Controversial Counter-Strike assault rifle SG 553, colloquially known as the ‘Krieg,’ has finally seen changes in the game’s most recent patch, the Shattered Web update.
Counter-Strike: Global Offensive developers teased potential changes to the now-infamous gun, which has been dividing the ranked and competitive communities on its over-powered state, and have now revealed how they have tweaked the rifle.
The Krieg has dominated the meta for the past few months, even out-stripping the tried-and-true AK-47 as a must-buy on the Terrorist side.
Part of the reason behind its power is due to its price. Previously set at $2,750, it’s only $50 more expensive than the AK-47, but offers players an easy to use spray pattern, long-ranged power with its scope, and increased armor penetration.
The gun — which some CS:GO stars have even slammed as a “CoD gun” because of its skill-level — has finally landed on the nerf chopping block in the November 18 patch, which also dropped the game’s first new operation in more than 900 days.
The SG 553 has seen its price increase by $250, from $2,750 to $3,000, bringing it more in line with Counter-Terrorist assault rifle option M4A4, which costs $3,100, or the similarly scoped AUG, which has cost $3,300 since March.
The change brings the Krieg back to its original price-point, after the assault rifle first saw a reduction in cost on October 9.
As well as the changes to the Krieg, CS:GO’s latest patch also saw the FAMAS and the Galil both reduced by $200, to $2,050 and $1,800 respectively. Both guns have also had full-auto spraying accuracy increased alongside the price changes.
Time will tell if this price swap will knock the Krieg off the top of the Terrorist options list, but it did take a rate-of-fire and reduction of unscoped accuracy to bump CT counterpart AUG out of the must-buy list last June.
The long-awaited SG 553 changes come at the same time as Valve’s bombshell release of Operation Shattered Web, which is bringing new maps, playlists, weekly missions, and a mountain of new weapon skins and cases available for players.
CSGO Shattered Web Patch notes
OPERATION SHATTERED WEB – Introducing Operation Shattered Web, featuring all-new equippable Agents, weapon collections, missions, and more! – For more details visit www.counter-strike.net/shatteredweb
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GAMEPLAY – Increased price of SG553 to $3000 to bring its price more in line with its value. – Reduced the price of FAMAS and Galil by $200 (to $2050 and $1800, respectively) – Improved full-auto spraying accuracy of FAMAS and Galil.
Danger Zone – Buymenu price adjustments for ssg08 and radar jammer. – Minor timing adjustments for locked door and safe interaction. – Automated sentries now fire M249 bullets. – Added killfeed icon for automated sentry. – Added more explosive barrels. – Tablet crate icons now show an above/below annotation if significantly above or below the player. – Minor change to zone effect visuals.
MISC – ‘AWP | Hyper Beast’ and ‘P90 | Nostalgia’ updated to correct wear at Factory New
WORKSHOP Pearlescent coatings:
We have added support for applying a pearlescent coating to weapon finishes. Pearlescent coatings use ceramic crystals to reflect and refract light, splitting it into different colors as the view angle changes. This effect can be used in a number of ways to subtly enhance your weapon finish or make drastic changes. The new Operation Shattered Web collections have some weapons with pearlescent coatings to illustrate some of the ways this new feature can be used. The Workshop Workbench has been updated to include this feature so you can experiment with adding this coating to a weapon finish. Using higher values will make the color bands tighter and more frequent and using negative values will flip the spectrum to start on the opposite end. It should be noted that this coating will shift the hue of your weapon finish so parts with no saturation, and therefore no hue, will have no pearlescent effect. We look forward to seeing what interesting applications you come up with.
MAPS – Added Studio to Scrimmage and Casual Sigma map groups. – Added Jungle to the Danger Zone rotation. – Added Lunacy to Flying Scoutsman – Zoo and Seaside have been removed.
Cache: – Cache has been moved from Scrimmage to Competitive Matchmaking
Vertigo: – Added ramp to final stage of scaffolding on A ramp, no longer need to jump up – Connected corridor to back of A with CT elevator room – Widened top of mid – Offset doors from CT spawn and to CT elevator room – Made A site CT death funnel shorter, widened site area – Removed big block in CT spawn – Moved A ramp sandbags to allow jump up – Various bug and clipping fixes
Source: Valve