AWP | The Prince (Factory New)

The AWP | The Prince in Factory New (FN) buys unbroken gold on the raised fittings, which wear strips first. The float lies inside 0.00–0.07. The rank is Covert; the rifle belongs to The Canals Collection and appears in no case.

What the AWP | The Prince looks like in Factory New

The base is black graphite under a dense gold ornament. Gold covers the front third of the barrel, the receiver side and the stock in broad masses, not a thin thread. The barrel's middle and the scope body stay black. Separate fittings are gold too: the muzzle brake collar, the front scope ring and the stock cutout rim.

The ornament is tight and scrolling, with plant and geometric elements, and no crowns, crests or lettering despite the name. Valve's description calls the base red, though little is there: narrow inserts at the magazine well and under the scope, plus a dark olive cheek rest. The rifle reads as black and gold.

Gold on the small raised fittings is the weak point, untouched here. With wear the muzzle collar, scope ring and stock rim go first, then the thin scrollwork along the side edges. On the receiver flat gold holds longer, and wear reads as black bald spots inside the pattern.

Where the AWP | The Prince came from

Valve made the finish; there is no Steam Workshop submission. The Canals Collection appeared on November 19, 2019 with the skin set for that map. This finish is number 736 in Valve's catalog. No CS2 case has carried the rifle.

What to check before buying

Three points get checked before payment:

• the float, which tells how much gold is left on the raised fittings;


• the muzzle collar and the scope ring, which give way before the receiver sides;


• the name tag and stickers on the body.

The artwork does not vary, so pattern index plays no part. The 0.00–0.07 stretch is so narrow that listings barely differ.

What the AWP | The Prince costs in Factory New

The grades are packed close: Minimal Wear is about a fifth cheaper and Field-Tested about half again. Battle-Scarred is roughly a quarter below Factory New, putting it above Field-Tested. Saving money through wear stops mid-scale here.

The rank is expensive. Of nearly twenty Covert finishes for the model, only AWP | Medusa, AWP | Dragon Lore and AWP | Gungnir cost more. The nearest below, AWP | Desert Hydra, is about half the price, with AWP | Fade and AWP | Oni Taiji four to five times down. At the bottom, around AWP | Neo-Noir and AWP | Chromatic Aberration, the gap reaches forty to fifty times.

Getting the AWP | The Prince

The skin drops through The Canals Collection on its map. The other source is a contract of ten skins a rank down from it. One Covert finish sits in the set, so the trade-up lands on it.

StatTrak and Souvenir

Stickers and craft on the AWP | The Prince

No StatTrak version of the AWP | The Prince was ever released, and no Souvenir packages were made for this finish either: packages only ever covered tournament map collections. A souvenir copy can still be built by hand. The Souvenir-O-Matic puts gold tournament stickers and a player autograph on a normal skin from the inventory. That is why the odd souvenir copy turns up where no package was ever made.

Black and gold is self-sufficient, so stickers are chosen carefully. Yellow and gold echo the ornament, white gives direct contrast, dark ones disappear on graphite. Free surfaces are the barrel's middle and the scope body, both black; the ornamented side stays untouched.

Who this wear suits

This grade makes sense when:

• the gold on the small fittings has to be whole;


• the skin is bought for the long run, not one CS2 season;


• a fifth of the price over Minimal Wear is acceptable.

For CS2 play a middle grade is the better buy: the ornament looks the same at range. A clean grade pays off where the rifle is examined closely.