Overview

The AWPer, a term coined from the popular videogame Counter Strike Global
Offensive(CSGO), is the in- game player that buys and wields the AWP. The AWP is a
sniper rifle that can be purchased with in-game money on both the terrorist and counter-
terrorist sides. The game of Counter Strike Global Offensive(CSGO) is almost primarily
played on a PC. CSGO is a PC game with the competitive game mode being set up as a
5v5 where players either defense bomb/hostage sites or attack them. Teamwork plays a
significant role in deciding the outcome of Competitive Best of 30 matches. The AWPer
plays a significant role in map control, gaining early round advantages, and making in-round
comebacks. [1]

The AWP can be used in an aggressive or passive play style. The two styles are often
played in the same match depending on the round strategy the CSGO team is playing.
Famous professional AWPers have become role models for the CSGO community to learn
from their play style. Becoming an AWPers take lots of time and effort to come to the
superior skill level. [2]

The AWPer, if played superiorly, can change the tides of a match. The AWP is the only one
shot kill weapon to body with mild balances to not be overpowered in the game. The good
AWPer will have practiced and learned how to overcome or even use the balancing
mechanism to their advantage. [3]

Contents
1. The AWPers play styles
2. Famous AWPers
3. Skins
4. Becoming an AWPer
5. Related Sources
6. Citations

This is an image of the standard AWP looking down "mid" on

the map Dust 2.

The AWPers play styles

The Aggressive AWPer is a popular play style throughout most ranks in CSGO due to the
influence from the pro scene. Most players are trying to rank up or at least win the match
and having an Aggressive AWPer significantly helps a team to victory. The duty of the
Aggressive AWPer is to get early round kills and to take risky but potentially favorable gun
battles. [4]
The ability to consistently get opening picks or late round picks to hurt a teams economy or
momentum all contributes to how much an AWPer can change the game.[4] Aggressive
AWPers can gain the advantage for their team by being mobile enough to find the opening
in the enemy strategy. The aggressive AWPer needs to know when to push angles that
would seem suicidal in normal scenarios and often wield their slow, clunky weapon more
like a shotgun than a sniper rifle. [3]

Catching players out of position can be the easiest kill for an AWPer. These scenarios are
when they aggressively peak a corner the other team is not expecting. In these actions
most often the AWPer is going to be quick scoping. [1]

Another form of aggressively peaking is rushing to an angle in which the AWPer can see a
common spot the enemy team rushes to at the beginning of the round. Rushing to the right
angle often becomes a game of luck on who has the better spawn time, but also a test of
skill for reaction time and game sense. By successful getting opening picks, the AWPer can
gain map control for his team which is an advantage in executing the round objective. [1]

The passive AWPer is more of a tactical AWPer that tries to stay alive and hold favorable
angles. When an AWPer plays passively, he is trying to support his team. [3] If the enemy
rushes a passive AWPer he will most like be able to get a kill and not be traded which gives
his team a man advantage for retakes. The passive AWPer takes defensive long-range
position where the enemies can only come from one direction which normally occurs at
entry spots to bomb/hostage sites. [1]

Famous AWPers
A general consensus, in the CSGO community, come to believe the best AWPers in the
world are (screen name) KennyS, Guardian, and JW. [5] While number 2 and 3 spots are
often disputed, KennyS is most often described as the best AWPer of all time. [6]

KennyS has mastered being the aggressive AWPer, passive AWPer, and clutch AWPer.
The era that prompted the AWP nerf, KennyS wielded
the AWP like no other player had done. His game
plays included hitting difficult shots other professional
AWPers could not hit and making clutch saves when
the odds were stacked against him. [6]

In game, players can nickname their weapon. KennyS

was proclaimed to have a Magic Stick because the
shots he would hit were unbelievable. The phrase
inhuman reactions and impossible often described his
shots. Often KennyS would top frag serves and carry
This is an inventory inspection of KennySs
Magic Stick AWP.
his team to victory. [6] The glorious results happened on any roster he has played on from
Titian to EnVyUs to now G2.

Frags dont win CSGO matches, working as a team does. The plays KennyS makes is for
his team. KennyS gets the opening picks to open up a bomb site for his teammates, and he
makes the clutch round 3k or 4k (3 or 4 kills in one round) in retakes or bomb site holds.
Even when KennyS didnt frag a lot he got impact frags. Impact frags are frags that even if
KennyS got one kill that round it was on a 2v3 and it was to even it to a 2v2 so that his
teammate could close in on an objective and win the team rounds. [6]

Notable AWPers such as JW and Guardian, play with similar play style. The best AWPers in
the world arent afraid to run around a map and just find and kill the enemy. They have a
high-risk game play but get high rewards when they succeed. The confidence comes from
their thousands of hours of play in game and learning the mechanics of the game. The
average professional CSGO gamer is in-game for 2,397.9 hours (or more) a year. [2]

This is a graph of the professional players time spent on CSGO by professional team.

The match ups between top AWPers in the world are normally very close. When KennyS
and Team EnVyUs took on GuardiaN and team Natus Vincere in a Major finals, KennyS top
fragged the servers with a 43-23 kill death ration out performing GuardiaNs 41-29
performance. [7]
The status famous AWPers gain in the community is similar to celebrities and professional
athletes in football or soccer. The skill professional AWPers show are exception such that
people can learn from watching professional players game. The superior game plays styles
outline how they have been around long enough to see the rise of expert practitioners with
skills sufficient to reliably separate their play from that of casual players. [8] The skill gab is
only exacerbated by the significant difference in play time the casual player gets compared
to professional CSGO players.

Skins
Skins for the AWP weapon are esthetics that change the way the standard AWP looks. The
basic AWP is a military green color all over with black trimming. The Skins for the AWP
range from colorful patterns to graphics of cartoons are creatures such as a dragon.

The most expense skins are rare and normal have bright and vibrant colors that are
flashing/standout such as the Pink DDPAT or they are lots of detail such as the Boom or
Hyper Beast. If the skin has all of these traits, the skin is worth upwards of a thousand
dollars such as the Medusa or Dragon Lore. The list of skins starts from a base price of
about $200 dollars and works its way up to upwards of $2000. [9] The Pink DDPAT has a
$2000+ value do two only having 2 in existence and it features a beautiful flashy pink and
black design. Collecting skins in CSGO has a big market.
Skin Name Number in Existence
StatTrek Factory New Hyper Beast 793
StatTrek Factory New Corticera 458
StrakTrek Factory New Elite Build 304
Factory New Medusa 163
Factory New Snake Camo 130
Factory New StatTrek Boom 110
Souvenir Minimum Wear Pit Viper 39
Souvenir Factory New Dragon Lore 13
Factory New Souvenir Safari Mesh 3
Factory New Souvenir Pink DDPAT 2

Most of these top tier skins are owned by collectors that just like to have nice skin. They are
not famous on YouTube nor do they play professional CSGO. They are mostly casual
players that will pay high prices for the aesthetics of the game. Collector often exacerbate
the flamboyant game style of AWPing simple to show off.
 Another famous YouTuber and Streamer,
Sparkles live streamed opening
Cobblestone cases. Cobblestone case are
upwards of $20 dollars each. The people
that open Cobblestone cases hope to get
the famous AWP Dragon Lore Skin. The
AWP Dragon Lore easily has a value of
$600 or more. Sparkles unboxes this very
rare skin that is sought after by skin
collectors and normal players. [10]
This is an in-game look at what the Souvenir AWP
Dragon Lore looks like thats signed by KennyS.
Sparkles reaction and fact that he calls other famous people in the community solidifies the
fact that the Dragon Lore is such a unique skin. What makes Sparkles specific Dragon Lore
so unique is because there less than 20 Souvenir Factory New in existence. Sparkles calls
McSkillet the skins expert to confirm and gloat about his new treasure. He then calls Nick
Bunyun another famous YouTube and formal official CSGO caster to rub the Souvenir
Dragon Lore in his face because Nick Bunyun only has a normal Dragon Lore. [10]

The Souvenir Dragon Lore has been prices up to $50,000 due to its rarity and value placed
in it from the community. [11]

Becoming an AWPer
To AWP, a players in-game economic position must be excellent with plenty of cash at
hand to buy the AWP, armor, and necessary utility. Learning economic management will
take the AWPer practice doing the mental math in-game during completive matchmaking.
The AWPer must play tactically which requires games sense and lots of practice
understanding various situations of how to use the AWP most effectively.

The best way to develop the game sense of an AWPer is just playing the game whether it is
the deathmatch or competitive mode in-game. [12] [13] The new AWPer must continue to
become better through lots of hours of messing up and attempting hard shots. In the game
of CSGO, custom maps can help with aim, reaction time, and practicing pre-firing. [13] The
mechanics skill can come from custom maps and deathmatch.

The AWPer needs to move around comfortable with the AWP, understand the shooting
mechanics, learn how to manage the in-game economy to buy an AWP on buy rounds, and
most importantly know when to put down the AWP. The AWPer must spend some time on
all the different maps to feel comfortable playing on different maps. [2]

Spending time shooting bots or running around a map pre-firing positions are helpful, but it
is not until you make mistakes and correct what youre doing wrong will you become a
better AWPer. Correcting mistakes and practicing playing correctly develops a healthy
muscle memory to play as an AWPer. [13]

The best players have thousands of hours of game play simply to get the game sense of an
AWPer which will allow them to guess the plays of enemy players. [2] The right combination
of guesswork and timing can lead to impossible shots that defy logic. The guesswork
comes into play when you see the enemies behavior and how teams react to various
situations. The game sense develops to help put an AWPer in the right bomb site or right
position to catch the enemy off guard or even on guard but the AWPer out performs the
enemy team. [3]

Developing the superior reaction time is key to outperforming the enemy. One significant
problem when being patient as an AWPer is staring at the crosshair and loosing focus on
the surroundings. [14] To stay focused and keep reaction time fast, the AWPer must keep his
eyes moving and look at the surroundings and not fixed on the in-game crosshair.

Related Sources

TheWarOwl teaches fundamental skills for playing CSGO on his channel

Twitch.tv provides an easy way to watch professional matches live
Custom maps from the steam workshop that can help practice AWPing

Citations
1. ^TheWarOwl. AWP Tutorial. YouTube, YouTube, 30 May 2014,
www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_aDQDtcd-8
2. ^Yu, Eric 'Xenon'. 2015 Counter-Strike Statistics. Unikrn News, 12 July 2017,
news.unikrn.com/article/2015-counter-strike-statistics
3. ^Malachowski, Michal. How to AWP: Mastering Counter-Strike's Iconic Rifle.
Pcgamer, PC Gamer THE GLOBAL AUTHORITY ON PC GAMES, 15 Sept. 2015,
www.pcgamer.com/how-to-awp-guide-tips/
4. ^Soussi, MohamedAli. Player Roles in CS:GO. Team Radical, Esportsify, 29 Dec.
2015, radical.esportsify.com/articles/news/csgo/11/player-roles-in-csgo
5. ^Spark. Top 10 CS:GO Awpers of 2015. Kill Ping, 25 Nov. 2015,
https://www.killping.com/blog/top-10-csgo-awpers-2015/
6. ^Cinematic Edits. KennyS The Legacy. YouTube, YouTube, 22 Aug. 2017,
www.youtube.com/watch?v=86sJLwpvqfM
7. ^EnVyUs vs. Natus Vincere at DreamHack Open Cluj-Napoca 2015. Edited by
HLTV.org, 1 Nov. 2015, www.hltv.org/matches/2298989/envyus-vs-natus-vincere-
dreamhack-open-cluj-napoca-2015
8. ^Ferrari, Simon. ESport and the Human Body: Foundations for a Popular
Aesthetics. Ations for a Popular Aesthetics Simon Ferrari Georgia Institute of
Technology, 2013, www.digra.org/wp-content/uploads/digital-library/paper_387.pdf
9. ^OGMCSKILLET. ACTUAL Top 10 Rarest AWP Skins for CS:GO. YouTube,
YouTube, 25 July 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pp7Jx3KLkeQ
10. ^SparklesProduction. CS:GO - Souvenir FN Dragon Lore Unboxing! YouTube,
YouTube, 12 July 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNCqPivVlVI
11. ^OGMCSKILLET. $50,000+ BEST DRAGON LORE EVER UNBOXED! (New Most
Expensive CS:GO Skins). YouTube, YouTube, 21 July 2016,
www.youtube.com/watch?v=7kLY1KR473M
12. ^AWP Training. HLTV.org, 3 June 2013, www.hltv.org/forums/threads/390594/awp-
training
13. ^Mousecake. Mastering the AWP. Steam Community, Steam, 2 Jan. 2015,
steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=368102427
14. ^Bntlol. Wonder How pro AWPers Etc React so Fast? Here's a Tip for You.
r/GlobalOffensive. Reddit, 13 Dec. 2016,
www.reddit.com/r/GlobalOffensive/comments/3wp85k/wonder_how_pro_awpers_etc
_react_so_fast_heres_a/