Roles and understanding the roles are some of the most important parts of being a great CS2 player. There are many roles in the game, such as anchor, support, AWPer, entry, and IGL, but today we focus on another role - the lurker.
One of the most impactful roles in the game, lurkers can flip a round on its head and steal key moments away from an enemy team.
Therefore, playing the lurker role effectively is of utmost importance, so we have put together a useful CS2 lurker guide that will teach you how to play lurk in Counter-Strike, the spots you should play, and the decisions you should make.
But first, what do lurkers in CS2 actually do?
As opposed to entry fraggers, lurkers often begin rounds in more passive positions, typically on the extremities of the map. They will then wait for the action to play out in more active areas of the map to see how they can capitalise on the gaps and rotations caused by this action.
Lurkers aren't always strictly passive. There are aggressive lurkers, players who often look for aggressive, solo fights earlier on in rounds than passive lurkers, who are more focused on preventing the CTs from taking map control.
The lurker role in CS2 is typically played by someone with a thorough knowledge of every map and the ability to communicate and coordinate plays in the late round.
Counter-Strike lurker strategies can also include waiting on one side of the map while your teammates execute on the other bombsite.
From there, you can either try to steal a kill on enemies rotating away to disrupt their retake or move silently into a position where you can be the safety net to prevent the bomb from being defused.
To correctly carry out the lurker role in CS2, a player must also understand the importance of default setups and where gaps in default setups are likely to occur when an enemy player is killed.
To improve your CS2 lurking skills, try watching professional players. You can pick up CS2 lurker tips and see how they play in the same spots as you.
Here is a list of CS2 professional lurkers you could watch:
By watching pro players, you will not only see excellent CS2 stealth gameplay but also how those players manipulate rotations and man-down situations.
You’ll pick up lots of great Counter-Strike lurker techniques, tips, and tricks that you will then be easily able to apply to your own game.
Outside of watching professional players, you can also see CS2 lurking skills improvements by simply practising your aim. Aim is one of the most fundamentally important roles of all Counter-Strike roles, but this is especially true for lurkers.
You can practise your aim within CS2 itself by playing a map like Aim Botz, or by using third-party options such as Refrag or Aimlabs.
In the next part of our CS2 lurker guide, we will tell you the positions that you should look to be occupying on the T side.
To do this, we’ll go map by map.
Before that, we’d first like to remind you that these are just default setups for lurkers in CS2. To be an effective lurker, you will need plenty more Counter-Strike lurker strategies and should look to move around the map based on what the majority of your team is doing to remain unpredictable.
Although lurking is primarily a T-sided role in CS2, and you should typically build your strategies around the T-side, you can still lurk to some degree on the CT side.
Play in active, rotator spots and don’t be afraid to use mid-round aggression to find gaps in the T-side default to flank and ruin executes.
You should be a master of rotations and stealth gameplay in CS2, that can be applied to both attack and defence.
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