Ancient: how pros play it
68 pro matches and 1,512 rounds on Ancient: where pros plant, the CT setup at 0:20, early grenades, who wins each buy, retake times, AWP spots and the most-thrown lineups with setpos commands.
The round
| Rounds won by the CT side | 50% | 758 of 1511 |
| Pistol rounds won by the CT side | 43% | 50 of 116 |
| The pistol winner also wins the next round | 80% | 93 of 116 |
| The team with the opening kill wins the round | 72% | 1084 of 1506 |
Where pros plant
Ts get the bomb down in 60% of rounds (910 of 1511). They win 74% of the rounds where they plant and 13% of those where they don't.
| Site | Plants | Ts win after it | Median plant |
|---|---|---|---|
| A | 45% (478) | 73% | 0:52 left |
| B | 55% (585) | 72% | 0:53 left |
The CT side's default
Spots someone holds at 0:20 in at least 70% of a team's rounds, out of 71 pro CT sides:
- Bombsite B: 12 of 71
Grenades a team throws in the first 30 seconds of at least 60% of its rounds, out of 71 pro CT sides:
- molotov at T Mid: 59 of 71
- smoke at T Mid: 49 of 71
- molotov at Construction: 48 of 71
- HE grenade at T Mid: 46 of 71
- HE grenade at Construction: 36 of 71
- flash at T Mid: 31 of 71
- molotov at White: 23 of 71
- smoke at Outside B: 11 of 71
The T side's early grenades
Grenades a team throws in the first 30 seconds of at least 60% of its rounds, out of 71 pro T sides:
- smoke at Stairs: 69 of 71
- smoke at Outside Totem: 20 of 71
- flash at Mid: 18 of 71
- HE grenade at Catwalk: 10 of 71
- smoke at Window: 10 of 71
- molotov at Bombsite B: 8 of 71
Rounds won by buy
The first buy is the side's own; rounds played in brackets.
| As CT | As T | |
|---|---|---|
| Full buy vs full buy | 51% (825) | 49% (825) |
| Full buy vs force buy | 64% (137) | 73% (118) |
| Force buy vs full buy | 27% (118) | 36% (137) |
| Eco vs full buy | 9% (127) | 10% (166) |
Players alive
Rounds won from each count of players alive.
| As CT | As T | |
|---|---|---|
| 5 vs 4 | 69% (874) | 76% (629) |
| 4 vs 5 | 24% (629) | 31% (874) |
| 3 vs 2 | 73% (453) | 89% (392) |
| 2 vs 3 | 11% (392) | 27% (453) |
| 2 vs 1 | 80% (278) | 91% (270) |
1-vs-N clutches won: 1v1 50% (210 of 420), 1v2 15% (80 of 548), 1v3 4% (22 of 597).
Rotations
Once the Ts hit a site, how long until the first CT from elsewhere on the map is on it:
- A site: 14.9 s (median; half of them in 10.6-22.8 s). In 33% of these rounds no CT from elsewhere got there at all.
- B site: 19.8 s (median; half of them in 12.0-29.4 s). In 44% of these rounds no CT from elsewhere got there at all.
Where pro CT AWPs fight
AWP duels by where the CT AWPer stood, most fought first.
| Spot | Duels | Won |
|---|---|---|
| Bombsite A | 97 | 66% |
| Street | 70 | 61% |
| Speedway | 61 | 67% |
| House | 55 | 69% |
| Bombsite B | 49 | 63% |
| Side Hall | 36 | 81% |
| Red | 27 | 78% |
| Backstage | 26 | 65% |
The most-thrown pro lineups on Ancient
Paste the line into the console on a local server (sv_cheats 1) to stand exactly where the pro stood, looking where they looked.
- T smoke: T Spawn to Stairs (jump), thrown 340 times
setpos -328.36 -2282.61 -121.28; setang -32.00 93.85 0 - T flash: T Spawn to Mid (jump), thrown 321 times
setpos -735.94 -1925.33 -119.17; setang -19.63 92.69 0 - T smoke: T Spawn to Window (jump), thrown 272 times
setpos -687.97 -2467.96 -128.11; setang -26.86 63.01 0 - T smoke: T Spawn to Outside Totem (jump), thrown 213 times
setpos -735.97 -2135.97 -125.41; setang -26.95 93.60 0 - T molly: Outside B to Bombsite B (standing), thrown 158 times
setpos 1058.09 -935.02 3.53; setang -30.77 110.46 0 - CT molly: House to T Mid (running), thrown 146 times
setpos -479.65 712.97 131.68; setang -11.07 -100.60 0 - CT smoke: CT Spawn to T Mid (jump), thrown 142 times
setpos -518.62 1664.82 69.89; setang -26.21 -102.00 0 - CT HE grenade: Bombsite B to Construction (running), thrown 140 times
setpos 660.40 260.39 130.53; setang -11.64 -76.39 0 - CT molly: Short to Construction (jump), thrown 138 times
setpos 639.90 585.99 161.03; setang 3.63 -89.67 0 - T molly: Outside to Mid (running), thrown 134 times
setpos -1143.05 -895.98 35.01; setang -4.49 35.05 0
See your own team next to these numbers: upload a demo and RetakeHQ shows where you play Ancient differently from pros, round by round.
Analyse your demoOther maps: Anubis · Cache · Dust2 · Inferno · Mirage · Nuke · Blog
Round, buy, setup, rotation and AWP numbers: the 68 pro matches on Ancient measured on 2026-11-01. Plants and lineups: all 84 pro matches on Ancient in RetakeHQ's pro library now. How each number is counted: how the analysis works.