Flashes/Smokes/Nades

[lolitskai]

Flashes

So some of you may know the irritation of being team flashed frequently by teammates who are either:

1) not aware that you are already in the area that they intend to flash
2) are randomly tossing flashbangs in hope of blinding the enemy

Well, just how useful is a well-placed flashbang? If done correctly, some may completely blind enemies for an amount of time enough to essentially get a free kill. It could also move opponents out of a position that otherwise may have been devastating for you (ie. shutter flash)

In most situations, flashbangs are categorized into two types:
1) Pre-flashes - The most common usage, just how most people use it by flashing before entering an area
2) Counterflashes - Now this might be a little different. When there are 5 enemies rushing into the bombsite and it's just you alone, how do you expect to mow them down? Running straight in is very reckless and will get you killed more often than not: instead, flash them so they will be disoriented (not only in the sense of sight, even if they dodge it their positioning may be off)! But, to take the name of these flashes more literally, it is used mainly when you are under a barrage of flashes,nades, smokes that the Terrorists toss at you before initiating their rush. Now that they're equally blind, the rush is stop/slowed, right?

I will show specific examples later on when I'm not too lazy to screenshot/capture clips of them. Although, there are a few dvanced counter-flashes on youtube as well if you look for csgoodies.com's videos and around the net

[puppet]

the best time to use a flash is when its dark .... everyone knows that lol

[lolitskai]

Alright so let's start with the map de_dust2.

Pre-flashes
Probably one of the first flashes that most people learn/are taught for scrims (or proper flashbangs anyway) would be this:



A simple bounce flash off the wall that is effective for flashing a big portion of the B bombsite. It's not the most elegant flash, but it's a very useful one for beginners learning to use flashes for rushes and such. Here are a few more very rudimentary ones:



So some of you are going like, "Kai, you post as if it's our first day of CS -.- ," but I'm just making a point on the concept of preflashing and showing how common it should be. Now, let's add a few more:





So, those are just a few pre-flashes that you will use very normally on dust2.

[lolitskai]

Agh, idk if it's IE not supporting this forum or what, but I get this problem that when I type too long of a message it keeps glitching so I cannot see the bottom of my posts for very long before it jumps back up to a previous line (like my previous post, I took a long time to move around my links in logical order since it kept bouncing back up).

Counter-flashing
Anyway, let's go into counter-flashing. As I said earlier, counter-flashing is where you use flashes to stop rushes or to counter the enemy flashes. Here are a few (to my knowledge) for your viewing:



If you would like me to explain the screenshots, I will edit this and go over them later. So for now, have fun with these!

[lolitskai]

NOTE: I am open to constructive criticism, if you have anything to say about how my tips/posts feel free to do so, the game is always changing and some plays may become outdated and useless after awhile: nonetheless, don't flat out reject it with out giving a good reason/example please!

Pre-flashes

I am probably going to go through this map's flashes with more detail, as de_dust2's flashes should be quite self-explanatory.

The Shutter Flash
So some of you haven't been into the game long enough to learn this or know exactly what it is, but you hear it all the time during scrims: "shutter flash and rush b" or something of the like. So what exactly is it?



It is a MUST-KNOW for this map, as many awpers will look down the banana looking for a pick and will shut down a B rush if this flash isn't used. Practice this while running as this will be the scenario you'll be in if you are the first on a B rush. Of course, don't expect the awper to sit idly when he is blind: he may fire a timed shot while blind before running for cover, so anticipate that when you are making a rush towards the top of banana.


In contrast, CTs who like to push out will need to know these two flashes. The first one may be self-explanatory (over the wall leaning to the right), but the second one may take a little bit of practice. If done correctly, you will not be blind from the flash as long as you are approximately behind the headshot boxes. You will also need to practice doing these while running as you'll need a good spawn and toss these as you're running to get there before the T's.


Now let's say you're not rushing, but you're still going B. "What are good flashes for blinding CTs defending B?" you ask. Here are a few:



these are good for the bombsite, but you may be wondering why I took 2 screenshots of the "same" flash: well, they're not. One flashes more of the back of the B bombsite, while the other flashes the front portion and and a ct that might peek from alley. God, I hate this posting glitch!

[lolitskai]

Sorry for splitting the same section into two posts, I just can't handle typing without seeing if I made a mistake or not (not to mention it takes a lot of extra effort to fight with the posting glitch when I do make a mistake). I'm going to just copy paste from word now so hopefully that'll solve the problem.

Have you ever got annoyed at crossfire setups where a CT plays in site and another on the outside of B? Well, here's 2 flashes that they can eat:


Now for the alley flash:


You can also flash into the heart of the site bouncing off this box:


Alright, so now there is the A bombsite and related. Let's start with the middle:


These flashes are dubbed "pop flashes" or "impact flashes". It doesn't look that special, right? However, these flashes are tossed so that once it reaches the ground or its destination, it will blow up instantly without giving any sort of prior notice to the enemy. This is especially good for the one flashing the left, as an awper in the jungle side of the bombsite would be rendered blind for a moment: that is all you need to get up to A. Now, there are a few flashes worth noting even after you are at the top of middle.
These three flashes blind the tennis area or the A site in the general vicinity:


This flashes the big pit area in general (great for helping teammates in apartment rush out):


Here are the apartment flashes:


This flashes the balcony:

This flashes the big pit:

And finally, tennis:

PHEW, that actually took up two pages on Word, haha.. anyway, I'll finish up tomorrow with the counter-flashes and then I'll add nuke and train on here as well.

[lolitskai]

Counter-Flashing
Here are a few flashes for retaking the B bombsite if you are playing a passive style at B. An important note that I have forgotten to add to all my previous posts is that some flashes will require running forward before tossing.
These flash alley from the outside:


This can be tossed slightly higher (where the red roof begins), but it may be riskier to do so.
You can also counter-flash from the outside into the cove area from here:

Here are some flashes from inside the B site and from the top of banana:

So where the hell is that second image? That's behind the tri-box, and it flashes the front of the site when the Terrorists try to enter the bombsite.
Now for the A bombsite counter-flashes: