G2 Esports is one of the most fascinating and perplexing teams currently present within the

Counter Strike scene. At a bird’s eye view, the skill on the roster is so high that even the casual viewer has nothing but the highest expectations for them. After all, such a high level of firepower being present within the lineup should entail some sort of consistency. How many teams in the world can truly compete with names such as Kennys, Apex, Shox, and more?

Surprisingly, however, the team has actually been one of the most up and down rosters present within the professional scene. The variance in their level of play from tournament to tournament is so drastic that even the most extreme of results have seemingly stopped shocking viewers, whether G2 gets knocked out by an unranked team or they win a slog of a best of three versus the best team in the world seemingly is determined by the flip of a coin.

When attempting to break down the exact reasons that lead to such a bipolar nature in G2’s play most analysts tend to attribute a significant portion of the blame to their supposed poor economic management. Prominent individuals in the scene claim that the constant force buying of G2 holds them back, at least somewhat, from truly reaching a consistent level of play. What I have decided to do is take a look into this narrative by going through G2’s games at Dreamhack Malmo and IEM Oakland in order to get to the crux of the issue. The reason that I have specifically chosen Dreamhack Malmo and IEM Oakland is to get a picture of G2 at their best and worst, which would also allow me to see whether or not a difference in economic management resulted in their epic run at Dreamhack Malmo.

While it will always be hard to only take a look at one characteristic of a team in order to gain a holistic view of their strengths and weaknesses, this article attempts to glean whatever empirical evidence it can pertinent to G2’s economy management from their runs at Dreamhack Malmo and IEM Oakland. From there, I will attempt to analyze whether or not said information has a role to play in the high levels of variance that is built into this G2 team.

Dreamhack Malmo

Dreamhack Malmo has arguably been the magnum opus of this current roster of G2 if one were to look at the quality of opponents they defeated, and in which manner, en route to lifting the trophy. G2 finished the tournament with best of three wins over a tournament favorite in SK and coupled that win with a sundry of wins over respectable teams such as Immortals, North, and NiP. All in all, this tournament was a demonstration of the high degrees of variance that G2 was capable of. They won in an unequivocally dominant manner that came into complete contrast with the disappointing results that they have shown at different points in time.

The question at hand was what exactly enabled G2 to bring about this result. Some argued that it was largely due their changed style of economic management in the playoffs that allowed them to see it through. What I have done is I have gone through the entirety of G2’s games at Dreamhack Malmo and focused in on their economic management at the tournament, and attempted to get to the heart of the issue as to whether or not it was the proximate factor in G2 hoisting the cup.

G2 kicked off the tournament with a 16-12 win versus Envyus in which they did not forcebuy to an extreme degree by any measure of the imagination. They simply force bought, as is standard by the professional meta, after pistol round losses and once after being reset after winning one gun round. Even in the forcebuy that occured after having their economy reset, G2 acted in a way so as to maximize their chances of winning; they saved two rifle’s into the round and force bought around them, thusly raising the probability of a favorable result.

From there G2 kicked off a slugfest versus Immortals. In this series it can definitely be argued that G2 had such poor decision making in regards to force buying that it potentially cost them a map. In the first half on T side, after losing the anti eco round that follows a pistol round win, G2 inexplicably decided to forcebuy not once, but twice in a row. The first buy had some justification behind it, however, the fact of the matter was that the second buy showed clearly that G2 had misjudged the risk at hand and probability of success in their endeavor. This misbuy put G2 in an economic drought which had a role to play in their 13-16 loss. It seems as this Immortals game was the key moment which marked G2’s decision to no longer resort to the force buy as one of their key tactics for the rest of the tournament. From there on out, G2 largely resorted to partial forces and/or force buys in which they had either managed to save rifles into the round or in which the opponents were on low economy themselves. To sum it up, the Immortals game changed G2’s decision making to favor higher expected value gambles.

While it would be easy to chalk up the success completely to a change of economic management, the fact of the matter is that there were also games where propitious circumstances emerged and allowed G2 to be in full economic control for most of the game. A large takeaway for me after studying G2’s economic management for this game was that I feel that G2 best maximizes their chances at success with partial forces as opposed to full force buys. The reason I feel this is is due to the fact that thanks to the vast ocean of skill present in the lineup the probability of success on partial forcebuy rounds for G2 is much higher in comparison to other teams. Furthermore the partial force buys come coupled with far less risk in comparison to full force buys as they do not really hamper the economy, and thanks to the higher probability of success that G2 possesses in these rounds, it feels that G2 has a comparative advantage in partial forcebuy rounds that they should resort to far more often.

IEM Oakland

At IEM Oakland, G2 kicked off the tournament in a best of 1 14-16 loss versus Faze on Overpass. On this map, forcebuying did not have a large role to play in their loss; other than the standard force buy after a Terrorist side pistol loss, G2 actually won their forcebuys. Rather, Faze simply systematically shut them out on gun rounds, and despite G2’s best efforts at a comeback, they ultimately fell short.

Their next game was a 16-9 loss to Renegades on Cobblestone and surprisingly enough, this map was where, undoubtedly, their supposed tendency to forcebuy cost them the map. Upon going down 0-6, it seemed G2 had been psychologically defeated to a point where they had no trust in their gun rounds whatsoever, and this was reflected in the fact that they force bought a sum total of seven times over the map.

The Renegades game was followed by a double overtime win versus Gambit on Overpass, the map where they had previously played Faze extremely closely. Throughout the entire map, they  showed a high level of trust in their gun rounds, contrary to the Renegades game. After all, they did not forcebuy once on ct side. Upon T side, however, they did break out the forcebuy at times, at one point following up a post T side pistol loss forcebuy with another forcebuy after having killed four counter terrorists coupled with a bomb plant. All in all, G2 showed that they had the ability to make smart economic decisions, and they strategically chose to forcebuy only in the moments where the expected value of the rounds justified it.

The next game was a comfortable 16-9 win versus Team Liquid on Cache where G2’s economy was only really tested in the early stages of the game. Upon those tests G2 showed smart decision making, they chose to force only in situations where they had managed to save AWP’s from previous rounds, thusly maximizing their chance to win. In summation, the story of the game was a comfortable G2 win thanks to stellar play and smart economic management.

Finally, G2’s run at IEM Oakland came to an unceremonious run with their 14-16 loss to Optic. What famously stood out, however, was the fact that this loss could not at all be attributed to their forcebuying. In the first half they only partially force bought once when they had managed to save an AWP, and then in regards to the second half, they only force bought upon facing map, and tournament, point. Rather, their loss was attributed to their inability to string enough rounds together through proper gun round play.

The case study of G2’s economic management at such radically different tournaments in the form of Dreamhack Malmo brings us quite a bit of interesting insights into the maladies that have plagued G2. What has become quite clear in my eyes is the fact that surprisingly enough G2 actually has the ability to make intelligent decisions about when to and when not to forcebuy. They have had games, and even series, where the only times they would resort to a risky tactic like the forcebuy was when the payoff would be high, or they had managed to raise the probability of success. These signs of mastery are also why the casual viewer can end up so frustrated with G2’s poor games, the ones where they fall into the abyss of excessive force buying.

What specifically stood out to me after conducting a thorough case study into those two tournaments was that the issue of excessive force buying cropped up very rarely. Arguably it only happened on the map versus Renegades where G2 seemed psychologically broken, and one map versus Immortals. As such it is hard to attribute inordinate force buying as one of the main factors in creating high variance play from G2.

Be that as it may, it still is not necessarily true that forcebuying does not have a role to play in the cyclical play of G2. As testament to that, G2’s main source of impact is KennyS. Even though G2 has shown the tendency to go for risky force buys with a high expected value, there exists the possibility that, even if the expected value of the forcebuy rounds is large, if the probability of losing is high enough, the negative effects that can come from not being able to furnish their best player and superstar talent with an AWP, ultimately comes to haunt them later down the line.

In summary, G2 does not have as bad of economic management as most others have said. R arely have they fallen into the classical French trap of force buying into oblivion. While they did change up their style of force buying at Dreamhack Malmo, it is hard to draw broad conclusions about the effectiveness of said strategy with such a small sample size in data. After all, even if they enjoy a comparative advantage in partial forcebuy rounds, it is hard to attribute that as the sole change needed to make G2 a consistent team.

There are a vast amount of factors which could have affected G2’s play at Dreamhack Malmo. Perhaps the change in style simply gave them more confidence in taking risks on their gun rounds, as they felt they had more of those to play with, which allowed them to channel aggression into the right avenues. Regardless, the one thing that I hope does not happen after their major debacle is a French shuffle. While G2 has been a high variance roster, I feel that the highs of this roster are by itself enough to justify sticking together and changing fundamental aspects of the roster in attempts to figure out a path to success.