Updates and fixes made over the course of the Y6S1 Test Server. For the full Crimson Heist Patch Notes, follow the link below.

Crimson Heist Season Patch Notes: https://rainbow6.com/crimsonheist

Due to data consolidation following changes in textures, the patch size will be larger than usual.

Below you will find the download sizes for each platform.

Ubisoft Connect:

• 59 GB if live build was installed with HD PACK
  
• 33 GB if live build was installed without HD PACK

Steam: 10 GB

Xbox One: 18 GB

Xbox Series X: 18 GB

PS4: 24 GB

PS5: 28 GB



FLORES

• Reduced the RCE-Ratero Charge's explosion radius from 4 M to 3 M, and its lethal range from 2 M to 1.5 M.
  
• This change was designed to encourage players to develop a focused strategy when using the RCE-Ratero Charge, as a smaller explosion radius requires accuracy.
  
• This change reduces the radius by only 25%. However, the surface covered by the RCE-Ratero Charge explosion is reduced by almost 50%, and the total volume of the explosion is reduced by more than 50%.

In-Game Tips

• In-game tips have been added to the HUD. In addition, some warning messages and in-game feedback have been reworked.

• User remains zoomed in on Ubisoft Connect interface after pressing the Right Trigger on Xbox Series X before the interface finishes loading.
  
• Unique ability is missing from the information displayed in Support Mode.

Match Replay

• Rewinding after fast forwarding will cause the destruction replication issues.
  
  • Workaround: Playing the destruction scene normally at least once will allow the player to fast forward/rewind that scene without issue.
• Some SFX loop infinitely under certain circumstances.
  
  • Workaround: Using the rewind 5 seconds button or interacting with the timeline to stop the audio loop.
• The effects filter stays present after using rewind.
  
  • Workaround: Replaying the scene when the gadget effect is applied will remove the filter.
• The sound is out of sync when using fast forward or slow motion.
  
• On the first round, the first person camera is offset in the replay of a player that joined a match in progress.
  
• Ping system is not working in match replays.
  
• The Hostage is captured even if the Attacker cancelled the action.
  
• Various HUD and VFX elements are missing.
  
• Several missing/misplaced SFX.

• FIXED – Various invite and matchmaking errors.
  
• FIXED – Various Deployable Shield issues.
  
• FIXED – The first situation ""01 CQB Basics"" is not available throughout the PlayGo.
  
• FIXED – Online Custom Game hosts are unable to create a second online match.
  
• FIXED – Various issues occur when the second to last player alive is eliminated right before the last player.
  
• FIXED – Operators in DBNO can move freely while being revived by Finka's Adrenal Surge or Doc's Stim Pistol.
  
• FIXED – Navigate secondary input doesn't work to exit rappel.
  
• FIXED – Planting the Defuser on top of the round table located in 1F Lobby destroys it.
  
• FIXED – Missing blue in-use light on cameras when an Attacker is standing in the Jammer effect radius.
  
• FIXED – The HUD counter does not always display the accurate number of opponent AI in Elimination.
  
• FIXED – Users can't vault on shelves in 1F Compressor Room on Outback map.
  
• FIXED – During the end of round replay, the camera displays the inside of the player's head for a fraction of second.
  
• FIXED – Newly deployed metal objects are not electrified right away when they are deployed in range of a disabled Electro Claw.
  
• FIXED – When all Attackers and their drones are eliminated after the defuser is planted, the spectator camera fixes on where they were eliminated, instead of the defuser.
  
• FIXED – The reactivation of Kaid's Electro Claw is delayed after being disabled by Thatcher's EMP Grenade.
  
• FIXED – Echo's Yokai is briefly seen if player presses space bar at the same time that it's destroyed.
  
• FIXED – Reinforcing a wall does not destroy sticky gadgets if they are deployed at the top of some walls or on the ceiling.
  
• FIXED – Surrendering during the end of round replay does not take away or give ELO. This bug has already been patched on live servers and this is intended to be a long-term fix to the bug.
  
• FIXED – Eliminating an opponent with an explosive after death doesn't count towards the Blast Wave Challenge in Battle Pass.
  
• FIXED – Players with high latency might be unable to perform actions after exiting their drone.
  
• FIXED - The prompt that appears when a player tries to attach a shield to a doorframe does not appear if a Bulletproof Camera is placed beside the doorframe.

• FIXED – Various lighting issues on maps.
  
• FIXED – Multiple map asset destruction and collision issues.
  
• FIXED - Exploitable gaps in various map areas.
  
• FIXED - Hatches have inconsistent bullet penetration.
  
• FIXED – Various defuser planting and retrieval issues in specific areas on maps.

BANK

• FIXED – Remove pawn collision on some assets for better smooth vault to prevent players getting stuck.

BORDER

• FIXED – Various clipping and asset issues on Border map.
  
• FIXED – Various LOD issues on Border map.
  
• FIXED – Attackers are able to plant the defuser on top of a locker in 2F Armory Lockers on Border map.
  
• FIXED – Players can easily spawn peek from atop a desk towards the EXT West Road Spawn on Border map.
  
• FIXED – The sound is propagated through supplementary nodes on the west wall of 1F Detention on Border map.
  
• FIXED – The drone can go out of bounds to the South of the radiator from EXT Pedestrian Customs on Border map.
  
• FIXED – Operators are able to vault on top of a shelf located at 1F Tellers on Border map.
  
• FIXED – Rappel prompt disappears when getting too close to the destructible wall in EXT Parking Lot Alley on Border map.
  
• FIXED – Missing vault prompt along most of the length of the railing that leads to EXT Crash Scene on Border map.
  
• FIXED – Operators can take damage with explosives from 1F Main Stairs towards 2F Main Hallway on Border map.
  
• FIXED - The luggage on Border map blocks explosions from damaging nearby Operators.
  
• FIXED - The hostage spawns on top of the desk in 1F Customs Inspections during Protect Hostage on Border map.
  
• FIXED - Various location names missing from compass in drone view on Border map.

CHALET

• FIXED – Spinning in a specific location creates FPS drops for everyone in the same match on Chalet map.

CONSULATE

• FIXED – Various new iterations of LOD issues present.

HEREFORD

• FIXED – Operators can hide inside the loom after vaulting from the secure box in 2F Loom Room on Hereford Base map
  
• FIXED – Attackers remain stuck after falling from the left building roof in the space between the brick gate and the electric panels at EXT Spitfire Courtyard on Hereford Base map.

KAFE DOSTOYEVSKY

• FIXED – Attackers can secure the area of 2F Train Museum by rappelling outside on Kafe Dostoyevsky map.
  
• FIXED – Area cannot be secured in 2F Train Museum when the operator is close to the fireplace wall on Kafe Dostoyevsky map.
  
• FIXED - Small area in 3F Cigar Shop that is considered out of bounds for Defenders on Kafe Dostoyevsky map.

OUTBACK

• FIXED – Certain deployable gadgets cannot be deployed on the blue carpet located in 2F Piano Room on Outback map.

SKYSCRAPER

• FIXED – Various new iterations of LOD issues present.

• FIXED – Weapons customized during the Planning Phase are not visually updated in Operators section.
  
• FIXED – Various visual fixes and clipping issues for Operators and their gadgets.
  
• FIXED – Forced unlean and various minor animation issues.
  
• FIXED – Minor overlay animation issues for operators and their gadgets.
  
• FIXED – Multiple clipping issues for Operator weapons, headgear, and uniforms.
  
• FIXED – Operators return to a neutral standing position after performing a melee while leaning.

ALIBI

• FIXED – When Alibi's Prisma is thrown and hit midair by Thatcher's EMP Grenade, the opening animation still occurs.
  
• FIXED – Alibi's Prisma doesn't redeploy after falling through a hatch.
  
• FIXED - Alibi's Prisma icon scales differently for the Operator and hologram.

ARUNI

• FIXED – Multiple issues while using Aruni's Surya Gate.
  
• FIXED – Aruni's melee cannot destroy Gridlock's Trax Stingers when Aruni is played by the host in a Local Custom Game.
  
• FIXED – Aruni's Surya Gate appears deactivated to players over 20 M away.
  
• FIXED – Aruni's Surya Gate and Kaid's Rtila Electroclaw incorrectly display a pulsing effect when disabled by Thatcher's EMP Grenade and viewed through IQ's Electronics Detector.
  
• FIXED - Attackers will sometimes take damage from Aruni's Surya Gate when the Preparation Phase ends if they change their spawn point.

BLITZ

• FIXED – The Enemies Blinded statistic for Blitz is not updating.

CLASH

• FIXED – White light on Clash's CCE Shield does not turn off when the shield is disabled by Thatcher's EMP Grenade.
  
• FIXED - Players receive no feedback when Clash's CCE Shield is on cooldown and can't be activated.

ECHO

• FIXED – The disabled state for Echo's Yokai does not appear for players who join a game in progress.
  
• FIXED – Echo's Yokai can remain stuck in the metal pipes from 2F Archives on Border map.
  
• FIXED – Echo's Yokai can be attached to the outside of the southern door frame at 2F East Stairs on Border map.

FLORES

• FIXED – Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge is not destroyed if the wheels are shot while the gadget is moving.
  
• FIXED – Flores' RCE-Ratero controller will disappear when the player faces a wall.
  
• FIXED – Distorted SFX when a player joins an in-progress game and spectates Flores while he is deploying the RCE-Ratero Charge.
  
• FIXED – Flores' voice line is missing when the RCE-Ratero Charge gets destroyed.
  
• FIXED – On some occasions, Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge is deployed with the wheels closed.
  
• FIXED – Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge wheels don't appear to turn for onlookers.
  
• FIXED – No audio line is triggered when Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge is driving under Aruni's Surya Gate.
  
• FIXED – When Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge gets anchored to a wall, the explosion cannot be heard from the other side of that wall.
  
• FIXED – Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge stops rolling when the player exits the device's camera view and deploys a drone at the same time.
  
• FIXED – White outline can be noticed on Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge from support mode and caster view.
  
• FIXED – Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge will destroy only one layer of the soft wall when anchored on the glass of Mira's Black Mirror.
  
• FIXED – The wheels of Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge appear closed in match replays.
  
• FIXED – The explosion radius of Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge is big enough to destroy gadgets on the floor above.
  
• FIXED - High latency can cause player to be stuck in the camera view of Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge when trying to exit after deploying it.
  
• FIXED - Exiting Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge while it is being anchored causes the player to be able to exit the camera view faster.
  
• FIXED - Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge can be deployed inside some objects.
  
• FIXED - Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge doesn't destroy windows when hitting them mid-jump.
  
• FIXED - Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge stops rolling if Flores' body is inside the range of Mute's Signal Disruptor.
  
• FIXED - If deployed on a wall, Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge remains floating after Oryx destroys the wall with Remah Dash.
  
• FIXED - Flores' face is partially covered by his weapon in the Operator section menu.

FROST

• FIXED – Frost's Welcome Mat will not deploy on some elevated surfaces.

HIBANA

• FIXED – When fired at a barricade that is then removed, Hibana's X-Kairos pellets float in mid-air.
  
• FIXED – Friendly Fire penalty occurs when an ally destroys Hibana's X-Kairos pellets on a reinforced hatch.
  
• FIXED – Using 2 pellets from Hibana's X-Kairos, Attackers are able to breach a reinforced wall that's been electrified by Kaid.

IQ

• FIXED – Invisible phone in the animation that occurs when IQ selects Observation Tools.
  
• FIXED – Defender phones don't display a pulsing effect when detected by IQ's Electronics Detector.

KALI

• FIXED – Kali's CSRX 300 shows a damage value of 97 instead of 122.
  
• FIXED – Kali's CSRX 300 does not always destroy a hatch with one bullet.
  
• FIXED – Kali's CSRX 300 won't destroy a hatch if only one panel is hit.

KAPKAN

• FIXED – Inconsistent deployment prompt for Kapkan's Entry Denial Device.

MAVERICK

• FIXED - Maverick's Breaching Torch has to be used twice to destroy the destructible layer of floors that have carpets on them on Border map.

MIRA

• FIXED – Mira's Black Mirror can be deployed on the wrong side of a reinforced wall.
  
• FIXED – Mira's Black Mirror has a bigger hitbox when held.

MOZZIE

• FIXED – Mozzie's Pest Launcher loses its functionality after it is shot on top of Gridlock's Trax Stingers.
  
• FIXED – Pest warning is displayed when the player uses Observation Tools after capturing a drone as Mozzie.
  
• FIXED – Mozzie's Pests only capture Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge when it's anchored.
  
• FIXED – Mozzie's Pests are not interrupting the timer/explosion after catching Flores' RCE-Ratero Charge.
  
• FIXED - Warning icon for Mozzie's Pests only works according to the first Pest a drone has approached while simultaneously in range of 2 of them at the same time.
  
• FIXED - Warning icon for Mozzie's Pest does not blink when a drone is thrown in range of a Pest and moves to another Pest's range.

MUTE

• FIXED – VFX for Mute is missing in certain circumstances.
  
• FIXED – Deploying Mute's Signal Disruptor while Observation Tools are in use by Attackers prevents them from being jammed.
  
• FIXED – Various Claymore issues when the gadget is affected by Mute's Signal Disruptor.
  
• FIXED - While inside Mute's Signal Disrupter range, the warning message for some gadgets is shown when the gadget is in the Operator's hands.

ORYX

• FIXED – Oryx's Remah Dash can hit Attackers behind reinforced walls.

TACHANKA

• FIXED - Tachanka's DP27 LMG will destroy only one layer on multi-layered destructible walls.

THATCHER

• FIXED – Thatcher's EMP Grenade will not disable Clash's CCE Shield when activating the shield at the same time as the EMP explosion.

TWITCH

• FIXED – Twitch's Shock Drone cannot fire through debris.

WAMAI

• FIXED – Disabled effects remain on Wamai's Mag-NET when it self-destructs.

ZERO

• FIXED – Zero's Argus Launcher has a green highlight when ADS is activated in end of round replay.

• FIXED – Various performance issues on PS5.
  
• FIXED – A black screen appears when the game is booted on Xbox One X.
  
• FIXED – Various issues with Ubisoft notifications and Rewards.
  
• FIXED – Friendly fire prompt does not appear when match cancellation prompt is active.
  
• FIXED – Bundles don't appear as owned when buying a larger bundle that contains them.
  
• FIXED – Multiple UI improvements and fixes.
  
• FIXED – Minor voice over, VFX, and audio issues.
  
• FIXED – Minor cosmetic and shop fixes.
  
• FIXED – Multiple customization issues.
  
• FIXED – Various issues with chat accessibility features.
  
• FIXED – Various localization issues throughout the game.
  
• FIXED – Defenders can prevent a match cancellation by prematurely ending the round.
  
• FIXED – Getting shot by Maestro's Evil Eye causes the game to crash.
  
• FIXED – Switching from one monitor to another removes the first monitor's resolution presets.
  
• FIXED – Various UI and audio issues in match replays.
  
• FIXED – Various killfeed/ticker elements remain stuck on screen.
  
• FIXED – Various UI issues with Observation Tools.
  
• FIXED – There is no confirmation window after changing settings during a match.
  
• FIXED – A typo can be observed in a hard text image in Arabic on Border map.
  
• FIXED – Custom Graphic settings cannot be applied.
  
• FIXED – Player card goes outside of screen in certain aspect ratios.
  
• FIXED – When a player is eliminated, the kill cam showcases the opponent.
  
• FIXED – Outdated warning message appears when Defenders are detected outdoors.
  
• FIXED – Incorrect message is displayed for caster when looking at the first-person view of an eliminated player.
  
• FIXED – The timer is overlapping the objective in Disarm Bomb (Training Grounds game mode).
  
• FIXED – New messages stay on screen for more than 6 seconds when the chat module is unfocused.
  
• FIXED – The switches for reduced situation difficulty are not enabled by default.
  
• FIXED – Forgiveness vote will appear for a kicked user.
  
• FIXED – Charms are displayed backwards on the GONNE-6.
  
• FIXED - Triple and quad multi-kills are not triggering the animation.
  
• FIXED - Missing bonus score for Incendiary Grenade kills.
  
• FIXED - Progression header overlaps with the player count in Hostage and Secure Area game modes.
  
• FIXED - Y5S4 Champions Charm notification displays an incorrect Charm image.
  
• FIXED - Various Charms have low resolution on very high resolution settings.
  
• FIXED - Ash appears in the first ban briefly, even when she has not been banned.
  
• FIXED - Defuser icon has no shading when held by the Operator.
  
• FIXED - If a Surrender vote is denied, it becomes unavailable in subsequent rounds.
  
• FIXED - During the Planning Phase of a Custom Game of Bomb, players can pick and drop the defuser after Operators have been locked.
  
• FIXED - Recruit's description in the Operator selection phase mentions that he only has two reinforcements.

We know many of you have been eager to get your hands on community made skins, so we are super excited to partner up with Prime Gaming to introduce you to our Community Artist Bundle Program. We are launching this new program in Y6S1 Crimson Heist and it will bring operator bundles created by some of the top Siege fan artists going forward.

With this program we want to celebrate our amazingly creative and dedicated community artists and give them a chance to be represented in-game. Each selected artist gets to create a full set for an operator of their choice and these bundles will drop over the course of Year 6 and beyond.

The first installment of this program for Y6S1 was designed by the infamous SAU_SIEGE for our resident spooky lady: Caveira.



This Caveira Operator Bundle includes the SAU_SIEGE:

• Uniform
  
• Headgear
  
• M12 Weapon skin
  
• Charm

The SAU_SIEGE Operator Bundle will be available through Prime Gaming shortly after the launch of Y6S1 Crimson Heist later in March.
Prime Gaming members will be able to claim this exclusive set for free – if you’re not a Prime member yet, sign up for a free trial.

https://gaming.amazon.com/rainbowsixsiege

The SAU_SIEGE Operator Bundle offer will only be available for a limited time, so make sure to claim it once it’s live!
This offer will be available for PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series S|X, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, and Amazon Luna.


Paddy “SAU_SIEGE” Hall has been creating Siege fan art on an almost daily basis since 2017, and quickly became one of the most well-known and dedicated fan artists in our community.

Many players can relate to his comics, that often deal with current (gameplay) topics and his adorable illustrations of our operators bring smiles to everyone’s faces.

Caveira's always had a special place in his heart and many appearances in his art, either as one of the main actors of the comic or more hidden somewhere inside it and we all spent some time searching for her. So – Do you see her?

Check out his Twitter and Instagram, and show him some love!




What is the Community Artist Bundle Program?
The Community Artist Bundle Program will launch in Y6S1 and bring you operator bundles created by some of our most talented and dedicated Siege fan artists going forward.

I’m a Siege fan artist too – what can I do to get selected as well?
Given the length of our production cycle for in-game content, the fan artists for Year 6 have already been determined. However, we are always on the lookout for future participants. If your goal is to see your bundle in-game, continue showing us your passion and strive to be an outstanding member of the Siege community.
We have multiple ways for our dedicated community artists to get more involved with the game, such as the Siege Champions Program.

How can I get the Y6S1 SAU_SIEGE Operator bundle?
Link your Ubisoft account with your Amazon account here and claim the Operator set through Prime Gaming once it’s live. After successfully redeeming the content, it will be available in your in-game inventory within 48 hours. Players must have Caveira available as an operator.

Can I buy the SAU_SIEGE Operator Bundle with renown or R6 Credits as well?
The SAU_SIEGE Operator Bundle is exclusive to Prime Gaming for a limited time only and can be obtained via the Prime Gaming offer as described above. Prime Gaming is included for free with Amazon Prime, and free trials are available for new users.

Will this offer be available on all platforms?
Yes, it can be redeemed on PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series S|X, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, and Amazon Luna.

How long will this offer be available?
Following its release shortly after the launch of Y6S1 later in March, you have one month to claim this offer via Prime Gaming.

I don’t see my rewards.
If you’re having trouble redeeming your SAU_SIEGE Operator Bundle, please contact our support.

For more information about Prime Gaming, visit the Prime Gaming FAQ.

Each season will bring the release of new charms, as well as a return of the streamer’s charms from previous seasons!




Braction6

MrBboy45

Lt Custard

JessGOAT






Ad9m Alfredoplays AnneMunition Beaulo Bighead BikiniBodhi Bnans Drid Gabbo IceyCat25 Interro JerichoFive Jinu6734 Just9n Kalera KingGeorge KittyR6 Kixstar LagonisR6 Lil_Lexi MacieJay Matimi0 Narcoleptic Nugget PaladinAmber Pengu Punjistick REMGURI / 렘쨩 Rubsarb Salty Academy SexyCake Shorty SilphTV TangyD Tatted THE_M3RY Tranth Varsity WhiteShark67 z1ronic Zander Zigueira


These charms are only available by subscribing to the respective streamer’s Twitch channel with a linked Uplay account. For more information on how to link your Uplay and Twitch account, as well as opt in for Twitch Drops, please refer to [this FAQ](https://support.ubi.com/Faqs/000035432/Get-your-Twitch-Streamer-s-charm).


Given the length of our production cycle for in-game content, the participants for Y6S1 S2, S3 & S4 have already been determined. We are always on the lookout for additional content creators to add to the program and will be exploring new candidates in 2021. If your goal is to see your charm in game, we use the following criteria to begin the selection process for potential candidates:

Requirements to be considered

• Approximately 350+ concurrent viewers – preferable.
  
• Average of 10 Rainbow Six streams per month.
  
• Average of 20 hours of Rainbow Six streamed per month.
  
• Positive standing with Ubisoft/Rainbow Six Siege.
  
• High quality level of content.
  
• Rainbow Six Siege reserves the right for final decision.

Consideration for Removal

• Less than 10 Rainbow Six Siege main streams over 3 months.
  
• Level of quality dropping below an acceptable level.
  
• Standing with Rainbow Six Siege/Ubisoft compromised.
  
• Any actions that may negatively affect the R6S/Ubisoft brand.
  
• Rainbow Six Siege reserves the right for removal of any charms.

In November, we released an article outlining the top issues and community concerns among the Rainbow Six Siege community. Protecting our content creators from players using streamers’ public information to disrupt their experience was highlighted among our top priorities. With the release of Streamer Mode, creators will have more control over what information is publicly available, protecting them from Stream and Queue Sniping.

So, what are these disruptive actions and our efforts to stop them in their tracks? Read on for the details.


Queue Sniping—when players taunt or kill a streamer after they deliberately queue at the same time as them—has been a growing problem within the Siege community. Streamer Mode will give creators two forms of protection against Queue Sniping:

• Hide Region and Latency – This will allow users to hide all instances where region and ping are mentioned.
  
• Hidden Matchmaking Delay – This will offer a random, hidden delay to the streamer’s matchmaking. The streamer will be able to choose from several delay options. The delay will not impact a player rejoining a match if they are reconnecting.

Find these settings in the Options menu under “Streamer Mode preferences.” Utilizing these settings will greatly reduce the ability of players who are watching a stream to purposely queue into that streamer’s lobby. This isn’t the only issue facing content creators, though.


There are instances in which players also intentionally use another player’s livestream to gather information and get an unfair edge, or to act in a disruptive manner. This behavior, calledStream Sniping, is another issue we want to protect against. Our initial release of Streamer Mode will have three settings that empower creators in the battle against these disruptive actions.

• Hide Names – This option--listed as “Hide Usernames” for PC players, “Hide Online IDs” for PlayStation players, and “Hide Gamertags” for Xbox players--gives users the ability to hide their own name or the names of their entire team by replacing them with randomly generated presets taken from the NATO phonetic alphabet. This will be reflected not only in-game, but also across text and voice comms, the scoreboard, and Squad drop down.
  
• Hide Clearance Level – Hide the Clearance level on the after-match bonus screen and the contact panel by replacing it with a placeholder.
  
• Hide Avatar – This allows streamers to hide their avatar and replace it with a placeholder.

Currently, these settings will only impact the point of view from the streamer, limiting the information those watching have regarding the match. However, our team is hard at work on the next iteration of Streamer Mode. Our hope with the next version is the anonymization provided by these settings will be seen by all players in the match, not just the streamer.


Cheating and toxicity are subjects we are [committed to winning](http://rainbow6.com/anticheat_update) the war against. We understand that allowing players to activate these options may raise concerns regarding the process of reporting cheating and disruptive behavior. For this reason, we will add visibility of the Match ID on each match’s scoreboard. This not only gives players a reference point when reporting, but also increases our team’s ability to accurately investigate these reports.


Streamer Mode is just one step we are taking in our efforts to protect our players and is a feature we intend to keep building upon. This is just the first version. We are currently working on and will be releasing a second version that will strengthen and improve stream sniping protections. As we continue to listen to your concerns, our efforts to address those concerns will also continue. We look forward to sharing more updates regarding our work addressing issues facing content creators in the future.

Kicking off 2021, all of us at Rainbow Six Siege are proud to introduce Crimson Heist, a season that gears players up for the ultimate heist. A new Operator is joining our ranks: the sly and tactical Flores, an Attacker from Argentina who knows how to mix precision and passion. He brings the RCE-Ratero Charge, a remote-controlled charge, with a timed explosion, that sneaks up on unsuspecting opponents.

Crimson Height is an action-packed season that offers reworks of the Border map and Newcomer playlist, a new secondary weapon, and plenty of other exciting additions. Are you ready to get the stash? Keep reading the Patch Notes below to discover more.

View Patch Notes

In this latest edition of Designer’s Notes, we'll go into more detail about the balancing changes that’ll come with the Crimson Heist patch and give you an insight into the reasons behind these changes.


WIN DELTA VS. PRESENCE





Please note that we are using presence to gauge the popularity of an Operator. This notion had to be introduced to reflect the implementation of the pick & ban.

Presence definition: pick rate of an Operator when not banned. Win Delta: The Win Delta is aggregated from Operator's Win Deltas per Bomb Site.

OPERATOR BAN RATE

• Increased CSRX 300 damage to 127 (from 122)
  
  • 1 body shot will kill a 3-speed Operator
    
  • 1 body shot will DBNO a 2-speed Operator
    
  • 1 body shot will DBNO a 1-speed Operator
    
  • Wearing Rook Vest:
  • 1 body shot will DBNO a 3-speed Operator
    
  • 2 body shots will DBNO a 2-speed Operator
    
  • 2 body shots will DBNO a 1-speed Operator

Population targeted by this change: Casual, Top Ranked and Pros.

Our main objective with Kali is to make her a viable and balanced operator. In general, this requires us to strike the right balance between ability (LV Explosive Lance) and loadout. For Kali in particular, this depends on two main elements. The first is that Kali brings a great amount of utility to the game. The LV Explosive Lance can deal with gadgets, including bulletproof gadgets and ones behind electrified reinforcements. The second element is the CSRX 300. This primary weapon is in charge of most of her killing potential, and keeping this weapon in line is key to avoiding an overpowered operator.

Unsurprisingly, finding the right balance for a one-shot-kill weapon can take a number of iterations. We noticed that on release, Kali was perceived as overpowered, but the power perception has been slowly drifting towards "underperforming." In the previous patch, we took our first step in finding the sweet spot for the CSRX 300. We have looked at your feedback and we are making new changes.

What we've done so far:

We started by identifying the 1-shot-DBNO mechanic as one of the main issues. The mechanic was perceived as frustrating and it did not allow us to tweak the weapon power level, so we decided to transform the CSRX 300 into a normal weapon. Now, we can modify the weapon damage and iterate until we find the sweet spot.

With this change, we've also tackled the lack of counter for Kali's CSRX 300. For example, now, wearing Rook's Armor Plates can now help Operators to survive a body shot.

We also wanted to keep the damage modifiers caused by bullets getting through walls or hitting Operators limbs', as this helps to prevent lucky shots that can kill or put Operators in to DBNO. This also ensures good aim is rewarded.
The first iteration set the damage at 122. With this value, we had a compromise where 3-speed Operators would die from a chest shot and 1-speeds would survive it. This compromise took into account that 1-speed Operators do not represent a majority in a defensive line-up, especially on Pro League. This approach has been perceived as too weak, though, and we are making new changes to address that.

What we're doing now:

Our next step is to increase the weapon damage to make 1-speed Operators also fall into DBNO. Like last time, we will be monitoring your feedback and the game data to ensure we continue tracking towards finding that sweet spot for Kali. For some Operators, balance is a process that takes iteration, so we appreciate the feedback and insight the community has shared here!

Additional insight into Kali's interaction with Rook's Armor Plate:

With the above change in mind, we want Rook's ability to be relevant against Kali's CSRX 300. We are not creating any specific rules for the interaction, but we want to clarify how Rook's Armor works:

When an operator is wearing Rook's Armor Plate, their armor gains an extra 15% protection. This means that:

• A 3-speed Operator will have 15% damage reduction.
  
• A 2-speed Operator will have 25% damage reduction.
  
• A 1-speed Operator will have 35% damage reduction.

This means that with the new damage value, only 3-speed operators will fall into DBNO when receiving a CSRX 300 body shot. The rest of the 2 and 3-speed Operators will survive that shot.

• Reduced Shield HP to 20 (from 50)
  
• Reduced MK17 damage to 40 (from 49)

Population targeted by this change: Casual, Top Ranked and Pros.

According to the Balancing Matrix, Blackbeard continues to be a force to reckon with, sporting the highest Attacker win delta. Between the great utility afforded by his Rifle Shields and a loadout with strong damage capabilities that has earned him a high K/D, he is a point of frustration for Defenders.

By reducing the HP of his shields and damage of his MK17, this will slightly reduce both his killing potential and survivability. Given that the majority of the time, Blackbeard ends matches with shield economy to spare, this change should be fair to both sides as it brings him more in line with other Attackers.

• Added Gonne-6 (Removed C75)
  
• Added Stun Grenades (Removed Frag Grenades)

Population targeted by this change: Casual, Top Ranked and Pros.

Dokkaebi is the first of two Operators who will be encountering a loadout shakeup this patch to make way for the newest gun in the Siege armoury. The Gonne-6 will replace the C75 as her secondary weapon, providing highly accurate explosive utility for dealing with gadgets, abilities and Operators. As a result, her gadgets have also been tweaked to limit the number of explosives at her disposal.

It's no secret that Dokkaebi has received a number of loadout changes in the past year. The initial intention for giving her Frag Grenades was to offer more utility against bulletproof devices rather than to increase killing potential. By switching to Stun Grenades, she will retain this utility against bulletproof devices while also empowering her with a wider range of tools to better adapt to her surroundings while disrupting Defenders.

• Added Gonne-6 (Removed GSH-18)
  
• Added Stun Grenades (Removed Frag Grenades)

Population targeted by this change: Casual, Top Ranked and Pros.

Like Dokkaebi, Finka is also receiving an update to her loadout, gaining the Gonne-6 secondary weapon and replacing her Frag Grenades with Stun Grenades. Given her strong win delta compared to other Attackers on the Balancing Matrix, the slight reduction in AoE damage capabilities is not expected to have a significant effect on her performance, particularly now that she is able to accurately deny many Defenders’ tools with the Gonne-6.

• Warning will hint at the distance to Pests by modifying its blinking speed

Population targeted by this change: Top Ranked and Pros.

In its current state, Mozzie’s Pest lacks clear counters and often forces Attackers to waste time and resources in order to avoid or mitigate obvious traps. The difficulty countering him has made Mozzie a particularly useful Operator, and has contributed to driving up his presence in the Balancing Matrix.

By adding a proximity warning to Pests, this provides Attackers with a tool to more effectively avoid or deal with clear traps. While this change will not fundamentally change Mozzie’s moment-to-moment actions, it will encourage more creative placement of Pests to get the jump on Attackers.

• While HEL Presence Reduction is active, Nøkk won't activate proximity-based gadgets
  
  • Gadgets affected: Ela's Grzmot Mine, Melusi’s Banshee, Kapkan’s Entry Denial Device, Proximity Alarm, and Metal Detectors
• Nøkk's glitch effect will cancel the proximity immunity, resulting in the activation of any gadget in range
  
• The color of the HEL device on Nøkk’s hand will change colour when bypassing any proximity device

Population targeted by this change: Top Ranked and Pros.

Nøkk was initially designed as a counter-intel Operator, but not every intel tool is a camera. Devices triggered by proximity give very useful information as the activation’s sound cue provides information without requiring players to lower their weapon. We want to make Nøkk's gadget more interesting to play and useful against more defensive setups.

Please note, this is a TEST SERVER ONLY change. We will turn it off before releasing the new season to continue working on her. We have tested this change internally and while we feel it adds an interesting dynamic to her play, there are still some unanswered questions. Therefore, we would like to hear your feedback and iterate before deploying this to the wider community.

• Added Smoke Grenades (Removed Stun Grenades)

Population targeted by this change: Top Ranked.

Twitch continues to have a high presence in the Balancing Matrix. This is due in part to her high killing potential and aggressive playstyle as a secondary entry fragger.

By replacing her Stun Grenades with Smoke Grenades, this removes one of the tools that empowers such aggressive play and opens up additional role opportunities for players who would rather hang back and provide support. We will continue to monitor how this affects her playstyle to ensure any changes retain the core of why players love Twitch.

• Improved recoil

Population targeted by this change: Casual, Top Ranked and Pros.

It's no secret that the G36 has been overshadowed by the R4C and ARX and is in need of a tweak. In order to make it feel better to use while bringing it more in line with the effectiveness of its contemporaries, this assault rifle's recoil has been updated.

Players should notice an immediate change in its handling. Specifically, recoil will no longer drift horizontally, making it more reliable. Like anything relating to the handling of weapons, though, it's important to note that we are continuing to look at how we can further improve the feel of different weapons in players' loadouts.



With Year 6 Season 1, when a gadget is disabled by Mute, there will be proper feedback showcased to players.

Expect feedback when the following gadgets are disabled while in play:

• Attacker drones
  
• Breach Charges
  
• Hibana's X-Kairos
  
• Fuze's Cluster Charge
  
• Thermite's Exothermic Charge
  
• Zero's ARGUS Cameras
  
• Claymores
  
• Nomad's Airjabs

---

Try out the latest Rainbow Six updates on the Test Server and earn an exclusive charm through the Bug Hunter Program.

Follow us and share your feedback on Twitter, Reddit, Facebook and on our forums.

It’s been about half a year since our last dev blog on the Rainbow Six Siege war against cheats. For the last six months, the team has continued the fight and we would like to share with you a bit about what’s been happening behind the scenes. While we would love to be fully transparent, doing so could hinder our efforts as it could aid in the creation of new cheats.

Most of our changes will be made on the backend, so you may not see them. To summarize our current status, we are actively reinforcing cheat detection by adding to existing security measures and lessening the overall ability to cheat in Rainbow Six Siege.


Throughout the blog we’ll reference a few different groups of exploiters:

- Cheaters: Players using a 3rd party application, script, or macro to obtain an unfair advantage in-game or in a manner that violates the Terms of Service for Rainbow Six Siege.
- Cheat Developers: Those developing cheat applications which they then use, sell, or give to cheaters.
- Hackers: For the context of this article, these are malicious individuals/groups who are taking over accounts that are not theirs and re-selling accounts they do not own.




In our never-ending cat and mouse game with cheaters and cheat developers, we continue to focus our efforts on 3 core points:

- Detection Improvement
- Increased Barriers to prevent cheaters and novel cheats
- Reduction of Impact of cheats in-game




By the end of 2020, we confirmed we exceeded our previous annual ban number record by 44.73%. Improved detection, detailed reporting, and data sharing with BattlEye were big factors in this ban increase. With a continually growing population and the increased availability of cheats, new cheats and cheaters regularly keep us on our toes.

In August, we started issuing a new type of cheating sanction based on player data—something we will go into more detail on below. We used this new data detection model to ban over 4500 players between August and December. Adding this to our cheating sanctions brings us to a total of 52,69% increase in cheating bans.




The June Dev Blog described three important topics for 2020: Detection, Blockers, and Vulnerabilities. These continue to be our focus and we have some updates to report.


Cheat detection will always be a work in progress, as well as a ‘’hunting’’ process. As cheating is ever-evolving thanks to changing behaviors, the continued bypassing of systems, and more, it will always be impossible to detect 100% of cheaters.

That’s why we are building new cheat detections based on statistics to uncover our most disruptive cheat users.


Bans based on player statistics are still new to Rainbow Six Siege. One of the major goals of data-based cheat detection is to sanction cheaters faster. We are happy with the accuracy of our first model, but we are still operating the ban waves manually. This is causing the process to be slower than we would like. Automation for this first model is planned for the beginning of Year 6.   

New detection models will always launch manually. We start by identifying data that will make our detection model relevant. Next, we launch it on the backend and make sure we are comfortable with the results. The first ban waves are done by hand, allowing us to review each impacted player. This helps us ensure the detections are identifying concrete proof of cheating. We will continue to develop new models that give us better visibility on what is happening live in order to expedite the identification of cheaters and sanctioning them.


For the last six months, we have been working with BattlEye to improve cheat detections in Siege. We will continue to ensure that our partnership with BattlEye has a positive impact on the Rainbow Six Siege community.

Cheat detection is only one piece of the anti-cheat puzzle in Siege. We are also working to increase barriers to entry for both cheat developers and their users. Our goal is to cancel any benefit that could be gained from this practice by making it costly for illegitimate players.

 

In our quest to make cheaters' lives as difficult as possible, we included APAC regions in the 2-Step Verification Ranked Lock. This not only deters cheating, but it helps secure a wider array of accounts from being hacked. Increasing the overall security of accounts is an effective way to help fight instances of account stealing or selling, and makes it harder for Cheaters, Hackers, and Cheat Developers alike.

Another tool in the arsenal of cheaters and cheat developers is the creation of burner accounts. To combat this, we have linked BattlEye bans with Steam Vac bans, which prevent banned players from receiving game refunds.

In the upcoming months, we’ll also be keeping a closer eye on leaderboards. We are aware that cheaters are appearing in the highest rankings and will dedicate efforts to manually cleaning the leaderboards periodically.


While we can’t offer specifics on this topic, please know we are working to make it harder for cheat developers to analyze and modify our game. With every update we’ve launched for the past few seasons, we have continued to further secure code, making it more difficult for cheat features to keep up.

Cheat Developers may only be one part of the equation, but they are the source of the problem. We will continue securing our code and eliminating vulnerabilities in order to make the upkeep of cheats more costly and time-consuming.


We are continuing to learn a great deal from our battle against cheating as we fight on multiple fronts, from live issues and fires, to planning the future of Siege’s anti-cheat responses, through to making sure we maintain visibility on our vulnerabilities.


Cheat developers take advantage of vulnerabilities to create their cheats. For this reason, we assess our vulnerabilities every season to not only detect current vulnerabilities, but also to predict what new loopholes could be found in the future. We keep the Ubisoft game security team close and use their knowledge to plan our initiatives and understand past and present errors.


In addition to using software to discover potential risks, we actively keep an eye on social media and work closely with the community team and customer support to concentrate our efforts on issues that matter to our players.  As soon as we discover vulnerabilities, we get to work on fixing them. In some instances, there are no simple solutions, so we complement prevention with detection.


We have big plans on the horizon for our team and for the game, and have no intention of slowing down. While we can’t go into full detail at this time, we hope this Dev Blog has helped you understand some of the work we do behind the scenes. This work is rarely user-facing and can be overthrown by new cheat iterations, but we’ll keep pushing to improve on all fronts.

In the future, the anti-cheat team plans to remain transparent by publishing Dev Blogs when we have notable updates to share.


For every wall reinforcement that we deploy, Cheat Developers are trying to breach in another room. But it far from deters our will to rid the game of as many opportunists and cheaters as we can. We are dedicated to making Siege secure and fair for everyone. We look forward to sharing exciting new releases in future Dev Blogs. Until then, keep reporting cheaters in-game and stay safe out there.

Y5S4.3 will release the week of January 26th on all platforms. For additional information and further details on the changes listed below, please see our Y5S4.3 Designer's Notes.

Below you will find the download sizes for each platform.

- Ubisoft Connect: 1.09 GB
- Steam: 868.62 MB
- Xbox One: 1.57 GB
- Xbox Series X: 1.82 GB
- PS4: 1.31 GB
- PS5: 1.10 GB



- Reduced Breaching Round explosive damage range to 2 meters (from 3.5 meters)


- Increased shotgun's total ammo to 30+1 (from 26)
- Added Hard Breach Charge (Removed Claymore)


- Reduced Yokai drone jump cooldown to 2s (from 3s)
- Reduced drone time-out failing to stick to the ceiling to 0.5s (from 2s)
- Reduced Sonic Burst cooldown to 16s (from 20s)


- Removed resistance to Concussion effects
- Removed "extra" mine while in DBNO


- Removed 1-shot-DNBO from CSRX300.
- CSRX300 now has base damage of 122 for 25 meters.
- 100% damage until 25 meters and linearly falls to 80% (97.6) at 35 meters
- Damage to the limbs has not changed.


- Removed 1.5x scope from the T-5


- Added Claymore (Removed Hard Breach Charge)


- Removed Angled Grip from the MP5


- Removed 1.5x scope from the Vector .45 ACP


- Removed resistance to Concussion effects
- Removed Withstand
- Reduced impact grenade explosive damage range to 2m (was 3m)


- Removed (set to 0) the camera penalization during the Guard Break animation


- Reduced deployment time to 2s (from 3s)
- Reduced activation time to 5s (from 6s)


- Improved recoil for: ARX, C8, M1014, and TCSG12



Ranked Match Cancellation

- Timer has been extended to allow disconnected player more time to rejoin a match in progress.
- Fixing known abuses occurring when players end the first round prematurely, preventing the opposing team from cancelling the match.



- FIXED – Disabling Hostage in matchmaking preferences prevents users from matchmaking into a Road to S.I. match.
- FIXED – Players are having loadouts reset after playing an Event.


- FIXED – Various LOD issues present on Bank and Stadium maps.
- FIXED – Zero's ARGUS Camera can pass through an indestructible floor at EXT Construction Site on Clubhouse map.
- FIXED – Shooting the bottles and spinning a player character around quickly in a specific location at 1F Pantry can cause FPS drops for everyone in the match on Skyscraper map.
- FIXED – Multiple collision issues present across various maps.
- FIXED – Exploitable line of sight present in gaps visible across various maps.
- FIXED – Desk panels in INT Office on Skyscraper map are not currently breakable.
- FIXED – Various gadget deployment and clipping issues present across maps.
- FIXED – The light source on the south-west wall of 2F Penthouse can be seen on the bottom of the north-east wall in 2F VIP Lounge on Penthouse map.
- FIXED – Unnecessary vault prompts are currently present on exterior garage roof near EXT Garage of Kafe Dostoyevsky map and on a police truck at the main entrance of Coastline map.
- FIXED – A container in 1F Bedroom on Skyscraper map appears positioned off of the ground.
- FIXED – Defenders that stay in the doorway at 1F Back Stairs will be detected by Attackers and receive a "You are detected" message on Villa map.
- FIXED – Breach Charges will sometimes not destroy the floor in 2F Master Bathroom on Villa map.
- FIXED – The defuser can get stuck in 2F Front Office on Consulate map after destroying the floor or if it's dropped between the electrical generator and metal pole in EXT West Spawn on Stadium map.
- FIXED – Players can go out of bounds after climbing the ventilation units and dropping near EXT Ventilation Stairs or when fast rappelling down a particular tree on Skyscraper map.
- FIXED – Grills above the AC unit on the 3rd floor in the Cigar Room on Kafe Dostoyevsky map are unable to be pinged.
- FIXED – Attackers can be knocked back by Oryx's Remah Dash through the bulletproof transparent glass in 1F Main Lobby on Stadium map.
- FIXED – Bullets can penetrate through the blue barrel located at 4F Tractor Storage on Hereford Base map.
- FIXED – Under specific circumstances, Operators can float above the ground in EXT Main Entrance on Bank map.
- FIXED – The Secure Area objective clips with nearby furniture in Kids Room on Hereford Base map.
- FIXED – Operators can spawn with their back to the house at EXT Side Street on House map.


- FIXED – Maestro's Evil Eye turret used in quick succession is occasionally causing issues with gameplay.
- FIXED – The Bailiff .410's crosshair elements are clipping while Operator is crouching or prone.
- FIXED – Improper hand animation is visible after Caveira activates Silent Step and performs a melee attack.
- FIXED – Sprinting with Warden does not leave footsteps for Jackal's EyeNox.
- FIXED – Zofia has additional resistance to her concussion projectile and Ela's GRZMOT Mine in Road to S.I. 2021 sessions.
- FIXED – Melee butting with Tachanka's Shumikha Launcher causes both hands to clip into the grenade launcher.
- FIXED – Maestro's Evil Eye can be deployed midair by placing it on Goyo's Volcan Shield and then removing the Volcan Shield.
- FIXED – Tachanka's DP-27 LMG will only destroy one layer of destructible walls that have multiple layers.
- FIXED – Audio sounds muffled when deploying a secondary Hard Breech Charge while crouching on barricades.


- FIXED – Weapons customized during the Operator Selection Phase are not visually updated in the menu.
- FIXED – The "Cosplay Guide: Operation Void Edge" Reward is currently displaying a placeholder image in the Ubisoft Connect launcher.
- FIXED – A pop-up will appear after each game session when the player returns to the main menu.
- FIXED – Minor visual issues are present in relation to the "Road to S.I. 2021" event.
- FIXED – Risen Headgear syringe glows intensively.
- FIXED – Welcome pop-up message for users is not always displaying consistent messaging.
- FIXED – The hands on Mute's Swamp Trek uniform have a visual issue while holding a weapon.
- FIXED – Inviting players to a Custom Online Game creates a Squad instead of adding players to the Custom Online Lobby.
- FIXED – Several Renown Booster packs are missing the R6 Credits button in the purchase confirmation side panel.
- FIXED – Players are reporting that despite winning a match, it is counting as a loss and the player can be de-Ranked.
- FIXED – If a player leaves a Road to S.I. session, the Dynamic Play button from the Player Hub will instead initiate a new search for the event.
- FIXED – During the MVP screen on Stadium map, minor flickering and visual issues are present.
- FIXED – The playlist name is missing when a player attempts to reconnect to a previous match.
- FIXED – When hovering on 1F, the icons of the Operators, objective markers, and bomb sites are visible from 2F as a Caster on Stadium map.
- FIXED – The Ubisoft Connect weekly challenges are not updated from "Terrorist Hunt" to the current title of "Training Grounds".

At Ubisoft we are committed to providing an inclusive gaming environment where everyone, anywhere in our global community can have fun while feeling safe and respected.

We value each and every member of our community and we appreciate your passion for our games. After all, where would we be without you? We trust you to be respectful and kind to yourselves and to one another. Together, we’re making this community stronger, safer and more positive.

To that end, our Code of Conduct establishes a set of core guidelines that all players, partners and employees must follow when participating in activities associated with Ubisoft’s products or services, both on and offline – we all play by the same rules.

This document supplements Ubisoft’s Terms of Use. For more details, please refer to our terms: https://legal.ubi.com/termsofuse/




Safety first. The safety of our players, partners and employees is our highest priority.

*Ubisoft does not tolerate threats, sexual or moral harassment, discrimination, endangerment of others, stalking, doxing or any other illegal or illicit conduct in our communities.*

Do:

- Educate yourself and respect local laws.
- Report any illegal or suspicious activity that you see.

Don’t:

- Engage in or encourage any form of illegal activity.
- Put anyone in danger or make them feel unsafe.
- Pretend to be another player or a Ubisoft employee.




Think IRL. Behind every avatar is a real person. All players should feel safe, welcome and accepted in Ubisoft’s communities and playspaces.

*Ubisoft does not accept any form of bullying, intimidation or the proliferation of hate. *

Do:

- Be your best self! Be kind and play your part in keeping the Ubisoft community great.
- Be respectful in communicating with others, no matter who or where they are. Make sure to use and share appropriate language and content.
- Stay cool. We’ve all had games where emotions run high. If you need to, take a break, take a deep breath, or just hit pause.

Don’t:

- Use any form of bullying, harassment, or hateful language to target others (whether they are players or Ubisoft employees) online or offline.

- Lose control. It’s easy to lash out or give in when things get tense, but don’t let your adrenaline do the talking.




Have fun and play fair. Let your skills alone take you to the top.

*All players are created equal. Anything aimed at gaining an unfair advantage disrupts the balance of our games and is damaging to our communities*

Do:

- Play fair and encourage others to do so.
- Call out cheating and help us foster fair play by using our reporting features.

Don’t:

- Cheat! Buying, making, distributing or promoting cheats for our games ruins the experience for all, even you.
- Have a 3rd party malicious software running in the background even if you’re not actively benefitting from it while playing.
- Abuse exploits or glitches to gain an unfair advantage.
- Attempt to edit, corrupt or change Game or server code.
- Use macros or mods.
- Purchase of game benefits, including but not limited to “MMR boosting services”.
- Buy accounts or cosmetics via 3rd party sellers.
- Exploit a broadcaster's live broadcast in order to gain an unfair advantage or harass them in-game, such as stream sniping.


When you’re using Ubisoft’s games and services, be respectful towards all players, users and our representatives. The purpose of our Code of Conduct and Terms of Use is to provide safe and welcoming communities for all, and any suspected breaches of these guidelines and rules will result in an investigation that could lead to sanctions. Sanctions can include; but are not limited to: restricted access to certain services, suspensions and bans at game or at account level. Sanctions may vary depending on the severity, impact and/or frequency of breaches. We don’t enjoy taking this kind of action, but breaking the rules can negatively impact the community, and therefore we need to hold you accountable.

SECURITY: Protect your account & yourself

We strongly advise our gamers against sharing personal or account information with anyone else. This includes information that could be used to identify you, like your telephone number, home address, etc., as well as information that could be used to compromise your account, like your email address or answers to your security questions, etc. Ubisoft representatives will never ask you for your password. Help us help you, we count on you to keep your account safe, secure and to yourself.


You are responsible for all actions and any comments you make in-game, on our forums or within other Ubisoft services. To protect our communities, representatives and partners, we may remove any and all content published by you that is in breach of this Code of Conduct or our Terms of Use.

In this latest edition of Designer’s Notes, we'll go into more detail about the balancing changes that’ll come with the 4.3 patch and give you an insight into the reasons behind these changes.


WIN DELTA VS. PRESENCE





*Please note that we are using presence to gauge the popularity of an Operator. This notion had to be introduced to reflect the implementation of the pick & ban.*

*Presence definition: pick rate of an Operator when not banned. Win Delta: The Win Delta is aggregated from Operator’s Win Deltas per Bomb Site.*

OPERATOR BAN RATE





*Due to a continued tracking issue, we are unable to provide the "No Ban" details for this edition of Designer’s Notes. We hope to have this fixed for the next one.*



- Reduced Breaching Round explosive damage range to 2m (from 3.5m)

Population targeted by this change: Casual, Top Ranked and Pros.

According to the Balancing Matrix, Ash continues to be the Attacker with the highest presence, owing to her strong versatility.

Specifically, the explosion range on her Breaching Round has made her an effective utility denier from below, destroying gadgets in the top floor ceiling, like Kaid's Electroclaws. By reducing this range, this will bring her versatility more in line with other Attackers.


- Increased shotgun's total ammo to 30+1 (from 26)
- Added Hard Breach Charge (Removed Claymore)

Population targeted by this change: Pros.

Further differentiating Buck from Sledge and highlighting his unique strategies as a master of destruction, we are increasing his utility with a Hard Breach Charge and additional shotgun ammo.

Combined with his Stun Grenades, we expect the Hard Breach Charge to offer additional versatility and increase his presence in matches.

As his shotgun is less reliable than Sledge's trusty hammer, the extra ammo will ensure Buck brings value to team compositions while accounting for the additional shots required (i.e. two shots required to destroy both layers of the floor).


- Reduced Yokai drone jump cooldown to 2s (from 3s)
- Reduced animation time when Yokai fails to stick to the ceiling to 0.5s (from 2s)
- Reduced Sonic Burst cooldown to 16s (from 20s)

Population targeted by this change: Casual, Top Ranked and Pros.

With this patch, we wanted to improve the way Echo's Yokai drone feels to use, focusing on quality of life changes.

Compensating for the removal of invisibility, players will find that the Yokai is more reactive to their commands and has a snappier feel. This empowers Echo to be more aggressive with his drone use.


- Removed resistance to Concussion effects
- Removed the "extra" mine while in DBNO

Population targeted by this change: Casual, Top Ranked and Pros.

With this patch, we intend to remove some of the "hidden" mechanics that are not explicitly explained and are based on the character's lore, rather than their balance.

During the Tachanka tests on the TS, the community was very vocal about these kinds of mechanics. The work we did removing these exceptions on Echo last year (i.e. vulnerable to Dokkaebi's Logic Bomb and hacking, allowing IQ to detect his cellphone with the scanner) was mentioned as a step in a positive direction.

We have decided to approach Ela in a similar manner, removing her Concussion resistance and "extra" mine. We do not believe these changes will affect her current viability and presence.

Additionally, we feel that removing these "hidden" mechanics helps make the game easier to understand and learn for new players while retaining the qualities players pick Ela for.


- CSRX 300 base damage set to 122
- 100% damage until 25 meters and linearly falls to 80% (97.6) at 35 meters

Population targeted by this change: Casual, Top Ranked and Pros.

Looking at our Balancing Matrix, Kali's low presence is due in part to a weapon that is considered underperforming.

We have noticed that the 1-shot-DBNO mechanic has been mentioned several times in balancing surveys as a frustration for players. We understand that the exceptions to this rule (i.e. headshot, limb hit, the target is extremely far away) can cause confusion.

With this in mind, we will remove this rule and turn her sniper into a normal weapon, increasing its base damage in the process. This means that damage will function the same as any other weapon against the armor and health of the target (good news for Rook, as his armor is now useful against her):

- 1 body shot will kill a 3-speed operator
- 1 body shot will down a 2-speed operator
- 1 body shot will damage a 1-speed operator

It is worth noting that we will keep one of the exceptions noted above—the damage to limbs—as we do not want to reward inaccurate shots now that the base damage is higher. We feel this fits with the logic of the weapon and is unlikely to generate the same confusion.


- Removed 1.5x scope from the T-5

Population targeted by this change: Top Ranked.

Looking at his place on the Balancing Matrix, Lesion brings a lot to teams, making him one of the top roamers.

From a primary gadget that offers strong map control by slowing Attackers and providing intel, to an effective weapon, he has a great deal of utility without factoring in his scope. Since this was already the case before giving him the 1.5x, we have decided to remove this scope from his kit.

Reducing his killing potential slightly, we want to make space for other Operators to find their footing in the roamer role, while also encouraging interesting roaming pairings to emerge.


- Added Claymore (Removed Hard Breach Charge)

Population targeted by this change: Casual and Top Ranked.

Trading part of his gadget loadout with Buck, Lion is now the proud owner a Claymore. Given his role a roamer focused on control, this shift better fits with his playstyle.

Given the option, players were less likely to choose the Hard Breach Charge. We feel this change will be a more appealing option to Lion players.


- Removed Angled Grip from the MP5

Population targeted by this change: Ranked.

Melusi continues to have a high presence in matches per the Balancing Matrix, combined with a strong win-delta.

By removing the Angled Grip, her presence is expected to see a reduction back to previous values. She is a valuable asset to teams, but the effectiveness of her MP5 made it possible to outpace roamers at their own game.

We also intend to make adjustments to Melusi's gadget in the future. As gadget changes require more iteration and testing, this will come later on. This Angled Grip change is more immediate, however, as we do want to have something in the short term to address Melusi's current performance.


- Removed 1.5x scope from the Vector.45 ACP

Population targeted by this change: Top Ranked.

As a result of her perceived ability to hold longer angles with the 1.5x sight, Mira's ban rates have become disproportionately high.

Removing this sight will reduce her killing potential back to previous values, while still maintaining her strong utility in matches. We hope to see a decrease in bans, giving her more chances to see active play.


- Removed resistance to Concussion effects
- Removed Withstand
- Reduced impact grenade explosive damage range to 2m (was 3m)

Population targeted by this change: Casual, Top Ranked and Pros.

Zofia is considered a strong pick with the second highest Attacker presence, as you can see in the Balancing Matrix above.

Similar to Ela, we are removing some of the "hidden" mechanics that are not explicitly explained in the game and instead stem from the character's lore. For Zofia, this means removing her Concussion resistance and Withstand effect, which we do not see affecting her power or presence.
We have also observed Zofia's ability to destroy gadgets placed in the top floor ceiling with impact grenades. To balance her currently high presence, we are decreasing their explosive range, slightly reducing her versatility as a utility denier from below.



- Removed (set to 0) the camera penalization during the Guard Break animation

Population targeted by this change: Top Ranked and Pros.

We introduced this mechanic to counter shield Operators' quick rotation during the Guard Break animation. We initially viewed this quick rotation as a source of frustration and sought to reduce the feeling of putting yourself in danger to engage a shield Operator and not getting anything from it. We've all had that one run-in with a skilled Clash…

But over time observing our community's evolving strategies, this interaction feels more in line with how a skilled shield player uses them.

As a result, we have removed this aspect of ballistic shields, as it wasn't our intention to remove a key component of shield play which created frustration for the player using the shield. Shields should now feel more comfortable to play.


- Reduced deployment time to 2s (from 3s)
- Reduced activation time to 5s (from 6s)

Population targeted by this change: Top Ranked and Pros.

Since the introduction of Hard Breach Charges as a secondary gadget, they have been a useful part of Attackers' kits, albeit not quite as reliable as we had intended.

By reducing deployment and activation time, they will become an even more viable option for Attackers, leaving them less exposed and giving Defenders less time to react to their tactics.


- Improved recoil for: ARX, C8, M1014, TCSG12

Population targeted by this change: Console.

As part of our continued efforts to improve controller game feel on console, specifically while aiming down sight, you will notice tighter recoil on a number of guns, making them more viable options when using a controller.

You will notice that successive shots for both the M1014 and C8 will land closer to one another. Similarly, it should be easier to chain shots with the TCSG12 now. As for the ARX, we have reworked the recoil pattern to keep shots more centered instead of spiking to the side.

Since this is an ongoing topic of discussion and experimentation, these changes reflect a part of the bigger picture. We are continuing to look into the console controller experience and how we can further improve the feel of your loadout.



Following experimentation on the TS, we've made the decision to set aside the idea of pre-reinforcing roof hatches.

Our initial objective with this idea was to make these hatches more interesting points of contention between Attackers and Defenders. We hoped to make it less trivial for Attackers to open these hatches and make it possible for Defenders to try to defend these hatches (with a Kaid, for instance).

We knew this could be problematic in a meta-game where Attackers' resources are already spread thin when it comes to dealing with Defenders' setups, but we hoped the addition of the Hard Breach Charge and Hibana rework would solve that issue.

After several tests on TS, here's what we observed:

- On many maps, our objective seemed to be achieved based on what we could observe, although this has been difficult to evaluate for several reasons. First, our current TS player population and behaviors don't always represent our Live player population. Second, we don't always have enough TS activity for our telemetry results to be reliable.
- On some maps where opening roof hatches is particularly crucial (like Kafe Dostoyevski), it made an Operator like Hibana almost a mandatory pick.
- We did not manage to convince. Most feedback we gathered was negative, and we saw few players perceiving upsides to the change.

Our conclusion is that the cons seem to outweigh the pros, which has led us to the decision set this issue aside.

Thank you to everyone who played this feature on TS and took the time to send us constructive feedback. This is always incredibly useful!

This was a very valuable experience for us, so you can expect more like this one in the near future… we have lots of wild ideas that we want to test with your help!