Communication in CS2 - The Ultimate Guide

Communication in CS2 is extremely important. If you put two teams with the exact same skillset against each other, the team with better communication will always win. If you ever look at those POV videos of pro teams, you’ll notice just how efficiently and frequently they are communicating.

Communication is an often ignored aspect of being a great CS2 player, but it really shouldn’t be. You’d be surprised at just how many rounds (even at the higher levels of play) are lost due to bad communication. Something as simple as making a wrong callout when your teammate is clutching that all-important round can lead to devastating economic consequences for the next couple of rounds and ultimately a match loss, for example.

Learning how to be an effective communicator in CS2 is one of the easiest ways to greatly increase your amount of wins. In this in-depth guide, we’ll cover everything you need to know about communication in CS2 in 12 tips. Read this guide, apply the concepts, and you’ll not only become a better teammate, but a better player in general.

1. Use your mic

In this day and age, there is no excuse to not speak up. Microphones and headsets (see our best headset for CS2 guide) can be bought for extremely low prices. Sure, the very cheap ones won’t be the best when it comes to microphone quality, but you don’t need a fancy mic + mic arm setup or a dedicated gaming headset for making callouts. Anything that can transmit your voice works.

And no, typing in chat does not replace talking. No matter how fast you type, it’s way slower than talking. CS2 is a very fast-paced game once the action gets going, so by the time you’ve typed your callout your entire team can be wiped.

It’s quite simple: get a mic (a very cheap one will do) and use it.

Bind your mic button to something you can use while playing

You should make sure you can use your push to talk button while playing. If you need to take your hands off of your mouse or WASD keys to make a callout, you’re doing it wrong. Which button you use is up to your personal preferences, but you should make sure you can use the button without interrupting your gameplay, as you will need to be making callouts in the heat of battle.

2. Know the callouts, especially on the sites

This is an obvious one, but you should know what you’re talking about and know the basic callouts of the maps you play. It’s not necessary to know the names of every inch and niche spot on the map, but you should definitely know what the major areas are called.

On the sites themselves (where the most action will be) you should also know how to call out specific spots. All sites will have different callouts for smaller sections of the site, often based on quite obvious visual cues. You should make sure that you know these callouts. If your whole team is fighting for a site, a regular ‘he’s A site!‘ callout won’t do.

If you’re in the lower r a nks, there’s no need to treat it like an exam. By watching streams, walking through maps in offline mode with callouts next to you, or just asking other players, you’ll learn quickly enough. Handily, a lot of callouts repeat. You’ll find a ‘short’ section on the vast majority of maps, for example. Once you have a few maps under your belt, you’ll find that learning new ones comes easier.

3. Be clear and quick with your info

CS2’s time to kill (TTK) is extremely short, and one second can decide an entire round. As such, it’s important that your callouts are precise, clear, and called in a timely manner. Always focus on calling out the most important info first, and secondary information after. Usually, the most important info is the location and direction of enemies, but this can vary from situation to situation.

Above all, keep your frustration for later. When you die, make the callout first instead of airing out your grievances first. By the time you’ve finished venting, your teammate might have already died a preventable death.

Don’t say

‘God damnit, I knew he was there! He’s coming hut by the way.’
‘He just killed me! How did he even do that? He’s hut.’
‘I believe in you, you can clutch this. He’s defusing with a kit by the way.’

Do say

‘One coming hut.’
‘One hut.’
‘Defusing with kit.’

4. Use actual callouts, not directions like ‘left’ or ‘in our back’

One major mistake that lower level players often make is calling out directions instead of locations. If you call ‘left’ or ‘in your back’, that location depends on where the listener is facing so it’s open to interpretation. Furthermore, if there are two or more teammates left alive, it can be unclear who the callout is meant for.

There are some scenarios where it makes sense to use directions, but in general you should always use actual callouts. That way, the entire team knows exactly what you’re talking about.

Don’t say

‘In your back!’
‘To your left!’
‘Over there!’
‘Enemy dropped their AWP behind you!’

Do say

‘Banana!’
‘Quad!’
‘Sandbags!’
‘Enemy dropped their AWP by firebox!’

4. Be specific and precise with your info

Equally important as being quick with your info is being specific. With fakes, lurkers, rotations, and utility baiting, teams are always trying to win the strategic game. As a consequence, having good information is key. Making a misleading callout can cause your team to fall for a fake or make other tactical mistakes, which can have disastrous consequences.

Try to make sure that your information is correct and cannot be misinterpreted. Avoid using the dreaded ‘they’: if you only see or hear one enemy, call it out as such. If you see two, say exactly that. If you are unsure of what exactly is going on, call that out as well.

If you know what weapons they’re using, call that out as well. You should approach enemies who are on an eco differently than enemies with an AWP, for example.

Basically, you want to make sure that your callouts are not open to interpretation.

Don’t say

[When hearing one enemy] ‘They are banana!’
‘One A site.’
[When confronting an AWP] ‘One on ramp.’

Do say

[When hearing one enemy] ‘One banana, could be more.’
‘One fountain on A site.’
[When confronting an AWP] ‘AWPer on ramp.’

6. Call out utility and your own situation

You should call out all relevant information during a round. Everything that can help your teammates or forces your teammates to take action should be called.

Examples of callouts you should make

When you’re holding an angle or chokepoint and you need to relocate or lose vision. Your teammates need to know that you no longer have eyes on that location, or they might become an easy kill for the enemy.
When you see enemy utility. Call it out as you see it: ‘smoke on A’, ‘multiple flashes on B’, …
When you’re flashing. This prevents your teammates from being blinded.
When you’re using other utility. This prevents accidental double smokes and the likes.
Locations of defuse kits (as CT) or weapon upgrades.
Double peeks. When you have a numerical advantage on an enemy, simply count down for a double peek.

7. Keep irrelevant chatter to a minimum

CS2 is a game where sound is of great importance, so you should leave the talk about last night’s football game for freeze time moments after a round. This is especially true for clutches and other tense moments when everything’s gone quiet. If you have a callout to make during a clutch, keep it extremely short and precise.

Don’t be a backseat gamer: be quiet during clutches

Everyone has their own playing style. Just because you might have done something differently doesn’t mean that you need to guide your teammate who is trying to clutch as if they’re some voice-controlled bot. If you have any tips or criticisms to share, save it for when the round is over. During clutch situations, you should only speak up when it’s absolutely necessary.

8. Never state a guess as fact

Naturally, you can make (educated) guesses in CS2. However, you shouldn’t state guesses as if they are a fact.

If you’re unsure of what’s going on, explicitly let this know to your team. Communicating your guess as if it’s an actual callout can make your teammate(s) act on that info. If your guess turned out to be wrong, this can have disastrous circumstances.

In general, try to avoid making callouts on specific enemy positions unless you’re sure that someone’s there.

You should also be mindful of the words you use. For example, there’s a world of difference between the words ‘they‘ and ‘multiple‘. Calling ‘they’re B‘ when you’ve only seen a couple of enemies can make your teammates rotate carelessly, only to be easily killed by an enemy lurker.

Don’t say

[When you have no confirmed info] ‘Ramp!’
[When you’ve only seen 3 of 5 enemy players] ‘They’re all tunnels!’

Do say

[When you have no confirmed info] ‘Might be ramp?’
[When you’ve only seen 3 of 5 enemy players] ‘Multiple in tunnels.’

9. Communicate necessary strategic info

This tip is a bit vague and kind of ties in with tip #6, but you should always let your team know about strategic decisions you’re planning to make. Especially if you’re going to be doing something that’s different from what’s considered default or going against pre-discussed strategies.

For example, if your team decided to go B before the round started and you want to go A with the bomb after your lurker got a pick there, call it out. Don’t just silently head towards A, assuming that your team will know what’s going on. If they’re busy taking B, you might end up in a situation where you (and the bomb) get dropped by an enemy rotator while the B site has been cleared by your teammates.

To summarize this tip: nobody likes a lone wolf who doesn’t say what they’re doing. Lurkers can be very valuable, but if you’re always doing whatever you want without letting your team know you might as well just go and play deathmatch. Teamwork is key in CS2.

This seems extremely obvious, but a surprising amount of people have a bad habit of sharing outdated info as if it’s current. If a teammate ends up in a 1v1 and you saw an enemy in B tunnels 20 seconds ago, don’t call that he’s on B. In those 20 seconds, that enemy could’ve gone anywhere, so your information isn’t very useful anymore. You can share that you saw the enemy, but contextualize it. Say things like ‘last seen B 20 seconds ago.’

11. Call out deaths, but also kills

It’s common for people to make callouts when they die. It’s less common to also make callouts when people make a kill. You don’t always have to call out a kill, but in general it’s good practice to do so. This way, your teammates know that a certain position or enemy has been dealt with so they can focus on other things. Additionally, they won’t spend any utility or other resources on that position.

Yes, there is the killfeed and the radar, but when you’re busy with a hectic push and clearing angles it’s not ideal to have to take your eyes off of your crosshair.

12. Don’t flame

If you’re playing with friends, you can naturally do as you please. Some friend groups talk to each other as if they’re angry sailors who have just lost their last crate of rum and that’s completely okay. However, you should never flame or berate a random teammate.

When people are having a bad game, they’ll know. No one in the history of gaming has suddenly started playing like a rockstar after random teammates started calling them trash. Most of the time, it’s even quite the opposite, as the added stress of the flaming usually makes people play even worse.

Even if you’re dealing with a troll or a griefer, it’s best to keep your frustrations private. Airing them out publicly is feeding right into their hand. ‘Don’t feed the troll’ is one of the oldest pieces of internet advice out there for a reason.

In short: no one wins when you start putting your teammates on blast.

Conclusion

If you’ve never played competitive games before, you might be making some of the mistakes mentioned in this article subconsciously. Even seasoned veterans could learn a thing or two from these tips.

Whatever your experience level or desired goal with the game is; it pays off to become a reliable communicator. Having teammates who are making calls with valuable info that help win rounds are of great value in CS2. What’s more is that you don’t even need to interrupt your regular schedule in order to get better at communicating.

Contrary to learning smokes or other strategic aspects (often requiring you to be in the game studying angles and smoke trajectories), improving your comms is all about applying a couple of key principles. After reading this article, you should be able to do exactly that.

Apply everything you’ve seen in this guide, and you’ll see that you’re winning a lot more of those close matches that feel like a true 50/50 matchup.