Ubisoft just unveiled the latest season coming to Rainbow Six Siege, North Star, which will be bringing the new operator Thunderbird, map rework, quality-of-life updates and a lot more.
With Rainbow Six Siege’s Y6S2 North Star, Ubisoft is finally bringing some of the massive changes that were promised in the Year 6 roadmap, which you will surely don’t want to miss.
Thunderbird: New Defender
Mina ‘Thunderbird’ Sky is the new 3-speed operator joining the Rainbow Six Siege team from the Nakoda Nations: an indigenous people based in Western Canada.
Thunderbird will be the second healer on the defending side, but unlike Doc, her gadget is a deployable item. This new defender is bringing her new “Kóna Station” to the battlefield, which can be deployed on surfaces similar to a Jäger ADS. Each Kóna Station can fire a healing dart within a 2-meter radius that will boost a player’s HP by 30 and then goes on cooldown, which lasts for 35 seconds.
Thunderbird will have three of these stations in her pocket. As her primary weapon, she will have the option for the Spear.308 and SPAS-15. As her secondary, she can equip the Q-929 or the BEARING-9 (which is receiving a slight recoil buff this season).
Favela Map Rework
As announced earlier in the Year 6 roadmap, Favela will be the new map to receive a rework this season. As the devs explained, the map has undergone a massive internal rework, reducing the number of small rooms and making navigation clearer for the players.
The new Favela will also be permanently played in night mode, making the map a lot special for many people. Night versions of maps were removed from Siege for competitive reasons many seasons ago. However, Favela, being a casual-only map, makes sense to be played in night mode.
Barrel Attachment Rework
With Y6S2, Ubisoft is bring a surprise change to barrel attachments. Currently, the in-game barrel attachments seems very confusing and difficult to discern, even for veteran players.
The rework aims to seperate these attachments, mostly the compensator and flash hider, for different use. So now, the compensator will only affect horizontal recoil, while the flash hider will only help with vertical recoil. The muzzle brake will re-centre your aim faster, which will come in handy for DMRs.
Operator Reworks
Almost all the operator reworks (except Goyo) that were shown in February’s reveal panel is finally coming with North Star. The changes are aimed to affect the powerful and annoying to deal with defender gadgets, including Melusi, Mira, Maestro. The new glass shatter mechanic will nerf both Mira and Maestro’s gadgets, making it impossible to see through.
- Melusi: Banshee devices will now open based on proximity, so Attackers can shoot to destroy them.
- Mira: Black Mirrors can be meleed to remove vision.
- Maestro: Evil Eyes can be meleed to remove vision when closed.
This glass shatter feature will also affect bulletproof cams. But to make them more powerful, the bulletproof cams can now be rotated to shoot a single EMP dart, which will disable all electronic gadgets within a small radius.
Sticking to the defending side, Smoke’s gas grenades will finally receive the propagation rework, which has been in the works for a long time. The new propagation system will work like Capitão’s Fire Bolts so that the smokes won’t pass through solid walls. At the same time, the visual and sound effects of these smoke grenades have been slightly changed for better comfort.
On the attacking side, Finka is the only operator to receive a slight rework. Right now, Finka’s Adrenal Surge only provides temporary health buffs to all teammates. But with the new change, her gadget will now provide a permanent HP boost to all attackers.
Quality of life updates
Bullet Holes
Bullet holes, a frustrating issue for Siege players, will finally be fixed with the new season. While the destruction capability will remain the same, single bullets won’t create see-through holes on soft surfaces.
Client-sided dead bodies
Another persisting issue that Siege players have been complaining about are client-sided dead bodies. The operator’s dead bodies can look completely different on your opponent’s screen as they are not updated on the server-side. So to mitigate this issue, corpses will now disappear shortly after death, and a small hologram of the dead operator’s icons will appear instead.
Test Server only changes
On Test Servers, two new features will be tested: a revamped armour system and activities after death. Players’ armour will be converted to additional health so they have better visibility on their armour’s impact. Rook vests will provide +20 HP to the defender’s total health.
- 1 armor => 100 HP
- 2 armor => 110 HP
- 3 armor => 125 HP
Additionally, players will have new activities after death, with Attackers being able to control their own drones while some Defenders will be able to use their gadgets after their death (including Maestro, Echo or Mozzie). These changes will have a strong impact on gameplay and need to be tested to get players’ feedback. They will be available on the Test Server only and will not release on live servers at North Star launch.
Rainbow Six Siege Y6S2 North Star Test Server is set to go live on May 25, 2021, so make sure to try it out and provide feedback to the devs.
