Hello, my name is Villain.

I am a former trader and casual player. I’ve dedicated myself and my knowledge to this community in the form of a guide for trading items in CS:GO and selling them for cash as well. Thank you for stopping by and taking a look.

This is the second version of my guide as I have updated it to include more recent changes to trading, item value and patterns. Also, I will discuss the tendencies of the market and what items are good to invest in, what items are stable, and what items may not be dominating the list for ‘Most Wanted’ any longer.

Welcome to Villain’s trading basics tutorial 2.0.

Trading is a magical, yet also frustrating journey that involves lots of patience, knowledge of prices and a reliable and solid gut instinct. Sometimes a good deal might not appear to be a good deal, but sometimes taking a risk once in a while will net you a huge profit. The most notable examples of investments include case hardened knives, where profit is the most drastic, but the risk being exceptionally high to boot.

Trading is not hard. Many people tell me that they are unable to trade up, or have hit a pothole in the road. Yes, I’ve been stuck countless times as well. Yes, I know what that feel is like and I can only tell you that patience is your friend in these circumstances. But on the same watch, if you are unwilling to trade away your current skins and get new ones in the face of profit, trading can be very slow and unproductive.

I’ve helped quite a few individuals in trading from a mere 10-20$ investment or even just a few cent skins up to highly desired, highly coveted knives such as Karambit Fades, M9 Crimson Web’s and also elusive guns like the AK-47 Fire Serpent and M4A4 Howls. If you are really determined to succeed, you will always find a way to overcome the legions of lowballers, highballers and come out on top, wielding that mighty Factory New Dragon Lore AWP on the plains of Dust II.



Buckle up, grab a drink and let’s begin, shall we?

Trading requires patience, patience and more patience. What makes or breaks a trader is how long he or she can wait for a deal, trading at the opportune moment. Some items take time to sell, and that’s the reality of trading. There are no tricks, there are no secrets, only determination and willpower. In order to be a good trader, you must accept that not all deals come easy, and that not everyone is willing to trade in your favor.

It takes money to make money, friends.

Please join my group to be alerted INSTANTLY on updates to this guide and giveaways.

So many people ask me these questions, so I figure I’d put them to rest once and for all:

How do I start?
How can I make money?
How can I get a knife from nothing?
How do you do it?

First off, why am I credible? Why should you trust me to guide you through managing your money, both in steam and in the form of skins? Who are you to dictate what I do with my skins and what I trade them for to make profit?

• I have over 3,800 trades made
  
• I have cashed out $2900+ dollars with a $800+ inventory remaining
  
• My guide has 1000+ favorites as of December 3rd, 2014
  
• I have helped 12 people from nothing to a knife
  
• I am a three year steam veteran

The beginning of everything is intimidating. Imagine riding a bike. No one starts off in the Tour de France, nobody just suddenly becomes the next Lance Armstrong. Like everything in this world, it takes practice to become an expert at something, and luckily I’ve had 2 long years of experience, across games, both TF2 and CS:GO.

To start off, I would strongly recommend charging 10-20 dollars into your steam wallet. The more the better. More money available means you have a larger potential profit margin. What that means, a profit margin, is that you can use your money to buy cheap items under the typical market price. You can use your resources to buy what are called “quicksells,” a term that you will too soon be familiar with.

Countless people ask me, I'd say 80% of all my questions, what do I buy with the steam wallet? What do I use to buy quicksells? What should I do with my money? Invest?

Honestly, I can't give a definite concrete method because trading isn't a planned out course of action. If you really want specifics, this is what I will say. Either buy keys from the steam market under 2.50 (or if you are experienced with PayPal trading, buy keys from sellers @1.80~ each) and then post them on {LINK REMOVED}♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥.com and see what people offer you. If you take the price of that offer and divide by 2.5 and find the result is more than the amount of keys that he/she is asking for, it's probably a good deal, as long as it's not something small like 0.1 over.

If you want to buy specific items, AK skins like case hardened and redline are very desired and easy to trade at low levels. M4A1/4 skins are also very viable, although the AK's will be easier by at least threefold. Any weapon that is commonly used (see below) in your price range in a decent condition will attract buyers. I guarantee this.

Having some money in your steam wallet is the first step, as I wouldn’t recommend starting with nothing. I started with ten dollars to minimize the pain I would have suffered if I was trading cases and cent skins up to what I’ve cashed out today. What you’re going to do is look for deals on the market, especially during new operations (if applicable) or buy keys and purchase quicksells.

Quicksells are the bane of owners and a treasure trove for buyers. It means that the seller is willing to sell for a drastically reduced price (sometimes up to 20-40% off the market price of the item) for keys. Keys are the currency of CS:GO and everyone is after them. Always. It is rare to find someone looking exclusively for other skins, outright rejecting keys.



I would like to introduce the methods I use to check market prices of items. I will be covering basic items as high tier knives fluctuate and often vary to an extreme extent based on patterns, scratching and other factors (collector knives).

To check the market price of something, simply open the Steam Community Market for CS:GO and type in the item that you are attempting to price.

Examine the graph. Hover over the different points of sale and price points that the item has gone for in the past. From this, you can safely estimate the average price of something. For instance, the AWP Asiimov Field-Tested is a very common item and very desired, but also is very expensive.


If we take points of recent sales, we can see that the AWP is around 60-70 Dollars on average. The market does fluctuate, so do be aware that current selling prices are not always accurate of what you can sell them for.

Just make sure to keep in mind that you should use the average market prices to determine whether an offer of skins is worth trading for in relation to the items that you currently have.

Now, onto the next step, connecting with other traders and finding bidders who are interested in your items...

To sell items or trade them for other items in CS:GO, there are a few methods.

The most simple, yet slow, method is the Trading Server method. It requires CS:GO to be downloaded and for you to connect to certain servers which are dedicated to trading. There you will find people trading items and talking, much like an actual market or store. You can advertise your goods by pasting in All-Chat a message like this one:

[H] (Insert Item, Skin and Condition Here) [W] (Your Price)/Offers.

The H stands for Have and the W stands for Want. It’s a very basic and straightforward way to sell items, but one problem that arises is that a server has a very limited pool and no search filters for certain items. There might not be anyone in the server who wants your item, and you may be stuck with no potential buyers.

The next, and most commonly used method is the Steam Community Market. This one requires no explanation, it’s just a Steam platform supported method where you can obtain steam wallet for your item minus the fee that Valve absorbs. It’s good for saving for games or keys because the money can be used straight away.

The last method, which is the best method for trading up, making profit is using CS:GO Lounge. It’s a betting site, and you’ve no doubt heard about it, but it also doubles as a sort of auction site where users can list items and other users can bid on them by posting item offers or messages. They can also add you and send trade offers, but beware of malicious link-spamming bots, usually identifiable by their private profiles and level 0 accounts with little to no play time/not owning CS:GO. Don’t accept these friend requests or click links that they post--It could potentially hijack your account or infect your computer. Dangerous, right?

Examples of phishing bots (pictures are very similar, usually created automatically by bots to add users with valuables):

In trading, not all skins are equal. Some are in much higher demand than others. It is inevitable that the community will prefer certain skins over others. I'll start off with some picture examples and you can think to yourself which you'd prefer. It's rather obvious how tiers are created in this trading scene.

This:

VS.

This:


Or even this:

VS.

This:


In addition, certain guns tend to be in higher demand skins-wise than others, so consider obtaining these skins when possible because they tend to sell much easier and are also the ones with the highest possible values.

In no particular order, they are:

• Default Pistols (USP, P2000, Glock)
  
• Five-Seven
  
• P250
  
• Desert Eagle
  
• P90
  
• M4A1-S/M4A4
  
• AK-47
  
• AWP

Stattrak is also a feature that can add lots of value to certain skins, so make sure to look out for those when trading. Stattrak Rifles tend to fetch a very high price and sell very well, specifically AK-47's. Those are always, and always will be in high demand as the AK-47 is the most used rifle in all of CS:GO.

A couple examples:











Next up, skins can vary greatly in price by condition.

• Factory New=FN
  
• Minimal Wear=MW
  
• Field-Tested=FT
  
• Well-Worn=WW
  
• Battle-Scarred=BS (Hah)

A Dragon Lore Factory New can fetch up to 500+ Keys whereas a battle scarred one might only fetch around 120 keys. Also, a Stattrak Fire Serpent AK-47 Factory New can fetch over 4000 keys, whereas a Field-Tested could fetch only a mere 230 keys.

IMPORTANT/PLEASE READ!
I've received a lot of questions asking "How do I trade?" or "How do I make profit from my skins?". Unfortunately these questions are very broad and it is hard to answer them in a succinct manner. In my experience, the only way to trade up is to actually TRADE. Don't be afraid of bargaining with people with items you want, and don't be afraid to add them. Lots of times people who deny all adds will still politely discuss a deal with them if you clearly state the reason for adding them and treat them with respect and good manners. The only real way to learn "How to trade" is to start making some trades, notice some trends on what items people really look for, and perhaps different ways to negotiate and make deals with people. There is never a time when a deal cannot be made, unless you choose to turn down the opportunity. A trader, even though reluctant to give his skins up, may always bend at the right price and offer. Don't be afraid to negotiate prices, outright decline potential offers, even if they are just above the price you are willing to pay. Patience is how traders like us solve problems.

Patience determines your success. The longer you are willing to wait for a good deal, the juicier the deal and the profit. Don't ask me "How to trade?" because in retrospect it's just like every other thing, even playing. JUST DO IT. There is no need to take notes on what I say because notes don't make deals people.

There are, without a doubt, many bad people in the trading community that do not wish to attain wealth through legitimate means.

For instance, some common scams are

• Phishing Bots
  
• Paypal/Steam Wallet Scams
  
• Impersonation Scams
  
• Trade Offer Scams

Phishing bots will usually add you and send an automatic message that would link you to a fake website, like "staemcommunly.com" or "csqolounge.com" which are intended for you to enter your password and then basically hand over your credentials to some scammer on the other end who will then hijack your account.

Do not click these links, make sure that the link being sent is always exactly the steam link or ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ link itself before clicking on it or logging in.

Paypal scams are also common. Paypal users can file for a chargeback and rip you off all the money they gave you, meaning they would get the item for free. This is the most common kind of scam other than bot hijacking, and people may often be victims of this scam even though it may seem completely safe.

To avoid being scammed from paypal, it is necessary to find traders with reputable identities before making a trade.

Impersonation scams involve another user impersonating a famous member of the community, so be careful and check their profile to know that they have the proper credentials.

In addition to impersonation, one variant is when the user asks you to trade your knife to a friend whilst he/she buys the keys to pay for it, where in the group chat, an imitation profile matching your friends name and picture is set up to bait you into trading the knife to his alt account. Be very careful when trading in a group chat as anyone can invite you to a trade situation.

Trade offer scams involve a fake "valve steam wallet authentication", because steam wallet is NOT transferable, so do not fall for these scams that ask for free items and promise a "payment" afterward.

USE COMMON SENSE--MANY PEOPLE HAVE FALLEN VICTIM TO THESE, DON'T BE NEXT.

This section will be updated often as more knives come in and I become more familiar with patterns and pricing myself.

This is a work in progress, but overall, knife prices work the same as item prices except they tend to be more stable, so the market price is often a safe bet. For stattrak knives, prices can fluctuate, so be careful when trading for them.

Here are a few videos showing all the knives in CS:GO:

ARMS DEAL: (Original 5: Gut, Flip, Bayonet, M9, Karambit)

HUNTSMAN UPDATE:

BUTTERFLY KNIFE:

The knives vary in price on average, as they look different and some knives look better than others, as the community dictates.

Here is the tier list for pricing, from highest to lowest:

Karambit>M9 Bayonet>Butterfly>Bayonet>Huntsman>Flip>Gut

In addition, each knife may have a camo, (no camo being known as vanilla), which can vary and greatly affects the price. For instance, a Fade Karambit can be easily upward of $500, whereas a boreal forest Karambit may struggle to top $150.

Check out CS:GO Stash[csgostash.com] for a good overview of knife camos and all possible skins that can be obtained on knives.

There are many knives that are too expensive to sell on the market. To find prices for them, search CS:GO Lounge to find average prices and offers to make a call, or ask an experienced trader for a price.

Knives are sought after and a sort of status symbol for CS:GO players, so get yourself one and ball hard on de_dust2.

Different patterns on knives can also affect the price. For instance, a full faded, or completely colored fade knife can be worth significantly more than the standard variation which may have grey on the blade or scratching. Also, this applies to weapons as well. For instance, the AK Case Hardened may have a rare and valuable blue pattern, and the more blue on a case AK, the more you could potentially fetch for it.

I will show some examples, with FADE knives (I am most familiar with them) and Case hardened weapons.

Here is a standard karambit fade (notice the high amount of purple, almost in a 50-50 pink purple split):

Now taking a look at my karambit fade (90% pink, 5% yellow, 5% purple):



Notice how my karambit has far more pink than the other karambit, which means that it is more valuable to a great extent. Pink is favorable on the karambit fade, so mine would retail for around 420 keys, where as that one would retail for close to 260 keys, a massive difference on the same exact knife.

Another fade knife, this time with ALL the normal fade colors mixed in. The gut knife fade, another personal favorite as shown in this picture has a reasonably large amount of grey on the blade.


As you can clearly see, the grey extends to the handle and beyond, which is unfavorable for fade knives. The less grey, the better.

Now let's take a look at my fade gut knife. There is absolutely 0 grey on the handle or the blade, rendering a cleaner look.



Because it is a lower tier knife, the value does not change as greatly, but it may still add around 8-10 keys of value simply because mine has a nicer pattern with less grey on the blade and the handle. It is fully yellow.

On guns too, patterns can make a huge difference. For instance, the Case Hardened AK relies on the blue on the top of the gun for value.

Let's take a look at a standard, market listed ak with no special pattern:


As you can clearly see, there is almost no blue on the body, top, only near the stock, there is a little uniform section of blue. This AK would simply sell for market price--nothing special worth noting.

Moving on, here is my AK-47 Case Hardened, in the Minimal Wear quality to make sure that the blue is of the ocean/sky color, rather than the dull blue found in BS and WW AK's:



My AK has close to 100% blue on the top of the gun, making it worth a surprising 170-180 keys, compared to a $25 market AK, the one shown above. As you can clearly see, my pattern is far more rare, and therefore will be sold at a much higher price than a typical AK is.

Patterns can change the value of a knife or gun COMPLETELY, so do not just assume that a knife is worth its market price, but also be aware that some users may try to overprice their patterns when it is nothing special, merely something they made up.

Also, a warning to people, when trading for profit, try to stay away from weapons that look "better" than the listed quality. For instance, trying to sell a WW Asiimov M4A4 that "Looks FT" may take a very very long time compared to just going for a regular WW one and reselling it. Those may often take longer to sell and may take a long time to find the right buyer for, who will pay a better price. If you are looking for skins to keep, however, feel free to buy a weapon that looks good in a cheap condition.

Still a work in progress. I will add terms that I see fit for use and that pop up commonly in the CS:GO trading community.

• Quicksell-Selling something lower than it's market price for pure currency (usually cash or keys).
  
• B/O or Buyout-The selling price you would instantly trade your item for.
  
• C/O or Current Offer-The best offer that you have received up til a certain point.
  
• SS-Screenshot
  
• PS-Playside
  
• BS-Backside
  
• Pure-Keys or Cash
  
• FN-Factory New
  
• MW-Minimal Wear
  
• FT-Field-Tested
  
• WW-Well-Worn
  
• BS-Battle-Scarred
  
• Lowball-A very low offer.
  
• Highball-When a seller overprices his/her item.
  
• Full Fade-Entire knife has fade colors, no grey.
  
• Pinky-Specific to the Karambit Fade, a Karambit Fade with 85-90% Pink.
  
• Webspots-Black vertices on the Crimson Web Pattern that resemble the centers of webs.
  
• Blue Gem-A knife with a lot of blue color on it (WW, FT, MW, FN Case Hardened, not so much BS).
  
• CH-Case Hardened
  
• CW-Crimson Web
  
• Flawless-No scratches
  
• Glitched "FN"-FN looking knife/very good condition.
  
• Rank-The top 10 knives of that preset (Top 10 Crimson Web M9 Bayonet MW is a common tier list)
  
• Mirrored-Same playside pattern as backside pattern on a knife.
  
• Diamond-Diamond Slaughter Pattern
  
• Phoenix-Bird Slaughter Pattern
  
• Heart-Heart Slaughter Pattern
  
• Angel-Angel Slaughter Pattern
  
• Zebra-No Slaughter Pattern/Stripes
  
• Vanilla-No skin on a knife (Default, plain looking version of that knife)
  
• Kara-Karambit
  
• M9-M9 Bayonet
  
• Bayo-Bayonet Regular
  
• Bfly-Butterfly Knife
  
• Gut-Gut Knife
  
• Flip-Flip Knife
  
• Autobump-Automatic bump on CSGO Lounge Trades.
  
• All-in-Placing 240$ Value on a bet.

Pricelist of High Tier Knives (credits to /r/GlobalOffensiveTrade)

Thanks for taking the time to read through my guide. I hope that each and every one of you found this guide helpful in terms of learning how to value basic items, how to find traders to trade them with, and what to aim for when trading for profit.

If you have questions or concerns regarding trading, please join my trading group. Also, you can stay updated on any changes that I might make to my guide. I do update this guide regularly and I do hope that all of you tune in when it does get a facelift because times change, and so must my guide.

Trading is not an easy task, but with practice and experience anyone can trade. I repeat, there are no tricks or special mind games that you can play on people. The only thing that matters is patience--the longer you can wait for a good offer, for the perfect exchange, the better the profit is and the more money you will make.


Remember this, skins are skins. They are pixels in the video game and please do not assume that trading is a valid way of making a living. It pays extremely poorly, so don't trade as a job. Trading is for fun, making a quick buck on the side, but most of all, it's about the skins. It's always been about the skins and always will be. Thanks for reading, and I really do hope you enjoyed what I have to offer to this great, ever-expanding community.

-Villain 2.0