Introduction

With the advent of what has been called the ‘run and gun’ patch over a year ago, SMG effectiveness was considerably increased. Taking into consideration the positives of an increased kill reward, lower initial buy cost, increased fire rates and the ability to quickly push into areas due to high movement accuracy, the SMG becomes a useful weapon in many circumstances. This then begs the questions, "When should you buy what SMG?" and "What are the most efficient ways to use these weapons?" Please note that I will be leaving the P90 out of this article as it is more of a full buy weapon, as it is considerably more expensive than the other weapons and does not boast the extra kill rewards of the other SMGs

Quick tips: Due to the high movement accuracy of SMGs you can effectively jump shoot from close range!

MAC-10

Boasting a low base damage, terrible accuracy and abysmal armor penetration, the very cheap MAC-10 ($1050 to be exact) plays a very particular role in CS. The only real advantages of the weapon lie in a very high rate of fire that can enable you to shred unarmored opponents. This means that the MAC-10 falls into a very particular niche of no armor anti-ecos that, considering the current buying strategy of forcing following a first round loss, tend to be few and far between. I would only advise you to buy the MAC-10 if you are sure that the CT side is out of money or if you consider yourself to be so much better than the enemy that this awful gun will not hinder you.

MP9

Now to the CT specific SMG that fills a similar role as the MAC-10, the MP9 costs slightly more at a price of $1250. Luckily for players that choose to purchase this weapon you’re also getting a slight improvement on the MAC-10 with a slightly lower DPS but greater armor pen, better running accuracy and better accuracy over time. Unfortunately, this gun still underperforms when considering other SMGs but it perhaps has a greater use being on the CT side than the T side. Sometimes on second rounds if the T players get a bomb plant you can expect that they might just full eco to prepare for an AK buy on the third round. Here, against unarmored players, the weapon will shine and given the right circumstance you can potentially build a nice bank for the 3rd and even 4th rounds if things don’t go your way.

UMP-45

The UMP is the first SMG that I would actually consider to be an efficient buy in almost any circumstance, being both relatively cheap and effective. The UMP has a good base damage of 35 and a decent armor penetration of 55% (second only to the P90). Its accuracy is not the greatest but is respectable considering the close ranges you’ll likely engage at. Its only really downfalls are its rate of fire which is considerably lower than other SMGs, being on par with many rifles, and its slightly smaller clip size of 25 that can make it difficult to take on more than 2 enemies before having to reload. With its cost of $1200 being only $150 more expensive than the MAC-10 and $50 less than the MP9, I would almost always buy this gun over the other two in any situation as it is typically more effective and doesn’t rely as much on the enemy team not buying armor.

MP7

The MP7 fills a similar role to the UMP-45 being just as effective for slightly different reasons. The MP7 boasts a slightly lower base damage of 28 and slightly lower armour penetration of 52.5%. However, it makes up in this department with a higher rate of fire of 750rpm. It has a lower accuracy but this is negligible considering the run and gun play style so long as you are not at longer ranges when using the weapon. On the upside, it boasts 5 more rounds per magazine and a lower reload time of 3.15 opposed to the UMP’s 3.5 seconds. This means that you’ll be able to take on more enemies in a firefight and potentially be able to reload before reengaging. Thus the decision comes down to personal preference of which gun feels better to you, which spray pattern you prefer and if would you rather pay an extra $500 for the extra bullets or have the slightly cheaper UMP.

PP-Bizon

Clearly the best SMG of its class with a whopping 64 bullets and a sleek design, the only gun better than the Bizon is the Negev. As much as we all might wish this were true, the Russian SMG unfortunately underperforms in almost every area with the lowest armor penetration, lowest DPS and abysmal accuracy. Considering it is also one of the more expensive SMGs, it is an almost useless weapon as it is simply outperformed either in damage or simple cost effectiveness. The Bizon might fight into the role of the MP9 and the MAC-10 but these weapons are more efficient choices against unarmored opponents. The only positive of this weapon is the impressive 64 round ‘Helical-feed magazine’ (yes, I did some research on the Bizon!) that allows you to pump an inordinate amount of ammunition down range, but even this is a double edged sword as no one can be bothered remembering a 64 bullet spray pattern. The gun even sounds terrible following the update that makes the Bizon sound more like a high powered paintball gun than a 64 round capacity killing machine, I would only consider this weapon to either really annoy your team or damage the enemy moral by killing them with potentially one of the worst weapons in the game.

Conclusion

So having said all that, what do I do? I buy the UMP basically 9 out of 10 times as it tends to be the most effective in any situation as a cheaper alternative to the MP7. This way you aren’t relying on the enemy to buy up in a way you have to anticipate. To be most effective, keep moving with all these weapons while accounting for the spray patterns shown above. It can be difficult to multitask, but it is well worth it. If you want more information regarding the exact stats of these weapons, I recommend the website Strike-Counter.com, as they have great graphic representations of all the guns and their exact statistics including accuracy, damage over distance and more.

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