Over the course of the past few decades, smoke grenades have remained a core component of strategies in Counter-Strike. From executing attacks on bomb sites, stopping an opposing team from rushing onto a site, or blocking off dangerous sight lines for your teammates, smokes have been one of the most important tools in the game.
In Counter-Strike 2, however, Valve will be implementing some significant changes that will drastically affect how smoke grenades are tactically used, and how players counter their effects on the other side of the battlefield.
There are multiple different changes that will shift the usage of grenade in the upcoming title, and every single player, new and old, will want to get accustomed to these massive adjustments before the game releases later this summer.
Here are all of the new changes to smoke grenades in CS2.
All Counter-Strike 2 smoke changes
New smoke physics
Whenever a smoke grenade is thrown out, players can calculate what kind of sight lines and areas will be blocked from view, especially after years and years of practice. This time, however, smoke grenades will no longer have a static coverage area, and will instead expand to fill areas naturally through the creation of volumetric 3D objects that live within the game world.
Depending on where the grenade is thrown, smoke will spill out of open windows and over terrain, fill corridors, and seep over staircases in ways that have never been seen before. Smokes also react to lighting, whether it’s from a frag grenade or a muzzle flash. Players will also see the same smoke pattern, regardless of their position, making one-way smokes a thing of the past.
Gameplay differences with smoke
When there is smoke on the battlefield, players can now interact with it in a handful of different ways. One massive change, for example, is that smoke can now be shifted and altered with the use of frag grenades and gunfire. The shape of a smoke cloud can be carved into by bullets, while a grenade can completely clear smoke from an area with its explosion for a brief moment.
It’s a huge gameplay shift that allows for even better strategy, since teams can now use well-coordinated gunfire, or a well-placed grenade to help gain visibility in a heavily smoked area before a push onto a bomb site or choke point. A surprise volley of bullets can give a teammate a split second to return fire accurately, whereas before, a smoke grenade was an impenetrable visual block that players needed to wait to clear or run through.
