Creating a Classic Counter-Strike Map

This page covers the Classic Game Modes of and as well as map requirements.
, , and are the classic game modes in .
See below for instructions on how to load a map in these game modes.
== Game Mode Description ==
The game consists of rounds with a maximum duration. The ways that a round can be won is defined by the map's scenario.
The default scenario is the Elimination Mission.
The other two extend the default scenario and eliminate drawn rounds.
Elimination Mission
* Before match start, there is a warmup period with player respawns. For warmup arenas, see Setting up 1v1 Warmup Arenas.
* At the beginning of each round, the players spawn at a spawn point of their team. Each round starts with a freezetime where players can neither move nor shoot. Its duration in seconds is set with the ConVar .
* During the freezetime, the players can purchase weapons and equipment. After the freezetime, players can move and shoot.
* Round-ending objectives are elimination and timeout (draw).
* Players earn money by winning/losing rounds and by getting kills.	
Elimination Mission
* Before match start, there is a warmup period with player respawns. For warmup arenas, see Setting up 1v1 Warmup Arenas.
* At the beginning of each round, the players spawn at a spawn point of their team. Each round starts with a freezetime where players can neither move nor shoot. Its duration in seconds is set with the ConVar .
* During the freezetime, the players can purchase weapons and equipment. After the freezetime, players can move and shoot.
* Round-ending objectives are elimination and timeout (draw).
* Players earn money by winning/losing rounds and by getting kills.
↓	↓
Bomb Defusal - basically an Elimination Mission, but:
* Round-ending objectives are bomb explosion (Ts win), bomb defusal (CTs win), elimination and timeout (CTs win). There are no drawn rounds.
* Terrorists must plant a bomb (weapon_c4) at a bomb site (func_bomb_target) and wait for it to explode, Counter-Terrorists must stop them from doing so. All players are notified if a bomb has been planted.
* Players also earn money by planting or defusing the bomb.	
Hostage Rescue - basically an Elimination Mission, but:
* Round-ending objectives are hostage rescue (CTs win), elimination and timeout (Ts win). There are no drawn rounds.
* Counter-Terrorists must reach and rescue hostages (hostage_entity) by bringing them to a Rescue Zone (func_hostage_rescue), Terrorists must stop them from doing so.
** If there are no hostages left, CTs win if they have rescued at least 50 % of all hostages, otherwise the round continues. 
** CTs win as soon as they have rescued one hostage.
* Players also earn money by reaching and rescuing hostages.
== Map Requirements ==
A map definitely requires the following to be able to play any classic game mode.
==== Spawn Points ====
Create entities and change their classname to either info_player_terrorist or info_player_counterterrorist. This is where players will spawn.
On official maps, the spawn points of each team are not spread among the map but close together in one area.
The two spawn areas are usually placed opposite each other on the map and should not be visible to each other.
In Classic Competitive, there are only 5 players on each team.
 In , there are up to 10 players on each team.
It is a good idea to include 16 spawn points for each team, to work with 32 player servers, otherwise 5-10 are also sufficient.
==== Buyzones ====
Create one or multiple brushes so that each spawn point of one team is touching one, texture them with the texture, select them all and tie them to an entity by pressing +. Change the entity class to func_buyzone and set the keyvalue () to the appropriate team. This decides which teams are able to open the buy menu while touching the previously created trigger volume(s).
Do this for the spawn areas of both teams.
==== Map Objectives ====
A map already works until here, just that it is only an Elimination Mission, meaning that a round can only be won by eliminating the entire enemy team, otherwise the round is drawn. A disadvantage of this is that this encourages passive gameplay to not risk losing the round. To avoid this, there are map objectives so that there is a winning team if the time runs out; This encourages active gameplay for the other team.
You should decide for one of the following:
==== Competitive Aspects ====
* The time that players need to reach bomb sites or hostages influences their winning chances, so the spawn point placement can severely impact map balance and can make choke points (meeting points) very engaging.
* Random spawns may not be desirable to some players, but can work on some maps. For example, players on the Terrorist's team on de_dust2 can have a good spawn for B or for A long.
== Testing ==
You can test your map by launching it with the command.
== Miscellaneous ==
==== Map Prefix ====
 The map prefix is just a naming convention.
 The scenario name that is displayed in the loading screen depends only on the prefix of the map file.
Map Prefix 	Example Filename	Scenario Name in Loading Screen (English)
 	 	Hostage Scenario Mission
 	 	Bomb Scenario Mission
none of the above	 	Elimination Scenario
==== Further Game Modes ====
 There are more game modes such as , , , or that can also be played on classic competitive maps and that only need some (map) adjustments. For a list of all game modes and more, see CS:GO Game Modes.
== See also ==
* How to Develop a Map That Works
* Creating a working mini-map
* Nav Mesh Editing - Make bots work (better) and add Place Names
* mapname.txt - Display custom text when loading your map
* Choosing Player Models - Creating 
* Publishing Your Map to the Steam Workshop
Category:Level Design
Category:Tutorials