Is The Latest Inferno Patch Really A Big Deal?

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In the hyper-competitive world of CS:GO, the margins between victory and defeat can be tiny. Mere pixels have the ability to decide the difference between a game-winning headshot and a complete miss on either side of an opponent, which has led to players and pros alike becoming masters in the angles and geometry that get brought into play on the different maps in the competitive pool. The latest change to Inferno, CS:GO’s second-most popular map pick, has certainly opened up a can of worms around this discussion, with the tweaks not being particularly well received by the majority of players so far. 

But, is it really such a big deal? Check out Gamelevate as we run you through the latest Inferno change, and what it means for competitive CS:GO now. 

What Have Valve Done With Inferno? 

Being on the T side on Inferno can be a tough ask, with CTs being able to defend both the A and B bombsites with the assistance of plenty of nooks and crannies to tuck themselves in. 

With that being said, the A site has historically been the easier nut to crack for those seasoned enough on the map. More often than not, Ts would plant the bomb at Default (just behind the wooden crates on the site), before seeing out the round in the corner of Pit where the blast radius of the bomb wouldn’t damage them. 

In the latest update to the map, Valve had tweaked the wider blast radius so that planting at default and saving in Pit is no longer possible. Even with full HP and armor, the blast will be enough to wipe a player off the server, making the spot essentially redundant when it comes to the economy game. 

Should be said that planting on the far side of the site away from Pit will *only* deal 52 damage when saving (so still technically possible), but there’s no denying it’s a bit of a faff compared to what players are used to. 

Why Is The Inferno Patch Such A Big Deal? 

So why has this one small change caused such a stir in the CS:GO community? 

For one, Inferno is already a CT-favoured map, so having a tweak implemented that only hits the T side is certainly a head-scratcher for some. Secondly, the likelihood of finding yourself in a team with a player who hasn’t seen the update is incredibly high, so there could be a few irritating deaths on the horizon. 

And the criticism hasn’t just come from casual players either, we even Team Liquid’sTeam Liquids Jonathan “EliGe” Jablonowski weighing in: 

“[I] think the bomb explosion radius on inferno change only nerfs Ts being able to save more consistently, so not sure about that one.” 

Time will only tell how significant this one small change will prove to be on the great decider in the map pool, however, be sure to keep it in mind the next time you hop into a matchmaking queue.