Side-stepping Skill

Counter-Strike is constantly evolving. From art, to maps, to inventive plays, and even player input, the CS community shapes the game. Scripting and automating player commands has always been contentious, but over the years some forms of scripting (e.g., jump-throws) have gained acceptance, as they enable plays that wouldn't otherwise be possible. In fact, jump-throws became such an important part of the game that we've done the work to make them reliable without any special scripting or binds (i.e., by jumping and quickly throwing a grenade). Developing one's coordination and reaction time has always been key to mastering Counter-Strike. Recently, some hardware features have blurred the line between manual input and automation, so we've decided to draw a clear line on what is or isn't acceptable in Counter-Strike. We are no longer going to allow automation (via scripting or hardware) that circumvent these core skills and, moving forward, (and initially--exclusively on Valve Official Servers) players suspected of automating multiple player actions from a single game input may be kicked from their match. To prevent accidental infractions, in-game binds that include more than one movement and/or attack actions will no longer work (e.g., null-binds and jump-throw binds). If you have a keyboard that includes an input-automation feature (e.g., "Snap Tap Mode"), be sure to disable the feature before you join a match in order to avoid any interruption to your matches.