★ Butterfly Knife | Gamma Doppler Emerald (Factory New)

Factory New (FN) on the ★ Butterfly Knife | Gamma Doppler Emerald is the top wear of the priciest Gamma Doppler phase on this model in CS2. Covert rank, with the ★ mark. The knife drops from the Operation Riptide Case and the Dreams & Nightmares Case. The finish's float scale ends at 0.08, so it comes in just two wears: Factory New and Minimal Wear (MW).

What the ★ Butterfly Knife | Gamma Doppler Emerald looks like in Factory New

Dense green lacquer covers the whole blade. It is heavier toward the heel, with lighter turquoise patches across the face, and the dark green swirls end in sharp edges rather than soft blends. The handles are black, each half carrying a gray-blue stripe from the pivot to the tip, and the latch is green. The pivot screws and the lock are left as bare metal.

In Factory New the green is intact on the cutting edge and on the ridges of the handles. The edge wears first, then the raised ridges, and light metal shows sharply against the dark lacquer. That is all that separates this knife from its Minimal Wear version, and in a CS2 match you cannot tell the two apart.

Where the ★ Butterfly Knife | Gamma Doppler Emerald came from

The finish has no Steam Workshop author: Valve drew Gamma Doppler itself. Its number in the Valve catalog is 568. Gamma Doppler reached the butterfly knife later than the other knives. The pattern guide dates the release to September 21, 2021, and Valve posted "Introducing Operation Riptide" the next day, with a case carrying this finish arriving alongside the operation. In January 2022 Valve also moved the gamma knives into the Dreams & Nightmares Case, and said so in a separate post.

Phase and pattern

The phase is written into the item name, so you pick Emerald on the page instead of pulling it from a case. Phases 1 through 4 are the ordinary ones, and Emerald is the only gem of this finish: Gamma Doppler has no Ruby, Sapphire or Black Pearl. Copies within a phase differ. The pattern index changes the balance of black, green and turquoise on the blade and where each sits. Phase 3 copies that lean turquoise are called "BTA Cyan"; for Emerald, some pattern guides single out a "Max Emerald" tier, while others recognize no rare variations at all. There is no consensus on a premium for pattern within a gem, so rely on the float.

What to check before buying

Before paying for the ★ Butterfly Knife | Gamma Doppler Emerald, look at three things:

• the phase in the name: Emerald and the ordinary Gamma Doppler phases sit on separate pages;


• the applied name: the knife takes a name tag, and it stays on the item after purchase;


• the float: in this wear the knife can range from 0.00 to 0.07.

What the ★ Butterfly Knife | Gamma Doppler Emerald costs in Factory New

From 0.00 to 0.07 the knife looks the same. Minimal Wear on this gem costs roughly the same as the top wear, so there is practically no premium for Factory New.

Among the Covert butterfly knife finishes, Emerald is third by price: only Black Pearl and Ruby cost more. Sapphire trails by very little, Butterfly Knife | Crimson Web is about a third cheaper, and an ordinary Phase 2 costs nearly half. At the cheap end of the model, Butterfly Knife | Bright Water sits about twelve times below Emerald.

Getting the ★ Butterfly Knife | Gamma Doppler Emerald

The finish comes from two cases, Operation Riptide and Dreams & Nightmares. In both, the knife sits in the special slot, and the phase is random. The other route is a trade-up contract: five Covert skins from one collection return one rare special item, again with a random phase.

StatTrak and Souvenir

A StatTrak™ version of the ★ Butterfly Knife | Gamma Doppler Emerald exists in the game. There is no Souvenir release.

Who this wear suits

Factory New on the ★ Butterfly Knife | Gamma Doppler Emerald makes sense for these jobs:

• you want a saturated green blade with an intact edge;


• you are building around a green-and-black palette and the knife sets its color;


• you care about the top of the rank: on this model only Ruby and Black Pearl cost more.