What separates Counter-Strike from other competitive shooters? The answer to this question is the economy. This difference may seem to be an irrelevant part of the game at first, but rest assured that learning about the intricacies of this crucial piece of Global Offensive will allow you to gain further insight into your own games and professional games.

To begin with, let us determine what the goals of each round for both sides are. Besides the most obvious target of winning the round, there are many other objectives that each faction must always keep in mind. For the Counter-Terrorist (CT), the aim is to prevent the bomb plant while simultaneously keeping as many of their players alive. On the other end of the spectrum, the Terrorists (T) strive to always plant the bomb or eliminate as many CT as possible.

Now what do these objectives have in common? If you were paying attention thus far, you would begin see the theme of money becoming more prevalent. The Counter-Terrorist wants to prevent the bomb plant because by doing so, it will lessen the amount of money available to the Terrorist next round. They want to keep as many players alive as possible because it allows the CT to build a buffer between Eco’ing and Saving. Likewise, the Terrorist want to plant the bomb because doing so provides extra income during the next round. They want to kill as many CT as possible because, as you may have guessed, it weakens the buying potential of their enemies.

You may have noticed that the CT wants to survive with as many guns as possible, while the Terrorist would like to take away those guns. This is because the cost to fully buy is not the same for both sides. To fully equip a Counter-Terrorist with a standard full kit, which would be an m4a1-s, full armor, grenades, and defuse kit, would cost approximately $5600. The costs for the Terrorist would amount to about $4700, the price for AK-47, Armor, and grenades. Because of this difference in price, it is almost always more important for the CT to retain their guns than it is for the terrorist.

Why does it matter for the Counter-Terrorist to save as many guns as possible, they won the round anyways right? I agree that the round win is much more important than saving a gun or two, and I advocate for always trying to win the possible retake situation that every CT will encounter once or twice in a game, as long as the odds are somewhat decent, but by knowing when to risk losing your equipment for exponential gain, as opposed to blindly playing without any regard for the economy, can play a significant impact on the outcome of the game.

So let us outline a few scenarios that would fall into these categories. If we recall, the primary goal of every round is to, obviously, win the round. In scenarios that involves equal or close numbers of enemies to allies, I would almost always advocate for the attempt to fulfill the most important objective of the round. Situations where one party is considerably outnumbered or outgunned, so much to the point where the chances of success are near slim to none, might advocate for a save, however.

Why, you might ask, why not try at the very least no matter unfavorable the odds. This brings us back to how CS:GO has an economy system. Unlike other franchises, such as Call of Duty or Battlefield, every round in Counter-Strike is interconnected through this money mechanic. In Call of Duty, in the comparable game mode search and destroy, you would simply respawn with your chosen loadout at the start of the next round. This is not so in CS:GO. That gun you save may be the difference between your entire team buying that round or saving their money for the next. It could be what allows you to afford all the grenades. Simply put, it could mean a win or loss in the next round.

Okay, say that it didn’t matter how many casualties you took, you at least won the round. Primary objective achieved, that means that the secondary objectives should be discarded right? Well, this is where the economy system comes back into play. The reward for winning the round is about $3250 for round won through elimination, and $3500 for win by defuse/explosion of the bomb. Notice how that is significantly less than the cost of a standard kit for the CT. Winning through Pyrrhic victory, while a victory, will impact the outcome of the game. Suddenly, you cannot buy a M4 rifle, or those grenades you need to keep the enemy at bay, which is exactly what your opponent is waiting for to give themselves an edge and the round win.

For the Terrorist, I also stated a few secondary objectives that are connected to the economy system of Counter-Strike. The objective of planting the bomb should be fairly straight forward. By doing so, the planter receives a small sum of $300 while also simultaneously giving his entire team another 800$. Besides giving an advantage over to the Terrorists during the actual round, it ensures the team the possibility of better equipment or full amount of grenades if they so wish. As noted before, there is a huge price difference between the cost of a Terrorist to buy and the cost of a CT. This puts the Counter-Terrorist more prone to save if suffered enough economic damage. Considering that the Terrorist half is usually the less favored one, I would say it is more important for the Terrorist to cause their opponent to eco than it is for the CT.

A player may be better than the other, but I suspect a higher skilled opponent will have difficulties against even less skilled players when a pistol is all he has against rifles. Unlike other first-person shooters, CS:GO requires attention to future rounds. To ensure further round wins, the money situation must always be taken into account; it is what separates CS:GO from other shooters and part of the reason as to why we all love it so much.