AWP | BOOM (Minimal Wear)

This is the AWP | BOOM in Minimal Wear (MW), the middle one of the three wears the finish comes in. The scale breaks off at 0.28, so the rifle has no Well-Worn or Battle-Scarred. The float lies within 0.07 to 0.15. It is Classified rank; the AWP drops from the eSports 2013 Case, which the finish came into the game with.

What the AWP | BOOM looks like in Minimal Wear

The receiver, handguard and stock are flooded with saturated orange, almost carrot, across which spreads a net of black cracks of varying thickness. The long barrel is left bare, and the scope and bipod are dark, with no pattern. The finish has no other elements: only the orange field and the cracks, which converge into dense knots in a few places.

Valve's description calls the finish a hydrographic with a comic-book sound effect over an orange base. What reads on the model is a net of cracks: no letters or numbers can be seen. In Minimal Wear the orange fades on the receiver edges and the butt plate, and the cracks there merge with the scuffs. The pattern is intact on the flat areas, so the difference from a factory-fresh copy only shows on a close look.

Copies differ by more than float: the pattern index shifts the film across the body, and the cracks lie differently on each copy. Sources name no named rare variants for this finish, so buyers look at how the net lies on the side of the receiver.

Where the AWP | BOOM came from

Valve made the artwork itself, and there is no Steam Workshop submission behind it. The eSports 2013 Collection appeared on August 14, 2013, in the very first year of weapon collections. The finish's number in Valve's catalog is 174.

What to check before buying

What matters when buying the AWP | BOOM:

• float within 0.07 to 0.15: near the upper bound the receiver edges are already lightening;


• how the net of cracks lies on the side of the receiver you see on inspection;


• stickers and a name tag already on this AWP | BOOM.

On the AWP | BOOM the 0.07 to 0.15 spread is so small that choosing by float is pointless.

What the AWP | BOOM costs in Minimal Wear

Factory New costs about three and a half times as much, and the premium is large for an obvious reason: the finish has only 0.06 to 0.07 for factory-new quality. Field-Tested is about a quarter cheaper, and there is nowhere lower to go — the AWP | BOOM has no other wears.

Among the fourteen priced Classified AWPs in this wear, the AWP | BOOM is third by price: only AWP | Graphite and AWP | Silk Tiger cost more. The nearest below, AWP | Redline, is half the price, AWP | Crakow! a third, and AWP | Corticera trails at a fifth.

Getting the AWP | BOOM

The first route is the eSports 2013 Case. The AWP | BOOM can also be obtained by trade-up, which takes ten skins one rank lower. There are two Classified items in the collection, so a ten from it gives either this rifle or AK-47 | Red Laminate: a one-in-two chance. P90 | Death by Kitty is out of reach that way, being the Covert of the set, a rank above.

StatTrak and Souvenir

Stickers and craft on the AWP | BOOM

The AWP | BOOM has a StatTrak version. No Souvenir packages were issued for this finish: they were made only for tournament map collections. But you can build a Souvenir copy yourself — Souvenir-O-Matic puts golden tournament stickers and a player autograph on an ordinary skin from the inventory. That is why single Souvenir copies occasionally turn up even where packages never existed.

The orange field on the receiver and stock is even and large, so a sticker on it shows in full. Warm colors vanish in this palette: a yellow or red sticker merges with the base, while black-and-white and blue logos read. The stock and the side of the receiver are the places where a build does not cover the knots of cracks.

Who this wear suits

Buying this wear of the AWP | BOOM is reasonable if:

• you want a nearly clean body, but a threefold premium for Factory New doesn't suit you;


• how exactly the net of cracks lies matters: in this wear it is fully visible;


• the rifle will go both into CS2 matches and onto an inspection in the CS2 inventory.

In Field-Tested the edges of the AWP | BOOM are noticeably lighter, and that is how the two wears differ in looks.