During the Rainbow Six Siege annual Six Invitational event, the development team sat down to show the fans their plans for the future of the game, starting with Operation Void Edge (will be referred to as Year 5 Season 1or Y5S1). In Y5S1, two new operators will be joining Six: one attacker named Iana, and one defender named Oryx; Each focusing on throwing the enemy off guard with their unique abilities.
Iana, like the Year 3 Season 2 defender Alibi, can summon a hologram copy. But, that’s the only similarity. When Iana summons or takes control of her hologram, she can move it around freely around the map. This includes vaulting over obstacles, jumping through windows, and scanning enemies. Plus, unlike Alibi, her hologram will have the same skins and gun attachments that you have equipped. The only downsides? Her hologram cannot shoot enemies, they will disappear in 1 hit, and she is unable to move while controlling it. So if you think you see an Iana hologram running around, hunt her down before she stops controlling it.
Oryx on the other hand is the Siege version of Marvel’s Juggernaut. His ability, Remah Dash, allows him to run through any non-reinforced wall (which causes him 10 damage), break down wooden barricades (no damage), and sprint short distances. Oryx also has a unique passive ability that allows him to jump up opened hatches to peek around and climb up through them; this does not apply for any hatches that go to the roof. If you happen to be right by an attacker when you dash through a wall, they will be knocked down just like if they were hit by Nomad’s Airjab. One notable use of Oryx’s dash is how effective it is against a Montagne. Got a camping Montagne with his shield deployed defending a planted defuser? Oryx can dash through him to knock him down leaving him wide open to be eliminated.
Additionally, Y5S1 will bring along a rework of Oregon, an update to barricade damage, and drone spawn location changes. The rework will be very similar to past reworks; areas will be opened up, new connectors will be added for more movement throughout the map, and changes to reinforceable walls. Barricaded windows and doors should no longer suffer with “hanging chad” pieces. If a barricade is hit, bigger pieces of boards will break off and immediately fall away instead of obstructing view occasionally. Finally, drones will no longer spawn at random locations. Your picked spawn location will now dictate where your drone spawns. Operation Void Edge will be added to the PC Test Server February 17th, with the map and gameplay updates being free for all players on all systems at a later date.
We also were shown a 5-ish minute video detailing what to expect for the rest of Y5 content, along with the future of Rainbow Six Siege. Y5S2 will add a reworked House map, 2 new operators, and a new seasonal event. Starting Y5S3, the Rainbow Six team will shift the way they implement new content. We will no longer be receiving 2 new operators a season. The new focus is one new operator that will be more impactful to the game instead of two operators that add not-as-impactful gameplay features. Additionally, there will be no new maps. Every season in Y5 will have a map rework that will allow each map to be competitive, fun, and fair. Finally, Y5S3 and beyond will make up for not having two new operators by including a new gameplay feature update, like a new reputation system, and/or an operator rework. These reworks will not be like the old updates that were labeled as reworks. If the core gameplay of an operator stays the same, then that will be labeled as a tweak or update. A rework will change the core gameplay features of that operator. One of the notable operators high on the rework list is the long awaited Tachanka rework. Tachanka will no longer be tied to his mounted and loaded LMG. He's picking it up without the shield and using it as his primary weapon. His new gadget will be an incendiary grenade launcher that can bounce off walls. For fans worried that the changes will affect Tachanka's internet presence, the developers confirmed that he will retain his “meme status”. There have been many notable complaints by the community since Y2S2’s Operation Health, and the planned updates to the game are a way to keep the game healthy for the long term. As noted earlier, Rainbow Six Siege will eventually receive several new gameplay features, like a gadget ping system and a reputation system. Gadget pinging will soon let players tag gadgets to warn their teammates where traps are hidden. As for the reputation system, players will get a rank from 0 to 4. Rank 0 and 1 players are players with negative standing. They will have limited matchmaking, limited chat capacity, and additional sanctions. Rank 2 players will experience balanced gameplay as usual. Rank 3 and 4 players are labeled Positive Standing players and will receive special rewards. More details regarding what affects a player’s rank and standing will be announced at a later date.
Finally, each season starting with Y5S1 will include a new season-long Battle Pass, and a new event with later seasons having more frequent events. The notable event shown off was Golden Gun, which is a 1 shot 1 kill event where you must reload after each shot. Rainbow Six team must have seen success with their Year 4 events like the haunted house creature hunt for Halloween, and playhouse level for April Fools.
As a long-time Siege fan, I’m excited about these changes. Everything announced has reaffirmed my belief that Siege will be around for many years to eventually let the game reach their 100 Operator goal. For more news, like the possibility of cross-progression and cross-play coming to Rainbow Six Siege, stay tuned here at MyXboxAndMe.com.
EDIT 02/17/2020: Updated article with details about Tachanka's rework, as that information was shown off during the SI 2020.
All photos credit to Ubisoft