Rainbow Six Siege enters Year 5 in 2020, set to offer new content across several seasons. With new operators, equipment and changes coming to Ubisoft’s competitive shooter, the question of start dates and launch times remains on players’ minds.
Here’s everything we know about Rainbow Six Siege’s Year 5 Season start date and launch times.
Rainbow Six Siege Year 5 Season Start Date Launch Times
Publisher and developer Ubisoft hasn’t officially revealed the full schedule for Rainbow Six Siege’s Year 5 just yet. That, however, doesn’t mean we can’t attempt to make an educated guess at the start dates of its seasons.
What we do know at the moment is that Year 5 Season 1 will start on March 10, at 9 AM EDT/1 PM GMT. Here’s a general look at expected season start dates:
- Year 5 Season 1 – March 10, 2020
- Year 5 Season 2 – June 2020
- Year 5 Season 3 – September 2020
- Year 5 Season 4 – December 2020
Rainbow Six Siege Year 5 Roadmap
Rainbow Six Siege’s Year 5 will do things a bit differently, including just six new Operators, down from the usual eight. Seasons 1 and 2 will bring two Operators each while the final two Seasons will slow things down, introducing just one Operator.
Each Season comes with a map rework, adding different versions of Rainbow Six Siege’s Oregon, House, Skyscraper and Chalet maps.
Each Season will also get its own event and Arcade playlist – which come with fun modes that provide breaks from the title’s usual competitive fare – and a Battle Pass.
On top of that, Year 5 will introduce a ping 2.0 system – similar to Apex Legends’ –, map bans which let players choose the maps they don’t want to play, a reputation system that’s meant to reduce toxicity and encourage team play, alongside a replay system that records entire matches and lets viewers jump between different players’ perspectives.
Rainbow Six Siege Year 5 Operators
The first two Year 5 Operators were confirmed to be Iana and Oryx. Hailing from the Netherlands, Iana is an attacker whose special ability lets her summon a Replicator hologram that looks, moves and sounds like her.
Players can control the hologram – which is fragile enough to die in one shot – to scout out locations and disorient or manipulate enemies into revealing their position. The hologram cannot deal damage, rappel or climb ladders.
Iana can also not move while controlling the hologram which lacks body warmth, cannot ping or scan enemies. As far as her arsenal goes, Iana can use the ARX 200 and G36-C as primary weapons, the MK1 9mm pistol acting as a sidearm.
Jordan’s Oryx is a defender capable of using his Remah Dash ability to initiate a quick sprint and use his strength to crash through barricades, unreinforced walls and knock Attackers down, including shield-wielders.
Crashing through reinforced walls comes at the cost of a small portion of his health, the Remah Dash running on charges which replenish over time and reset to 0 when busting through walls. Needless to say, performing the dash doesn’t help with staying stealthy.
Oryx can also jump up and grab hatches which let him peek before either climbing up or dropping back down. This ability is independent of his Remah Dash.
In terms of arsenal, Rainbow Six Siege’s first Year 5 Defender can use the SPAS-12 shotgun and MP5 submachine gun as primary weapons, the Bailiff 410 revolver and USP40 pistol acting as his secondary weapons.
Rainbow Six Siege will then get two more Operators coming from Norway and South Africa in Year 5 Season 2, one Operator from an unknown country is Season 3 and, lastly, another Operator that hails from Thailand.
Rainbow Six Siege is now available on PC, Xbox One and PS4.
