New patch brings reload change that nerfs smoke spams

Valve have once again meddled with a mechanic that seemingly nobody had any issue with.

That doesn't necessarily make it a bad thing, but it does seem an odd change at this point in time. The big headline change of yesterday's patch was that now when reloading, leftover bullets in the magazine are discarded instead of recycled, mimicking how reloading works in real life.

This is coupled with some reserve magazine changes for a host of guns, with the most notable being the AWP and the M4A1-S having their spare magazines culled again.

The majority of these will have little to no impact on gameplay (did the Galil need another buff, no matter how small?), but this does in theory make spamming smokes with the A1-S or AWP a lot more risky, as there's a real chance you'd run out of bullets. You can no longer afford to waste more than a magazine of A1-S bullets, and while the smart ones in the audience might realise that the AWP only takes one bullet to kill, that does assume you hit every bullet, don't wallbang or have to reload with a bullet or two left.

The AWP might be the most affected; you can keep the M4 out with half a mag, but sitting on the AWP with just 2 bullets left makes you incredibly vulnerable, so you have to be extremely careful now.

Largely, the community has been a bit baffled by this change. Some are massively against it (likely mostly out of habit), some agnostic and the rare contrarian for it, but generally most are just a bit surprised. This is not a change anyone wanted, or was asking for, for the most part. It will fundamentally change how some people play, especially on the CT side.

It's an interesting change, but at a very strange time. We're in the middle of the competitive season, with complaints everywhere about anti-cheat and performance, and yet we're worried about changing a reload system that has existed for 20 years?

However, there are some potential upsides to the change.

Spam wars have been extremely prevalent and can be very boring to watch. Rounds being decided by kills through smoke or walls can completely change the round, and when it's first to 13 and with the economy in such a delicate state those swing kills become incredibly important.

Until now there was little to no downside for a player trying to go for a 'lucky' (it's not really luck, but you get what we're saying) pick and changing the round, but if you're liable to run out of bullets you may either decide against it or do it for less of the round, reducing the risk of getting caught for the spam-ee.

Forcing A1-S users to run some risk when spamming smokes isn't a terrible thing at all, and maybe we might see some A4s again.

We're... intrigued. But very confused.