Tactics and combat

Tactics & playbook

A tactic is 5 jobs, one per role: the IGL's job, the AWPer's job, and so on, on one map and one side.

A job is four things: a START, a ROUTE of stops, a WATCH held from the end of the route, and the THROWS on the way (Planning a throw).

A job belongs to the role, not the person: whoever fills that slot in your lineup does it.

The Tactics tab opens on the Playbook: the maps on the left in your ban order, and for the map you pick, three columns that say which tactic runs on a full buy, a force buy and an eco.

Edit opens one tactic in the Editor: pick a job with its chip above the map and read it on the card beside the map; under the map, the readout says what the whole tactic will do.

Editing a tactic has the clicks and drags; the ready-made plans give you something to start from.

Editing a tactic on the map

Click the empty map to add a stop at the end of the selected job's route; click a route line to add one in the middle.

Drag the big marker to move the start, drag a stop to move it, and drag the small dot at the END of the route to turn the watch.

A click near a marker or a stop counts as a click on it, and grabbing another job's marker switches to that job.

To plan a grenade, drag it from the tray onto the map where it should land: it joins the nearest stop, inside the ring it can throw.

A drop outside the ring is refused, and a drop on a stop that already has a throw replaces it: one throw per stop.

Nothing is kept until you press Save.

Ready-made plans

Every map carries 8 attacking plans and 5 defending setups, each with its throws planned on that map's real doorways and its defenders' rotate spots already drawn.

Start from one and change it rather than drawing from nothing: "Add a ready-made" in the Playbook puts a copy on the Not in use shelf.

Keep as many named tactics per map and side as you like; the shelf renames, duplicates and deletes them.

Tag each one for the buys it should run on by adding it to a buy column (3 buy types, see Buy types); a column with nothing tagged says what runs by default.

Tag SEVERAL tactics with the same buy and the game picks one at random each round, so you are harder to read.

A replay of the same match still plays out identically.

Your Playbook starts full

A new club opens the Tactics tab on a full Playbook: one plan per map and side, tagged for all 3 buys.

That plan is the one the game already runs when nothing is tagged, so a full shelf changes no result. It is a starting point, not a recommendation.

Swap it, edit it, or add your own at any time; the Playbook is yours from the first day (Ready-made plans).

In Casual, a map and side you leave with nothing tagged is filled again on the next matchday, and a letter names the maps.

In Full it stays empty and the default plan runs. More in Casual and Full.

In-match economy

Every player starts a half with $800, and every round pays them for how it went.

A round win pays $3,250, or $3,500 when it ends by detonation or defuse.

A loss pays a rising ladder, from $1,400 up to $3,400, so a beaten team is never broke forever.

A kill adds a reward that depends on the gun that made it.

Money caps at $16,000, and whatever is not spent carries into the next round.

Armour is priced here too: kevlar $650, a helmet $350 more (Armour).

Buy types (full / force / eco)

Before each round both teams decide how much to spend, and the game names the round after what they spent.

A FULL buy is rifles and armour.

A FORCE spends the little that is there after a loss.

An ECO saves the money for a real buy next round.

The tactic you tagged for that buy type is the one that runs (Ready-made plans).

Grenades are bought on a FULL buy only (Grenades).

Weapons: the two sides carry different guns

As in real competitive play, the attacking and defending sides buy from different arsenals.

The attackers' AK-47 ($2,700) is the only gun that kills a helmeted opponent with one headshot, and it holds its damage better at long range.

The defenders' M4A1 ($2,900) hits harder per body shot (38 against 36), but it never takes a helmeted head in one shot and holds only 20 rounds.

Everyone also starts each round with a free sidearm: the attackers' Glock (20 rounds) or the defenders' USP, which hits harder and holds 12.

The SMG ($1,400) is the force-buy gun and pays the biggest kill reward; the AWP ($4,750) kills almost anything it hits, pays the smallest, and only your AWPer buys one.

See Armour, Guns you keep and buying one for a team-mate.

Armour: kevlar and helmet

Armour is kevlar for the body and a helmet for the head, and it is bought fresh every single round.

Kevlar costs $650 and the helmet $350 more, so full armour is $1,000.

The helmet is what stops most headshots being instant deaths, so full armour is rarely wasted on a buy round.

Armour is the one thing that never carries over, where guns do (Guns you keep).

A player's buy only counts as a FULL buy when they hold a rifle AND armour (Buy types).

Fire is the one damage armour does not blunt at all (Fire).

Guns you keep, guns you find

Guns are not lost at the end of a round: a player who survives keeps the weapon and defuse kit they finished with.

Next round they buy only what they are missing, so a won round leaves you richer than the money alone suggests.

Everything resets at half-time, which is why round 13 is a second pistol round.

Weapons also lie where their owner fell, and anyone who walks over a gun better than their own picks it up.

That is the main way a team with no money claws its way back (Saving a lost round).

Grenades never reach the floor: what a player dies with is gone (Grenades).

Buying a gun for a team-mate

On a full buy round, a player with money to spare buys the standard rifle for a team-mate who could not afford one.

That team-mate then spends their own money on armour and grenades instead.

A player only gives if they can still afford their own full armour ($1,000) afterwards.

One giver buys for one team-mate, so two poor team-mates need two well-off ones.

On a round where the team is saving nobody buys for anybody: the whole team saves together.

The match log names every gift, so you can watch it happen.

Saving a lost round

When a round is clearly gone, your players may stop fighting and walk their weapon out rather than die holding it.

Whatever they survive with, they keep for the next round (Guns you keep).

They only do it when the round really is lost: outnumbered by 2 players or more, with no time left to plant or defuse.

Nobody bothers saving a free pistol, and nobody ever abandons the bomb.

Playing IQ reads the situation and Calmness stops the panic-swing, so a sharp, composed squad protects its rifles.

In a replay it looks like a player walking away from a fight, and that is deliberate.

Grenades: what your team buys and throws

Your players buy their own grenades and throw them themselves. There is no throw button, and there never will be one.

What you can do is plan a throw in advance (Planning a throw), and Utility decides how well any throw lands.

There are four kinds: HE, flashbangs, smokes and fire, each drawn its own way in the viewer.

They are bought on a FULL buy only, and last of all, out of whatever is left after guns and armour.

One player may carry 4 in total, and who carries what depends on the job they do.

None of them reach the floor: a survivor keeps their unthrown grenades, and a dead player's go with them.

Who carries which grenade

What a player carries depends on the job they do in a push, and on which side they are playing.

On attack: Support: 2× Flash, HE, Smoke; Entry: Flash, Smoke, Molotov; IGL: Flash, Smoke; AWPer and Lurker: Flash.

On defence: Support: 2× Flash, HE, Smoke; IGL and Entry: Flash, Smoke; AWPer: Flash, Incendiary; Lurker: Flash.

Fire is why the two lists differ: the sides use it for opposite jobs (Fire).

Only the players who really full-bought carry anything, so a poor round leaves the team empty-handed.

You can see exactly what each player is holding in the match viewer.

HE grenades

An HE costs $300 and each player may carry 1.

It does up to 98 damage at the very centre and 57 through armour: enough to break a player open, never enough to kill a healthy one.

The fall-off is steep, not gradual, so an armoured player caught halfway out from the middle takes only 7 damage.

It is a weapon for hitting someone where they stand, not for covering ground.

It never touches your own team, however close they are standing.

A grenade kill pays $300, the same as a rifle frag, and counts in the stats like any other kill.

Flashbangs

A Flash costs $200, does no damage at all, and is the one grenade a player may carry 2 of.

Where it lands it goes off as a white-out, and every enemy inside that is blinded.

A blinded player stops where they stand, cannot shoot, and loses any fight they are dragged into.

It never blinds a team-mate, so your own side can never flash itself.

Caught looking straight at it, a player is blind about 4 times longer than one who had already turned away.

A player suddenly standing still in the open is not being careless, they are blind (Grenades in the viewer).

Smokes

A Smoke costs $300, each player may carry 1, and it does no damage and blinds nobody.

What it does is take ground away: for about 18 seconds nobody sees through the cloud, neither team, equally.

Because it blocks sight both ways it blocks YOURS as well, so an enemy behind a cloud disappears from your screen.

A squad pushing together throws one onto the enemies it last saw, cutting the defender off rather than covering its own ground.

A defender whose angle a cloud takes away gives it up and falls back, losing the edge of being set and aimed.

A cloud stops eyes, never ears: an enemy you can hear behind it still shows as a suspected contact (What you can see in a match).

Fire: molotov and incendiary

Fire takes GROUND where a smoke takes SIGHT, and it is the one grenade the two sides use for opposite jobs.

On attack a Molotov costs $400 and burns for about 7 seconds; on defence an Incendiary costs $500 and burns for about 5 seconds. Each player may carry 1.

Where it lands the ground catches fire and NOBODY may stand on it, your own team included.

Standing in it costs 40 health per second, and armour does not help at all: it is the one damage armour never blunts.

Your players are never stuck behind one: they wait at the edge until it burns out, so fire delays but never traps.

A smoke landing on a fire puts it out on the spot, and fire is the one thing that can stop a plant or a defuse.

Grenades and the bomb

A player planting or defusing keeps going through a flash and inside a smoke alike.

Nothing that messes with a player's eyes can take the bomb off them.

Fire is the exception, because it moves them: a planter standing in one gets up and leaves, and so does a defuser.

So burning the bomb is a real way to deny a defuse, and burning the site a real way to deny a plant.

If a defuse ever stops for no visible reason, look for fire on the bomb.

See Fire and Round timers.

Utility: who throws well

Utility is the attribute that decides how good a thrower a player is, and a low one means worse grenades, never fewer.

On an HE a sharp thrower reads where the enemy actually is and lands it on the group, while a poor one hits empty floor.

On a Smoke it is the same read, and a poor thrower blocks off where the enemy used to be.

On a Flash it is timing instead: a sharp thrower's pops just before their team swings in, a poor one's has faded by then.

Fire reads like a smoke, where a poor thrower burns ground the enemy has already left.

Planning a throw aims the attribute, it does not replace it (Planning a throw).

Grenades in the viewer

A thrown grenade is a small marker travelling from the thrower's hand to where it will land, with a short trail behind it.

Where an HE lands you see a bright flash at the middle, a ring spreading out, and debris.

That ring is drawn at the real damage radius, so anyone inside it when it went off took damage from it.

A blinded player is ringed in white for as long as they cannot see.

With fog on you always see your own team's utility, and an enemy's only where your players can see it land.

A cloud is always visible once your team can see the spot, because smoke is opaque, not invisible.

Planning a throw

In the Tactics tab you can plan a throw yourself, and that is how a route becomes a set play.

Click one of a player's route points, pick a grenade, then click the map to say where it should land.

When that player reaches that point in the round, they throw it there.

It is tied to the PLACE, not to a stopwatch, so a fight on the way in or a slow route never throws the plan out of sync.

You can plan any of the 4 grenades the editor offers, fire included, and each route point carries at most one.

A planned throw RESERVES its grenade: see what stops one and what to plan.

When a planned throw does not happen

Four things stop a planned throw, and they are the only four.

The player is dead before they get there.

They are not carrying that grenade, because utility is bought on a FULL buy only (Buy types).

Every enemy is already dead, so nobody is left to throw it at.

The landing you drew is further than they can throw from that point: the ring around the point you are editing is that range.

Whenever one of those stops it, the grenade goes straight back to the player to use as they see fit.

What to plan, and when

Your plan covers the walk you drew, so planned throws are for the opening: an execute, or a defender's setup on the way to their angle.

Once a player has walked their route out the round is in their hands, and retakes are handled already: they smoke a planted site off themselves.

A planned fire is an opening tool too, and nobody may stand on it, so a fire on the site you are about to take denies it to you as well (Fire).

Utility still decides how well it lands, and a smoke short of a doorway does not cover the doorway (Utility).

Planning one is never worse than not planning one; at worst you get what you would have had anyway.

The ready-made tactics come with their throws planned, and one setup plans none on purpose: the Retake (Ready-made plans).

The readout: what a tactic will do

The readout under the map says what your tactic will do, worked out from the routes and the players' run speed: no dice, no enemies.

The TIMELINE lists when each player reaches the end of the route and when each planned grenade lands.

FIX THESE lists what is wrong and the change it wants: a player alone, a smoke gone too early or landing too late, an attack with no smoke, a site held by one, a watch into a wall, a doorway nobody watches.

ANGLES says what each watch actually sees from the end of its route.

A match still has enemies and luck, so the readout is a plan check, not a promise.

Rotate spots for defenders

A rotate spot is a defender's second spot: where that job moves when the team calls the other site.

The call is the team's own: when your defenders see or hear the attack at the other site, the ones holding the wrong half rotate; you only draw where they go.

On Defence, open a job's card and press "Add a rotate spot": a hollow marker appears at the other site, and you drag it where you want.

A spot serves the one site you drew it on: a job with no spot, or whose spot is not on the called site, rotates to the middle of that site, as it always did.

The readout says how far the spot is from where the job holds; a long walk arrives late.

Rotation happens before the bomb is planted; after a plant everyone converges on the bomb.

Waiting at a stop

A wait is a pause at one stop of a job's route: for a number of seconds, or until a named teammate's first grenade lands.

Set it on the stop's line in the job card, under Route; the timeline in the readout shows what it costs.

A fixed wait is at most 10 seconds: every second you wait, the defence gets for free.

"Wait for the Support's throw" is the way to push behind a smoke: the player walks on the moment it lands.

A wait can delay but never trap: if that teammate dies, or the throw is refused, or nothing is in the air, the wait ends.

While waiting, the player looks toward the next stop, and still fights anyone in sight.

Preview one round

The preview under the readout plays ONE real round of your tactic against one of the AI's own plays for that map, drawn like a match, fog on.

Press "Preview this tactic" to run it; nothing runs until you do. "Another round" rolls again, against a different AI play, picked the way a match picks it.

Both sides carry rifles, armour and a full set of grenades, so what you see is the plan, not the money.

One round shows where the fight happens and who falls first, which the readout cannot know.

One round is one roll of the dice (a "seed", in the engine's word): "Run 10 rounds" counts how many of 10 you win, and that number is the verdict.

The preview changes nothing in your club: no money, no fitness, no result.