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

• Increased number of Gas Canisters to 6 (from 5).

Population targeted by this change: Casual and Top Ranked.

Currently, Maverick needs 2.3 canisters to open a hatch with the Suri Torch.

The previous number of Gas Canisters left very little margin of error to open two hatches, even for pro players.

By increasing the number of Gas Canister at his disposal, we would like to give him a slight Presence bump in the Casual player spectrum.

This change will not allow Suri Torch experts to open more than two hatches, which was already the case in Y5S2. However, resource management should now be easier to handle for everyone.

• The Gemini Replicator (Iana’s hologram) is now able to use the Ping 2.0 system.

The hologram is a carbon copy of Iana and controls related to the Ping System are the same as well.

We hope that this change will reinforce the level of synergy and cooperation that Iana brings to the attacking team, we also hope that it will also rationalize and streamline her ability.

• EMPs will now disable gadgets instead of destroying them.
• Thatcher’s EMP effect increased to 15s (from 10s when applicable).
• Picking up a disabled gadget will remove the EMP effect.
• The EMP effect will not affect gadgets within the Operator’s inventory.

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

Too often, Thatcher’s EMPs ended up destroying Defender gadgets by accident or without real intention to do so.

The following gadgets affected by Thatcher’s EMP are now disabled for 15s instead of being destroyed prior to Y5S3:

• Nitro Cell
• Kapkan’s Entry Denial Device
• Jäger’s Active Defense System
• Lesion’s Gu Mines¹
• Ela’s GRZMOT Mine
• Mute’s Signal Disruptor
• Smoke’s Remote Gas Grenade
• Kaid’s Rtila Electroclaw
• Mozzie’s Pest Launcher
• Bandit’s Shock Wire
• Echo’s Yokaï Drone²

Note¹: When affected by Thatcher’s EMP, Gu Mines will now lose their cloaking ability, and won’t be triggered nor destroyed when stepped on.

Note²: The Yokai Drone was already disabled by the EMP Grenade, however, the Sonic Burst Charge refilling was still happening. It is no longer the case in Shadow Legacy as the refilling will be suspended during 15s as well.

Bandit Tricking (and other similar techniques):

Now, a disabled battery can be picked up to remove the disabled state. However, this takes more time to perform than deploying a new battery after the first one had been destroyed.

Bandit tricking should remain very efficient against slower hard breachers like Hibana, Ace or the new Hard Breaching Charge.

EMP Effect and IQ’s Electronics Detector:

In addition, we have updated IQs gadget feedback when she locates a disabled electronic device.

The white outline around the electronic gadget is still present but the pulse animation around the gadget is not displayed.

Thatcher mains will have to think a bit more and increase synergy with their teammates, before spending their ressources.

We are aware that this is a big change for Thatcher which should lead to more consistency around the EMP effect in Siege.

It may improve Defender performance as a consequence, but we’ll monitor the impact of this change and react as we feel necessary.

Almost our entire pool of weapons is going to be changed with the addition of new sights.

Given how important these changes are, a dedicated blog with additional detail and information will be made available soon.

• Adding a new Secondary Gadget: Hard Breach Charge

Operators affected:

• Montagne instead of Stun Grenades.
• Ying instead of Breach Charges.
• Fuze instead of Smoke Grenades.
• Finka instead of Breach Charges.
• Amaru instead of Claymore.
• Nokk instead of Breach Charges.
• Capitao instead of Stun Grenades.
• Lion instead of Claymore.

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

With the addition of the Hard Breach Charge, our goal is to provide the attacking team with more tools against their opponents.

Picking a hard-breacher is often a must for many bombsites. It reduces the flexibility of the attacking team’s composition and increases pressure on the Operator tasked with opening reinforced walls and hatches.

The gadget will not perform as well as pure hard-breachers. It takes 3 seconds to deploy and 6 seconds to explode and the activation of the charge will be automatic.

The breach created will be too small for players to run their way through it and will require player to either crouch or vault their way in.

This new gadget could open a window of opportunity for Teams willing to adopt a more versatile approach and reduce the pressure on Hibana, Maverick, Ace and Thermite mains.

This is quite an important change, and results will be monitored closely. We would like to see if the presence of Operators listed above will increase as well.

Multiple hard breach devices can be combined to destroy a reinforced hatch.
Population targeted by this change: Top Ranked and Pro League.

With Y5S3, we are introducing a change that will enable attackers to effectively destroy a reinforced hatch, combining different hard-breaching devices.

If an Operator does not fully open the hatch, another one will be able to finish the job and invest ressources proportionally to what was already done.

Before Y5S3, opening a reinforced hatch required one Exothermic Charge, or 4 X-Kairos, or 116 Breaching Torch impacts, or 2 Selmas.

Hatches were destroyed only when one of those conditions was met. When enough X-Kairos were destroyed to deny the destruction of the hatch, Maverick still needed to invest 2.3 canisters (or 116 Suri Torch impacts) to open it.

With the introduction of the new Hard Breach Charge, as we are having more and more hard breaching tools, we also felt that we needed be able to combine them.

Now, reinforced hatches will have a health-pool of one million points and each device will deal damage as follows:

• 1 Exothermic Charge: 1M
• 1 X-Kairo: 250k
• 1 Breaching Torch impact: ~87k
• 1 Selma: 500k
• 1 Hard Breach Charge: 1M (3 or more Conical Shaped Charges have to be on top of the hatch)

With this change, you will be able to combine your resources more efficiently to reach the one million damage necessary to destroy the reinforcement.

We have not changed the way each device works by itself, we are just opening the door to more strategies and synergy.

—

Try out the latest Rainbow Six updates on the Test Server and earn an exclusive charm through the BugHunterProgram[rainbow6.com].

Follow us and share your feedback on Twitter, Reddit, Facebook and on our forums[forums.ubi.com].

Kompletter Artikel: Y5S3 PRE-SEASON DESIGNER'S NOTES

In the past, we have released a post touching on how the MMR system works. We are updating it to properly reflect the current system in Rainbow Six Siege.

Your skill represents your ability to win a game. Comparing two teams’ skill gives you the probability that one team will win against the other. The higher the difference, the more likely a given team is going to win. When two teams with the same skill levels are matched up with each other, they both have an equal shot at winning. The algorithm used in Rainbow Six Siege assigns two values to each player: an estimation of their skill (μ) and the uncertainty of this estimation (σ). The players’ skills are distributed along a Bell curve, centered around 25 (High Silver – Low Gold).

The estimation of your skill is probabilistic. In general, the more games you play, the more information we have about you, and the more confident we are about this estimation. This confidence is represented by the uncertainty value sigma (σ). The lower the uncertainty, the higher the confidence.

Early on in the game’s first year, your rank was partially also determined by your engagement with the game. This led to confusion as the play experiences of players of different ranks would vary greatly.This has not been the case since Year 1 Season 4 and presently, your MMR only takes into account your skill (MMR = 100*μ). This also means that your clearance level has no impact on your MMR.

The MMR is updated solely on the outcome of your match. If this outcome is unexpected (for example, you lost against players with a lower skill than your team), the skill updates will be more substantial, and vice-versa. In addition to that, the more confident we are about your skill (i.e., if your σ is low), the smaller the updates will be.

Let’s take a simple example with only two players: Hibana vs Pulse. The values in this example do not reflect the actual updates that would happen with our system but it should give you an understanding of the situation. Hibana is a Gold player (μ ≈ 29), and has been playing at that level for quite some time. Hibana’s rank has a low uncertainty value attached to it, so σ ≈ 3. Hibana faces Pulse (a Copper ranked player, but he has a lot of heart), and loses. Due to the low uncertainty value, it is likely that Hibana just had a bad game, so her skill level would decrease, resulting in μ ≈ 28. This is due to the system taking into account the rank of the enemy you have lost to. If Hibana lost to someone that was Gold, the adjustment would be closer to μ ≈ 28.5. Losing to a Diamond would have resulted in a change to μ ≈ 28.9.

That being said, Pulse is still relatively new to the game, and our system is attempting to determine where he should be placed (μ ≈ 17 and σ ≈ 6). By Tachanka’s grace, Pulse won the match, so we would increase his skill level to 20. His victory against Hibana has helped us to determine that he may be a better player, so his uncertainly has dropped a small amount (σ ≈ 5.5). The large increase in skill level rating for is a result of Pulse being a fairly unknown player, and our confidence in Hibana’s placement.

In order to prevent matchmaking abuses while switching regions, we’ve changed our Matchmaking Rating system in Y5S2 to unified MMRs for each playlist. This means that you will not have different MMRs depending on the region you play in. However, your matchmaking ranking will remain separate in different playlists.

(formerly Casual)

This is the standard multiplayer playlist offering a fair environment for beginner and intermediate skill levels to play in.

Quick Matches are available for all players, do not affect the players’ ranking in Ranked and offer 3 game modes: Bomb, hostage and Secure Area.

Quick Matches and Unranked Matches use the same MMR. Therefore, winning/losing in one will affect your MMR in the other playlist as well.

However, MMR used in Quick Match is not linked to the MMR used in Ranked. Therefore players that mainly play Ranked, and rarely enter Quick Match have an MMR in QM that does not reflect their real ability. We think that that may be one of the reasons why QM is considered unbalanced. Unless they enter from time to time to update their QM MMR they will currently have this issue.

In the past we’ve tested several methods with the goal to provide all Quick Match players with a best possible matchmaking experience. Since Y2S3 the Quick Match matchmaking pairs players based on an independent and hidden Quick Match / Unranked Matchmaking Rating (MMR). This Quick Match / Unranked MMR is based on the same system described above, taking into account your performance in both, Quick Matches and Unranked. It is not tied to your Ranked MMR at all, nor visible to you or other players.

New players are provided with a base line MMR, which is more on par with where a beginner should be. A lower starting point for beginners means that they will be able to increase their MMR in a pool of players with a comparable skill level. This lower MMR rating will be erased over time as they win more matches, eventually placing them where they truly belong based on their skill level.

The leap from Quick Match to Ranked can be overwhelming due to the stark difference between competitive and casual players in terms of mentality, playstyle, and even personal comfort level. This gap was the driving motivation behind the creation of the Unranked playlist, which was implemented in Y4S3.

Unranked is a multiplayer playlist, available for all players with a Clearance Level above 10. It follows the Ranked ruleset, but has no Rank restrictions (which will be detailed further in this article) and doesn’t affect a player’s Rank or Ranked MMR. Unranked shares the same hidden MMR, which is used for Quick Match matchmaking as well and pairs players based on the same system. So whether you’re into competitive gameplay but would rather do without the pressure of a ranking system, or you want to get familiar with Pick & Ban and other associated features before heading into Ranked, this is the playlist for you.

Its advantage over Ranked is that you don’t need to meet the MMR Restriction as you do in Ranked. This, along with the lower CL compared to Ranked allows you to join a squad that do not meet the requirements for Ranked but still play with competitive rules.

Keep in mind, however, that Ranked policies also apply to this playlist, and any sanctions you incur in it will also apply to the Ranked playlist.

*The distribution above may vary depending on the Season.

Ranked is the competitive multiplayer playlist, which becomes available to players upon reaching level 50. Next to a smaller map pool and bomb being the only game mode available, this playlist features a ban phase, allowing both teams to choose and ban an Attacker and Defender.

Ranked features 23 skill ranks. These ranks are based on a players Matchmaking Ranking (MMR) which is derived from numerical scores generated by the TrueSkill algorithm as described at the beginning of the article. A player’s skill rank is first obtained after successfully completing 10 ranked placement matches.

MMR changes are based on:

• The relative skill levels of the players/teams in the game.
• Whether or not the player won the match.
• Large skill difference between teams has a dramatic outcome based on who won the match as per the previous Hibana/Pulse example.
• Prematurely exiting a ranked match always counts as a loss toward skill ranks, even if their team won

• Abandoning a match or inactivity are all included.
• Connection issues do count as a loss but not as a win if their team won.
• When internet connection is lost then restored, the player is given an option to re-join the match instead of taking the penalty.

Your personal performance as your score or your kill/death ratio does not impact the number of points you get.

If you get 15 kills per game but lose all of them, then your ability to win a game is very low, hence you should be ranked very low too. Conversely, a player that does not land kills, but still wins often, should be ranked quite high (maybe they make excellent callouts, which is an important factor in a team’s ability to win). The idea is that if you play well, and are an asset to your team, you will naturally win more matches in the long run. This positive influence on winning matches is what we measure.

If you both have the same skill, the update will depend on how confident our system is regarding where you are placed. Let’s say that you are both Gold IV but your friend has played a lot more games than you (they have a low uncertainty), you will gain/lose more points than they will.

In Y4S3 we’ve implemented a limit to the MMR gap between party members. There cannot be a bigger gap than 1000 MMR between the players with highest and lowest MMR in the squad in order to play Ranked. Players can check their squad members’ MMR in the Side Panel Profile. For players above 4400 MMR (Diamonds), you are able to group with any player above 3400 MMR (Platinum). Players below 1200 MMR can group with players below 2200 MMR. This was partially done to reduce the impact of boosting, but, of course, to also encourage a more balanced matchmaking environment.

Once a player reaches 5000 MMR, and has completed a minimum of 100 matches, they’ll enter the Champions rank. While it mostly functions like other ranks, it has something that ups the ante: individual rank numbers. The top 9999 players with the highest MMR within the Champions rank will have their standing displayed on their rank, which means that whichever players have the highest MMR in the game will be recognized as the #1 Champions.

This doesn’t mean, however, that Champions who aren’t currently in the top 9999 will be taken down to Diamond. As long as you remain above 5000 MMR and have more than 100 completed matches, you are a Champion.

At the beginning of every new Season we perform a so-called Soft MMR Reset. This means we are resetting the ranked MMR of all players between the “middle” (2500 MMR) and their rank from the previous Season, with extremes above 3500 and below 1500 clamped to those respective values. This also applies to placement matches.

Before Y4S2, we reset all players to a 2500 MMR at the beginning of the new Season. We changed this in order to improve the matchmaking experience at the beginning of a Season. This change leads to players reaching their “true skill” faster; players that should be Diamond will reach Diamond faster. We understand that some players, particularly those at the extreme high end of Diamond, would like more of a “grind” implemented for attaining the higher ranks. We have heard these concerns and are working on how to provide that type of experience for those who want it in the future.

At the end of every season, players receive a charm based on the highest rank they’ve managed to achieve during that season. For example, if you reached the Diamond rank but finished the Season with a Gold rank, you will receive the Diamond charm. Please note that if your MMR has been reset due to drastic MMR changes, you will not receive the seasonal ranked charm for your highest rank prior to the reset.

This feature’s goal is to help reduce the long-term impact cheaters may have on other players’ seasonal rankings.

When a cheater is sanctioned, the feature will roll back any rating gains and losses for all players from matches that the banned player took part in for that season. This cancels all games that the Cheater played for all parties.

Please note that you cannot go beyond your maximum MMR for the current season as a result of a roll back.

More information on the MMR Rollback feature can be found in this article[rainbow6.com].

Part of the reason we are doing this is also to push back against boosting services or players that use cheats to boost accounts or exploit the integrity of our ranked system in other ways. After those cheaters are banned the boosted accounts would receive drastic MMR changes through the MMR Rollback, which is a sign of massive irregularity and a red flag in our system. This is why we started resetting MMR for players with drastic MMR changes since Y4S3.3.

This means that instead of undergoing a significant change in MMR, players will have to redo their placement matches to get back appropriately on the ladder. Players who have their MMR reset will also not receive the seasonal ranked charm for their highest rank prior to the reset.

The current Roll Back feature will roll back all games (victories and defeats) the banned cheater participated in. We also explored a few other options, but based on the results of the data, rolling back all games will help to maintain a stable MMR environment, while still reducing the impact of cheaters on games.

Due to our process of detecting cheaters, and then the subsequent banning process, there is no way for us to identify which specific matches a person cheated in accurately (such as when players toggle their cheats on/off prior to being caught). With this in mind, we also explored the possibility for limited MMR resets based on recency, and tested MMR resets for the last 7 days vs the entire Season.

However, the results were too random, and there was no way to determine if we had actually reduced the entire footprint of their negative behavior. So in order to confidently ensure that we maximize our removal of the impact of a cheater, we are resetting the MMR from matches that player participated in from the entire Season.

We have noticed that the system itself induced quite a lot of frustration for our most dedicated players.

Therefore, we have decided to tweak the system at some point during Y5S3 and to expand the highest seasonal MMR value up to a fixed number of points. This means that you should still receive meaningful adjustments even if you are at the highest MMR value of your Season. This should lead to a significant reduction of neutral MMR adjustments (receiving 0 points).

If we define the additional fixed number of points you can earn above your maximum MMR value to 10 (disclaimer: it’s not). And if 3000 is your current and highest MMR ranking this season, any positive adjustment will still increase your MMR value beyond 3000 and up to a maximum 3010 MMR points.

We will monitor closely the impact of this change on the MMR economy and adjust the fixed number of MMR points (10 in the example above) based on your feedback and on our data.

An update will be shared as soon as we have a more definitive date to announce.

We want to let you know that we have heard some frustrations around the current MMR Rollback feature. We understand that losing MMR due to winning against cheaters or not gaining more MMR than your seasonal peak can lead to some frustrations for players. We are currently planning to revisit the MMR Rollback feature to explore if we can reduce these frustrations for our players in the future while still effectively cancelling out any effect cheaters have on matches.

Furthermore, the Matchmaking Ranking system as a whole is quite a complex system. We know that it can cause frustration amongst our players, when they feel like the matches are unbalanced and not fair for them. It is difficult to find the sweet spot between short queue times and balanced matches on all playlists and we always work on improving our system and its functionalities to give you all the best possible matchmaking experience.

Your feedback is – and always has been very important to us. Therefore, we want to encourage you once more to share your feedback on the Matchmaking Rating system and the MMR Rollback feature, and what kind of improvements you’d like to see.

We are looking forward to reading your thoughts on Twitter, Reddit and on our official forums[forums.ubisoft.com].

Kompletter Artikel: MATCHMAKING RATING

NEW IN-GAME EVENT: M.U.T.E. PROTOCOL

The future may or may not be here, but one thing’s for certain: technology is changing. Mute has taken control of the Comm Tower, but dissenting forces are itching to take it back. In this all-new game, it’s robot against robot! Can you secure victory with gameplay modifiers thrown in the mix?

For two weeks starting August 4th, reinvent yourself with the M.U.T.E. Protocol!

PLAYABLE OPERATORS

For this event, most Operators will be available to play, with a few exceptions for gameplay reasons that deal with drones and cameras. We’ll explain in a moment but know that for the playable characters with customization exclusive to this event, their robotic appearances will be automatically equipped.

RULES OF THE EVENT

Whether or not you’re used to playing Secure Area, you’ll probably find this game mode quite unique. For starters, Attackers will have to secure not one, but two areas. Divide or unite your tactics accordingly, because Defenders will have to protect twice as many objectives!

However, the special thing about this event is the Operators’ use of technology. On the attacking side, you’ll be able to switch between Operator and Drone forms by entering and exiting Observation Tools. This means that while you’re controlling your drone, your Operator is nowhere to be seen. Then, when you switch back, your Operator will be where your drone was. You cannot control your teammates’ drones, but if you’re eliminated in Drone form, you’ll respawn in Operator form.

On the defending side, you can use indestructible cameras to travel digitally. Opening Observation Tools will make your Operator enter the network and exiting them will make the Operator appear in front of the last controlled camera. Navigate those electronic pathways, and victory could be yours!

THE COLLECTION

The M.U.T.E. Protocol event comes with its own Collection of 26 items, featuring exclusive customization for Jackal, Lion, Ying, Kapkan, Mira, Mute, Oryx and Vigil. These high-tech stylings are the same you’ll find in-game by picking these Operators to play the Event. Inside the packs, you’ll also find some signature items, including the event’s signature weapon skin, exclusive to this Collection.

You can earn M.U.T.E Protocol packs through a special Event Challenge. You can also purchase packs for 300 R6 Credits or 12500 Renown each in the Packs section of the Home screen.

We have been listening to the community’s requests, so each Operator’s exclusive, time-limited customization items are also available for purchase as Bundles in the Shop section for 1680 R6 Credits each. Year Pass owners can purchase bundles and packs for a 10% rebate.

For more information about the M.U.T.E. Protocol event, follow us on Twitter.

Kompletter Artikel: New in-game event: M.U.T.E. Protocol

Y5S2.3 will release the week of July 27th for PC.

Some updates to the notifications system to help make future popups less spammy.

After August 11, 2020, 2-Step Verification will be mandatory for ranked on PC in APAC[rainbow6.com]. If you have not activated 2SV prior to this date you will be locked out of the Ranked queue until 2SV is activated on your account.

Go activate 2SV under the account management section at https://account.ubisoft.com/!

For more information on balancing changes, see our Designer’s Notes[rainbow6.com].

If you’ve ever stepped on a Lego…this hurts worse.

By making her gadget a bit more enjoyable to use, we’re looking to make Gridlock players’ lives a bit easier.

• Lowered Gridlock’s Caltrop deployment time to 9s (down from 13s).
• Lowered the individual Caltrops deployment time to 0.45s (down from 0.7s).
• Lowered the range of random deploy variation to 0.05s (down from 0.1s).
• Added a delay of 0.45s before the deployment sequence starts (previously no delay).

The Rainbow 🐐 has goat to dash.

We want to let Oryx make more use of his dash, and added mobility and durability will hopefully make him a bit more fun to play.

• Using his dash through a soft wall will not deplete all the dash charges.
• Increased Dash refresh time to 12s (up from 8s).
• Dash recovery time for all dashes is now 0.5s. (Previous recovery times: soft wall = 1s, enemy = 0.7s).

Hide the hostages! Giving Fuze a bit more presence and utility with an additional charge.

• Increased the number of cluster charges to 4 (up from 3)

To maintain consistency with softwall interactions, we’re giving enemies that are pushed through walls the same feedback as when Oryx dashes through them.

When pushed through a wall by Nomad’s airjabs or Oryx’s dash, players will receive the same feedback and rtake the same damage (5 hp) as when Oryx dashes through a soft wall.

• FIXED – Missing anchoring decals from Ace’s SELMA.
• FIXED – Ace’s SELMA can get stuck when thrown in a certain way at some beams, becoming unrecoverable.
• FIXED – While grappling through a window or hatch, Amaru can aim faster with her LMG if she times her sprint and ADS buttons just prior to landing.
• FIXED – IQ’s gadget will not display the outline and distance of Melusi’s Banshees.
• FIXED – Zofia’s concussion grenades are impacted by external explosions and can bounce away from the target location.
• FIXED – Flattening the doorframes and windows on all maps.
• FIXED – Floating and indestructible wooden squares after destroying some walls on Yacht.
• FIXED – Gunshot sounds are muffled when shooting from inside 1F Technical Seating of Plane.
• FIXED – Various menu/UI fixes.
• FIXED – Various cosmetics fixes.
• FIXED – Various Lighting issues on maps.
• FIXED – Various shop visual and cosmetic fixes.
• FIXED – (PvE) Interaction between Ace’s gadget and AI.

Kompletter Artikel: Y5S2.3 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 2.3 patch and give you an insight into the reasons behind these changes. We’ll also take a look back at the previous changes detailed in the Y5S2 Designer’s Notes and the impact they had on several of the operators.

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.

• Increased total number of Cluster Charges to 4 (from 3).

Population targeted by this change: Casual and Top Ranked.

We are investigating several ways to look into increasing Fuze’s presence and usefulness. After looking into his overall performance, we noticed that the number of uses of his charges is fairly low. (Below 2 charges per round on average).

We suppose that Fuze mains are trying to optimize their charges and may sometimes be reluctant to deploy them. By increasing the number of Cluster Charges, we would like players to use those resources more aggressively.

Fuze can be quite efficient at destroying bulletproof gadgets deployed on Bomb Sites, given the number of pellets in each charge, he is often able to effectively destroy Defender gadgets, even with the presence of Wamai or Jäger.

• Increased general Trax Stingers deployment speed (from 13s to 9s).
• Decreased individual Caltrops deployment time (from 0.7s to 0.45s).
• Added small delay before Trax Stingers start deploying. (from 0s to 0.45s).

Population targeted by this change: Casual and Top Ranked.

By increasing the deployment speed of Gridlock’s gadget, we hope to make this gadget a bit more comfortable to use. We do not expect this change to have a significant impact on her Presence or Win Delta.

We were initially thinking about making the deployment even faster. The feedback we gathered pushed us to find a more reasonable middle ground, as it could become quite hard for Defenders to effectively counter the gadget deployment.

We are going to monitor the effect of this change and see if it influences her overall playstyle.

• Using the Remah Dash through a soft wall does not deplete dashing charges.
• Increased Dash charge refill to 12s (from 8s).
• Unified recovery time after dashing set to 0.5s (from 1s after dashing through soft walls and 0.7s after colliding with an enemy).

Population targeted by this change: Casual and Top Ranked.

Oryx’s Presence is lower than expected. Our goal is to increase his mobility to make him more popular and fun to play, while increasing his survivability.

Our goal is to make Oryx a better Roamer and we are exploring ways to make his ability more efficient in that regard.

Unifying the Remah Dash recovery times should also help understanding and streamline the ability.

The changes detailed in the Y5S2 Designer’s Notes[rainbow6.com] had some significant impact on several of the Operators.

Thanks to our data analysts, we are now able to share this information, as well as some of the key learnings from the Y5S2 patch.

Some statistics may have evolved following the Y5S2.1 patch, but this should still provide an overview of the impact of the previous changes.

This Season’s changes brought to Amaru have led to some significant improvements, both in terms of Presence and Win Delta.

At both Top and Regular levels of play, Amaru’s K/D following a use of her Garra Hook has significantly improved, from 0.45 to 0.90 for Top Ranked players, and from 0.45 to 0.96 for casual players. The Garra Hook is now used on Barricaded Windows the majority of the time (from 38% to 60% at both Top and Casual levels of play).

This has been a very solid improvement for Amaru. For Top players, her Pick Rate has increased from 4% to 10%, which makes her a Top 15 attacker in terms of Pick Rate. Her Win Delta went from 0.2% to 1.5%. For Casual players, her Pick Rate has increased from 5% to 11% and her Win Delta went from 0.8% to 1.7%.

Y5S2.1 Update: Amaru has stabilized at a 10% Pick Rate at the Top level of play with a positive Win Delta of 0.7%.

The Graph above is an analysis of the use of the Garra Hook. "Fight%" represents situations when in the 5 seconds following the use of the gadget Amaru entered a fight against a Defender.

The addition of the Angled Grip has provided Oryx players with a stronger option – although it seems this has not been fully accepted amongst the community: The Vertical Grip is still picked 59% of the time. In the current season, Oryx has a slightly higher Win%, 7% higher kills per round, and a better K/D ratio that exceeds 1.0!

It looks like players have responded well to the Remah Dash Damage reduction. At both levels we see significant increases to the number of wall dashes per round (+16% for Top Ranked, and +26% for Casual). We have also seen a nice reduction in rounds during which the Remah Dash is not used. In both Top Ranked and Casual – Regular players did not dash during 22.5% of rounds in Y5S1.2 (down to 17.2% in Y5S2.0).

Oryx has seen solid increases to his Win Delta as a result of these changes, but he still needs more help from -2.3% to -2.0% for Casual players, and from -3.8% to -3.0% for Top Ranked after the changes. His Pick Rate remains low at both levels with 4%.

Y5S2.1 Update: Oryx has an improved Win Delta, moving from -3.0% to -0.2% at the Top level of play but we are still monitoring this – the size of data we have on him this season is relatively low.

As a result of the disorientation effect changes, Echo players at both the Top Ranked and Casual level have seen a reduction in the percentage of kills they score on disoriented targets. For Top Ranked players, the percentage of kills under the effect of the Yokai Drone went from 0.478% to 0.400%, and for Casual players from 0.464% to 0.401%.

Echo players at the Top level have experienced a solid Win Delta increase from (from 0.4% to 0.9%), while his pick rate and win delta for the Casual population haven’t moved. Echo is banned much less at Top Ranked (from 68% to 38%) and Casual (from 59% to 37%) levels. The addition of Melusi probably had a direct effect on Echo’s ban rate.

Y5S2.1 Update: Echo has a lowered Win Delta, moving from 0.9% to -0.2% at the Top level of play and a slightly reduced presence compared to Y5S2.

Changes brought to Kali’s Lance has led to 13% reduction in Lances Destroyed per round at Top Ranked level and a 10% reduction for Casual levels of play. It seems that the fuse time reduction is making it a bit harder for defenders to counter-play, but not overwhelmingly so.

We have noticed a ~10% increase to Gadgets Destroyed per round at both levels due to more Lances detonating successfully. Lances are also used a bit more often than during the previous patch with a 7% increase at both levels of play.

The CSRX 300 recoil reduction is likely a small positive change (although follow-up shots by Kali are much weaker than a first shot).

The number of kills per round with the CSRX is on the decrease, because of the addition of the SPSMG9.

In Y5S1.2 35% of Kali’s kills at the Top level came from her C75 Auto (the remaining 65% coming from the CSRX 300). In Y5S2.0, we see the SPSMG9 accounting for 49% of Kali’s kills (for both levels of play). As a result of these changes, Kali is seeing small but noted Pick Rate increases at both Top Ranked (from 3% to 7%) and Casual (from 8% to 11%) levels.

Her Win Delta saw a small increase for Top players (from -2.0% to -1.6%) but no change for Regular players, holding steady at -1.9%

Y5S2.1 Update: Kali has experienced an increase in her Win Delta since Y5S2 – moving from -1.6% to -0.6% with a similar presence (8%).

Kompletter Artikel: Y5S2.3 DESIGNER'S NOTES

The Y5S2.2 update will soon deploy to PC with the updated Player Reporting Panel. For Console, the 2.2 patch will be bundled alongside the 2.3 release.

The Reporting Panel is getting an upgrade! Building upon the last addition of more reporting categories to improve the granularity of in-game reports, we’ve added a new player-reporting panel. This new panel will provide you with more information on each type of reporting category so you can make an informed decision about which report type best fits the situation. More accurate reports from you and other players, means we can make sure we’re handing out the appropriate sanctions to players that deserve it.

Access the Report options via the Player Profile Panel. Each report type has a description to help you choose the most appropriate report type. Once the report is made, you’ll receive a confirmation message that we received the report . Players can only be reported once per match per player.

FIXED – Issues with launching when AntiVirus protection is on.
FIXED – Gadget does not always properly deploy if the button is released right before completion.

FIXED – Various clipping issues on maps.
FIXED – Various visual texture issues on maps.
FIXED – Various issues with vegetation on maps.
FIXED – Echo’s Yokai can hide in certain spots on Bank due to missing collision with map assets.
FIXED – Uneven floor in Coastline.
FIXED – Defenders are not detected as being ‘Outside’ when in the window frame of 2F Control Room on Theme Park.
FIXED – Missing compass location on minimap on Tower.
FIXED – Some lower sections of soft walls on Kafe can act as unbreakable surfaces.
FIXED – Unbreakable sign in 1F Office Hallway of Bank.
FIXED – Gadgets can be deployed in out of reach areas in 2F Control Room on Theme Park.
FIXED – Defuser can’t be picked up after being dropped in the fountain in EXT Fountain on Villa.
FIXED – Ace’s SELMA can get stuck on the cupboard of 1F Kitchen on Oregon and become unrecoverable.
FIXED – Attackers can be spawn killed from EXT Warehouse on Cluhouse.
FIXED – Gadgets can be deployed in out of reach areas in 2F Cash Room on Clubhouse.
FIXED – Attackers can be spawn killed at EXT Warehouse.
FIXED – Drones can clip through the furniture in 3F Bathroom on Yacht.

FIXED – Various Menu/UI issues.
FIXED – Various visual cosmetic issues.
FIXED – Various cosmetic clipping issues.

Kompletter Artikel: Y5S2.2 PATCH NOTES

Operation Steel Wave, the second season of Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege Year 5, is now available. Operation Steel Wave introduces Ace and Melusi, a new Attacker and Defender from Norway and South Africa, in addition to an entirely reworked House map and slew of gameplay changes.

Owners of the Year 5 Pass can play with the new Operators immediately, while the rest of the players will be able to unlock these Operators starting June 23rd using Renown or R6 Credits. Additional seasonal new content, including the House map rework, are available for free to all players. Year 5 Season 2 will also welcome its Battle Pass “Tour De Force,” on June 29th.

In Operation Steel Wave, players will meet two new Operators:

• Norwegian Attacker Ace is equipped with S.E.L.M.A., a throwable and stickable device that will stick to any vertical surface and slowly destroy up to 3 panels, one after the other. The S.E.L.M.A. gadget can also be thrown at almost any defensive gadget and destroy it with its arms or water explosive.

• South African Defender Melusi is equipped with Banshee deployable electronic gadgets. It applies a slowing effect to any Attackers that are in range and direct line of sight. The Banshee can also be used as an intel gadget as it produces an identifiable sound when an attacker enters its range.

In addition to these two new Operators, players will be able to explore a reimagined House map, which has been newly reworked. The homeowners have expanded their family and their floorplan, with a large two-story addition adding new objective sites and entry points for players to contend with. Additional changes can be experienced throughout the map, all with the intent of evolving the gameplay meta.

Operation Steel Wave also introduces a new Defender secondary gadget – the Proximity Alarm. The small, throwable sticky gadget is an essential intel-gathering tool that loudly alerts Defenders of an oncoming Attacker in its line of sight.

Additional game updates include the following:

• Unified MMR
• Amaru Buff
• Addition of Echo Elite set

Kompletter Artikel: Operation Steel Wave is live!

Over the course of the Steel Wave test server period we have resolved a variety of issues and made a few additional updates.

During the Steel Wave test server period we received a number of feedback requests for balancing tweaks to the new Operators. After evaluating feedback from players, and data from the TS, we plan to make a few balancing changes to the new operators with the 2.1 patch. The changes will not go into effect until the Y5S2.1 update.

• Lowering the penalty zone by approximately 33%.
• Lowering the sound of Banshee effect in first person POV.

• Remove the possibility of destroying Bandit’s Batteries through reinforcements, by placing the charges on the floor.

• Replace her deployable shield with C4.

After re–evaluating a number of current game–meta and gameplay factors, we made the decision to swap out Melusi’s deployable shields for C4 to prevent putting extra pressure on attackers and specific attacker utility.

• Increased the damage from 41 to 59. Increased ADS Speed.
• Increase the ACS12 RPM to 300 RPM.

Buff to the ACS12’s damage to make it a bit more viable than it is currently. ADS speed should also now match other weapons of the same category. Furthermore, on release, the ACS12 had 300RPM, and it was lowered by a later balancing change. With this change alongside the change to slugs, the 300 RPM should not have issues with destruction.

Now has an ACOG. This is where all the lost ACOGs went.

French localized audio for Ace and Melusi will be available in FR at launch. RU localizations are still unavailable.

Attachment system updates allow for attachment skins and simpler loadout balancing.

Adjustment to metal detector SFX and activation on Bank, Kanal + Border.

• Now plays a short 3–sec alarm before stopping.
• Only one alarm can be played at a time.
• No cooldown on the alarm trigger.

This fixes an issue where alarm cooldowns meant that players could cross metal detector barriers multiple times without an alarm sounding (if it was already triggered previously and on cooldown).

Added a top window blocker and bars to the wall facing treehouse to allow players to shoot through, but players will not be able to rappel in through that window.

• FIXED – ACS12’s slugs deal no damage from distances greater than 40m.
• FIXED – M4 reload animation and audio are slightly out of sync.
• FIXED – AK12 reload animation and audio are out of sync.
• FIXED – FPS drops when debris flies next to players.
• FIXED – Bulletproof Camera casing still deploys after canceling when crouching.
• FIXED – Deployable shields (and Goyo’s Vulcan) have pick–up priority over other throwable gadgets. Gadgets should be able to be picked up in the order of most recently deployed.
• FIXED – Players can sometimes vault into another operator under specific circumstances.
• FIXED – Secure Area’s Biohazard container hitbox is too large.
• FIXED – Shield operators hugging a reinforced wall can prevent the deployment of hard–breach gadgets on the reinforced wall’s inner layer (such as Thermite’s breach charge and Mira’s Black Mirror).
• FIXED – Impact grenades and Zofia’s grenades explode on attacker instead of on the attacker’s ballistic shield if they are sprinting/walking at time of impact.
• FIXED – Objective discovery is not triggered when looking at it indirectly from the edge of the screen and FOV settings are above 60.
• FIXED – ADS appears zoomed out for some sights on the P10 Roni.
• FIXED – Hostage will go into DBNO instead of dying as intended, if an explosive gadget is detonated near the hostage.

FIXED – Abnormal gunshot SFX with T–95 LSW.
FIXED – Missing VFX when using specific weapons and attachments. (e.g.: Using the M12 + Muzzle Brake only yields giant sparkles instead of muzzle flash + smoke).
FIXED – Various minor animation issues when performing certain movements for various operators.
FIXED – Various minor visual fixes and updates for support mode and death replays.
FIXED – Various visual fixes for operators and their gadgets.

• FIXED – Ace’s SELMA does not destroy Barbed Wire on the first explosion.
• FIXED – Ace’s SELMA can stick onto a Black Mirror red canister, causing the animation to be improperly orientated.
• FIXED – Ace does not receiving points after destroying a deployable defender gadget with SELMA.

• FIXED – Melusi’s Banshees should have the same explosion resistance as Maestro’s Evil Eyes. Currently have very low explosion resistance.

• FIXED – Amaru sometimes cannot reel to a hatch even when the gadget activation icon is available.
• FIXED – Amaru’s Garra Hook is not attaching properly with the expected frame points on skylights.
• FIXED – Amaru can use her Garra Launcher on the blocked window at EXT Tree House of House.
• FIXED – Small smoke VFX at the corners where Amaru’s Garra Hook attaches to the corners of the window frame.
• FIXED – Amaru’s reeling SFX is distorted/missing in replays.

• FIXED – Floor debris and partially damaged reinforced hatches can prevent Bandit from deploying his gadget.

• FIXED – Fire does not propagate properly when darts are shot under some furniture assets.

• FIXED – Shock Drones and Yokai can shoot operators through normal barricades and Castle barricades. They will no longer be able to do so.
• FIXED – Yokai’s camera POV will gray out and lose color if Thatcher uses his EMP anywhere on the map.
• FIXED – Echo’s Yokai can sometimes clip through thin ceilings on maps and see onto the rooftops in support mode.

• FIXED – Missing VFX timer on Finka’s thumb gadget gauge when using the last adrenal surge charge.

• FIXED – Operators can take damage or even die when standing next to a detonating cluster charge even if they are not in the cluster charge AOE.

• FIXED – Glaz’s thermal scope provides no visibility through smoke even when fully charged. The yellow highlight is still visible, but weaker than intended.
• FIXED – Glaz’s OTs-03 can be used with full functionality while escorting the Hostage.

• FIXED – Iana’s hologram will trigger the shrapnel system.

• FIXED – Lesion can see through smoke when looking through a deployed GU Mine.

• FIXED – Lion’s EE–ONE–D can be hit and destroyed by weapon fire.

• FIXED – When Nokk has her HEL Presence active and is damaged by Ace’s SELMA, the Glitching VFX will not be displayed for anyone operating an Evil Eye or Bulletproof Camera.

• FIXED – If Maestro leaves the game, his Evil Eye windows are not opening to 50% in their disabled state.

• FIXED – Warden is missing his signature reload animation with the SMG–12.

• FIXED – Ying’s candelas do not activate properly after being thrown through an electrified, damaged wall.

• FIXED – Impact and concussion grenades from Zofia’s gadget at very close range do not affect enemy operators.

• FIXED – Doorways, reinforceable walls, and hatches on several maps are blocked if a player is AFK at spawn.
• FIXED – Various spawn kill/spawn peek opportunities on maps.
• FIXED – Glass resistance to gadgets for some map assets is broken.
• FIXED – Various collision issues on maps.
• FIXED – Various clipping/dynamic clipping issues on maps.
• FIXED – Various LOD issues on maps.
• FIXED – Various LOS issues on maps.
• FIXED – Various map asset destruction issues.
• FIXED – Unnecessary/missing vault prompts on maps.
• FIXED – Various map asset issues.
• FIXED – Various lighting/texture issues on maps.

• FIXED – Spawning in 1F TV Room and 1F Music Room as spawn points for defenders on House results in 1 defender spawning at B Gym instead.
• FIXED – Players are unable to pick up Mozzie’s Pests if they are deployed on the rug covering the stairs in House.
• FIXED – Gadgets can be placed in unreachable areas of reworked House
• FIXED – Operators can climb inside the bookcase in 2F Reading Room of House.
• FIXED – A wall in 2F Pick Room of House cannot be reinforced in Hostage mode if player who spawns next to it does not move.
• FIXED – Attackers rappelling into the window of 2F back stairs of House remain in the air for a brief moment due to a missing floor asset.
• FIXED – Defenders can block a reinforceable wall in 2F Car Room of House if they are AFK at spawn
• FIXED – Drones do not spawn close to the selected spawn location on House.
• FIXED – Small deployable gadgets cannot be picked up again when placed on the armchair pillow in 2F Master Bedroom of House.
• FIXED – Drones can get stuck between the pile of pipes in front of construction on House.

• FIXED – One of the hatches in the 2F Server Room of Border is not being completely destroyed and can leave collision that blocks players.

• FIXED – Pixel peek from B Wine Cellar of Chalet.

• FIXED – Alibi’s Prisma will not deploy when thrown into interior garden at 1F Main Stairs of Consulate.
• FIXED – Breaching charges can be placed on indestructible floor sections in 2F Hallway of Consulate.
• FIXED – Collision missing for Hibana’s X–Kairos pellets and the wooden desk at 1F Lobby of Consulate.
• FIXED – Rappel point is incorrectly placed for the skylight above 1F Main Stairs in Consulate.
• FIXED – Operators’ gadgets can get stuck in the flags on Consulate.

• FIXED – Planting the defuser in specific areas on the metal shelf of B Arsenal Room in Clubhouse can glitch the plant and cause attackers to lose the round.
• FIXED – Players can destroy the cardboard boxes in Snowmobile Garage on Chalet and hide in the shadows.
• FIXED – Spinning in a specific spot on Chalet can cause FPS drops for other players in the game.

• FIXED – Attackers can hide the defuser inside the closet at 2F Penthouse of Coastline.

• FIXED – Gridlock’s Trax Stingers are deploying inside the washing machines of 1F Laundry Room on Favela.

• FIXED – Gadgets and grenades can get stuck under the football table in 2F Games Room in Fortress when thrown from certain angles.
• FIXED – In Fortress, when players shoot a Capitao dart in specific places on the hood–extractor, the incendiary bolt will ignite, but the fire will not propagate.
• FIXED – Issues with reinforcing a wall in 2F Games Room of Fortress when one of the defenders is AFK.
• FIXED – Players can still get shocked through an indestructible wall in 2F Shisha Hallway on Fortress.

• FIXED – Players can hide behind a target dummy inside a wood rack in 1F Garage of Hereford.

• FIXED – Missing glass panels for some windows on Oregon.

• FIXED – Players can get stuck inside the vents of EXT Forklift Alley of Kanal after exiting rappel between the gap in the vents.
• FIXED – Echo’s Yokai drone can lose signal and stop responding if deployed on top of the vents of 2F Printer Room in Kanal.

• FIXED – Various Menu UI improvements.
• FIXED – Various minor cosmetic and shop UI fixes.
• FIXED – Various minor menu fixes and improvements.
• FIXED – Various cosmetic fixes to charms, uniforms, headgears.
• FIXED – Empty player cards visible in spectator mode if all observation tools are destroyed and player joins–in–progress.
• FIXED – Floating drones in support and caster mode.
• FIXED – Outlines of objectives and some gadgets are sometimes highlighted while in support mode after dying.
• FIXED – Various caster/spectator HUD improvements and updates. Increased legibility of the player states on player cards.
• FIXED – Visual replication issues from 3rd person POV for operators exiting rappel from a rooftop.
• FIXED – Missing flash FX for players who are in support mode.
• FIXED – Weapons clip through Defenders hands at spawn if a grip is equipped.
• FIXED – (PvE) Missing exterior barricades at the beginning of Situation 02.
• FIXED – (PvE) One bot can get stuck in front of the bar at 1F restaurant after the defuser is planted.
• FIXED – Attachments are invisible on bots in PvE.
• FIXED – Players cannot complete the "Kill one blinded enemy" objective in the 2nd Situation.
• FIXED – CPU Load displays 0% in the new advanced benchmark results report.
• FIXED – ‘None’/’Default’ options for attachments, charms, headgear, and uniforms is missing.
• FIXED – The Discovery playlist is missing a name on some UI elements in the main menu.
• FIXED – Infinite loading in the custom online game mode only
• FIXED – Quitting a match during prep/ban phase will display a VISUAL ONLY deranking to Copper V for players who are already ranked.
• FIXED – Texture for black weapon attachment skin is darker on holographic/laser sights.

Kompletter Artikel: Y5S2 STEEL WAVE PATCH NOTES ADDENDUM

1. Sound Issues
2. Connectivity
— 2.1. Overall Connectivity
— 2.2. Latency Policy
3. Cheating and Disruptive Behavior
— 3.1. DDoS
— 3.2. Boosting
— 3.3. Smurfing
— 3.4. Incomplete Teams
— 3.5. Vote to Kick Abuse
— 3.6. MMR Rollback Frustrations
— 3.7. Streamer Mode
4. Accessibility
5. Smoke Propagation Issues
6. Drone Issues

With a game that has been around for as long as Siege, we are aware that there are long-standing issues that we have yet to fully resolve. We are dedicated to maintaining and growing the game continually, as we have done for many years before. We appreciate the community’s support throughout the years, and we also thank you for your patience as the game continues to develop.

In this Status Report we will be shedding some light on long-standing topics of player concerns that are very important to us, but also complex to discuss. Our regular Top Issues and Community Concerns blog posts lays out current issues with more finite and short-term fixes. The goal of this Status Report is to share behind-the-scenes insight as to why some of the long-standing issues are so persistent, and how we are approaching solutions to them in the long-run.

While not all of these topics will be addressed in the near future, we do have several things already in the works that we want to share.

Concerns: We are aware that various sound issues in the game have been problematic for players for some time. Sound in Siege is a very complex system which attempts to realistically simulate sound propagation in a 3D environment. In some cases, the complexity of the sound system can be confusing which leads to player misunderstandings—for example, when sound uses a specific route to reach the player, but the player is not aware of that route (like in the case of a Maverick hole). In other cases, this complexity can also mean it can be very difficult to diagnose sound bugs, such as the frequently mentioned inversed audio, or missing sounds.

Challenges: Our sound system takes into account many parameters when serving sounds to players. This includes the player’s position, environment, game state, and more. New components that interact with our sound system get added every Season, and with new elements there are always new opportunities for bugs to be introduced.

Another important factor to consider is that Siege’s destruction engine fosters a constantly changing, dynamic environment. Every round is unique since sound propagation dynamically changes based on the different states of destruction. This adds an extra layer of complexity to reproducing and fixing sound-related issues.

The goal of sound propagation in Siege is to dynamically convey realistic sound direction and position to the players. This is done by dividing our maps into multiple spaces, which allow sound to propagate from one space to another through specific connection points (such as destructible walls, floors, doors and windows). Then depending on the current state of map destruction, the propagation system connects the sound to the listener by calculating the best path. It will check whether the connector points are covered by their corresponding wall, or if a hole was made which would let the sound pass. Once the algorithm determines the optimum pathway, we use this information to position and modulate the sound so players can recognize the sound’s origin and distance.

Future: To get sound in Siege to a better place we have taken multiple actions internally to help us diagnose and fix sound issues. First, we have instrumented the sound system to help us catch errors more quickly. This aims to enable us to identify errors earlier in our development process, as well as debug difficult-to-reproduce problems.

Secondly, we have reviewed the status of our sound and propagation systems. We’ve reached the conclusion that we need to rebuild large parts of it, starting with the way sounds are packaged and connected to the game. We are aiming to begin releasing the sound repackaging in Season 3. However, the full rebuild of the entire sound propagation and sound interactions systems is a major undertaking that will not be finalized in Year 5.

In the meantime, new bugs that pop up are fixed when proper reproduction can be achieved by our QC teams. This is one of the main roadblocks behind the inverse audio and missing sounds bugs: they seem to occur randomly and cannot be recreated consistently in-house, which makes it very difficult to work on the steps towards a solution. However, we will continue to try reproducing sound bugs as part of our usual processes and fixing them whenever possible. We would also like to ask for the community’s help on this matter. If you find a consistent way of reproducing any sound issues you face, please let us know through R6 Fix, opt in for direct contact in your submission, and we can reach out for more info.

Connectivity is a varied topic that encompasses many different areas such as internet service providers, our backend services (such as matchmaking), our game servers, our game server provider, and even DDoS attacks.

Challenges: Our live and online teams monitor our online services 24/7 to ensure that the game is always available to our players. They are always aware of any degradations that arise and work very hard to resolve them as quickly as possible. Despite their constant surveillance, degradations do still occur. While some degradations can occur due to changes on our end, other times degradations are outside of our control (i.e. third-party degradations). When a degradation occurs, we do our utmost to bring services back online with minimum impact to our players. For prolonged periods of downtime we have a compensation matrix in place.

As an example, at the beginning of the stay-at-home measures in mid-March, the added load on our servers caused degradations in matchmaking and login problems. To answer the increased load and player activity, we scaled up our infrastructure by:

• Doubling the number of servers allocated to processing matchmaking data (distributing the load across more servers to prevent backlogs).
• Adding additional shards (each shard is a separate server instance) to increase the capacity of our databases (increasing database scalability and performance).
• Doubling the capacity of the Rainbow Six Siege load balancer (increasing capacity to be able to distribute network traffic more reliably).
• From start to end, the connectivity issues lasted less than a week while we implemented the above measures before returning to normal.

During regular periods of activity, our data indicates that 97% of Ranked games start with 10 players, and more than 98.5% of matches end successfully without individual connection lost, high ping kicks, or game server crashes. The graph below illustrates the overall success rate of Rainbow Six matches since the beginning of the year (in green):

However, a good example of connectivity issues that are not within our control can be seen in the blue section of the graph. The blue section above indicates matches where at least one player was kicked due to high ping. With the start of stay-at-home measures in March, the percentage of high ping kicks has more than doubled due to the additional load placed on the internet globally — a factor we are unable to control.

Future: Our live and online teams are constantly exploring ways to improve the quality of service in Siege. They have been working endlessly behind the scenes since the launch of Siege and continue their efforts to this day.

To improve connectivity performance and resiliency, we migrated our game servers to Linux last year, and this year, work is already underway to improve resiliency in case of third-party outages. To improve horizontal scaling capabilities, improve matchmaking times, and allow for more seamless maintenances, we are working on transitioning our entire backend to a microservices based architecture. As you can imagine, these changes take time. However, we will make our best efforts to make everything seamless and transparent to players, so look forward to more updates from us as these changes go live.

Concern: When a player’s ping reaches a certain threshold for a sustained period of time, they are kicked from the game. The current kick threshold is considered too lenient by some in the community.

Challenge: Our current ping thresholds are based on values observed during the 2015 Alpha tests. Connectivity kicks and warning standards for what we deem to be so laggy as to have a negative impact on the game is based on that data. Anything less than a ping of 110ms is considered acceptable and for any values over this, additional checks and verifications are applied to the player’s actions before triggering a kick to remove the player. Future: We need to maintain an overall quality of play performance for everyone in the game, while allowing some flexibility for potential fluctuations in the normal course of gameplay. Our teams are invested in reducing latency by adding game servers in additional regions—but this will require proper assessments on whether the population in that region would be able to sustain matchmaking while still putting players into matches within a reasonable amount of time. It will also depend on the capacity of our infrastructure providers. (Siege currently maintains servers in West EU, North EU, South Africa, HK, Singapore, Japan, Australia, US West, US East, US Central South and Brazil). As we add more regions and the average player latency is reduced, we may re-evaluate our data and revisit potential changes to ping thresholds.

Cheating in Siege is and will always be a topic of high priority for us. In our latest issue of Top Issues and Community Concerns we outlined the results of some of our short-term tactics to mitigate hackers, cheating, and lobby freezes. We will continue to communicate on anti-cheat measures under the condition that it will not compromise our efforts against cheaters and won’t negatively impact implemented solutions. We do also aim to have a longer-form dev blog on cheating in the near future.

On the subject of toxicity, we take a firm stance against it. We seek to prioritize healthy interactions between players, promote a positive game environment, and uplift a supportive community. Presently, we try to mitigate toxic and disruptive behaviors in game with chat filtering, mute options, Reverse Friendly Fire, keeping all-chat off by default, and the upcoming Match Cancellation feature. The battle against toxicity must ultimately be a collaborative effort between the team and the Siege community, so we will continue to encourage positive behaviors we’d like to see more of.

Concern: DDoS issues have arisen from time to time as cheaters find different methods to attack vulnerabilities in our systems.

Challenges: We are highly committed to protecting our game from DDoS attacks. We have a dedicated team monitoring network anomalies and DDoS attacks on our servers. However, each case differs and often requires different partners (both internal and external) to investigate and remedy. For instance, a recent rise in reports of DDoS was actually tied to lobby freezing—a different method of disrupting the game. We worked to create a refined detection and tracking method for lobby freezers and then implemented an automatic kick for identified cheaters.

To provide some context, below is a graph that represents the number of successful DDoS attacks on our systems.

In the months leading up to Ember Rise, the number of DDoS attacks rose incredibly quickly. We began implementing a number of measures to put a stop to the attacks, including working closely with external providers. Once our DDoS mitigation solution was activated, we saw the number of successful attacks drop to almost 0.

The situation remained stable until recently, when a rise in DDoS reports in the beginning of March led to our discovery of some new DDoS techniques being used.

Future: We will continue to monitor and investigate DDoS attacks on our servers. Our dedicated DDoS team is currently pursuing several avenues to mitigate new types of attacks we’ve discovered in collaboration with our external cloud provider. We will provide more regular updates on this in our Top Issues and Community Concerns blog posts, or in upcoming patch notes depending on when we have more to share.

Concern: Boosters unfairly inflate the rank of other players via dishonest or illegal means. This is usually done by manipulating our matchmaking systems by smurfing and/or through cheats.

Future: To handle accounts boosted by cheaters, we have a 2-step system that includes banning the cheaters, and then carrying out a MMR rollback. Banned cheaters will trigger MMR rollbacks, and we can identify with quite high confidence players who receive a significant MMR as having been boosted. These boosted players then receive an MMR reset and are required to redo their Season’s placement matches. Furthermore, to reduce boosting, we also implemented a limit on the maximum MMR gap allowed between party members. Another step to combat boosting is the upcoming unified MMR change. This allows our matchmaking system to properly identify players based on their worldwide MMR rather than their regional one should they change servers (therefore allowing them to play at their Seasonal MMR reset’s value for a short period).

Unfair matchmaking caused by players who are misrepresenting their actual skill level is an issue we will continuously strive to improve on.

Concern: Smurfs create imbalances in matchmaking when they use new accounts to hide their actual skill level. Our matchmaking system does not use Clearance Level, K/D, or win rate to carry out matchmaking. It uses MMR. MMR is determined by your match’s outcome, while taking into account the enemy team’s MMR. By disguising their true skill level, smurfs impact the competitive balance of the match with very few ways for us to verify the incident.

Challenges: Smurfing is a struggle the entire industry faces and in our community, it damages the playing experience.

Our User Research team will continue to work to improve our understanding and analysis of this topic in the future, however a major difficulty lies in the limited tracking. Smurfs are difficult to identify, and we need a way to do so before making any changes to our system to combat these players. Currently, our team is using the available data to detect outliers that would indicate smurfing. In the meanwhile, we will continue to enforce measures such as 2-Step Verification to add barriers to multiple accounts creation.

Challenge: Games that begin with an unequal number of players are extremely frustrating, and this kind of disadvantage goes against our goal of fair, balanced, and enjoyable games. While the Ranked playlist does allow players to rejoin the games they were in, we do realize that rejoining does not always occur.

Future: In Year 5 Season 2, we have announced the introduction of a new Match Cancellation feature. This will not ship at Season launch but later on during the Season.

To create the new Match Cancellation feature, we had to ensure that the system would not be exploitable and easily abused by players who wanted to bail on a game after loading in. Many situations and parameters had to be evaluated to set up criteria under which disadvantaged teams would be able to justify cancelling a match—such as momentary disconnects needing a chance to rejoin and how the voting system would work. Match Cancellation will give the disadvantage team the agency of cancelling the match when all our criteria for a potential cancellation is met. We are excited to share this with you in our next Season.

Concern: While Vote to Kick is no longer an option in Ranked Games, we often see Quick Match players reporting frustrations over the abuse of this function. The intention of this feature is to provide players with an option to remove a teammate should they exhibit problematic behavior; however, the original intent has sometimes been manipulated by some to create toxicity.

Challenges: We are aware of how this function has been abused and we agree that a redesign of the Vote to Kick rules is in order. There are multiple ways this feature has been abused and we are currently assessing the data to understand the various scenarios and how we can block openings for abuse. We have identified a few starting points, such as preventing players under certain sanctions from voting, and we are currently going over the Vote to Kick designs with the goal of having an upgrade live by Season 4.

Concern: We often hear feedback from players regarding MMR rollback frustrations when players who manage to win against cheaters still have their games rolled back.

Challenges: When we first introduced MMR rollbacks, there were concerns of massive MMR drops to the unwilling/unknowing teammates of the cheater if games where cheaters lose are not cancelled. As an unwilling teammate, all the matches you’d won together are rolled back (thus losing MMR), but all the games lost together will not get cancelled either (and therefore, the lost MMR still remains).

This is a non-issue if teammates are players who knowingly were in a squad with a cheater. However, in many cases where accounts are hacked by cheaters or teammates are just unknowingly playing with a cheater, this can be exceptionally hurtful to a legitimate but unsuspecting player.

Future: With the recently introduced MMR Reset, this partially mitigates some of the potential massive MMR Rollback concerns outlined above. When there is a large enough MMR rollback, players affected will have their MMR reset and be required to re-do their placement matches. We will be exploring what other risks there might be in only rolling back games where cheaters win in the near future.

Concern: We want to provide streamers with a layer of anonymity to maintain their gaming experience against major frustrations such as stream sniping.

Challenges: We are exploring a few options and need to find a solution where we would still be able to internally identify players while Streamer Mode is on—while providing public-facing anonymity.

Future: We have an early iteration of a potential solution which we discussed with a select few streamers. While the initial reception was positive, we need to make sure the feature is as bulletproof as possible security-wise to ensure there are no workarounds to affect anonymity while still allowing us to trace our players and player data when a different identity is used. We are continuing to iterate on the design and validating to see if we can break down this feature into more intermediate deliverables. We are committed to providing tools where content creators can communicate with their community and express their passion safely. At the same time, we will continue to take feedback to ensure that our system is robust and aligned with our players’ expectations.

Challenges: Player accessibility is important to us and the continued growth of Siege. Our vision for greater accessibility involves a full-fledged colorblind solution as a system that allows players the option to re-color claymores, laser sights, camera lights, etc.—while also taking into account which team you’re on for proper feedback.

Our earlier initiatives for implementing colorblind solutions did not live up to our expectations when tested with colorblind players. We learned that filters alone were not sufficient answers to most of the issues, and in some cases, it even created additional problems. We needed to implement a proper solution offering full-spectrum color selection. Customization at this level entails separating multiple elements for dynamic re-coloring—a significant task we have decided to split into smaller parts.

We are revisiting colorblindness in the near future. We will begin by focusing on improving the shooting experience first through taking a look at reticle colors and what can be done there. We hope to have something to share soon.

This is the first step in putting in place a flexible and comprehensive system. Many of our accessibility team’s resources are currently focused on adding what’s outlined in the Communications and Video Accessibility Act to the game. This will come with other accessibility improvements not specifically targeting colorblindness.

Concern: Smoke propagation as it currently stands is unreliable and confusing. The core of the problem is that small interior environments do not work well with our current smoke propagation system to allow for realistic gas positioning. As a result, we often see smoke clipping issues which, in the case of Smoke’s gadget also causes damage.

Challenge: We have previously explored solutions for smoke propagation by expanding on Capitão’s reworked smoke system. However, that system was not built to handle large layers of very dense gas like that of smoke grenades or Smoke’s gadget. Using Capitão’s smoke system on these kinds of smokes would cause massive drops in performance, negatively affecting gameplay and player experience.

Future: We have tried a few smaller fixes and workarounds on the system, but the results were unsatisfactory. We have concluded that we will need to overhaul the smoke propagation system, which will involve sizable work on the graphics and engine side to ensure good visual quality while maintaining a solid framerate. This is currently on hold until we have the time and resources to address it. We will communicate further when we have more to share.

Concern: Various drone-related bugs will pop up from time to time. These are varied, but frustrating as droning and gathering intel is a big part of the game.

Challenge: As the game grows, the drone system has become overly complex with many different moving parts. Sometimes, when making new changes to drones, we may unintentionally affect other parts of the system. Future: We will continue to investigate drone bugs as they arise and will work to fix them as soon as possible.

We are also migrating the drone system to our new gadget v2 system, which is designed to simplify, streamline, and decouple systems. Migration of some gadgets to this system been done transparently in the past year, and we will continue to improve all our gadgets in this way to help them be more resilient to exploits, and iterate faster. Automatic tests have also been added to identify regressions as soon as they occur. In some cases, bugs are caused by complex interactions with the drone system—or the game at large. Those complex cases should be addressed once our migration to the gadget v2 framework is complete.

NEXT UP

If you’ve made it to this paragraph, you’ve made your way through a very long list of long-term goals and promises. But we have good news for the near future too. We have got some community requests that -are- coming soon such as the alpha of the match replay system, map pick-and-ban, and various reworks. Plus, we’ve got even more things on the horizon that we are excited to share such as the reputation system, ping 2.0, and more. We look forward to continuing to build on the game with all of you!

For regular updates on Rainbow Six Siege, continue to look out for our patch notes, dev blogs, designer’s notes, Top Issues and Community Concerns articles, and Seasonal reveal panels. We aim to improve communications on a few key topics such as cheating, connectivity, and matchmaking—we will be releasing dev blogs touching on those in the near future.

Kompletter Artikel: RAINBOW SIX SIEGE STATUS REPORT

At the beginning of Y5 we announced an upcoming new Match Replay feature for Rainbow Six Siege.

While originally scheduled to go live in the first half of the year, circumstances have forced us to push back the schedule on Match Replay. Match replay is a feature that requires a great deal of technical development, but we hope to deliver the best experience to our players when it is ready to go live. Despite the delay, we’d like to share an early look at Match Replay with you all.

Match Replay is a system that automatically records your last 10 played games. With it, you’ll be able to re-watch and fully spectate your recorded games from both first-person and top-down points of view, from any player, and any angle.

Our goal with Match Replay is to provide players with an interactive tool that will provide full coverage and perspective on their last 10 games. Through the Watch tab in the main menu, you will be able to access your replays where your last 10 games are saved. Once you’re in the replay, you can use the Spectator mode tools to relive your clutch plays, scrutinize missteps, and analyze your strategy to level up your game.

Further down the road, we would like to give Match Replay even more functions such as storing them on the game server instead of locally, a share feature so you can share your replays with your friends, and even the possibility of downloading and watching replays from official esports matches.

We plan to first push an early version of Match Replay out onto the PC Test Servers for testing before sending it to live, so keep an eye out on the TS Patch Notes for updates on when it will be available!

Kompletter Artikel: DEV BLOG: MATCH REPLAY UPDATE