Hi, my name's 2kliksphilip and I'm on a quest to go low.
I want to understand what it's like to take a vertical slice through the skill levels
as I plummet downwards through the ranks to reach Silver 1.
My quest started up here somewhere.
I'm not the best, but neither am I the worst... yet.
I see the ranks as a bubbling mess of people scrambling for the top, allowing me to slide
down past them.
I started this series for a bit of fun, playing terribly on purpose to see how the world would
react, but it's taken on greater importance.
I must have played over 100 games in this manner now.
It's getting to the point where I think I may never recover.
On the way I've hit criticism from people who think that what I'm doing is cold and
selfish.
Maybe.
But I've also met people who have become my friends, who have enjoyed taking a step back
from an endless conflict to mess about like it's Christmas.
And now I would like to share it with you.
My quest has taken me down to Master Guardian 1 and by the end of this series I hope to
reach the Silver ranks.
Welcome to Going Low in CSGO.
So far, my quest has looked a bit like this.
Season 1 only consisted of one game, which was inspired after I played a game horribly
drunk and went down a rank.
Season 2 dropped me down through the AK ranks over a series of games, ending me at 4 stars.
Between performing those games and the one I'm about to show you I accidentally played
quite well and went up a rank again, so it's important that I get down a rank as quickly
as possible.
But what I promised myself in season 2 may interfere with that.
Hmm, play badly, but don't play badly.
I pondered this question for all of 3 seconds
before deciding that I should play as best as I could!
Only with certain limitations.
The game started with a B rush.
I was to rush in first.
We had secured the bombsite, then I rushed out, got blocked and died.
An INCREDIBLY long battle then broke out in the bombsite.
It was kind of cool and had me on the edge of my seat for a while.
Then a teammate also got a knife kill.
Not a bad start!
How many people is it possible to kill in one match with just a knife?
Time to find out.
By now I was beginning to slip on the leaderboard, but not enough for anybody to care.
Our enemies were getting an easier opponent and our team seemed to find it quite amusing.
But two kills isn't enough!
Round 5 was another B rush, but I was robbed of any kills what so ever!
The troll becomes the trolled.
Some of the kills were easier than others.
This guy turned around and practically OFFERED me his behind.
How could I resist such a tempting prize?!
I plunged deep inside him and my points continued to rack up.
Other attempts weren't so successful.
At times I felt that I baited my teammates.
It's never something I deliberately aim for, but it sure does make it easier to get people
when they're distracted.
And with that, Terrorist side was complete.
Half way towards a respectable score of 10 kills.
In a competitive game.
With just a knife.
Against... mature players.
Maybe.
Now you'll see that I'm playing with jfcc.
I play a lot of competitive games with him.
For some reason, he doesn't mind if I deliberately muck up and make him lose.
I still don't think he's won 10 competitive games, bless him.
I've played with a lot of people over the last few months.
Sure, it's nice to have somebody there to prevent you from being kicked, but there's
more to it than that.
If you were hoping for more flashbacks to the past... you're out of luck.
I've covered everything from my Counter Strike Source days!
And I appreciate the responses I've received.
It means a lot to me when people message me saying how it really related to them and the
good old days.
But don't be one of those people who thinks that the past was always better.
It wasn't.
If you want to see more CSS action I recently unearthed a 2007 recording of a clan game
we had in the early days of Dissolutions.
Check it out and you'll see that it's just a match between people.
Nothing magical or nostalgic about it.
I don't even remember playing that game... or whoever Icotpan was.
It's amazing how much you forget.
Counter Strike Source was great at the time but I'd pick CS:GO over it any day.
I remember longing for a sequel, just to mix things up.
I got so excited when they released a new map for CSS like, once a year.
Compared with that, CSGO is a thriving community, even without any external programs or websites!
I'd have KILLED for matchmaking back then.
Probably not the gun models.
I'm just bitter and jealous of the amount of money everybody's raking in from that.
Any way, the point of this is that I've had lots of great games on CSGO as well that match
or even surpass anything that I had in Counter Strike Source.
Going down on the rankings has gone from being a novelty to a way of life and has become
rather exciting and deep.
I no longer have to think 'play like a noob!', I just DO it!
Going down a rank is something that requires a lot of work and effort.
Although I'm dropping down a rank per video for the sake of this series, what you don't
see behind the scenes are the 10 or so games that don't make the cut.
It's tiring to deliberately play all the time like a total noob, most of the time I'm just
a bad omen on the team who mucks things up if we're getting too close to winning the
game.
It doesn't take much to tip the scales and being the deciding player is quite empowering,
as though you're secretly controlling the other 9 players' destinies.
Sometimes, I play too well and win the game despite only using a pistol or whatever.
Embarrassingly, I've also had games where I'm the bottom of the team despite playing
properly.
Those tend to be the ones where I drop a rank at the end, just to rub it in.
I often confuse what's good for this series with what's good for my rank.
Yes, I'll probably be shot down for this and criticised for how I'm clearly a rubbish player.
But even when playing in a game with people 6-7 ranks below where I was, I'm not always
the best, even when I'm trying.
I end up making all sorts of justifications in my mind about why this is the case.
The closest you can get to experiencing this is on a public server where your team is holding
you back and the enemies happen to get lucky shots on you every round.
It's frustrating and somewhat embarrassing, but it's happened to all of us at one time
or another.
I assume that when you're up against 5 players with a lot of money who have just won a few
rounds, no matter how good you are you're not going to break the winning streak they're
having.
Other times I assume it's because although I'm trying to be good, I'm still just blindly
rushing in, hoping that my aim and knowledge of the level will protect me.
It often doesn't.
What's even stranger is how my perception of other players has changed.
When I see somebody with 4 gold stars, I now think 'WOW he must be good!'
even though I was way above him before and would immediately think that I could OWN him.
But if you're in a game and you're deliberately sucking, is there any difference between you
and a low-skilled player?
What I'm saying from this is that it's a big mistake to assume that just because you're
a higher ranked player than everybody else by quite a large margin, that you'll always
come top- sometimes, luck just isn't on your side.
Or you can blame lag and make a video about it, as I've done.
In future videos I plan to cover the unseen matches in this bit of the video.
But I figure this lecture has bored the hell out of you, so back to the main game for now.
Getting a knife kill as a CT certainly feels different and I found myself up against paranoid
and aggressive opponents.
Getting 5 more kills was becoming less and less likely.
I scored another kill, taking it up to 6.
But even that was a close one.
I became increasingly suicidal and risky in my attacks and they just weren't paying off.
They seemed to have me sussed.
I had 12 more rounds TOPS to get another 4 knive-kills.
Hmm...
5 with guns vs 1 with a knife?
I tried it.
Nope.
This was beginning to get tense, with only 9- 8 more rounds to prove myself.
Two rounds later, a lone awper was all that was standing between our team and another
win.
And more importantly, another knife.
Yeahhh.
Three more to go.
Still counts.
My team was friendly and fun to play with through-out.
Maybe I was just lucky, or maybe my antics unleashed their fun, playful side?
Nah, probably just lucky.
Of course, only using a knife meant that I had a lot of money to lavish on my wonderful
team-mates, It really brought out the charitable side in all of us.
Sadly, this wasn't enough to save us, and it reached 15-14 to them, and I had just one
final round to get that 10th kill to bring me into double figures.
I'm going to run this round in full, so that you can feel the pressure I felt.
Would I manage it?
Would I not?
Or worse still, would I ALMOST manage it?
Time to find out.
I
had managed it- double figures with just a knife.
Okay, I wasn't the best player on the team.
I'm pretty sure that they'd have preferred me if I had used a gun and the match would
probably have been a lot easier.
But what I've learned from this game is that stealth, cunning and down-right suicidal rushing
have their role in CS:GO.
Imagine if I had done the same but with a gun and how much damage I would have inflicted
on the enemy's team.
And for the first time in Going Low in CSGO, I've contributed to the team.
We've had a great time together and have shared the jokes.
We walked away from this game happy and with stories to tell and it's even aided my progress
towards going low.
Thank you for watching this video.
Ah, go on then, have the ending you were hoping for.
Next time in Going Low in CSGO our entire team plays using only CZ75's.
With wallhacks and thought, could become even better- maybe employ it in normal situations?
(with guns)