CSGO December 17 patch notes: “Donate” feature, Apollo & Elysion changes

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive’s latest patch on December 17 has finally added a long-requested “donate” feature, drawing inspiration from Valorant. A number of changes to new maps Apollo and Elysion were shipped as well.

Operation Broken Fang has given CS:GO players some long-awaited attention and new content from Valve. The new operation has breathed some life into the FPS title, with a host of new maps, skins, and content for players to grind for.

However, that’s not all. Valve are actually putting some nice quality of life changes into CS:GO to make the experience better.

First it was stat trackers in the new Broken Fang update. Now, Valve is adding a new Donate feature, similar to Valorant’s request feature, CS:GO players can now use.

New Donate feature added to CS:GO

The Donate feature in CS:GO allows players to buy weapons for their allies without having to do a juggling act. All players need to do is hold down the “buy menu donation key,” default bound to Control, and buy a gun.

• Read More: How to complete CS:GO Operation Broken Fang Week 3 missions

This will donate your weapon to an ally without the need of dropping your own one. It’s a basic feature for now, but one that will still be used by CS:GO players.

The next evolution of this would be a request and sell feature ⁠— just like Valorant ⁠— but there’s no timeline for this to be implemented.

Map fixes for Apollo, Elysion, more

Outside of the new Donate feature, no major game-changing updates were shipped. However, a few of the new maps were updated after a couple of weeks of release.

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Apollo is a bit less CT sided now, with less cover across popular angles and the spawn to “make it easier to clear.” Elysion has had a number of pixelwalks patched out too that let players get to places they weren’t meant to.

Anubis and Guard were also changed, but they were simpler updates. Valve even gave a shoutout to YouTuber 3kliksphilip, who is bound to find “some other minor things” on Anubis.

You can find the full CS:GO December 17 update patch notes here.

CS:GO December 17 patch notes

Operation Broken Fang

• Adjusted first person arm models for Operation Broken Fang agents.
• Adjusted end of match animations for Operation Broken Fang master agents.
• Fixed a bug that could allow extra stars to be earned from missions. Going forward players will be correctly limited to receiving the total number of stars available from all unlocked cards.
• Kick player vote is now disabled in Broken Fang Premier pick/ban arenas.
• Fixed kill distance in missions UI to be correctly rounded for display.

Miscellaneous

• Added 2021 Service Medal to be awarded for outstanding service and achievement starting from January 1, 2021 GMT.
• Donate weapons to teammates in need! Hold the buy menu donation key (CTRL by default) when purchasing a weapon to donate to teammates without dropping your primary weapon. You can change the “Buy Menu Donation Key” in settings.
• Game settings now have a search box to quickly find and jump to any setting or key binding.
• Zeus restrictions in Casual, Wingman, and Competitive modes are now the same as all other weapons.
• Adjusted Retakes clip areas in Inferno, Mirage, Nuke, Train, and Vertigo

Maps

Guard

• Repacked radar

Elysion

• Fixed a pixelwalk outside on the glass.
• Fixed a pixelwalk on the Elysion sign on A site
• Fixed a pixelwalk on the umbrellas outside.
• Fixed the pixelwalks on the doorframes
• Players were able to jump on top of the A sign on A site
• Player were able to jump on top of the small palm plant
• Players were able to 2 man boost outside and see into the site from an unfair position
• Players were able to run boost on the windows railing on A site
• The ladder outside has been removed
• Reduced the foilage outside, players were able to hide
• Waterfalls have been deleted from the white walls. Caused the smoke to become see through.

Apollo

• Reduced props that draw for people on very low and low settings to hopefully help FPS levels across the map. (Thanks Shavitish)
• Reduced CT spawn Cover to make it easier to clear
• Improved model shuttle collsions to make walking over nicer
• Reduced non-designed headpeaks across map (Thanks CF-166)
• Fixed car fade in CT spawn (Thanks Sylikoira)
• Fixed a few boost exploits
• Updated to radar to a more simple single layer one
• Reduced foliage over key angle (Near moonroom/CT spawn)
• Fixed a number of grammar and spelling mistakes (Thanks Dogman15 + Marisakiri)

Anubis

• Widened A main entrance
• Simplified A connector area
• Got rid of the deep corner below the windows on A
• Got rid of the wall near the pillar at Waterfalls A site and reduced some corners to hide in as a CT
• Some other minor things 3kliksphillip will probably find out