The M4A4 has been the most popular of the two for several years, but the M4A1 received
an improvement to its damage just the other week. But is this enough to balance the two
weapons in the eyes of players? There’s only one way to find out. Or two, if you play
the game.
Let’s start with the story leading up to this point. It is possible to track the weapons
being used from all of HLTV’s match stats, which is the best indicator we’ve got of
what the pros are using. For instance, here is how the AK47 has been used since the start
of CS:GO. And to explain that dip in usage, we just have to turn on SG 553 data and...
why, it’s almost like, as one gets more popular, the other becomes less popular or
something. So the timeline goes as follows: the SG553
had its price dropped in October 2018. I’m not sure which dot represents October exactly,
so I’ll just draw it approximately here. Now, players didn’t seem to notice its awesomeness
straight away, because it wasn’t until mid-2019 that the SG started to gain popularity. But
then its use BOOMED and Valve was all like ‘OH NO’ and upped its price again in November
2019. But this didn’t deter its use for long, and it wasn’t until it had its stats
nerfed in April 2020 that the AK became the firm favourite again.
So while I’m still not sure which dots represent which months, I like this data because it
represents which weapons good CS:GO players are using, and how quickly (or slowly!) they
react to changes in the balance and meta. So let’s see what this data makes of the
M4 battle. This graph uses hidden weapon names, which
is why it calls the SG553 the 556, and the M4A4 the M4A1. Just know that the orange line
on this graph is referring to the M4A4 and not the unsuppressed version of the M4A1 or
anything like that. The M4A1 was added to the game in late 2013,
which is why its line starts a little later than the M4A4’s which has been in the game
since release. It looks like the weapon’s popularity grew over time, thanks to its superior
accuracy, but in September 2015 it had its accuracy, rate of fire and price all dropped,
which made its popularity plummet and it’s been doing so ever since. Even the substantial
magazine size upgrade from 20 to 25 did little to improve the weapon’s popularity.
Clearly, something else needed to be done, and Valve decided a damage buff was what was
needed.
Because before this update, the M4’s in Counter-Strike were infamous for dealing 98
damage in 4 hits- not quite enough to kill an armoured player- so a good way of differentiating
between these two CT guns would be to buff the damage of the M4A1 to ensure this annoying
5-hits-to-kill situation wouldn’t occur. Valve has been careful to keep headshot damage
the same, and they’ve done this by dropping the headshot damage multiplier from 4 down
to just 3.475. A somewhat sacrilegious change in my opinion, but one that was needed to
prevent the M4A1-S from becoming a 1-hit kill against helmeted enemies. Which definitely
would have made it desirable over the M4A4! Let’s compare these two rifles in their
current state. I’ll start with the raw stat comparisons,
taken from Slothsquadron and Blackretina’s spreadsheet, because they give an overview
of the situation. And it is very simple: The M4A4 has more bullets, and can fire them faster.
But other than that, the M4A1-S will be better (or equal) in almost every meaningful way.
And it costs less. Here are the damage stats, if inflicted in
different locations, from different distances. Damage with the M4A1-S drops off much less
than with the M4A4, so its benefit increases the further away the enemy is. I have highlighted
all of the M4A1-S’s benefits in yellow, and all the ways in which the M4A4 is superior
in green. Exactly. So headshots are the same with both weapons,
no matter the distance. But straight off the bat, you can see the benefits of the M4A1-S’s
increased damage elsewhere- 4 shots will kill, no matter where you hit, regardless of how
far away. The M4A4, on the other hand, already requires 5 shots at point blank in some areas,
and this extends to everywhere and even as much as 6 shots when at long-range. What a
mess. No wonder I can’t kill anybody with it.
I also quickly looked an unarmoured figures and it’s brutal there as well- the M4A1-S
always kills in 1 less shot in the legs or upper body or arms.
But it isn’t quite as clear-cut as it seems. Yes, it might SOMETIMES take 1 bullet less
to kill players with the M4A1. But the M4A4 fires its bullets FASTER. It takes the M4A1
.3 seconds to fire 4 shots, but the M4A4 takes just 0.27. Which is 30 ms faster. If, however,
it takes an extra, 5th shot to kill, the M4A4 will take 0.36 seconds, which makes it 60
ms slower than the M4A1-S to kill the opponent. And then on top of that, you have the number
of bullets. The M4A1-S has just 25, compared with the M4A4 with its 30. And in the time
it takes to fire 25 shots with the M4A1-S, the M4A4 will fire almost 28. So that’s
almost 3 more chances to hit an enemy in the same space of time.
And then of course, we get onto accuracy. Firing 100 shots into a wall, from a distance
of 2048 units which is quite a long way away, this is the first shot accuracy of both weapons.
And here it is, up close so you can see the difference… or rather, how there isn’t
one. According to the numbers, the M4A1-S is technically better, but not by any meaningful
amount. Both weapons are, in my opinion, pretty much equal for first shot accuracy.
Where the M4A1-S pulls ahead of the M4A4 is with the size of its recoil pattern. If you
fire a full magazine at a wall, you can see that you won’t have to compensate downwards
with your mouse movement nearly as much as you would with the M4A4. It’s a sizeable
difference, making bursts and sprays with the M4A1-S a lot easier to manage. Especially
when you consider it also requires one less of these to kill in a lot of situations.
Even if you totally cancel out the recoil pattern as you’re spraying, the bullets
will still deviate from where you’re aiming by THIS much with the M4A4 at 1024 units…
and by this much with the M4A1-S. Again, the M4A1-S is noticeably more accurate.
Combine that with the smaller recoil pattern, and the M4A1-S is bae.
So in short: both weapons are about equal at first-shot accuracy, but the M4A1-S is
significantly easier to control when burst-firing or full-on spraying.
And finally, the M4A1-S has other benefits! It’s much quieter, and doesn’t fire tracers,
meaning it’s a lot less likely to give away your position. Unless you’re stood in a
cubby hole, where its extended barrel and suppressor might poke out further. And there’s
always the option to take of the silencer, which makes running and gunning more accurate,
but with a few nerfs to its general accuracy elsewhere.
In conclusion: I see few reasons to use the M4A4 instead of it now- especially given that
I rarely manage to fire off 25 shots before I’m dead. I look back in horror at all those
times I dealt 94 in 4. With the new and improved damage, that sort of stuff will be a thing
of the past! The M4A1-S is more accurate, more stealthy, more likely to actually kill
the enemy I’m spraying at… and more cheaper. More cheap. Cheaper. Cheaper!
So I agree with Slothsquadron, who as you can see here believes that the M4A1-S is going
to become significantly more popular than the M4A4. Because, like I already said, the
M4A1-S is bae.