This mod offers such variety, its hard not to want to map for it. cs has many entities for its special objects as well as the normal hl ones.

Player Spawns

Firstly you might want to know what entity is what team. Its fairly simple, but always put them at least one small unit above the ground, you can put them higher if you like because when you spawn it aligns with the floor anyway.

Counter-Terrorist: info_player_start
Terrorist team: info_player_deathmatch

(you dont need to change any of the properties for those)

Buyzones

You may also want to know about the areas of buying. As we know each team can buy items, by default the buyzone appears round about where you place the player spawns, so if you have them spread out then in all that area you will be able to buy items.

However you may want to have your buy zones more precise, to do this take the "aaa" texture and make a block then place it where you want the buy zone to be, then tie to the entity func_buyzone. (the aaa texture will be invisible in game) In the properties there's only one thing to choose, and thats which team can buy in the zone, so change it to what you want. Always remember if you put buyzones in manually it wipes out the default areas, for instance if a player moves after spawning only a small amount and is not in the manual buyzone then he wont be able to buy. You can place as many of buyzones as you want though to avoid this problem.

Hostages

If your making a cs_ map then you will want some hosts in, you can put in as many as you want and where you want. Its just like the player spawns, only this entity is called hostage_entity, there are a few properties in it, for instance you can choose where the model of the hostage is, by default it chooses the correct folder for the hostage models. Now you may want scientists or the engineer fellows, to change this, in the skin properties you can chose numbers for this skins, 0,1,2,3 etc for the different ones.

Hostage Rescue

The cts need to take the hostages to safety, now we need an entity for this rescue zone, now you can place in a hostage_rescue entity and when the cts take the hosts near this point then the hosts will be rescued.

If you want it to be more precise, then make some "aaa" texture blocks and tie them to func_hostage_rescue. if the hostage is taken into the areas where you have the blocks then they will be rescued (the aaa texture will be invisible in game)

Bombing

Now if you want to make a defuse map, then you will need to know about bombing. basically you can place a info_bomb_target, or the much better method is to make a "aaa" texture block tie it to a func_info_target and place them where you want people to be able to plant the bomb.

In the properties of this it says "target (when bomb blows)", if you want something to blow up when the bomb goes off you can put in a normal func_breakable, with whatever properties you want, and name it say bombtarget1, then in the func_bomb_target enter in the target (when bomb blows) bombtarget1.

Bomb radius

You may want to set how much of you map the bomb explosion covers, to do this put in a info_map_parameters. You can put it anyway in the map. In here you will see the option of the bomb radius, by default its 500, im think it means 500 units. However you can test it out easily by setting it lower of higher and see in game how big the radius of the bomb explosion is.

The VIP

The VIP start point can simply be placed by using the info_vip_start where you want it. There's no properties to change in here either.

Now you need to make a "aaa" block where you want your VIP to be able to escape. To do this place in a the block, and then tie it to the entity func_vip_safetyzone. There's no other properties to change.

Old style "no buy"

Now if you want to make an old style no buy map, - where you cant buy anything you can pick up weapons, then you'll need the armoury_entity in where you want the gun, for each gun you want you need another armoury entity, you can select what gun in the item box. You can also select armour, grenades etc.

Once you've done this you'll be able to pick up the guns where you have put them, however you will still be able to buy, unless you put in a info_map_parameters entity,and change the properties of weapon_buying and you can select various things, such as "neither cts or ts can buy guns".

Escape maps

If your after this one like in such maps as es_frantic, then you need to again use the map parameters entity, along with the armoury entity and a "aaa" block for the func_escape zone.

So basically start off by putting in a info_map_parametres and select from the weapon buying "only cts can buy guns" unless you want the ts to buy guns, its up to you, but wont really be a proper escape map then would it.

Now you need to use the armoury_entity to place in your weapons, as ive explained before, simply select what guns you want in from the list and how many, and use an entity per type of gun.

All you'll need now is an escape zone, all you need is to place in a "aaa" block in and tie it to the entity func_escapezone. Now the terrorists will be able to flee, you can have more than one escape zone as well I should think.

Now off you go and make your cs map!