AK-47 | Cartel (Battle-Scarred)

This is the AK-47 | Cartel in Battle-Scarred (BS), and it is where the rifle's float scale simply stops: the ceiling of the skin is 0.75, not the usual 1.00. It is a Classified skin from the Chroma Collection, and it drops from the Chroma Case.

What the AK-47 | Cartel looks like in Battle-Scarred

The skin is built from two materials. The handguard, stock and pistol grip are reddish-orange lacquered wood with a coarse grain, running in waves on the stock. The receiver, dust cover and magazine are dark metal with a fine engraving. Valve describes the subject as skeletons, flowers and snakes.

Battle-Scarred is the limit of wear. Lacquer and paint are rubbed away along the edges, the stock corners and the raised parts, and light steel shows through on the dark metal. At this level of wear the thin engraving line reads worst, because the scuffing is wider than the line itself. The coarse grain of the wood stays plainly visible.

Where the AK-47 | Cartel came from

The user coyote37 put the submission "Cartel - AK47" into the Steam Workshop on September 24, 2014. The description calls the work part of the Cartel collection by Room On Fire and credits the design to Hanzo and Coyote. In Valve's catalog the finish carries number 394.

The Chroma Collection was added to the game on January 8, 2015, and the AK-47 | Cartel came in with the same update.

What to check before buying

Before paying for an AK-47 | Cartel, it helps to look at:

• float. In this wear the rifle comes between 0.45 and 0.75;


• the edges of the wooden parts and the magazine, where lacquer and engraving go first;


• whatever the previous owner left on it: stickers and a name tag.

Every copy carries the same artwork. Between 0.45 and 0.75 there is enough difference to compare a few listings. Near the bottom of the band the wood is visibly cleaner than at the top of the scale.

What the AK-47 | Cartel costs in Battle-Scarred

Against the other wears, the price looks like this:

• Factory New costs about 2.7 times more;


• Minimal Wear costs about 1.4 times more;


• Field-Tested costs the same, with a difference under three percent;


• Well-Worn costs about 1.4 times more.

Battle-Scarred shares its bottom price with Field-Tested. The wear takes 40% of the scale: 0.30 out of 0.75.

Among Classified AK-47 skins in this wear the Cartel is dead center: seven skins are cheaper and seven are dearer. Redline is about 1.6 times higher, Frontside Misty is almost level, and Point Disarray is about a tenth cheaper.

Getting the AK-47 | Cartel

The Chroma Case is its only source: this rifle never landed in any other case.

The route without buying is a contract: ten skins one rank down, with the AK-47 | Cartel coming out. The inputs are Desert Eagle | Naga, Dual Berettas | Urban Shock, MAC-10 | Malachite and Sawed-Off | Serenity. With ten inputs from this set, which holds three Classified skins, the chance of getting this very rifle is one in three.

Beyond that, the Classified rank of this collection leads up to the Covert AWP | Man-o'-war and Galil AR | Chatterbox.

StatTrak and Souvenir

There is a StatTrak version of the AK-47 | Cartel. Souvenir copies of the finish also exist, but no souvenir packages were made for it; those went only to the tournament map collections. Such copies come from the Souvenir-O-Matic, which hangs gold tournament stickers and a player autograph on a regular skin in your inventory.

Stickers and craft on the AK-47 | Cartel

Two zones share the sticker field here. The wooden stock and handguard are large flat planes where a sticker reads whole. On the dark engraved receiver the fine pattern competes with any sticker. Light and yellow stickers stand out from the dark metal, and the reddish-orange wood picks up warm tones.

Who this wear suits

Battle-Scarred is worth buying for the AK-47 | Cartel when:

• you want a dark rifle with a wooden finish for CS2 and a clean body does not matter;


• the bottom price matters: on that count Battle-Scarred sits next to Field-Tested;


• you want a pronounced battle-worn look rather than a tidy body.

If wear matters to you, pick listings closer to 0.45: the engraving and lacquer survive better there than at the upper edge of the band.