Rainbow Six Siege‘s Y6S4 High Calibre was fully revealed yesterday, and it is bringing some exciting changes to the game.
The last season of this year is introducing Rainbow Six Siege’s 62nd operator ‘Thorn,’ who is bringing an explosive trap gadget called the ‘Razorbloom Shell’, alongside a new SMG called ‘UZK50GI‘. Apart from this, the game also gets some balancing changes that you might love or hate.
One change that has already created mixed reviews is that defender cameras now lose signal after 10 seconds when they are outside the map. So, Valkyrie mains will surely be disappointed as their cams (thrown outside the building) now won’t be able to feed intel for more than 10 seconds. However, this will also alleviate some major frustration for beginner players, spending a major chunk of time outside the building.
- Related: Rainbow Six Siege Y6S4 Designer’s Notes explains all the big changes coming with High Calibre
Read the full Y6S4 patch notes below: (via Ubisoft)
New Defender: Thorn
- Medium speed Operator from the Irish Garda
- Gadget: Razorbloom Shell x2
- Thrown gadget that sticks to surfaces
- Proximity-activated explosive trap (short delay between activation and explosion)
- Lethality similar to frag grenades
- Can be shot out or exploded, even during detonation sequence
- Countered by Thatcher, Twitch, IQ, Zero
- Primary weapons: New UZK.50GI submachine gun & M870 shotgun
- New submachine gun packs considerable destructive abilities
- Secondary weapons: C75 Auto & 1911 TACOPS
- Secondary gadgets: Barbed Wire & Deployable Shield
MAP REWORK: OUTBACK
Outback has received a variety of updates to improve balancing and player comfort. Both the main building and its exterior have been modified to allow Attackers to create and execute more effective strategies. As well, new exterior soft walls have been added to the building, and some areas have been refurbished and cleaned up to remove junk and provide better lines of sight and balance.
A few new locations have been added to the map:
- 1F Convenience Store, 1F Compressor Room, 1F Gear Store, and 1F Beer Fridge have been combined into 1F Bike Repair and 1F Mechanic Shop.
- 2F Office Supply is larger and has an exterior soft wall.
- 1F Restaurant has been split into two rooms: 1F Restaurant and 1F Shark.
- 2F Covered Terrace is now an interior area that connects 2F Mezzanine and 2F Piano Room. The 2F Piano Room stairs have been removed.
Bomb sites have been moved:
- The bombsites that were previously in 2F Dorms and 2F Laundry have been moved to 2F Laundry and 2F Piano Room.
TEST SERVER
TS UPDATE
- The Test Server will now only be open at three separate times throughout the season and content will be split into three different releases.
- Season Release: Contains only content that will ship for the season.
- Lab Release: Contains experimental content and will be used by the team as an opportunity to collect feedback on features that are still in early production.
- Balancing Release: Contains Operator and other balancing changes.
R6 FIX 2.0
- R6 Fix has received a variety of extensive updates. The website’s UI and UX design has been completely overhauled, and the function of various features, such as the search feature, has been brought up to date. In addition, a new notification system now allows users to track updates to reports, and to provide even more transparency, devs now have the ability to communicate directly with users.
TEAM COLORS
Since the game’s release, Rainbow Six Siege has always used two colors to represent teams: blue and orange. The default team colors have now changed to blue and red, with opponents always being red. This change is mainly reflected in the UI and round feedback. It aims to bring consistency to the UI and improve onboarding for newcomers. The team colors can be changed between blue, red, or orange in the Accessibility section of the Options menu.
To go along with this change, teams are now referred to in-game as Your Team and Opponents instead of Blue Team and Orange Team.
CUSTOMIZATION
ELITE 2.0
- Players can customize their Operator’s unique abilities in the Loadout section.
- Players can navigate to any Operator in the Operators section and select the Appearance tab to view Headgear, Uniforms, Victory Celebrations, Operator Portraits, and Card Backgrounds.
- Players can customize their Operator Cards by mixing and matching Operator Portraits and Card Backgrounds. Their selections will be seen by teammates before everyone loads into the match and in various places in-game. They will also be seen by opponents they eliminate.
- UX and UI changes have been made to various customization menus to improve player comfort.
3D WEAPON SKINS
- Players can now acquire Exotic weapon skins during their Battle Pass progression. These new weapon skins have a unique 3D effect.
OPERATORS PRICE DECREASE
As with every season, High Calibre brings a price decrease for specific Operators. Nomad and Kaid are dropping to 10,000 Renown or 240 R6 Credits, Kali and Wamai are changing to 15,000 Renown or 360 R6 Credits, and Aruni will now cost 20,000 Renown or 480 R6 Credits. Take this opportunity to add them to your roster and maybe you’ll find your new main!
PLAYER COMFORT
DRONE COUNTER
- Defenders now have access to a drone counter in the HUD to help them keep track of the number of regular drones they’ve destroyed. This feature can be turned off in the HUD section of the Options menu.
HUD REWORK
- Visuals for the HUD have been updated to be more in-line with the game’s art direction.
- Compass now displays pings and other marker locations, as well as feedback for height differences.
- Loadout (weapons, gadgets and unique abilities) was regrouped together to follow more consistent display rules.
- Text action reminders (ex: Press [SPACE] to Vault) have been replaced with icons to take up less space.
PLAYER PRIVACY
- A new Privacy section in the Options menu allows players to adjust settings related to in-game privacy.
OPERATOR BALANCING
FINKA CHANGES
- She can now use the Adrenal Surge to revive herself, which is more consistent with other devices in-game, like Doc’s Stim Pistol.
- Her recoil boost has been removed.
- The Adrenal Surge cooldown has been increased to 20 seconds (was 10 seconds).
ECHO + MOZZIE
- Increased drones’ time outside the building to 10 seconds (was 3 seconds).
BULLETPROOF CAMERA REWORK
- Defenders can now rotate the Bulletproof Camera and use it to fire EMP bursts that disable opponent devices. EMP bursts cannot be fired by Attackers when the camera is hacked.
CAMERAS LOSE SIGNAL
- When placed outdoors, Valkyrie’s Black Eye, Maestro’s Evil Eye, and the Bulletproof Camera will now lose signal after 10 seconds. The player must pick up and redeploy the cameras elsewhere to regain signal.
WEAPON BALANCING
ANGLED GRIP
- The increase to ADS speed provided by the Angled Grip is now 20% less than it was before.
GAMEPAD RECOIL COMFORT
- Reduced lateral recoil on:
- Jager – 416-C
- Ash – RC4
- Vigil – K1A
- Zofia – M762
- Ace – AK-12
- Warden, Echo, Hibana – SMG-12
- Mozzie, Aruni – P-10 Roni
- Alibi – Mx-4 Storm
TWEAKS & IMPROVEMENTS
BATTLE PASS
First Win of the Day Bonus
- Earn extra Battle Pass Points when winning any PVP playlist game within 24 hours of the first matched played.
- Time starts at the first match played and resets each day.
Battle Point Booster Update
- Boosters now give a 30% bonus for you, a 10% bonus for your teammates, and a 30% bonus for a team with at least 3 active Boosters.
- The bonus can be stacked for up to 100% bonus points.
GAME BALANCING
DSEG – Disabled State for Electronic Gadgets
- Created more consistent Scoring and Warning messages.
- Operators’ access to Observation Tools while being affected by DSEG has been normalized. Previously the access was only blocked for Attackers, and now it is blocked for Defenders too.
- Iana, Finka, Lion, Dokkaebi and Warden’s unique abilities cool down timer is now paused while affected by DSEG.
- Jackal’s Eyenox automatically deactivates when affected by DSEG
- Dokkaebi’s Logic Bomb ability can be interrupted by DSEG during its casting.
- Attackers affected by disabled state won’t receive Finka’s adrenaline boost anymore.
Testing Grounds Playlist (TS)
- No Squad MMR Restriction.
- Join in Progress enabled.
- No leaving penalty.
- Pro League map pool and New/Reworked map with a higher chance of appearance.
- No map ban.
- Operator ban enabled. New and reworked Operators can’t be banned.
- Mix of Unranked and Quick Match settings (3 rounds role swap and one round Overtime).
PLAYER COMFORT
Grenade Indicator
- Changes made to the UI so it is more reliable.
Operator Autopick
- While AFK during the Planning Phase, the Operator selected will be based on the player’s personal statistics.
- This does not affect the behavior of the Random button.
Esports
- Live notification added when there is an ongoing match.
Alpha Packs
- New visuals for Alpha Packs.
- Behavior of Siege Esports Packs has been adjusted so that, instead of duplicates, it will give out Battle Pass Points.
Switch Firing Mode
- Switch Fire Mode was removed for weapons, but the function (now called Switch Ability Mode) was kept for Operator’s that have unique abilities with different modes (Ex. Zofia, Capitao).
GAME HEALTH
Player Privacy
- New Privacy tab in the Options menu.
- Prevent Queue Sniping options moved to this new section.
- Options are: Hidden Matchmaking Delay and Hide Region and Latency.
Map Rotations
- Added Outback map and removed Border map from the Newcomer playlist.
- Added Outback map to Ranked/Unranked.
- Added Playlist Presets when creating a Custom game.
Read More: Rainbow Six Siege Y6S4 ‘High Calibre’: All New Changes introduced