Ubisoft Montreal has been chatting up its desire to reduce Rainbow Six Siege players’ dependency on operators Ash and Zofia. The dev explains in the FPS game’s preseason designer notes that it recognises the ‘Utility Meta’ has forced attacking players to heavily rely on projectiles, such as explosives, to deal with bulletproof utility. This has led Zofia and Ash to become mandatory picks as they already had a solid loadout to start with.
“Our goal is to have as much diversity as possible in terms of Operator presence, even in a competitive environment,” Ubisoft says. “We are not ignoring this aspect of the issue.”
While the developer isn’t ready to spill the beans just yet, it does say that the studio has been working on another solution that will let attackers deal with defenders’ utility. Expect to hear more on that “soon”. Ubisoft has also revealed some changes for Ash that are targeted at top-ranked and pro players. She’s received the claymore at the expense of stun grenades and has got one additional breaching round at the expense of the damage dropping to 50 from 90.
“Ash boasts a very strong presence and currently is one of the best Operators to counter Jäger and Wamai,” Ubisoft says. “She has a central role in the current utility meta, and we needed to have a closer look at her.
“We would like players to focus on her primary gadget and incentivise the team play. The utility she brings is very important, and we also need to provide attackers with more explosive projectiles to deal with the defending setup.”
If you’d like to see the patch notes in full, you can catch them on the developer’s website. The studio’s main focus in dealing with the game’s utility meta, which it admits is “causing issues to the health of the game”.
It’s a busy time over in the land of Rainbow Six Siege right now. Ubisoft has revealed Rainbow Six Siege’s Neon Dawn update, which comes with a new Operator alongside heaps of gadget reworks, quality of life improvements, and balancing tweaks.