We began this CS:GO weapons guide series with a look at the pistols available exclusively to one party - either Terrorists or Counter-Terrorists. Today we'll tackle the remainder of CS:GO pistols, those that are there for anyone to carry.
If you wish to go through the first part of this series, which goes over the exclusive CS:GO pistols, you can do so. We're not in any rush.
Now that you're done with that, we may continue. We already know what role pistols play in CS:GO, that there are five exclusives and five common ones and we went into detail on the exclusives. Which leaves five more to go. No time to waste, let's see what the market has on offer!
P250
- Price: $300
- Kill reward: $300
The P250 is the cheapest out of the five common pistols and by extension trails in most categories to the guns that are to follow in this article. Despite this, it is a fairly regular site as far as pistols go, mainly due to its price. Before we go to when and why this pistol is purchased, let's look at the dry stats.
The P250 can be summed up as an upgraded spawn pistol. At the cost of a few dollars you receive a gun that holds the same fire rate as the Glock-18 while also delivering higher base damage than the USP-S and the P2000. Its armor penetration is not enough to one-shot kill a helmeted opponent, but the story is different when helmets are out of the equation.
- READ MORE: The Story of Astralis – Part 1
The P250 can take down a non-armored enemy from much longer distances than the spawn pistols and especially in the case of terrorists, it makes some sense to go for this gun and a couple of grenades in the pistol round as they'd now hold the distance advantage over either CT spawn pistol. By doing so the Ts would give up a different type of high ground, though. That of ammunition. The P250 holds just three more bullets than the CT's usual spawn pick - the USP-S. Choices need be made here.
Because it doesn't have the necessary firepower to strike down a helmeted opponent with a single bullet, the P250 sees less play than some of the more expensive pistols but it is still a regular buy when you want to be more dangerous during an eco round and can afford the $300 without damaging next round's buy.
CZ75-Auto
- Price: $500
- Kill Reward: $100
The first of those expensive pistols we're going to tackle is the only automatic one in the game - the CZ75-Auto. As you might imagine, it has some pretty obvious advantages to others of its kind, but this is CS:GO, so be sure it's all balanced out in other areas.
The most blatant advantage which can be figured out without any deeper knowledge of the game is that the CZ75-Auto has by far the highest rate of fire among pistols. Combined with its decent damage and armor penetration, this makes it a very dangerous weapon in the right hands.
However, these perks are negated by a lot of setbacks. For starters, the ammo is very limited. The 12+12 combo is the second-lowest of any pistol. The rate of fire also comes into a somewhat negative role here as it makes these 12-round magazines disappear in a blink of an eye. By this point it should be clear that spraying heavily with the CZ75 is not the best idea. It only gets worse.
- READ MORE: The Story of Astralis – Part 2
The recoil of this weapon is horrendous. It's as close to uncontrolable as a CS:GO weapon goes. The damage dropoff and the slow reload and draw time complete the picture that screams at the top of its lungs: do not spray with this gun! As a passing note, it is also the only pistol to have a lower kill reward. That's rarely a priority when buying a pistol, but it still adds to the limitations imposed on the CZ75.
Despite two paragraphs of bashing the CZ75-Auto, its strengths remain pretty much intact in certain scenarios. The slow draw, reload time, damage dropoff and recoil are a non-factor when you use the gun for what it's meant to do - take down an enemy at close quarters. The CZ75 is extremely good at that thanks to the rate of fire and as long as you hit your shots, the magazine size won't bug you either. These traits make it a popular choice as a sidearm for snipers in particular, but in that case you should keep the draw time in mind. It can be extremely frustrating.
This pistol competes with the exclusives Tec-9 (Terrosrists) and Five-SeveN (Counter-Terrorists) in the buy menu. Now that you know the positive and negative sides of all three, it's up to you to choose which one suits your playstyle.
Dual Berettas
- Price: $400
- Kill reward: $300
The Dual Berettas are one of two "meme" pistols in CS:GO. We'll get to the second in a moment. They are rarely seen in a competitive environment mainly due to simply having better and/or cheaper options, yet still have something to offer to those who dare experiment.
- READ MORE: The Story of Na'Vi – Part 1
The Dual Berettas excel mainly in ammo and rate of fire. They hold the largest magazine size of all the pistols at 30 bullets and have four more mags in the back. The high rate of fire stems from the fact that you hold two pistols at the same time. Double the pistols, double the speed. Well, not exactly, but it sounds cool. The Dualies are still not firing at the rate as the CZ75-Auto.
The large magazine and huge amount of ammo are compensated by a very slow reload which requires you to be behind solid cover in order to have any hopes of firing another shot. Another compensation factor is the low accuracy and moderate damage. The Berettas fall in the P250 range of damage, but fare far worse against armored opponents. This paired with another heavy case of damage dropoff-ritis makes this pistol unusable at long and even medium range.
The low recoil, large magazine size and good accuracy while moving mean that this is, at last, a pistol of which we can say: go ahead, son, spray all you like. This is made all the more true by the weird contradiction of the Dual Berettas not being very accurate while standing still.
- READ MORE: The Story of Na'Vi – Part 2
It's a spray and pray type of pistol that isn't great at anything and isn't particularly worse at anything. That's its main strength and what's keeping it back at the same time as good players usually know exactly what they need and there are other pistols that can fill those needs better than the Dual Berettas.
Desert Eagle
- Price: $700
- Kill reward: $300
One such pistol is the Desert Eagle. Holding the same iconic status as the Glock and USP, the Desert Eagle is the most expensive pistol in CS:GO. You definitely get your money's worth thugh.
We've stuck to speaking on positives first, so why stop now? The Desert Eagle is in a tier of base damage and armor penetration that only the last pistol we're going to review is able to compete with. Unlike previous entries, the Desert Eagle can take someone's head off at virtually any distance with one shot, helmet or not. Accompanying that is a very high first bullet accuracy. Which basically sums up the good stuff. Hmm, weird.
So, you have a mini-sniper in hand. How do Valve nerf it enough to be gameplay friendly? By making it hard af to use. This pistol comes with any other disadvantage you can hink of: small magazine size, slow rate of fire, high recoil, slow movement speed, high price. The full package.
- READ MORE: The Story of Cloud9 – Part 1
Mastering the Desert Eagle's shooting pattern is considered among the best signs of CS:GO skill as it can be very punishing. The gun's huge kickback after shooting creates a small window during which it becomes very innacurate. Firing before the Desert Eagle is back to rest often leads to missed shots and frustration. Spraying with it is a strict no-no from anywhere past a couple of feet. The recoil is truly a nightmare, believe me.
As good as the Desert Eagle is, it is out of contention during pistol rounds for obvious reasons - price. Where it's most used is as a force buy option because it can outdo nearly every weapon in the game in a one-bullet face-off. One or two accurate DeEagle shots have turned around more than a few CS:GO matches.
R8 Revolver
- Price: $600
- Kill reward: $300
We arrive at the final pistol and the second meme in today's list. Though, just like the Dualies, the R8 Revolver has become something of a running joke among the CS:GO community these days, how it got there is not the same story at all. See, this was by far the most overpowered weapon CS:GO and maybe Counter-Strike as a whole had ever seen back when it was released. This is no longer the case because Valve took the necessary steps to bring balance to the universe. Which doesn't mean the R8 Revolver has been deprived of all its power.
What remains true to this day is that this pistol is a beast in terms of damage. We have been speaking about one-shot kill potential with strikes to the head thus far. With the R8 we're talking one-shot kill with a hit to the body at close range. That's only against unarmored opponents of course, but for perspective - the AWP is the only other CS:GO weapon that can do this. Needless to say, with such enormous damage, a headshot is a kill at any range.
- READ MORE: The Story Of Cloud9 – Part 2
Naturally, such a powerful pistol must be stripped of any other strong points or it would simply break the game. While stuff like low fire rate, slow movement and the lowest ammo capacity in the entire game - 8+8, would make this pistol difficult enough to use, it is its most defining feature that breaks the deal for CS:GO players. We're talking of the shot delay.
The R8 Revolver can be used a couple of different ways. The regular left mouse shot and a quicker right mouse one. The regular shot comes with a 0.2 second delay from the point of clicking, which might not seem like much outside of CS:GO, but can make a world of difference inside it. The secondary fire mode makes up for the delay by wrecking the accuracy completely. It can be potentially viable only at minimal distances.
As the R8 Revolver and the Desert Eagle compete for the same spot in the buy menu, you'd never see it in a serious match. If you like to troll and suck big time with the DeEag like yours truly, it can be a very fun gun to carry around regardless of its current status in the meta.
This concludes the pistol-covering part of our CS:GO weapons guide series. Next time we revisit it, we'll be moving on to the big boys. Keep tabs on EarlyGame or you might miss out on that magical moment. Our YouTube channel will be at your service while you wait.
