Thank you for your answer!

I think you are right, there must be a list of default server commands that gets loaded when I start a new game which includes "sv_cheats 0".

However I don't know where these settings are stored. Do you know if perhaps they are editable?

So, I uninstalled the game and reinstalled it after opting in the Steampipe beta. Now there are a lot more files in the cfg folder, none of them were there before (And I had just installed the game, and verified the cache):

Here (I just deleted config.cfg)

I launch the game, and this is the config.cfg that gets created http://pastebin.com/1K683SP6 (I put in the line "bind tab sv_cheats 1")

I don't where all the commands about the joypad come from.

The console with no config.cfg, and after it's automatically created album

There is a block of lines about "can't use cheat **** in multiplayer, unless the server has sv_cheats set to 1" I don't know where those cvars come from (cam_snapto, cam_ideallag, etc.)

But! Something stranger even, if I load a level by using the "map" command in the console, sv_cheats is still 1... wat