Rainbow Six Siege introduced the fourth season of year 6 today on the Player Test Server, and we’ve got all the news and patch notes. It’s called High Calibre, and one of the biggest additions comes in the form of Brianna “Thorn” Skehan, a new operator and technical weapons expert from Ireland’s Emergency Response Unit. Billed as an inspirational leader with both thorny inner and outer defensive, it’s anyone’s guess where she got her nickname from. Let’s delve into this mystery further, and also take a look at the rest of the High Calibre patch notes!

Rainbow Six Siege High Calibre Update and Patch Notes

Let’s start with Thorn herself: she’s got a special Razorbloom Shell, a nasty new weapons which sticks to surfaces. Once a hapless opponent walks by, it automatically propels a set of sharp blades (or, “thorns”, if you will) in all directions, potentially causing death at worst, and a nasty papercut at best. So you’ll probably want to keep an eye out for that.

There’s more than just Thorn! The Outback map has received some tweaks to improve balance and easier playing. There are also some new locations that have been added, just for you:

  • 1F Convenience Store, 1F Compressor Room, 1F Gear Store, and 1F Beer Fridge have been combined into 1F Bike Repair and 1F Mechanic Shop.
  • 2F Office Supply is larger and has an exterior soft wall.
  • 1F Restaurant has been split into two rooms: 1F Restaurant and 1F Shark.
  • 2F Covered Terrace is now an interior area that connects 2F Mezzanine and 2F Piano Room. The 2F Piano Room stairs have been removed.

There have also been a number of smaller tweaks and fixes.

Rainbow Six Siege High Calibre Update: Tweaks and Fixes

Test Server

TS UPDATE

  • The Test Server will now only be open at three separate times throughout the season and content will be split into three different releases.
  • Season Release: Contains only content that will ship for the season.
  • Lab Release: Contains experimental content and will be used by the team as an opportunity to collect feedback on features that are still in early production.
  • Balancing Release: Contains Operator and other balancing changes.

R6 FIX 2.0

  • R6 Fix has received a variety of extensive updates. The website’s UI and UX design has been completely overhauled, and the function of various features, such as the search feature, has been brought up to date. In addition, a new notification system now allows users to track updates to reports, and to provide even more transparency, devs now have the ability to communicate directly with users.

Team Colors

Instead of the classic blue and orange, teams will be denoted by the colors blue and red. Sorry, orange-lovers!

Customization

ELITE 2.0

  • Players can customize their Operator’s unique abilities in the Loadout section.
  • Players can navigate to any Operator in the Operators section and select the Appearance tab to view Headgear, Uniforms, Victory Celebrations, Operator Portraits, and Card Backgrounds.
  • Players can customize their Operator Cards by mixing and matching Operator Portraits and Card Backgrounds. Their selections will be seen by teammates before everyone loads into the match and in various places in-game. They will also be seen by opponents they eliminate.
  • UX and UI changes have been made to various customization menus to improve player comfort.

3D WEAPON SKINS

  • Players can now acquire Exotic weapon skins during their Battle Pass progression. These new weapon skins have a unique 3D effect.

Player Comfort

DRONE COUNTER

  • Defenders now have access to a drone counter in the HUD to help them keep track of the number of regular drones they’ve destroyed. This feature can be turned off in the HUD section of the Options menu.

HUD REWORK

  • Visuals for the HUD have been updated to be more in-line with the game’s art direction.
  • Compass now displays pings and other marker locations, as well as feedback for height differences.
  • Loadout (weapons, gadgets and unique abilities) was regrouped together to follow more consistent display rules.
  • Text action reminders (ex: Press [SPACE] to Vault) have been replaced with icons to take up less space.

PLAYER PRIVACY

  • A new Privacy section in the Options menu allows players to adjust settings related to in-game privacy.

Operator Balancing

FINKA CHANGES

  • She can now use the Adrenal Surge to revive herself, which is more consistent with other devices in-game, like Doc’s Stim Pistol.
  • Her recoil boost has been removed.
  • The Adrenal Surge cooldown has been increased to 20 seconds (was 10 seconds).

ECHO + MOZZIE

  • Increased drones’ time outside the building to 10 seconds (was 3 seconds).

BULLETPROOF CAMERA REWORK

  • Defenders can now rotate the Bulletproof Camera and use it to fire EMP bursts that disable opponent devices. EMP bursts cannot be fired by Attackers when the camera is hacked.

CAMERAS LOSE SIGNAL

  • When placed outdoors, Valkyrie’s Black Eye, Maestro’s Evil Eye, and the Bulletproof Camera will now lose signal after 10 seconds. The player must pick up and redeploy the cameras elsewhere to regain signal.

Weapon Balancing

ANGLED GRIP

  • The increase to ADS speed provided by the Angled Grip is now 20% less than it was before.

GAMEPAD RECOIL COMFORT

  • Reduced lateral recoil on:
  • Jager – 416-C
  • Ash – RC4
  • Vigil – K1A
  • Zofia – M762
  • Ace – AK-12
  • Warden, Dokkaebi, Vigil – SMG-12
  • Mozzie, Aruni – P-10 Roni
  • Alibi – Mx-4 Storm

Okay, that is a ton of changes! There are even more bug fixes and smaller changes for Rainbow Six Siege High Calibre, but we’ve hit the high points here. If you missed the last Rainbow Six Siege patch notes, you can check them out here, and if you’re looking for Rainbow Six Siege news in general, you know where to look.

  • Jager – 416-C
  • Ash – RC4
  • Vigil – K1A
  • Zofia – M762
  • Ace – AK-12
  • Warden, Dokkaebi, Vigil – SMG-12
  • Mozzie, Aruni – P-10 Roni
  • Alibi – Mx-4 Storm