Rainbow Six Siege may have started in 2015, but Ubisoft’s tactical shooter looks to be closing out almost a decade of support strongly – with Operation Heavy Mettle the third season of Year 8, following on from Dread Factor.
As is tradition now, Ubisoft has packed a lot into this season, with new Operator, Ram, alongside updates to playlists, a new Commendation system, and a fresh Arcade mode.
We’ve rounded up the patch notes for Rainbow Six Siege Y8S3, but for more on the game’s third update of 2023, check out our guide below.
Rainbow Six Siege Y8S3 Heavy Mettle Release Date
Rainbow Six Y8S3 Operation Heavy Mettle will arrive on August 29, meaning players don’t have long to wait.
Even better, it’ll hit Test Servers on August 14, so players can go hands-on with Ram even earlier.
Rainbow Six Siege Y8S3 Heavy Mettle Operator: Ram
Click to enlargeAnother season means another Operator, and this time it’s South Korea’s Ram that joins the roster.
A new Attacker, Ram’s gadget is the BU-GI drone, which can move in a path, tear up traps, and rip through defences while acting as a decoy.
Find out more about Ram in our full Rainbow Six Siege Ram Operator guide, including more on her gadget and counters.
Rainbow Six Siege Y8S3 Heavy Mettle Player Commendation System
Siege’s next Operation with debut a Commendation System for showing appreciation to teammates and opponents alike, with Ubisoft noting that 50% of players hit by toxicity warnings in the past have gone on to change their behaviour.
The Commendation System for Siege will let players award players for Guidance, Valor, Dedication, and for being a worthy opponent, with Alpha Packs up for grabs for players commended.
Rainbow Six Siege Y8S3 Heavy Mettle Playlist Changes
Click to enlargeQuick Match is getting a rework as part of Rainbow Six Siege Y8S3 Heavy Mettle, with improvements to match times thanks to reduced round timers, objectives being revealed, 10 seconds of invulnerability for Attackers, and defences being set up automatically.
That last one is likely to be contentious, but it’s not just Quick Play getting an update. Unranked is now dubbed ‘Standard’, and won’t offer Operator or Map ban phases.
As for Arcade, players will be able to play Weapons Roulette, which will start all players with the same weapon but rotate them all after a set amount of time.
Rainbow Six Siege Y8S3 Heavy Mettle Quality of Life changes
Finally, Siege is getting new onboarding tools with Heavy Mettle, with an additional set of tutorials narrated by Sam Fisher, also known as Zero.
Operator balancing continues for Grim, but Fuze can now use Cluster Charges on Deployable Shields. The long-awaited Frost Rework is coming later in the season, too.
The Match Replay mode, which added a new free cam last season, will now allow the removal of HUD elements for help with content creation.
That’s all we know about Operation Heavy Mettle in Rainbow Six Siege. For more, be sure to check out our Year 8 roadmap guide to everything coming in 2023.