players will spawn with their knives and team-based spawn guns at the opening of the first round of the game. If a player had lived through the previous round, they would have maintained the equipment they were equipped with after the last round ended and would have gotten a spawn pistol should they lack a backup weapon. For rounds following that, should they pass away in the previous round, they will spawn using their knife and spawn pistol.

Acquiring Weapons

From the buy menu, while the player’s character stands in the buy zone, players can purchase new counter strike wepons using the money they have acquired in the game.

Picking and Dropping Weapons

Except for knives, and in certain circumstances where the game does not let a regular weapon be dropped or picked up, most weapons can be dropped and picked up. A player’s death will cause their active primary and secondary weapons to be dumped. 

Aiming at a weapon on the ground and pressing the interaction key ( USE, whose default binding key is E), one may also directly replace a weapon on the player’s hands in Global Offensive.

Inspecting

Inspection was added alongside the Arms Deal in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive to let players check specifics on their weaponry in-game. Apart from the Gold Knife, every weapon may be checked; every piece of equipment cannot be checked. Examining weapons in-game should not be mistaken for examining weapons from the player’s inventory.

How to Inspect Weapons

The USE key used in-game when the weapon is idle will animate the player, looking at all sides of the weapon before reverting to the idle state. First-person viewers of GOTV and Spectators are the only ones who can view this animation in addition to the player. There is no comparable third-person animation, so other players cannot view the inspection.

The player can instantly interrupt the inspection animation to execute the typical action at any point throughout the animation (reloading, scoping in, firing, or switching to another weapon).

Most weapons cannot be viewed except when they are idle. Unlike other weapons, shotguns can be inspected during reloading; doing so will stop the reloading. The reload animation will start once the inspection ends (without a cancellation by shooting).

Looking through their scope does not allow one to inspect scoped firearms.

In this section, we’ll discuss the different gameplay actions involving counter strike weapons: 

Hitscan

Every weapon is a hitscan to replicate the fast and straight passage of bullets in real life; hence, when the player fires, the game instantly computes its landing location and decides if it hit a target, thus determining the damage done. Every weapon has a damage drop-off at a distance; if the projectile flies too far, it will vanish.

Damage

Weapons inflict damage upon another player. Several elements determine the damage done to the target: 

• Base damage of the weapon
• Damage dropoff
• Affected hitbox 
• Bullet penetration effects
• Armour penetration effects; 
• Friendly fire in server settings should the bullet hit a teammate.

Headshot Multiplier

Headshot Multiplier changes the damage multiplier during headshot. Added to buffer the M4A1-S’s base damage while maintaining headshot damage the same, this change was included on the September 21, 2021 update for Global Offensive. While keeping the headshot’s lethality, it also helped to decrease the Desert Eagle’s base damage.

CycleTime (Rate of Fire)

While CycleTime deals with the time between two fired bullet rounds, Rate of Fire indicates the speed of the weapon’s firing. There are four prominent CycleTime in Global Offensive as seconds. The firing process will go faster with smaller values.

Standard

Applied with standard weapons and secondary attachment turned on.

Burst

Designed for use in weapons with burst mode, such as Glock-18 and FAMAS. When in this mode, the player can fire a 3-round burst automatically. However, this won’t happen if the firing process is interrupted by switching or lowering the weapon or the prefab has a significant time value between each shot. 

The time between shots is the time between two bursts. For guns with both automatic and semi-automatic capability, burst CycleTime will refresh the time between bullet shots before the burst process is finished.

Alternative

This is applied in case the weapon is a revolver. A typical example of such is the R8 Revolver. Revolvers call for a weapon-preparing animation before firing. Animation time on the process can be relatively short before shooting. 

The revolver can also fan as double-action for an alternative Rate of Fire. Fanning calls for secondary firing animation; otherwise, a standard one will be used even though the primary fire cannot be used.

Zoomed

Scopable rifles and sniper rifles, both with scopes, use this CycleTime.

Weapon Scope Aiming (Zooming)

Weapon Scope seeks to improve accuracy by aiming at a farther (or closer) range. Based on developer console results and the items_game.txt, zooming alters the player’s base field of view to see certain distances.

• 90 is the base player FOV.
• The number of possible aims of a weapon depends on zoom levels. Zooming alters FOV to see at specified distances. Hence, this must be any positive number between 0 and n.
• zoom FOV modifies the game’s default FOV value to the value set accordingly to facilitate distance aiming (value less than 90) or close-up aiming (value of 90 and above). It should be “zoom fov i” depending on zoom levels (where i stands for the value). The FOV altering value has to be more than 0.
•  The zoom time is in seconds to modify HUD aiming or animation. Since zoom time 0 reflects the length of exiting scoped mode—that is, aiming—from n to 0. Zoom time is likewise should be “zoom time 1,” “zoom time 2,”… “zoom time n” while “zoom fov <1 to n>”. Once more, the time value has to be more than zero, at least a positive decimal value.
• Weapons will play zoom_in_sound until the n~th time it is not aiming; then, they will play zoom_out_sound.
• Aiming through either animation or the HUD can have zoom levels above 1. Beyond that, it could cause issues, but animations operate best at 1.

Armor Ratio

The Armor Ratio decides the degree of damage done to armor and health. The value must be divided by two to represent the damage proportion. If the armor is over 2, it will only absorb 1% but will get extra damage corresponding to the value divided by 2; if it is between 0 and less than 2, it absorbs the value.

Should the number be 2, the armor will not absorb damage; should the value be 0, the armor will absorb 50% of the damage dealt and receive 0% health damage. The damage done will be doubled and split by the relevant amount from above 0 to less than 2, determining the hitbox factors in the damage done.

Afterward, the damage deducted will keep lowering depending on the armor underneath.

Kevlar + Helmet relies on armor ratio on items_game.txt

Heavy Assault Suit is the same as Kevlar + Helmet, but it reduces damage by twice that of Kevlar + Helmet. Still, it will also receive twice its armor damage. The player will be returned to the regular featured team character on the map when surviving with 0% armor in the following round.

Range

1 unit in Counter-Strike: Global Offence is 0,0254 meters, 1 inch. The bullet or tasing round(s) will vanish at the maximum range.

Range Modifier

The range modifier calculates damage percentage after the bullet reaches 500 inches or 500 units.

Max Player Speed and its Alternatives

The speed of each weapon is calculated in units per second, or inches per second real life. Max player speed alt (alternative speed) determines speed utilizing secondary features (sans suppressing weapons). When these speed values are missing, stat runs on 1 inch per second, the default speed.

Ammunition

Weapons must have ammunition to be fired. Every weapon has a set loaded (primary clip size) and primary reserved ammo max (reserved ammunition). Once the loaded ammunition runs low, the weapon cannot be fired until reloaded.

Recoil and Its Alternative

From the player’s crosshair aim and their point of view to “bounce” upwards, recoil causes continuous intervals of shots to become progressively scattered. Alternatives are weaponry with secondary firing.

Inaccuracy and its Alternatives

Natural and uncontrolled variable departure angles from the player’s crosshair result from a weapon’s inaccuracy. The weapon and the player’s present activity will affect the inaccuracy. Alternatives describe guns with secondary fire.

Bullet Penetration

A bullet can continue damaging objects beyond a surface depending on the surface impacted and the weapon’s penetrating characteristics.

Aimpunch

When a player in Global Offensive is wounded in the torso, abdomen, pelvis, or head hitbox, their screen and aim will dramatically jerk upward, mimicking the consequences of being disoriented from a bullet injury. We refer to this as an aimpunch. 

While hitting the player in the head applies the most severe aim punch, hitting the player in the legs and arms applies no aimpunch, and hitting the torso, abdomen, or pelvis applies moderate aimpunch, given a target without armor.

Buying the Kevlar Vest lowers aimpunch to the torso, belly, and pelvis to 5% of its initial strength; buying the helmet nullifies aimpunch to the head.

Tagging

A gunshot strike slows the target down. The weapon used and the weapon the target is wielding determine the speed reduction degree.

Tracers and Its Alternatives

Several weapons in Global Offensive also shoot tracers. As the bullet travels its course, the tracer appears as a little white flash. This helps the targets pinpoint the location of the approaching opponent and react quickly against them.

tracer frequency represents tracers and shows them between about  ~n~ shots. 0 indicates that weapon discharge will produce no tracers. Suppressor-attached firearms make use of non-tracers by default.

Flash files from muzzle_flash_effect_1st_person & muzzle_flash_effect_3rd_person show tracers. Additionally available for secondary purposes are “muzzle_flash_effect_1st_person_alt” & “muzzle_flash_effect_3rd_person_alt”. The weapon will use the default without alternatives.

“tracer frequency alt” presents alternatives by showing tracers utilizing the Secondary Fire capabilities.

Firing Sound

Different weapons produce different loudness and shooting sounds. Generally speaking, silencers affect weapon shooting noise the most.

When firing the last shots in a magazine in Global Offensive, loud mechanical clicks accompany the discharge sound, indicating that the weapon’s magazine is empty.

Silent weapons don’t have distant sounds, per game_sounds_guns.txt. This position distinguishes Silencers with none from others.

“play_distant_version_1” is the cvar located under the “operator_stacks” & “start_stack” scripts and has to be available to concatenate the script in the braces below. Therefore, the command “entry_name” “<distant sound>” will yield a distant sound, which will be set up afterward without or with the exact base sound presets. 

Every weapon shown on its prefabs has base sounds. “sound_single_shot” is the firing sound; “sound_special1” refers to the secondary firing sound while secondary functions are in use, and “sound_special1,” is not in use; the weapon uses the default instead.

Secondary Fire

Certain weapons (and occasionally equipment, too) feature secondary fire capability, which is triggered by default pressing MOUSE2. Secondary fire is usually defined by a weapon’s specialty or other quality.

List of secondary fire functions:

• At-/detaching a Silencer (M4A1-S, USP-S, Mavericks M4A1 Carbine, K&M.45 Tactical.)
• Zooming in (Zoom/Zoom 2x) (AUG, SSG 08, AWP, Krieg 552, SG 553, Schmidt Scout, SCAR-20, Krieg 550 Commando, G3SG1, Fibre optic camera).
• Toggling burst-fire mode ( FAMAS, Glock-18)
• Toggling attached torch (K&M Sub-Machine Gun (Deleted Scenes only), Leone 12 Gauge Super).
• Switch (Radio-controlled bomb, between detonator and detonation)
• Detonate explosive (Breach Charge)
• Riot Mode (Tactical Shield)
• Fanning (R8 Revolver)
• Throwing a weapon (Axe, Hammer, Spanner)
• Heavy punch (Bare hands)
• Stabbing (Knife)

Weapons on the buy menu are arranged according to kind. Older games include five weapon buy menu categories: pistols, shotguns, SMGs, rifles, and machine guns. Machine guns and shotguns have been merged further into one “Heavy” class in Global Offensive. 

This guide will classify weapons from a real-life perspective, loosely using the Counter-Strike original categories.

Melee

The Counter-Strike games use only the basic knife as a melee weapon. Though it is lethal, has unlimited ammo, and may cause silent killings, the knife only operates at somewhat close range. Knives cannot usually be dropped; they are handed on spawn. 

Following the January 27, 2016 update, knives can be dropped in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive when the mp_drop_knife_enable command is enabled by setting it to 1.

Once intended to be a weapon of use, the Machete is seen on AI-operated terrorists throughout Counter-Strike: Condition Zero Deleted Scenes. This functional variant was also deleted from the original Counter-Strike and Condition Zero.

Global Offensive brought cosmetic knives that look just like standard knives but are only available via unpacking. There is also a Gold Knife specifically for the Arms Race game mode. However, it just differs graphically from the regular knife.

Knives in Global Offensive and Counter-Strike 2

• Stock Knife (CT)
• Stock Knife (T)
• Bayonet
• Butterfly Knife
• Falchion Knife
• Flip Knife
• Gut knife
• Huntsman Knife
• Karambit
• M9 Bayonet
• Shadow Daggers
• Bowie Knife
• Ursus Knife
• Navaja Knife
• Stiletto Knife
• Talon Knife
• Classic Knife
• Skeleton Knife
• Paracord Knife
• Survival Knife
• Nomad Knife

Pistols

The secondary weapons in the Counter-Strike series are pistols, sometimes referred to as handguns or sidearms; they are also the first weapons one could use at the start of a match or upon respawning following death.

Generally speaking, pistols have minimal magazine capacity and are weaker than other major weapons. Still, they are precise; they have little recoil and rather quick reload times. Their quick draw animation pulls them out faster than reloading any main weapon. Their low cost makes them also effective weapons for eco rounds.

Using any gun, Global Offensive excluded, players will run at default speed.

Pistols in Counter-Strike, Condition Zero and Source

• K& M.45 Tactical
• 9x19mm Sidearm
• 228 Compact
• ES Five-seven
• .40 Dual Elites
• Nighthawk.50C

Pistols in Counter-Strike 2 and Global Offensive

• P2000
• USP-S
• Glock-18
• P 250
• Five-SeveN
• Tec-9
• CZ75–Auto
• Dual Berettas
• Desert Eagle
• R8 Revolver

Shotguns

One type of main weapon found in the Counter-Strike series are shotgun. They shoot numerous hitscan pellets in one shot, delivering great damage instead of a single hitscan bullet. The distributed pellets of a shot disperse across a distance, limiting their efficacy to close range. Comparatively cheap, they cost less than most weapons.

Before the Global Offensive, Counter-Strike included just two shotguns: the Leone YG1265 Auto Shotgun, which was fired semi-automatically, and the Leone 12 Gauge Super, which used a pump action firing mode. Although both shotguns are worthless at long range and suffer from substantial speed and range reduction, they are quite effective for close-quarters fighting where they could be lethal. 

Two more shotguns were added, and the Nova in Global Offensive replaced the Leone 12 Gauge Super. Most shotguns cannot fire underwater.

Shotguns in Counter-Strike, Condition Zero and Source

• Leone 12 Gauge Super 
• Leone YG1265 Auto Shotgun

Shotguns in Global Offensive and Counter-Strike 2

• Nova
• XM1014
• MAG-7
• Sawed-Off

SMG

Among the main weapons used in the Counter-Strike franchise are SMG, short for submachine guns. Their cost, less than $2500, makes them rather affordable.

Most submachine guns are good for short-range warfare since most have a quick rate of fire, little to no speed reduction, and low to moderate recoil. 

Unfortunately, rifles at long-range outclass submachine guns since the former deal more damage, are more accurate, have superior armor penetration, and have less damage dropoff. Still, they help cash-strapped clubs greatly.

SMGs in Counter-Strike, Condition Zero and Source

• Schmidt Machine Pistol
• Ingram MAC-10
• K&M Sub-Machine Gun
• K&M UMP45
• ES C90

Global Offensive & Counter-Strike 2

• MP9
• MAC-10
• PP-Bizon
• MP7
• UMP-45
• P90
• MP5-SD

Rifles

One kind of main weapon available in the Counter-Strike series are assault rifles. Though they have significant damage and recoil and are rather costly weapons, the assault rifles included in the Counter-Strike series have relative speed reductions. 

Most assault weapons are meant to battle enemy combatants at medium to long ranges. Certain assault rifles have special characteristics, like the M4A1’s removable silencer and the FAMAS’s burst-fire option.

Rifles in Counter-Strike, Condition Zero, and Source

• Clarion 5.56
• IDF Defender
• CV-47
• Maverish M4A1 Carbine
• Bullpup
• Krieg 552

Rifles in Global Offensive and Counter-Strike 2

• FAMAS
• Galil AR
• M4A4(CT)
• M4A1 – S
• AK-47
• AUG
• SG 553

Sniper Rifles

As their name implies, sniper rifles are designed for extreme-range combat. Two kinds of sniper rifles are used in the Counter-Strike series: fully automatic rifles (nicknamed auto-snipers) and bolt-action rifles. 

While the latter has a faster firing rate and, hence, lower damage, the former causes great damage at the cost of punishing inaccurate users. 

The Schmidt Scout, SSG 08, and AWP are bolt-action rifles; the Krieg 550 Commando, SCAR-20, and G3SG1 are semi-automatic rifles. 

Their pricing falls on the higher end of the range because of their great killing capability.

Using these weapons hides the crosshair, discouraging hipfiring and close-quarters warfare.

Sniper Rifles in Counter-Strike, Condition Zero and Source

• Schmidt Scout
• Magnum Sniper Rifle
• Krieg 550 Commando
• D3/ AU-1

Sniper Rifles in Global Offensive and Counter-Strike 2

• SSG 08
• AWP
• Scar-20
• G3SG1

Machine Guns

One main weapon type in the Counter-Strike series is the machine gun. These heavy and often costly weapons have fast shooting rates and big magazine sizes. They are designed for defensive or suppression fighting. 

At $5750, the M249 was the most costly weapon available in the multiplayer Counter-Strike games, and the sole machine gun used there before Global Offensive. The Negev’s inclusion in Global Offensive finally brought the overall count of accessible machine guns to two.

The M60 was deleted for unclear reasons, although it was supposed to appear in the initial Counter-Strike. Later, it surfaced in Counter-Strike: Condition Zero Deleted Scenes’s single-player campaign.

Furthermore, several Counter-Strike beta maps, such as Forest and Desert, have M2 Browning Machine Gun placement. Serious balancing problems with the weapon caused the developers to delete it from these maps during development. It resurfaced formally in Deleted Scenes and still appears on several Counter-Strike custom maps.

Machine Gun in Counter-Strike, Condition Zero, and Source

• M249

Machine Guns in Global Offensive and Counter-Strike 2

• M249
• Negev

Ultimately, every player hoping to be the best in Counter-Strike must first understand the wide spectrum of weapons in the game. Having 34 weapons in Global Offensive, each with special qualities and strategic value, how to use them will greatly affect gameplay performance. 

Knowing the details of every weapon type—from pistols and shotguns to sniper rifles and machine guns—will help you develop a tactical edge that might swing the tide of combat in your favor. Whether a novice or a seasoned veteran, this guide is a complete tool to improve your Counter-Strike weapon knowledge and skills.