CS:GO is a team game. But it’s also a game that you can, in a way, play alone. Although it’s not recommended at all, you can just enter a match and do whatever you want, at least until you get kicked by your teammates by not doing anything good for them. Why am I telling you something that you probably already know? Because, if you’re here, you know how good CS:GO can be when playing with a team and you’re walking your first steps as a team player.

In this article you’ll find some general tips to help you and your teammates improve your game and eventually reach the next rank (or level), or even make you play your first online qualifiers - remember, anyone can reach the big stages, you just need to beat several qualifiers!

Welcome to team play, welcome to CS:GO!

If you’re taking your first steps in CS:GO with a team, welcome to the best part of this game! CS:GO is a game that is supposed to be played as a team and there’s no better feeling when a strat goes exactly the way you wanted or you ask for a perfect Flashbang that ends up blinding your opponents for an easy two-piece.

Remember that CS:GO is also a very complex game and there are no two rounds alike, which means that even playing in a team environment, your strats and calls will not always work as intended, whether that is due to adaptations from your opponents or even just some bad timings by your teammates.

Communication is key

Knowing how to communicate effectively is the key to having success in CS:GO. Sure, you might be saying where you saw an opponent or calling out how many are pushing B when you die, but there are countless ways to do it and most of them don’t really bring any good to your team.

You want to say your calls as fast as possible, but also very calmly. It does no good to your teammates if they hear you yell your call countless times. In fact, it can actually hurt their ability to hear precious sound cues. Give your call, say what you need to say, and shut up. This applies to all your teammates as well. Don’t panic just because you’re getting flashed countless times and suddenly you die to three players pushing - just say “I’m blind, 3 players pushing B”. You can also add information that you might learn during those brief death cam moments, but that’s it.

Your money is everyone’s money

Again, you need to remember that CS:GO is a team game and there’s no point in trying to play if you have rounds with “weird” buys just because a player does not have money, or at least enough money to buy a good weapon. You should also be always aware of the money your teammates have and not only yours, mainly because they might need your money.

If you have money to drop a weapon or grenades to a teammate that does not have them, it’s your job to give them whatever they need. This might seem weird for a newbie player, but there’s an easy way to look at this - just understand that your money belongs to the entire team. There’s a reason why you can see how much money the team spent overall in the scoreboard and on professional matches and not on a single-player basis.

Also, avoid having one player with a lot of money and others on the brink of going bankrupt. If there’s someone with way more money than the others, make sure he drops weapons, even if the other players have money to buy - that way, you can avoid having him reach max cash ($16000) and wasting rewards.

Playing simple can be hard

A lot of people think that playing in a team environment requires you to have super hard-to-execute strategies and have countless tricks on your sleeve… although these types of strats are always good to have “just in case”, you’d be surprised at how effective playing simple can actually be. Even the best teams in the world tend to avoid overcomplicating stuff whenever they can.

Playing simple is different than playing bad, though. You can try to play simple and still do a lot of mistakes. Start working on those mistakes, slowly, learn to identify them and how you can fix them, and eventually step up the difficulty of what strategies you’re trying to pull. But remember to stick to the basics - if they’re well-executed, even good teams will have a hard time stopping what you’re throwing at them.

If you don’t believe me, just take a look at demos from teams like Gambit or G2 - they’re not doing anything very difficult most of the time, but it just works.

Trading kills is essential

CS:GO is a game of numbers and advantages. You want to have more players alive than your opponent whenever you can. Having more players alive means that you can, at all times, overwhelm your opponents if you play together. Naturally, you’re not going to have that advantage at all times and that’s why trading a kill is super important in a competitive shooter such as CS:GO.

You want to play in a way that, if someone dies, there’s instantly another player ready to take down the killer. Play in pairs, defend on crossfire setups, just make sure that a second player is always ready to trade a teammate that dies. Think like this - you might lose someone, but since you traded the kill, the balance stays in place.

If you take a look at professional matches, you can see how the players work together - on the T-side, it’s rare to watch someone push alone unless they’re playing a lurker role. On the other hand, it’s also rare to see a CT player holding an angle where another player can quickly peek and punish a player that might have killed his teammate.

CS:GO is a positional game and you should have control of as many positions as possible during a match. The more you’re able to push your opponent back, the less they’ll be able to do.

In the end, it’s all about the time you put into the game. The more you play, the better you’ll become, the more you’ll understand what’s a good and bad decision, and the more chemistry you’ll have with your team.

Thank you for reading this article! You can reach out to me for feedback or suggestions via Twitter.