Ubisoft has announced several additions and changes to Rainbow Six Siege as part of its reveal of Crystal Guard, the third season of Siege’s sixth year.
Updates include Siege’s newest attack-sided operator Osa; in-game balancing updates, including tweaks to Twitch, Fuze, IQ, and Mute; a new Elite Lion skin; and the release of Ubisoft’s Collector case, a package of memorabilia for die-hard Siege fans.
Osa – Siege’s newest operator
A Croatian military engineer, Osa is Rainbow Six Siege’s newest attack-sided operator. Ubisoft has also confirmed that Osa is transgender — Siege’s first trans operator. Here is some important Osa information, including the contents of her inventory:
- Talon 8 Clear Shield: Unique to Osa, this is a transparent bulletproof shield that she can be deployed on the ground, in door frames, or in window frames. She can move with the shield in her hands, but with certain restrictions (weapon stored, no sprint, no prone). The shield can be shattered by attackers and defenders, and can be destroyed by explosives.
- Medium speed
- Medium armour
- 556 XI or PDW9 primary weapon
- PMM secondary weapon
According to a Ubisoft designer in this video, Osa’s role will be similar to that of Nomad or Gridlock, though she is very different to those operators. “She is there for map control,” Emilien Lomet said in a reveal video.
Map changes for Crystal Guard
- Clubhouse: A door has been added to the Bar area, as well as other small tweaks, to make the bomb site easier to defend and more easily navigable.
- Coastline: Ubisoft has added a breakable wall outside the VIP area of the map; added rappels up from the DJ deck to the roof; the windows in Courtyard can now be barricaded on all floors; the Service Entrance area has been redesigned slightly, with a doorway window being moved further into the room closer to the window attackers would come through.
- Bank: There is now less vision for attackers from the skylights; the arch windows from Exterior Garage have been blocked off; more cover has been added to Banana; the filing cabinet next to main entrance has been replaced with a doorway; the railings at the top of Square are now destructible; all bars in the Vault area have been removed; the hatch in Lobby has been moved so that it drops into Vault; an alleyway has been added from the manhole area to Back Access; the elevators have been adjusted.
Operator changes for Crystal Guard
- Twitch: Twitch will no longer start the preparation phase using her unique drone — this will now be replaced with a standard drone; Twitch’s drone can now jump; Twitch’s drone can no longer cause electricity damage, being changed instead to a laser that has infinite range.
- Fuze: Fuze can now deploy the charge on reinforced surfaces, which requires a longer detonation time, plus there is a tube on Fuze’s charge that can be shot to prevent detonation.
- IQ: IQ can now smart-ping any devices she detects through surfaces with her gadget.
Other gameplay tweaks for Crystal Guard
- Flash-grenade intensity: Flashes are being tweaked, with the intensity of the flashed state increasing. However, the duration of the flash is decreased.
- Rim-lighting for characters to improve visibility: A common complaint in the Siege community has been poor character visibility when operators use certain skins on certain maps. Ubisoft are attempting to solve the problem by adding light around character silhouettes.
Cosmetic changes
Players can now customise their operator cosmetics even further, being able to mix parts of different skins into one operator.
Lion’s new Elite skin: Resident Evil’s Leon S. Kennedy
Ubisoft also announced that Lion will be getting his second Elite skin, which is available from Tuesday August 17th.
This follows another Resident Evil skin in Siege for Zofia (Jill Valentine) earlier this year.
Lion’s new skin has been received well on Twitter:
Collector case — memorabilia for hardcore Siege fans
Ubisoft also unveiled that the Collector case — a package for memorabilia hoarders that includes a replica Sledge hammer, the Sparkle Tachanka chibi, and digital content for Rainbow Six Siege — is now available on the Ubisoft store.
