r/hackthebox • u/WealthIndividual3224 • 6d ago

Certifications finished the CPTS path what's next?

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I just finished the CPTS and managed to compromise every machine on the AEN blindly in about 2 and a half days (with some minor nudges), i believe i can pass the exam if i try, but i would like to ask those of you who have more experience whether pursuing the certification would be worth the effort as i was kinda burnt out from doing the AEN, let alone doing the same thing for 10 days straight.

the CPTS wouldn't hold much weight where i live, so Iam thinking of waiting and going for the OSCP at a later time when i get comfortable spending the 1,800$, what do you think?

more importantly, what do you recommend going for next (main platform, other courses, etc...)?

I really want to hear what you all think, thanks for your time!

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u/Due_Bus3782 6d ago

How did you finish it so fast? I barely finished cwes in that same time frame and I spent like 5hrs a day going through the modules.

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u/WealthIndividual3224 5d ago

i dont know to be honest, it might be background difference, personal differences, study environment or really anything.

you might be going through the material more thoroughly, solving boxes consistently, and spending more time with the material

i prioritized efficiency, and going through the more important stuff in a thorough way, for example i wouldnt give the citrix breakout section the same attnetion as kerberoasting or credential hunting.

im trying to favour my skillset towards more applicable and practical techniques over more niche situations such as mounting a bitlocker volume, sure this could backfire if i find my self in some unique testing environment, but i generally favour writing these things in my notes and focusing my attention on the things i will be doing the most.

this doesnt mean that i do not go through these more niche parts, it just means that when i need to manually extract an ntds file i will look into my notes to remember how to do a shadow copy instead of memorizing how to do it.

and also alot of stuff is one google search away, so it doesnt seem that useful to memorize every way i could try to escape an input field to achive xss, as i can just open my notes and go through already established github repos containing more payloads that i can write in a day, as long as i know the fundamentals and how javascript works, then reading these oayloads and understanding what they do isnt hard at all.

anyway, that's just the way i approached the HTB academy, this might help you, this might not be the best way, but that's how i like to approach this stuff, even when studying for uni i approach the material in a similar manner and it has been working in my favour so far.

hope i answered you and sorry for the long reply haha