**Hello everybody**


I am a CS:GO player, my rank is Silver Elite Master at the moment, I reached Gold Nova 1 but that doesn't mean that I don't know anything about CS:GO.

I found out how CS:GO... so a part of CS:GO works so where.... where do we get our ranks. Where is this going to be saved, I thinked everytime about it until I found it out.


Today, I will tell you how it works.


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###Where Steamcommunity saves its stuff


First of all, Steam does save their stuff in a site called "steamcommunity-a.akamaihd.net" or also steamcommunity. What a.akamaihd.net is I couldn't actually find out, but its like basically a normal website that saves its stuff in those ahm folders things --> those: /name/hello


http://steamcommunity-a.akamaihd.net/public/shared/images/community/levels_hexagons.png


But don't confuse yourself now both are cinda the same.


http://steamcommunity.com/public/shared/images/community/levels_hexagons.png


**Why isn't everything one or why isn't it COLOR BASED like a white frame and the color can be choosed with HTML magic?**


Well, I think it loads faster and this is also how our flairs here works too. (With coordiantions, positions and yeah)


Facebook also uses a.akamaihd too.



##What can't we see inside these servers?


http://steamcommunity.com/groups/Valve
This group, where one of my friends is also inside, is the group where basically all Valve members and others are inside but I don't wanted to tell you this because this is self-explanatory. Some of those people wear VALVE tags, but how does it work?


My theory is that everyone that has the VALVE badge gets this TAG.
http://steamcommunity-a.akamaihd.net/public/images/skin_1/valve_comment.png


This is saved right there, for some reasons it has a skin too.


Now how do they get those badges, well and my theory is that someone from Valve does log-in in the server and give him that badge.
One of my friends can have endless friends we also know "You can't trade the 5 friend slots" again here is where my theory comes. (This is also saved on the server) Those are settings that are saved on a server and I am sure that I am right with this theory also.


If you try to change the link it says that you don't have permissions to visit this site.

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###Whats now about CS:GO?

When you click View Profile while you play CS:GO you can see your friends stats. But it takes some seconds until it appears. But why?


Well, it gets it from the server, all those stats are in a server. I don't know in which server but it's definitely not in a Steamcommunity server, it's somewhere else.


##Why are you sure about it?


One time I played matchmaking and I was Silver Elite and won a round. A friend messages me that I am Silver IIII for some reasons. (This was the update when they changed the ranking system)


But.... But.... No one of us had to update csgo for that right?
Oh... Because they made it "server side"


They changed the requirements for MM, so that everyone needs Rank 3, to Rank 2. Nobody had to update CS:GO for this too.


Thats why I am sure about it and it also makes sense.



Didn't you ever noticed after a Matchmaking you see your opponents and your teams rank if they are not your friends? (Okay, everybody noticed this of course)


But it lags, while you are still in the Matchmaking after those rounds it lags and then the ranks are popping up. But why?


Well, when you finish the round it tells you immediately that you ranked up, but this only shows if you really ranked up.


Why is this thing so fast?


Why doesn't it lag?


What does this mean?


It means that this ranking system is active while we do the matchmaking, this is what it probably means.


If you click view profile while in a match it shows you what level he is and what badges he have and how many XP. If its your friend it shows you everything.


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We all know the reporting system and I want to tell you **how to report someone**.


When we get shot we think its a hacker but I think the reason why we can see badges and smileys and other icons is that we are able to decide it better if we should report someone or not.


Like if the player has all golden achievements, then he probably hacked it or he got it legaly, you can check it by clicking on his steam profile and hope that its not private. But this are stuff that are suspicious. You can decide if he is smurfing or not.


If you are in LE match and you see somebody having 14 MVP you may report him. *I was clicking on spectate and wanted to spectate a game to see how a good player is doing this nice burst fire shooting thing. And I randomly saw this guy with those MVP's in a LE or LEM match and well I thought "This must be a hacker" and I was true he had aim hacks and he also was AFK and was aim hacking with the knife looking on the enemys head. I think the guys overwatching him had something nice to laugh about*

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###How does this saving thing work?


The rank has a value. I think you are thinking now about those cinda ELO points or whatever it is, but you're wrong. The points are hidden, instead of points the server gives ingame a value which is 1 to 18.

* Silver 1 = 1
* The Global Elite = 18


There is also Unknown and Expired.


Unknown are the new players.


Expired is if you haven't played CS:GO for a long time and your rank disappears.


If you had Cheat Engine you could basically modify and fake your rank ingame. (Do not try this! I think you don't get VAC banned if you do it offline but DON'T TRY THIS, if you try it its your risk if you want to do it or not)


But if you reopen CS:GO everything is the same as it was before, your edits with Cheat Engine is gone away. This is called "client side".


**Whats client side?**


Client side is that you are the only one that can see it.
You are the client. Your HUD is client sided you see your HP and not the teammates HP in your HUD. Or if you click view profile you are the only one that sees the window that just poped up. It doesn't pop up to every player. Its only popping up to you.


**Whats server side?**


Server side is that everyone is together with it. So cinda you don't have access to it. If you drop a weapon its basically not client sided. The server creates the item and the physics do the rest and it lands on the ground or somewhere else.


I can't explain this so good.


**Let's continue with the stats**


So if you change something with Cheat Engine and reopen CS:GO everything is the same again. All edits you do are away. And if someone would view your csgo profile they won't see your changed rank, they see the original rank because they get it from the server.


The wallhacks you use is also client sided too.


It's like inspect element, if you change a site like you change the text and refresh the page it will return to its original form, so how it was before.


We do not have access to the servers, but I am sure the developers have access to it and they can manage our rank, our bans and everything else. If you get VAC banned then somebody probably has to remove your VAC so you can play CS:GO again. Your steam profile has an ID. This ID is saved in the CS:GO servers. There are statements that checks stuff, get your items and everything else. If you are VAC banned then Steam doesn't let you play on servers. But those server connection are more complicated and its not what we are talking about.


If you get an achievement csgo tells steam that you got an achievement and a notification is popping up on your screen. Then the servers adds a value. All your kills and deaths are part of the stats on the database of csgo.


Your competitive wins are in a server saved in a database or something like that and not in your files.


The ranking system is saved on the database too, your stats would maybe also show how good you are with a graphic.

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###Others


Let's go to CSGOSQUAD


CS:GO squad uses -1 to 18.


https://csgosquad.com/custom/img/ranks/18.png


This is global elite, it uses the value 18 as I said. The csgosquad bot gets values. I am not sure how it gets our kills and deaths but yeah.


This is the red service medal of 2016 https://csgosquad.com/custom/img/medals/1344.png


Where is the black service medal of 2016? Why isn't it 1345? Is it even saved? Does this mean nobody ever got it?
No this doesn't mean it, when they added these service medal it had -1.png because it didn't existed yet. I don't know why 1345 doesn't exist.


Feel free to search up 1.png to until any .png
It shows you keys and weapons and other ingame stuff. I don't know why its saved under medals but it is.


The levels are saved like this


https://csgosquad.com/custom/img/levels/40.png


**This is not where the original cs:go saves our stuff**


The progress-bar shows the value in % but that doesn't mean that this is the same in csgo.


In csgo the XP is saved as XP so like 1000 XP or something like, the visual stuff turns it into % or something like so we can see it or something like that.


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I hope you know now more about CS:GO and where the stats is saved at.

Have fun