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Rainbow6

Community Checkpoint #2 - Ranked Map Pool, Mid-Season Balancing, and more!

04-10-2026 · 1h 13m

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[00:13:27] Hey everyone, welcome to our second ever community checkpoint.
[00:13:55] I am John Spinarius, Community Developer here on Rainbow Six Siege,
[00:13:59] and I'm joined by two wonderful devs, so I'm going to allow it to introduce themselves here.
[00:14:02] Hi, I'm Christopher Budgen, Live Content Director.
[00:14:05] I handle a lot of aspects such as playlists, matchmaking, progression, all those things outside of the match.
[00:14:11] And I'm Joshua Mills, Creative Director on Siege, and I mostly just annoy Chris with a bunch of crazy suggestions and ideas.
[00:14:18] Now, I help lead the team in overall vision of where we want to take Siege, and yeah.
[00:14:23] I mean you guys probably already seen them before if you watched any of our reveals, but yeah that's
[00:14:26] suffice to say. We're going to go into some interesting discussions here today and for a
[00:14:30] refresher I guess for those who didn't see the first community checkpoint we want to do here is
[00:14:33] kind of target the things that you guys are saying out on our community and our socials you
[00:14:38] know bringing it up in our feedback service things like that so that we can address the
[00:14:41] important things for you. So that being said we do have one other person here behind the
[00:14:46] seeds again it's Adrian Russo from our marketing team and he is going to be observing a
[00:14:50] SEACH team league match, or an STL match, is the internal league we have here at Ubisoft
[00:14:55] because we are not only love making SEACH, we love playing SEACH as well, we're passionate
[00:14:59] on all levels and well right now we don't have everything going into the server just
[00:15:04] yet but you can see Adrian just going through, yeah.
[00:15:06] Well, I mean we're getting ready essentially to get going with the STL match but that
[00:15:10] being said, we have a lot to talk about so let's jump right into that and introduce
[00:15:14] our topics of discussion, you guys are going to see them on your screens but we
[00:15:17] are going to start with the ranked map rotation in the midseason balancing that
[00:15:20] We've already talked about publicly, but we're also going to go into a discussion of Dopey remaster
[00:15:24] Not too much details just a little bit to get you guys a bit more context on that
[00:15:28] New onboarding that's coming and player protection update a quick one there all that being said
[00:15:34] Let's jump into our first topic, which is the new ranked map rotation
[00:15:38] There's going to be multiple changes coming to this
[00:15:40] So why don't we just kick things off and talk about why you're changing things up for the right confrontation?
[00:15:45] Yeah, sure
[00:15:45] So we had 16 maps for a long time and we want to try a new approach
[00:15:50] We were swapping out the maps, we were thinking at the beginning of the season and the mid-season as well.
[00:15:55] But it was our first time doing this, we've actually learned a lot.
[00:15:58] We had announced all the maps for the full season at the beginning purposely because we were kind of
[00:16:04] testing the waters a little bit and we certainly heard from our community loud and clear that some of those maps were
[00:16:09] not necessarily the competitive level that they were looking for.
[00:16:13] So basically we've heard a couple things that are core to players.
[00:16:17] One are those new modernized maps that we've brought like Oregon and Villa,
[00:16:21] have gone through a modernization, all the destructible ingredients getting added, for example.
[00:16:26] Swapping those out with less competitive maps was not really matching expectations for players, which is great to know, right?
[00:16:33] We wanted to test the flexibility of those, you know, maybe more casual maps in the ranked for a temporary to see how that would work,
[00:16:40] and that's not necessarily something players would want to see.
[00:16:43] Additionally, we have all 9 pro maps in the ranked pool, and that's really important for players,
[00:16:49] is having those like competitive maps, those are the most competitive maps in our current scene,
[00:16:53] they even get maintained within the ranked rotation.
[00:16:56] So you talked about all this feedback you received and all of that,
[00:16:59] so we've got a new approach coming not only, well let's talk about season 1 first, right?
[00:17:02] What's happening for season 1 right now, or in a few days?
[00:17:05] Yeah, so actually it'll be coming next week, I think it'll be shortly after our point 2 mid-season patch.
[00:17:12] So what's going to end up happening is that we're going to be adding four maps to the pool.
[00:17:16] So that'll be canal, theme park, outback, and skyscraper are going to be added to the pool.
[00:17:22] So for this one time, we're going to boost the total size up to 17 from 13.
[00:17:27] Okay, and actually we have it on your screen as well folks to give you an idea visually of what's
[00:17:32] going to be happening here. So we talked about the four maps being added and then in
[00:17:35] season two with rank 3.0 it's going to change even further, right?
[00:17:38] Yeah, so we have a new approach for rank 3.0. So we really looked at well,
[00:17:42] But I would say we've learned a lot from this first attempt in season one.
[00:17:47] And so we changed basically the back end of how we're going to be able to rotate maps.
[00:17:50] So now if you picture the map band phase, you have five maps that appear.
[00:17:54] We're now going to be able to control those maps individually through different pools.
[00:17:59] So one of those is going to be the showcase pool.
[00:18:01] So the showcase pool will use primarily for new maps.
[00:18:04] So Clip's El Casino is coming in season two.
[00:18:08] Now with this new showcase option, you'll actually be able to have Clipso Casino in every
[00:18:13] single map band phase in the beginning of the season.
[00:18:16] That won't stay for the full season, but for the beginning of the season it will be the
[00:18:19] case.
[00:18:20] And then we're going to be pulling the rest of the maps through two different pools.
[00:18:24] One will be the pro pool and one will be the seasonal pool.
[00:18:27] That means we don't have to kind of counterbalance the number of seasonal maps that we have
[00:18:30] in order to, you know, rotate against the nine maps that we have on pro.
[00:18:35] So for every band phase, you'll have two pro maps, Clip's up Casino, and two seasonal maps.
[00:18:41] Okay, and we talked about the seasonal maps a little bit.
[00:18:43] Obviously we're not going to be pulling from the full eight, right?
[00:18:46] Is that correct? It's just going to be four maps?
[00:18:48] It'll be four, and then after that we're going to do a rotation.
[00:18:52] How that's going to work is that we're actually going to be listening to the community through the band phases.
[00:18:57] So if there's a map that's not banned very often, so Oregon is a good example, right?
[00:19:02] It's a map that doesn't get banned that often.
[00:19:04] but it's a seasonal map. It's not currently in our Pro League.
[00:19:07] That map might survive a rotation.
[00:19:10] So we don't have to necessarily do four and four and just kind of rotate back and forth.
[00:19:14] But as we kind of grow our seasonal pools, such as new maps like Casino,
[00:19:18] we're going to be actually listening to the community,
[00:19:21] maybe keeping some of the ones that are least banned
[00:19:23] and the ones that are most banned will be the ones that get rotated out.
[00:19:26] Okay. And is there a minimum amount of maps you want to rotate out?
[00:19:29] I mean, obviously there's going to be some rotated out.
[00:19:32] I guess one would be the minimum,
[00:19:33] or is there something else?
[00:19:34] Yeah, we still want there to be a seasonal flavor
[00:19:36] with those things.
[00:19:37] Yeah, exactly.
[00:19:38] If it's only one, it doesn't really invoke much change.
[00:19:41] And we want to be able to do that,
[00:19:42] like switch things up and kind of challenge it a little bit.
[00:19:45] I think there's a couple of other things to note.
[00:19:46] Like we mentioned the showcase pool right now.
[00:19:48] It's going to be Clipso in season two,
[00:19:50] but later in the year,
[00:19:51] we're going to have targeted map updates.
[00:19:53] There's a chance that we can actually place those maps
[00:19:55] in that slot.
[00:19:57] That's something we want to ask the community about,
[00:19:58] see what they think about that idea.
[00:19:59] So when the Vila update comes,
[00:20:01] maybe that becomes part of the showcase pool.
[00:20:03] And just to back up on another thing
[00:20:05] that I think is really important that Chris mentioned
[00:20:06] is normally the map rotation,
[00:20:08] the ring map rotation will be at the point to update.
[00:20:12] That is the cadence that we're looking for.
[00:20:14] Because of the adjustments we're doing
[00:20:15] and because of lots of different reasons
[00:20:17] to the seasonal surveys that we got this information from
[00:20:19] which I think we'll dive into.
[00:20:21] But beyond that, also the fact that whenever we do
[00:20:24] submissions in order to release content updates,
[00:20:26] there's a bit of a delay.
[00:20:27] There's a bit of a run up to that.
[00:20:28] There's certification and things.
[00:20:30] And because of that, we'll actually be delaying that rotation just a little bit in this season.
[00:20:34] But in the future, point two, our rotations will hit and it'll be awesome.
[00:20:39] Awesome. Yeah, and I mean, we're talking about the feedback series.
[00:20:41] Let's actually jump into that, right?
[00:20:44] And you've already gone through them, correct?
[00:20:45] There's been a feedback cycle that's taken place.
[00:20:48] Yeah, so we launched our Season 1 seasonal survey and we've now gotten the feedback.
[00:20:53] We actually put a number of questions in that seasonal survey about ranked map rotations.
[00:20:58] I was personally surprised how much Fevella was hated.
[00:21:01] I knew it was not a top map.
[00:21:02] I didn't expect the amount of hate that it got.
[00:21:07] And one thing we don't want is really impact
[00:21:08] overall players enjoyment in the ranked pool.
[00:21:11] So basically what it did highlight for us
[00:21:13] is that that's a map that we wanted
[00:21:15] to be in more of a competitive place.
[00:21:18] So maybe it needs some reworks.
[00:21:20] Maybe we need to do a little bit of work on that map.
[00:21:22] That's the key aspect on why that's not showing up
[00:21:25] in the rotation that we're doing in season one.
[00:21:27] So we were just listening to the community.
[00:21:29] We don't want that experience.
[00:21:30] It's okay, we're not gonna do that.
[00:21:31] But we're going a little fun by adding more maps in.
[00:21:34] And in terms of receiving feedback from everyone out there,
[00:21:37] what is the best way for them to get their voice heard?
[00:21:40] The seasonal survey is the best.
[00:21:41] Like if we had to, you know, prioritize them,
[00:21:44] the seasonal survey is a great structured way
[00:21:47] for us to get feedback.
[00:21:49] We do also watch a lot of content creator content.
[00:21:52] We're on socials.
[00:21:54] For sure we do workshops with our community and our pros.
[00:21:57] But at the same time the seasonal survey is the number one way to get your let players voice be heard
[00:22:03] Yeah, so guys keep talking on social media keep making your posts on reddit all that stuff
[00:22:07] But also if you really want your voice be heard make sure you check out those seasonal surveys
[00:22:10] Usually when we have one or actually always when we have one bottom right hand corner of your screen
[00:22:14] Once you launch the game, you'll see that it's coming up or you'll see that there's an announcement for it
[00:22:17] Click on it send your feedback and that is the best way to be heard on that on any subject that we're gonna be targeting
[00:22:23] So, all that being said, why don't we jump into that, check out what's happening in the STL match.
[00:22:30] I believe it's already started here. Yeah, we've got defenders winning round number one.
[00:22:34] People might not know what STL is, so maybe we should give them some context here, Josh, right?
[00:22:38] Yeah, so as you mentioned, it's the Siege Team League.
[00:22:40] So basically, internally we run a tournament with all the developers on Siege.
[00:22:45] There are a couple of, there's two different brackets. There's recreational for, maybe you just joined the team.
[00:22:50] Maybe you've never played C's before we can get you in the recreational league and then there's the advanced league
[00:22:55] That's where our champion players are sitting and stuff like this
[00:22:57] And if you have a lot of playtime, that's usually where you end up
[00:23:00] Which means I get stomped by champion players, which is great
[00:23:04] But it's a fantastic way for us to a play the game together get super excited and kind of hold this like internal tournament
[00:23:10] There's a trophy. We have our own trophy people's names go on it and stuff like this and we do a live-stage kind of
[00:23:17] finale and stuff it's like celebration
[00:23:20] and you'll have drinks and stuff together.
[00:23:22] And honestly, you mentioned it's a great way to learn Siege.
[00:23:25] Like if we do have new people coming on
[00:23:28] to the Siege team all the time, jumping into the SDL,
[00:23:30] you have coaches, you have floor plans
[00:23:33] and blueprints of the maps,
[00:23:34] you know who's playing which operator,
[00:23:37] there's a whole lot of strapped.
[00:23:39] That really depends on who the coach is.
[00:23:42] It's like some of the coaches are crazy.
[00:23:44] And when I say this, like most of the coaches
[00:23:45] are actually like our champ over very advanced players,
[00:23:47] and they'll be a coach for the rec league as well,
[00:23:49] but also the advanced league.
[00:23:51] And some of them are super hardcore
[00:23:53] where you'll show up and you'll get a folder with homework
[00:23:55] and dossiers on all our opponents.
[00:23:58] Like, the fact that I can't see people's names right now,
[00:24:00] it's a little frustrating because I could use this
[00:24:02] to pull strats off of what they're doing
[00:24:04] and then use it against them.
[00:24:05] But I know my team's already watching this,
[00:24:07] so we're ready.
[00:24:08] You've got people researching.
[00:24:09] We take it seriously, folks.
[00:24:10] It's not a joke here, this deal.
[00:24:12] But yeah, let's jump back into our discussion here
[00:24:15] on mid-season balancing now.
[00:24:17] We wanna talk about this.
[00:24:18] We're going to make an announcement for you guys for the first time telling you what's changing here in the 1.2 balancing patch
[00:24:23] And I guess for the first topic here Josh. How many operators are being targeted?
[00:24:28] Well, yeah, so I mean this is the mid-season patch. So this is a major balancing update
[00:24:33] We have two of these first season one of the season launch and then one mid-season which is happening very soon
[00:24:38] So you can expect bigger changes here stuff that has more impact kind of changes an operator's position within their
[00:24:44] or overall impact of the game as well.
[00:24:47] So we are actually bringing four,
[00:24:49] sorry, eight operators being modified.
[00:24:52] Okay, and what's the most important factor
[00:24:54] when you're selecting the operators to modify?
[00:24:56] Well, I kind of mentioned it right there with about impact.
[00:24:58] So all our operators should have impact
[00:25:00] and they should have it in specific scenarios.
[00:25:03] We don't want one operator just being the,
[00:25:05] you know, one size fits all
[00:25:06] and may able to do everything.
[00:25:08] But we want every operator to have their moment
[00:25:10] to shine, their scenario to shine
[00:25:11] so that when you're getting a good intel,
[00:25:13] going to read on the team. Maybe you're deep into the back and forth of a rank
[00:25:17] match and you've kind of got the essence of what this team is doing so you can
[00:25:20] start pulling out the strats that are going to make a difference to close out
[00:25:23] the match for you. This is the stuff that matters is like when you play those
[00:25:26] cards when you bring out those ops. So ultimately it's making sure each one of
[00:25:30] our operators can take space within the game and very specifically own that
[00:25:35] space as well. Okay and we have a lot of operators eight total that are
[00:25:39] being targeted here. Why don't you give me a top three of the ones you feel have the most
[00:25:44] significant changes starting with number three, let's say.
[00:25:47] Number three. Okay. All right. Maybe number one, actually.
[00:25:52] Well, I mean, it'll differ between people. Obviously, I know which one's mine. So I'll say
[00:25:56] which one's mine when I get to it. But we'll start with a big one because there's a
[00:25:59] multiple changes happening in this operator, which is Rurara. Yes. So for those who don't
[00:26:04] know, she has this DomPenna launcher. It's a device that allows her to close down
[00:26:09] doorways and take a lot of control as an attacker, which has been
[00:26:12] fantastic. Some of the big adjustments here and when you look
[00:26:15] at the device, it's been very kind of shared between attackers
[00:26:19] and defenders. What I mean by that is like a defender can
[00:26:22] utilize it against the attackers if they're clever and kind of
[00:26:25] play around it. But what we're doing here is really trying
[00:26:28] to center it back to being an attacker side of gadget. So it's
[00:26:31] more responsive to our attackers and more reliable for
[00:26:34] the attacking side of the fight. On top of that, just
[00:26:37] comfort stuff going into it and allowing her to take that
[00:26:39] ground faster. One big thing is the range is being increased
[00:26:42] pretty dramatically from 15 meters up to 25. And the biggest
[00:26:47] factor here is instead of having one panel to start, she's
[00:26:51] actually getting all four right off the bat. So yeah, so she can
[00:26:54] move very quickly to play these very, very fast. And just a
[00:26:57] pro tip for anyone using her, it's a real projectile, the
[00:27:00] actual dom panel. So if you don't hold your line of sight
[00:27:03] well enough or hold the angle kind of weird, you're
[00:27:05] actually going to hit the surface. So make sure you've got your
[00:27:07] light of sight to the essentially the doorway you're walking
[00:27:10] onto and then take that space. Okay, we have our number one
[00:27:13] then in our you guys can see on your screen some of these
[00:27:15] changes we just discussed right in terms of it's significant
[00:27:18] right in terms of how quickly the door is going to close for
[00:27:20] for attackers. Yeah, like what's on the screen right now
[00:27:23] we're saying opening closing for up to six seconds from three
[00:27:26] well in video games one second is a lifetime. Yes. And we
[00:27:29] just tripled that. So like it's so six seconds is massive.
[00:27:32] And it can really stop you from getting call off guard also to your timing better for when you put these panels up
[00:27:39] Thinking your head. Okay. It'll be this amount of time before something kind of can come through
[00:27:43] So yeah, it's it's a pretty big shift on it and I'm looking forward to seeing folks kind of jump into using your yeah
[00:27:51] Well, what about number two?
[00:27:53] Number two. Okay. So again, no particular order. This is the one. I think it's the big impact one, right?
[00:27:59] Ultimately, it's the fact that we're bringing an update to smoke. Yes
[00:28:02] and we are re-issuing his deployable shield.
[00:28:06] Yeah, so it's back.
[00:28:07] It's a pretty big deal.
[00:28:09] Smoke has had this in the past.
[00:28:10] It makes him a really, really strong anchor.
[00:28:13] Allows him to carry a lot of weight for the team
[00:28:17] and also allows you to change your lineup.
[00:28:18] So you don't have to bring that extra operator
[00:28:20] that's bringing the shield.
[00:28:21] So really excited to have this come back.
[00:28:24] And what about the third operator then?
[00:28:27] The third, this one's fun too, is Jackal.
[00:28:30] We're actually diving in the Jackal here
[00:28:32] and updating on how he can essentially get the scans to work.
[00:28:36] And it's playing with verticality.
[00:28:39] Verticality is a huge thing in Siege.
[00:28:41] It's something we want to embrace more.
[00:28:42] And it's also an advanced skill in Siege.
[00:28:45] And most FPS is in general
[00:28:46] because of the destructibility of the environment.
[00:28:49] In this case, Jockler can use that shotgun,
[00:28:51] open up the floor,
[00:28:52] and then start scanning footprints from underneath,
[00:28:55] which allows him to have a advantage
[00:28:57] to give that intel to his teammates
[00:28:59] who may be on repels on Windows
[00:29:00] they're holding the actual floor above.
[00:29:03] But also he's getting a set of frag grenades.
[00:29:06] So he becomes a bit of a menace from down below now.
[00:29:09] All right, I love playing jackals.
[00:29:10] I'm excited about that change for sure.
[00:29:12] The C70 is amazing.
[00:29:14] I love that gun.
[00:29:14] I'm looking forward to it.
[00:29:15] That secondary shock gun is going to clutch now.
[00:29:17] All right.
[00:29:18] And I mean, we've got those three operators covered.
[00:29:20] However, we do have other changes coming.
[00:29:21] You already talked about five other operators.
[00:29:24] And I think they're not as significant, but still
[00:29:26] interesting in their own right, right?
[00:29:27] Yeah.
[00:29:28] So these changes are definitely focused on quality of life
[00:29:31] and kind of more refined.
[00:29:32] Like there are smaller changes to give you
[00:29:34] that extra little bit of comfort that you kind of look for.
[00:29:36] And you can feel that resistance sometimes
[00:29:38] when you're playing a game.
[00:29:39] And right off the bat, we're looking at glass.
[00:29:42] When you scope in with a scope, there is,
[00:29:45] when you're moving, it'll get fuzzy.
[00:29:47] Everyone kind of has experienced this.
[00:29:49] It normally takes about 12 seconds to fully lose
[00:29:52] its image.
[00:29:53] We've bumped that up to 15.
[00:29:54] So you have a little bit more time
[00:29:55] to keep that movement going and be
[00:29:57] with it to kind of move a bit, stop, get that control, reset it, move a bit, stop, get
[00:30:01] that control, reset it. So again, quality of life, just giving you a little bit more functionality
[00:30:06] and 12 to 15, again, one second to lifetime, it can make a big difference.
[00:30:11] It said that we have an update for clash, the taser will be actually increased by
[00:30:14] five seconds, so it'll last a little bit longer. Just to give her that extra little
[00:30:18] bit of flexibility there. Grim, Grim, okay, we got to our book.
[00:30:22] a buff. Yeah, more buffs. No. Okay. So here's the thing. Nerves are not gone. And that's the
[00:30:28] thing that we have to kind of address and look at. But the one thing is the day of doing multiple
[00:30:33] nerfs that are really heavy handed, that is gone. Okay, unless there's an emergency. And I want
[00:30:37] to be very clear about that. Because our whole monitor going into balancing is we want to embrace
[00:30:42] the fun we want to have an enjoyable experience for everyone. But we want to be competitive.
[00:30:47] This is seeding we take the game serious, we want to be kind of locked in. So occasionally,
[00:30:52] Usually we are going to have to nerf stuff down, bring things in a line a little bit,
[00:30:55] right?
[00:30:56] And we're doing that with Grim.
[00:30:57] This is for more high-level play as well.
[00:30:59] So basically, when you shoot the canister, there's two stages to it.
[00:31:02] It shoots it out, and then it deploys the actual payload that has the bees in it.
[00:31:06] During that deployment, that payload is vulnerable.
[00:31:09] You can shoot it.
[00:31:10] We're increasing the window and which you're going to be able to take it down.
[00:31:14] So again, if you're using the bailiff, opens up the wall on site and lobs one
[00:31:18] of these into the site, you're going to have the chance to be able to deal
[00:31:21] with it.
[00:31:22] at least a bigger window to deal with.
[00:31:24] The audio key was well for that.
[00:31:25] Yeah, I have to click click and then the boom, while
[00:31:28] depending if it's a bank shot or if it's a sticky, yeah, I can
[00:31:31] can change. Next we have frost. Yes. So frost, obviously, if
[00:31:36] you land in one of these traps, you're not having a good day.
[00:31:38] But like, if you pull yourself out of the trap, you get a
[00:31:42] 60 second debuff, which makes you limp, makes you leave a
[00:31:46] trail, and makes you make a lot of noise. You're kind of
[00:31:49] dead to rights at this point, usually. But yeah, we're just
[00:31:53] going to twist the knife more. We're adding 10 seconds to that
[00:31:56] debuff. So it's 70 seconds if you get caught one of these
[00:32:00] traps and sell for five. It's again, they encourage folks to
[00:32:04] a help each other. Yes, if you if your teammates in the trap,
[00:32:07] pick them up, they don't get the debuff. If that's the case,
[00:32:09] or be just don't, you know, drone, don't go in the trap in
[00:32:12] the first place. So that's kind of the aspect there. And
[00:32:16] then last we have Thunderbird. Thunderbird it while
[00:32:18] The healing in seeds is always an interesting one and one of the key things is rate of healing.
[00:32:22] This is something we've been looking into a bunch.
[00:32:24] So we're adjusting the rate of healing of our cone of stations from 2 HP a second to
[00:32:29] 3.
[00:32:30] So you'll actually get the full health a lot faster and you will get the full health
[00:32:32] as long as you don't take more damage.
[00:32:34] That's the feature that's already been there.
[00:32:35] I think also this is, I guess, a representative of a shift in our mentality in terms of balancing.
[00:32:40] This is not going to be the last time we do mid-season balancing.
[00:32:42] This is now a permanent thing that we're going to be looking at every season, correct?
[00:32:45] Yeah, we're going to be doing the mid-season balancing as well as when we launch.
[00:32:48] Also, we have two refines per season.
[00:32:50] So, you know, we've been doing a lot of buffs and we've been doing a lot of updates and it's going to keep going.
[00:32:55] So, you know, it's even, you know, we're doing a big mid says now three weeks later, we're going to be doing a refine balancing.
[00:33:00] And then after that, as to comes another big major balancing is going to hit with that season as well.
[00:33:05] So it's there's a lot coming and the game is changing often.
[00:33:08] Yeah.
[00:33:09] When I think that's exciting.
[00:33:11] Personally, yeah, I mean, it's a big thing for us to be able to deploy updates every three weeks,
[00:33:15] Because that's ultimately what we're doing and have access to that from like a like a live service approach
[00:33:20] It's incredible. It allows us to be more reactive if a situation arises
[00:33:24] But also allows us to plan stuff like kind of further out make touchpoints with our community through those surveys
[00:33:30] Or even seeing them in person at different events and be able to bring that feedback in faster
[00:33:34] Because we actually have access to it. We're able to do that
[00:33:36] I think one thing to be to note though is that even though I won't leak all the changes
[00:33:42] coming because there's so much stuff coming but
[00:33:44] The reality is, if we do massive drops of like 50 changes or something like that,
[00:33:50] we lose track of how we can actually track the game and understand what's impacting what.
[00:33:54] So it's important that we are staging that stuff in order to react to the impact that this has.
[00:33:59] As everyone who like really is in deep into siege, one factor can have a cascading effect
[00:34:05] across multiple operators and multiple sites and kind of do this thing.
[00:34:09] So we need that data to kind of solidify as it moves forward to.
[00:34:12] And speaking of data, we do have testing grounds
[00:34:14] that you've used in the past for other types of changes.
[00:34:17] Is this something you would consider
[00:34:19] for these balancing elements,
[00:34:20] or is it just more of the live approach
[00:34:22] and taking this slower approach to it?
[00:34:25] Yeah, I think with testing ground,
[00:34:26] well, when we talk about our balancing
[00:34:27] and everything like this,
[00:34:29] one of the big things is we have the opportunity
[00:34:31] of doing workshops with players
[00:34:33] that say the major in the SI and stuff like this.
[00:34:35] Getting stuff in players' hands early,
[00:34:37] getting the feedback, that's one way we can do that,
[00:34:39] especially with balancing.
[00:34:40] When it comes to testing grounds,
[00:34:41] this is more systemic level changes.
[00:34:44] Speed and armor was the one that we had tested first
[00:34:47] and then, I mean, we have half reinforcements
[00:34:49] coming later this year.
[00:34:50] These are systemic things.
[00:34:52] And even with half reinforcements,
[00:34:53] it's really about how does that fit in the system?
[00:34:55] Where is it gonna go?
[00:34:57] But that's the avenue we wanna apply
[00:35:00] testing ground kind of that platform for, but yeah.
[00:35:03] Okay, and I guess next question is,
[00:35:05] what's your ideal outcome, right?
[00:35:07] All these changes are coming through.
[00:35:08] You're watching what's happening.
[00:35:10] What's the best thing that can happen out of all this for each operator, for example?
[00:35:13] I mean, it sounds kind of cheesy, but just that people are having fun.
[00:35:16] Like, this is honestly what it all comes down to is that as much as CG is super competitive
[00:35:22] and we want to take it seriously, like it's still a video game, it's still entertainment
[00:35:26] and it needs to be that first.
[00:35:28] We need to have fun with it.
[00:35:30] And that's fundamentally what we want to strive towards, is that you're not booting
[00:35:35] up the game and being frustrated the whole time you're playing, but you're having
[00:35:37] a great time.
[00:35:38] You can't wait to play with the squad.
[00:35:39] I can't wait to see what that next update is like, I mean, I know I'm beyond stoked about
[00:35:44] rank 3.0, that's the reality of it.
[00:35:47] And then, just to make it a point of joy in your life, because it's a hard game.
[00:35:53] We know this, and we'll talk a little later with onboarding stuff, but like it's the
[00:35:57] reality is we just want you to have fun when you're playing.
[00:36:00] Yeah.
[00:36:01] Okay, do you want to?
[00:36:02] Well, like I was just saying, like with the changes to the maps, through the
[00:36:04] ranked map rotations, the changes to the balancing. The game is evolving at a faster
[00:36:09] pace than ever. Like just the jackal change, you know, being a scan from jackal from below
[00:36:14] and then being able to play off of like a jackal scan with communication within your
[00:36:18] team, like it's one element, but then being able to do that on different maps within ranked,
[00:36:22] the game is changing at such a fast pace that we're still kind of, you know, testing
[00:36:26] the waters on like the rate of all these kind of changes coming in and do players,
[00:36:31] you know, do they want more, do they want less?
[00:36:34] And I know we were also looking at like, you know,
[00:36:36] weapons as well as like the different types of weapons
[00:36:38] that are, you know, being discussed within the community
[00:36:40] and how to make those changes appropriately.
[00:36:42] So we are listening to the community.
[00:36:44] I think that's a really good point to mention though,
[00:36:46] is the fact that the rate of change,
[00:36:47] this is a significant adjustment for siege,
[00:36:50] like coming out of year 10, season four and into year 11.
[00:36:53] And we are monitoring that closely
[00:36:54] to see how the community is reacting to it
[00:36:56] and less or more and whatnot.
[00:36:58] But like you said, listening,
[00:36:59] especially when it comes to balancing,
[00:37:00] We know there are key things that the community is talking about and leaks and stuff, but
[00:37:05] if I can tease a few things we are looking at, if that's all right, I'm asking permission,
[00:37:11] I'm just going to do it anyway.
[00:37:13] But we know IANA, NOC, Zofia, these are operators that players are giving us feedback on and
[00:37:20] that we're actively digging into them.
[00:37:21] Okay, cool.
[00:37:22] I think something else that's really interesting about these changes is that it can also
[00:37:25] change the meta a little bit in terms of what people play, and maybe people might
[00:37:28] start exploring new operators.
[00:37:30] Is that kind of the intent here, or is just kind of a nice side effect?
[00:37:33] How are you looking at it?
[00:37:34] Yeah, absolutely.
[00:37:35] Like, we are looking to kind of like, mix things up at the end of the day.
[00:37:39] You know, Smoke having the shield back, now Smoke might be played.
[00:37:42] It was played a lot before when he had the shield, so that's coming back.
[00:37:45] All of a sudden, Smoke's played more often, so you have that stalling techniques that
[00:37:48] are coming into play a little bit more in those rank matches.
[00:37:51] So like, all these things just keep changing and evolving, and then we get to kind
[00:37:54] of play and almost like kind of counter through different buffs, operators that are now
[00:37:59] being brought into that rotation and are on the field and can make a difference.
[00:38:03] Nice. All right. Well that being said we talked about fair, we talked about maybe a
[00:38:08] little frustrating sometimes for some operators and yeah there's one operator
[00:38:13] of course that is fun to play but sometimes can be frustrating to go
[00:38:17] against and that is Doka B right and that's why you know we got this Doka
[00:38:21] B remaster announced a lot of people viewed it and they saw it and said well
[00:38:25] this looks like a nerf. What was the reason she was targeted? Is it basically what I just summed up?
[00:38:32] Yeah, it's important to that. I mean, with all remasters, we have a very specific kind of approach,
[00:38:37] which is we've exhausted all of their balancing levers to really bring them in mind and alleviate
[00:38:42] the problems we're seeing, which Doka had a huge frustration problem around her, the fact that
[00:38:48] one operator with one charge of a primary gadget can affect an entire opposing team
[00:38:53] and in multiple ways. Like she can reveal your location, making you an easier target to kill,
[00:38:58] give away any strategy of stealth or something like this, if that's what you're trying to do.
[00:39:02] And then if she hacks a phone, say goodbye to all your primary gadgets if your maestro,
[00:39:06] Echo, or Valkyrie, and that's multiple gadgets just off the board or now in biabilities,
[00:39:12] not to mention PPCs and everything else. So it was a huge power space in which she was
[00:39:17] holding. The thing is, just using the same mentality of balancing is like we don't want
[00:39:22] want to strip her of the fun. She is an absolute hacking mastermind. And we want to make sure
[00:39:27] she maintains that and keeps that essence alive and really shows up in a big way and
[00:39:32] has again controls that impact because she needs to have that impact. Just maybe not
[00:39:38] as global with how she was attacking everything at once.
[00:39:40] I think the important thing right is that you're maintaining her essence. Correct?
[00:39:44] Yeah. Yeah. So I think there's a couple of interesting things that are happening
[00:39:47] especially with Doka is when we look at her, we have a really, a bit of a new
[00:39:52] approach to where narratively, a lot's happened to her. She was captured by
[00:39:57] carries and she went through a lot of stuff. So that will change you and they
[00:40:01] can evolve the way you look at the world and how you go about it. And we've
[00:40:05] initialized that into the character development of her remaster. So because
[00:40:10] of those events, she is taking a different approach on how she does
[00:40:13] what she does. It's very targeted, it's very precise, and I'll spoil everything that I want.
[00:40:23] If you want more information on the Doke for your Master, it will be revealed with the Season
[00:40:26] 2 reveal happening at the Major in Salt Lake City, so make sure you tune in for that for all the
[00:40:31] details there, but we'll end that discussion for now before maybe Josh says something we
[00:40:35] shouldn't say. No, I'm kidding. All right, let's go in to a discussion now on future
[00:40:40] remasters, right? Are there any others that are coming? Yeah, well, we announced that we're actually
[00:40:44] doing another remaster for Season 4. This is our final remaster. We announced that at the SI,
[00:40:51] being that we won't go into the same kind of caliber of saying, hey, remaster this season,
[00:40:57] brand new op this season. Going to Year 12, it's a new op every season. So this is our final
[00:41:03] remaster. The concept of reworking an operator isn't gone, though. And I want to make that
[00:41:09] clear like we've kind of gotten to the point where we still have levers on our
[00:41:12] operators to kind of play with but a rework of the past may still return if
[00:41:17] that makes sense. Okay and anything you can tease maybe about this? I think that
[00:41:23] the core part is even though we're going to new operators every season we're not
[00:41:28] going to be neglecting those other operators and if some needs a little
[00:41:31] bit more heavy lifting to kind of get the job done we're still up for that
[00:41:34] task. Yeah and I think as far as teasing for my own personal health I'm
[00:41:37] not gonna do that. Okay, fair enough, fair enough. Actually, one thing I wanted to talk
[00:41:41] about a little bit more is you mentioned that, you know, remasters probably won't be happening,
[00:41:45] but you're still gonna pull some levers, right? Yeah. In terms of balancing in the future.
[00:41:49] So it might not be a remaster, but there'll still be changes that could be made, perhaps
[00:41:52] like Aurora, for example, you know, a lot of different changes coming through for her
[00:41:55] size. And it's not really necessarily a remaster, per se, correct? Yeah, like, I mean,
[00:42:02] like she's a great example, but even I always keep going back to Thorne, but
[00:42:05] Yeah, a pretty strong one where those are the levers built into her already and we were able to revamp how she's played in the game and really, honestly, I think bring her to where everybody felt she should be.
[00:42:17] Probably like,
[00:42:21] So that was a pretty big deal to be able to do that and that is using our levers we have in place because every time we build a new operator, like everyone that's in development right now.
[00:42:29] The key aspect is to have multiple levers in place
[00:42:33] so that we can continue to tune them as the game evolves
[00:42:36] because we know it's going to evolve.
[00:42:37] Players are going to get better.
[00:42:38] They're going to change up their strategies.
[00:42:40] We want to be able to be reactive.
[00:42:42] And the key way of doing that is making sure
[00:42:43] we have those levers in place.
[00:42:45] So even from a new operator design point of view,
[00:42:48] we've adjusted the way that we kind of do our new ops.
[00:42:50] Fair enough.
[00:42:51] All right.
[00:42:52] And while we are already seeing on your screen guys,
[00:42:53] we're jumping back into the STL match
[00:42:54] to see what's going on here.
[00:42:56] And do you know which teams are plugged?
[00:42:58] There we go.
[00:42:58] I love the names any research that you're going to be doing on are you going to be facing
[00:43:04] you have a match later right I do I do have a match as soon as I'm done this I have to
[00:43:07] like packing my stuff at my desk and then run home because I have my match but the thing
[00:43:13] the funny part about the names too is that the names are they carry over season to
[00:43:16] season so the players swap out but the name remains so you come part of the legacy
[00:43:20] of the team which is true there yeah and there's like discord channels that we're
[00:43:25] talking and stuff but the funny part about that is the team I shouldn't say this
[00:43:28] because if you're watching, but the team I'm going against today, I'm still in their discord.
[00:43:32] Oh, I didn't, I didn't, I didn't check, I didn't check, but I'm saying maybe maybe on the way home.
[00:43:45] All right, well, that being said, let's jump into our next topic here. And I mean, this kind
[00:43:50] of ties in with what we're doing at STL, you know, we have that more recruit league that's
[00:43:53] coming through. And obviously, we were always looking at ways to make people feel more
[00:43:57] comfortable when they're onboarding and you know that's what's happening here
[00:44:01] with this new onboarding experience Chris that's going to be coming through
[00:44:05] and that being said there was already an onboarding system in place it was
[00:44:08] working it seemed to be working why change it now yeah so onboarding is
[00:44:12] what we call an ever-active topic right it's it's never going to go away
[00:44:16] for Siege the skill floor is just too high as much as we try to lower it
[00:44:20] through all the different onboarding changes and so on it just remains a
[00:44:22] very high skill floor we tried to adjust the skill floor without touching
[00:44:26] the skill ceiling, because that's what makes Siege Siege, right, is that it has a very
[00:44:30] high skill ceiling. So one of the key aspects that we've been really looking at is, you know,
[00:44:35] how do we continue to improve? We've actually seen a lot of improvements, especially starting
[00:44:39] in season four. We had bot teammates that had shown up. That's working very well. We had the
[00:44:45] Clearhouse that got added, a great PVW e-way to learn maps. We had the mini map appear for
[00:44:50] the first time. We have a lot of different improvements that have been slowly rolling
[00:44:54] out and we have seen a lot of big gains but yes we are going to be adding a new feature
[00:45:00] coming in season two. And what does the new onboarding plan look like? So it's centered around
[00:45:06] our bots so our bots are machine learning bots as you might remember so that means we don't have
[00:45:12] a designer telling the bot how to behave or where to place the gadget or where to go roam or
[00:45:16] so on we actually feed it live player data and then the bots just act out that data so
[00:45:22] where to place the gadgets, where to roam, where to anchor, which weapon to use, which secondary
[00:45:27] to use, all of this is actually dictated directly from the bots themselves. So for the first time,
[00:45:33] we're actually going to be bringing bots into Quickmatch exclusively for new installs only.
[00:45:40] So if you've just installed the game, you've never played Siege before, there's a chance in
[00:45:45] your very, very first matches of Quickmatch that you'll be able to play against a bot match.
[00:45:49] The reason why we're doing this is we still struggle against putting new players into our existing PVP pool.
[00:45:56] Going up against quick matches is very, very difficult for us to give them or tweak with them a positive experience.
[00:46:04] Basically, a lot of our players, even if we try with our skill-based matchmaking or trying to incorporate with clearance level,
[00:46:11] it still has limitations because players know maps, they know operators, they know how to play and counter,
[00:46:17] and new players just get destroyed basically.
[00:46:20] Yeah, I mean to be honest with you, I used to play at the beginning of Siege
[00:46:23] and then I hadn't played for a long time and then I started again and I was like,
[00:46:26] oh my god.
[00:46:27] So yeah, this is a really good opportunity for like that to be a little bit
[00:46:31] slower and like just okay introducing you slowly to everything that's going on
[00:46:34] as opposed to like just getting absolutely destroyed immediately as
[00:46:38] you're jumping in. So yeah, there's multiple phases, right? Of this, there's...
[00:46:41] Yeah, absolutely. There's phase one. So phase one is again, this is
[00:46:46] exclusively for new installs that have ever played before.
[00:46:49] They will play against a, with bot teammates,
[00:46:53] going up against a team of bots.
[00:46:55] After they play a couple matches, they go to phase two
[00:46:58] where they have players on their team
[00:47:00] and they're going up against bots.
[00:47:02] And then finally phase three,
[00:47:03] which is an improved matchmaking that we're trying
[00:47:05] with including clearance level as a higher value
[00:47:08] to try to match those new players together.
[00:47:11] So this is something that we're testing.
[00:47:13] I do know and I'm aware that it's a sensitive topic.
[00:47:16] bringing bots into Quick Match. Again, it's exclusively only for new installs, new players.
[00:47:22] But we are talking today with our most active community. So if there's opportunities where
[00:47:29] players see, for us to maybe bring bots into other situations, we're open to listening to it.
[00:47:36] We're also, I'm okay to come back to a live stream like this and say how it went.
[00:47:41] This is a test that we're doing in Season 2 with those new installs, with those new players.
[00:47:45] and let players know how did it go.
[00:47:49] But thinking about situations, right?
[00:47:50] Like right now we don't backfill if it's match point
[00:47:54] and quick match.
[00:47:54] So sometimes you end up in like a 5v3 or even worse.
[00:47:58] And that was quick match matches.
[00:48:00] And what ends up happening is that it just
[00:48:02] encourages other players to leave.
[00:48:03] And then the match just kind of falls apart.
[00:48:05] And sometimes it was a good match.
[00:48:07] So maybe there's an opportunity
[00:48:08] there in match point to backfill with bots potentially.
[00:48:12] That's just one example.
[00:48:13] Another example could be, I'm
[00:48:15] a player that hasn't played for years and I come back to Siege maybe it's okay
[00:48:19] to have a couple of bot matches to kind of warm up in that experience but again
[00:48:23] that's not what we're doing with season two. Season two is just I've never played
[00:48:27] Siege before I click on PvP you might get a bot match. Okay I mean and by the way
[00:48:31] guys if you want to see stuff like that like what Josh just mentioned in
[00:48:34] terms of bots please let us know in the chat we might do a seasonal survey at
[00:48:37] some point who knows but yeah we're always listening we're always
[00:48:40] watching we're always seeing what you guys want to have in the game. So if I
[00:48:44] If I don't mind just one more thing. Again, we are talking to our most active community today.
[00:48:48] So I'll just say how do I identify a bot? So there's three ways that you can identify if it's a bot
[00:48:55] that you're playing against. One is there's a number at the start of their name. So that's one
[00:49:01] of the giveaways is that bots would always start with a number at the beginning of their name.
[00:49:05] Another one is you can't add them as a friend. And another one is you can't report them.
[00:49:10] So those buttons are just missing on the player profile panel, for example.
[00:49:15] So that's like a telltale sign. Once again, it's only for new players, new installs.
[00:49:20] Ideally players are not smurfing, but if you want to see what are those signs for,
[00:49:25] is that a bot or not, those are the telltale signs.
[00:49:28] Fair enough. And I guess another thing that's important with these bots, or maybe it's not
[00:49:31] important, I'm just curious, like, do you feel like they're representative of how a human
[00:49:36] might act in a real game?
[00:49:38] Yeah, they're getting better. Honestly, we have a full team that's constantly working on our bots and
[00:49:43] improving them season by season, adding new bots to play as or new operators that you can play against.
[00:49:49] Like there's some operators like Azami that's been very difficult for us to bring into the
[00:49:54] bots matches. But ultimately, they are improving. And do they replicate player behavior? Yes,
[00:50:00] because they're given player behavior to play off of. So they're basically kind of replicating
[00:50:05] very common situations.
[00:50:07] Okay.
[00:50:08] And let's see here, just I think I have, yeah, okay.
[00:50:13] This is actually an important one that I want to ask you.
[00:50:15] So can you skip these phases if you just want to jump straight into PvP?
[00:50:21] So for Season 2, the answer is no.
[00:50:23] The reason why, again, it's a test.
[00:50:25] We're wanting to see what the value is on having those bot matches at the beginning of a player's journey.
[00:50:30] So encouraging that we do have the data ultimately on reflecting our players playing more matches
[00:50:37] Are they sticking around? Are they falling in love with the uniqueness of Siege?
[00:50:40] Those are interesting data points that we really want to learn. So in season 2 the answer is no
[00:50:46] But for the future we'll discuss them again
[00:50:49] I'm happy to come back and report back on how the test went. Absolutely
[00:50:52] And I think we already covered this this next one that I was curious about
[00:50:55] but will bots be introduced in regular game modes
[00:50:59] or is it strictly front-boarding?
[00:51:00] But you already mentioned, right?
[00:51:01] That's something that we want to do.
[00:51:02] Exclusively for new installs.
[00:51:03] Exclusively for new installs, and that's it.
[00:51:06] So, yeah, I think that pretty much
[00:51:08] covers up our conversation on that one.
[00:51:11] But one more conversation, one more topic,
[00:51:13] we kind of want to go through is player protection.
[00:51:16] Kind of an update on what was happening previously, right?
[00:51:19] And what we talked about previously
[00:51:20] and let you guys know how it's going.
[00:51:22] So I guess my question to you then, Chris,
[00:51:23] is how are things going? Is there any updates you want to share?
[00:51:26] Yeah, so last time we did a community live stream, it was 100% focused on player protection.
[00:51:30] Actually, no, we touched on testing grounds as well, but mostly it was on player protection.
[00:51:36] So ultimately, we announced that we are going to start banning on Maus Trap, and I'm happy
[00:51:40] to say that we have started banning on Maus Trap. We've been banning our worst offenders.
[00:51:44] We've been banning those that are showing other telltale signs of being a bad actor
[00:51:48] within our community, and Maus Trap bans have begun. Additionally, we did a major
[00:51:53] update to Mousetrap and we found it to be six times more effective identifying a
[00:51:57] mouse and keyboard in a console pool. We're well aware that there's more work to
[00:52:01] do in terms of detecting recoils. We mentioned last time in the community
[00:52:05] lab stream we are actively working on this and we'll have more to announce
[00:52:08] soon but for MNK on consoles so players playing mouse and keyboard in
[00:52:13] consoles we've started the band phase and we've been improving our systems.
[00:52:16] And are there any other updates? I know last time we talked about toxic
[00:52:20] behavior and moderating text chat and voice chat. Has anything changed there?
[00:52:24] Yeah. So last time we talked about the sensitivity levels, like not all players
[00:52:28] have the same sensitivity levels. What we've done is to basically taken a big
[00:52:31] step back in terms of how sensitive the systems have been. Players are likely
[00:52:35] noticing that they're getting flagged less often, right? Then for the, the
[00:52:40] chat communications. Also, we completely stripped away the idea of
[00:52:44] something that's slightly offensive or moderately offensive. We just said,
[00:52:48] you know, just let that roll.
[00:52:50] You don't see that yellow text anymore that says,
[00:52:51] hey, maybe this is offensive.
[00:52:53] We just remove that idea altogether.
[00:52:56] There's one other thing that we've been working on,
[00:52:58] which is we've been trying to detect positive communication.
[00:53:02] So players that are making callouts,
[00:53:04] players that are saying, you know, upstairs,
[00:53:06] you know, downstairs, you know, big tower,
[00:53:08] like those are strong positive callouts
[00:53:11] that are helping with the match.
[00:53:12] That's being a good teammate.
[00:53:14] So if players check the Reputation Center,
[00:53:16] they're likely gonna see they're getting flagged
[00:53:18] for positive communication at a much higher rate
[00:53:20] than they were in the past.
[00:53:21] That's awesome, yeah.
[00:53:22] Always important to have that to be reinforced, right?
[00:53:25] Anything else you want to share regarding
[00:53:27] player protection before we move on?
[00:53:29] I think the key part is that it's, again,
[00:53:32] an ever-active topic for us.
[00:53:35] It's a mouse and cat game.
[00:53:37] We're always going to be updating our systems.
[00:53:39] We have a team that's fully committed to it.
[00:53:41] We've been ramping up.
[00:53:42] We had a lot of big wins,
[00:53:45] and it's going to be a topic
[00:53:46] we're always going to be committing to fight against and there's going to be up and downs,
[00:53:50] but stick with us because we are 100% committed to that fight.
[00:53:53] That's good. All right. That does wrap up our coverage here and I promise guys I haven't,
[00:53:57] I'm there. Okay. Hey, I just thought I, my camera wasn't seeing, we're seeing a lot of
[00:54:01] STL coverage coming through though. But yeah, if you guys have any questions that you want to
[00:54:05] ask in the chat, please do so now. If you already have been, we've been monitoring,
[00:54:09] we've been collecting them. So we're going to go through those soon. Before we do,
[00:54:12] we have some pre-submitted questions that we want to cover here and we'll go through them.
[00:54:15] guys feel free, whoever wants to answer them, I'm just going to throw them out there.
[00:54:19] So, first question is, and we may have already answered some of these, but
[00:54:23] is there a possibility of ranked map rotations while also removing the BAN system?
[00:54:28] So, right now we're not looking at removing the BAN system. We like the idea that it has
[00:54:32] some player agency in the match, so players can kind of choose, okay, I want to avoid that map,
[00:54:37] but I want to play on this map, etc. So, we still feel the map BAN phase has a place.
[00:54:41] I mentioned earlier in the discussion we were updating the rules that how we populate those maps
[00:54:47] You know a showcased map X amount to guaranteed to be pro maps and so on
[00:54:52] So that's something that we are actually bringing for season 2 with rank 3.0
[00:54:55] But as of right now, we're not removing the ban case. Okay, fair enough
[00:54:59] And then on the do could be remaster. I'm not sure we can answer this question
[00:55:04] I'm gonna put it here anyway
[00:55:05] If you can't just tell me so far
[00:55:08] It looks like Deimos where you choose someone and call them directly, which I think we kind of used at SI, right?
[00:55:13] Yeah, so I won't go into too much
[00:55:18] But yeah, she's definitely it's not the global call ability is the thing that we talked about it
[00:55:22] I said being removed soon. She no longer calls everybody a lot once but we have to look at
[00:55:27] Don't give these full kit. She had more functionality than just calling people
[00:55:31] She could hack into the network and that had functionality
[00:55:34] So there's other aspects that are existing in her kit and what she can do and of course like the
[00:55:40] effect of what she's doing and how is that effective compared to say a demo? Where is that intel
[00:55:45] coming from? How is that being communicated? These all change those different vectors.
[00:55:50] She's still a hacking expert. I think that's the best way to do it was, you know, thread the
[00:55:55] needle here. Okay, fair enough. Next question kind of very heavily focused on player protection
[00:56:00] here. When will we be seeing bands for macros and console cheaters? Yeah, so we know it's a big topic.
[00:56:06] We are actively working on it. We mentioned last time we actually had some partnerships with some
[00:56:12] pro teams that kind of really helped us gather some recoil data especially on PC. So we'll be
[00:56:17] bringing it to the PC pool first and then the console pool after we'll be looked at.
[00:56:22] It's something it's a big topic for us we're actively working on this.
[00:56:25] Okay, and the next question is actually pretty much the same thing, so we're
[00:56:30] going to move past that one. And then our ranked map rotations already being
[00:56:35] changed here, and we already discussed that already. Yeah, it's likely based on
[00:56:40] our seasonal survey where we, you know, kind of tease the fact that this season
[00:56:43] we're adding maps instead of swapping. And yeah, we did get cold feet on
[00:56:47] bringing some of those casual maps into our ranked, but also we're listening
[00:56:51] to our community like we had the seasonal survey out there taking for
[00:56:55] Vela as an example over 70% of players said this will negatively affect my
[00:56:59] ranked experience like it's how do you just add it and move forward we're open
[00:57:06] to continuing those discussions we do see opportunities to with these mini map
[00:57:11] reworks to bring updates we're gonna continue analysis on maps like
[00:57:15] especially maps that are not hitting the mark competitively for us because we
[00:57:19] do you want a larger pool so we can do the rotations more
[00:57:22] effective?
[00:57:23] The one thing that really came from that too is when we saw
[00:57:25] that data come in, we saw that 70%. I mean, that's a punch in
[00:57:27] the face. It's like, okay, yeah, we got a change of strategy
[00:57:30] here. And I remember the call we were in, we were talking about
[00:57:33] it, we were with Max, who's our eastwards director, and we're
[00:57:35] going over like nine maps, they're not moving. We need our
[00:57:38] nine pro maps 100%. We were talking about it. And I remember
[00:57:41] Chris said one point just said, well, if we just add them
[00:57:44] all in. And then I was like, Yeah, all right, let's do
[00:57:48] And again, we're chasing that fun and that entertainment and that's kind of the joy of it.
[00:57:53] We're mid-season, let's have a little spike of fun and change things up a little bit.
[00:57:57] Okay, and I guess another question on the maps, can you make it a map boat instead?
[00:58:02] Yeah, so that's a big change.
[00:58:04] I guess ultimately at the end of the day, if you look at it when we added new maps,
[00:58:08] we added Emerald Planes.
[00:58:10] This is now going back a long time ago, year seven, season one.
[00:58:13] But we added Emerald Planes.
[00:58:14] It was the first map we had added in a long time and it was just immediately banned
[00:58:17] and removed from the game.
[00:58:19] So would it have been voted on?
[00:58:21] Probably not.
[00:58:23] We then took a stance and said, going in with Night Haven Lab
[00:58:26] saying, well, guess what?
[00:58:27] It's a new map.
[00:58:28] Or at least its launch season is now going to be featured.
[00:58:31] And you won't be able to ban it.
[00:58:33] And what ended up happening is that Night Haven's appreciation
[00:58:36] increased over time.
[00:58:38] So we've had some different learnings about sometimes
[00:58:41] you have to say, this season we want it to feel different.
[00:58:45] We don't want it to feel more of the same.
[00:58:46] have a new map, guess what? It's gonna get played. Yeah, I think there are
[00:58:50] opportunities to find ways and get the community involved with decisions that
[00:58:53] are being taken here. Like obviously we're listening to surveys, but I'll go
[00:58:56] back to just, and this is kind of off the cuff, I'll go back to the example when
[00:59:00] we launched that Ash bundle. It was three different versions of Ash and the
[00:59:04] community voted on it, and that's what went live. I would love for more
[00:59:07] opportunities to do stuff like this with the content in the game. So maybe
[00:59:10] there are other things we can do, but we'll discuss when we'll figure
[00:59:12] out what those kind of touchpoints are to get the community involved and
[00:59:15] have impact from what's showing up in the season.
[00:59:18] All right, and I'll go ahead and say one last thing,
[00:59:20] like recently we did in April Fools.
[00:59:23] Yes.
[00:59:24] This is so good.
[00:59:25] It was kind of like we're having fun, obviously.
[00:59:28] We're bringing our most casual maps
[00:59:30] and putting it into our ultimately our most competitive
[00:59:33] playlist that we have.
[00:59:34] And it was pretty well received, right?
[00:59:37] So just because it's not necessarily in rank
[00:59:39] doesn't mean that those maps need to stay in casual.
[00:59:42] I think we can find other ways to have fun.
[00:59:45] anything? Okay, so I just wanted to make sure. Okay, and then the final question that we have
[00:59:50] previously been done, I'll go to live questions. For Secure Boot, will it eventually be rolled out
[00:59:54] into ranked and the whole game? I think we kind of covered this last time, but let's reiterate
[00:59:58] again. Yeah, so Secure Boot is definitely going to get rolled out. It's part of our Six Shield
[01:00:02] Guard Secure platform, which includes Secure Boot, TPM 2.0, and many other aspects. But
[01:00:08] ultimately, that's going to be launching for Legend Division. We're going to have that
[01:00:11] that rollout, we're going to see how that goes.
[01:00:13] And then if we get big wins through that system, then yes,
[01:00:16] we'll be looking at, where else do we bring it,
[01:00:18] including ranked.
[01:00:20] So that is a target for us, but it's not necessarily
[01:00:23] something that we'll be doing in the short term.
[01:00:25] For now, it's exclusive to the Legend Division.
[01:00:28] Okay, and it's like Chris mentioned,
[01:00:29] like when it comes to anti-cheat and protecting the game,
[01:00:33] this is an ongoing battle,
[01:00:34] we are never going to collect tools that are available
[01:00:37] to us that allow us to secure the game.
[01:00:39] And that's really what it is.
[01:00:40] and we are constantly looking at new technologies
[01:00:43] and new things that we can do and implement
[01:00:44] in order to keep the game secure
[01:00:45] so we can all just enjoy the game.
[01:00:47] Okay.
[01:00:49] We do have maybe still an elephant in the room here
[01:00:52] that we wanna address here
[01:00:54] and that's in terms of Marketplace, right?
[01:00:56] And what's happening there?
[01:00:57] Maybe you can give a quick rundown
[01:00:59] of what the current status is.
[01:01:00] Yeah, so Marketplace is still closed
[01:01:03] and ultimately we're just looking at account security.
[01:01:06] It opened up a lot of different exploits for players
[01:01:08] to be targeted for their accounts,
[01:01:10] for their inventories, for many different aspects.
[01:01:13] And we just need to make sure that we keep players safe.
[01:01:15] So at the end of the day,
[01:01:16] that's where the work is going right now.
[01:01:19] It's less about because we don't want it
[01:01:21] as part of the, oh, my.
[01:01:22] Those are proximity alerts.
[01:01:24] No more proximity alerts are gonna go through.
[01:01:27] But no, ultimately, we're looking at account security.
[01:01:32] And when we feel that the account security efforts
[01:01:34] are matched up to the expectations we have
[01:01:36] for Marketplace, we'll be looking at reactivity.
[01:01:38] And just looking to see if we have more questions come through a lot of it was honestly about marketplace
[01:01:45] I think people are just wondering what's going to be happen. Yeah, there's a lot of appetite for marketplace and I understand
[01:01:49] Yeah, for sure
[01:01:52] Someone's asking about DMRs and will they be updated or rebalanced? We are actually looking at DMRs right now
[01:01:59] okay, so as I mentioned earlier we're talking about like
[01:02:04] Nerfing different things because this DMRs are definitely in the category of they are needs to be adjustment there
[01:02:08] And the question is how do you do it without completely killing the weapon class and we have multiple avenues
[01:02:15] We're looking at next morning, but that testing is happening right now
[01:02:17] So it's been something we've talked to our pros and the pro workshops to get the understanding because obviously DMR
[01:02:23] Shop a lot more at higher-level lobbies just by the very nature of it
[01:02:27] And that's the funny thing is when you look at the data their pick rate is
[01:02:30] Like substantially smaller than like full ARs and stuff like this
[01:02:34] But just by the nature of the beast these you have to get your shots and you're probably seeing it in STL
[01:02:39] Like I'm sure people are running them
[01:02:41] But ultimately we are looking at them and trying to find essentially the best solution to keep them have
[01:02:48] Controlling the space just like an operator, but within the armory so I wouldn't say like also when you mentioned the bouncing and
[01:02:55] Looking at we don't look at just percentage. We look at the the MMR the play rate within those different
[01:03:01] and ultimately there's a bell curve.
[01:03:03] So when you go to the higher MMR,
[01:03:06] it is a smaller percentage of players
[01:03:07] because it's just a bell curve
[01:03:08] that's naturally how things will work.
[01:03:10] Well, we take that very seriously.
[01:03:12] Like we're not discounting it because it's a small percentage.
[01:03:15] In fact, that's the top of our game.
[01:03:16] So we do pay close attention to what's happening there.
[01:03:19] Right.
[01:03:19] And I think we've mentioned in a couple of things,
[01:03:20] like whenever we see, let's say, like SI is going on,
[01:03:24] whatever is happening on SI is gonna show up in the game
[01:03:26] at all, like multiple ranks,
[01:03:28] much further down than you'd expect,
[01:03:29] just because people start to mimic the strats that they see
[01:03:32] and they're like, okay, well, if they're running this DMR
[01:03:34] or whatever, I gotta learn it.
[01:03:36] And then it can amplify the impact in the overall game.
[01:03:39] But the point being, it's definitely something
[01:03:41] we're monitoring and adjusting.
[01:03:43] So regardless of how big any issue is,
[01:03:47] we still recognize it as something we wanna address.
[01:03:49] Okay.
[01:03:50] We have some more fun questions, let's say, coming in.
[01:03:54] Will we see night maps?
[01:03:55] Can we talk about that?
[01:03:57] I mean, it's just been asked a lot.
[01:03:58] No, no. So the one thing I've said about this lighting in general, when it comes to siege is we did a huge update for siege
[01:04:05] acts like this overhaul their entire lighting system, but that system's
[01:04:08] maturing. This is something that we're doing. We're improving it in the
[01:04:11] back end for ages development purposes, like behind the scenes development,
[01:04:14] making sure it's easier for our teams to use or artists to use. You can see
[01:04:19] that with the modernized maps. You'll see like just them looking so much
[01:04:23] more rich with everything going on. But it's an evolution of tech and we
[01:04:27] have to continue to make those evolutions. So investments in C.H. and investments in
[01:04:32] where we can take the game are things that we're always talking about the best
[01:04:37] like non-direct answer. Don't worry I'm calling myself on it.
[01:04:43] I mean look we got we were talking about balancing and stuff like that people
[01:04:49] are asking a 1.5 scope. 1.5 yeah so how do I so 1.5 is a really interesting
[01:04:57] one because it, it had all the benefits with none of the negatives. And, and that's one
[01:05:01] of the things we talked about in Siege is that there's pros and cons to every action
[01:05:04] you take, and there's pros and cons to everything you, you bring in your gear. So if you bring
[01:05:09] the DMR, you better hit your shots. And as we can tell, like not all players are at
[01:05:13] that skill. So they'll stay out fully automatic weapons. Right. But that's the same thing.
[01:05:18] Like depending on what you're bringing in the field, there has to be the repercussions
[01:05:21] we're doing so because the consequence is kind of in the
[01:05:24] nature of siege. The 1.5 really didn't have that it just was it
[01:05:28] was the joy of everything and I'm gonna admit I love the thing
[01:05:31] to like this is not like, not liking it but finding how we
[01:05:36] can make comfort there because there is a very real comfort
[01:05:40] conversation about that especially like, honestly,
[01:05:43] when we talk about console players, they sit 12 feet,
[01:05:45] eight feet away from their TV and stuff like this. So having
[01:05:48] that the proper verification that makes a big
[01:05:50] difference. We are constantly re-evaluating different sites, sites being the actual attachment,
[01:05:58] and looking into new ways in which we can enhance that experience in the gunplay overall.
[01:06:05] But again, you can't have all the things, because if you have all the things on one
[01:06:10] thing, you choose nothing else, and nothing else has purpose, so we have to keep that
[01:06:13] in mind.
[01:06:14] Another question on weapon balancing. Will the SMG-12 be nerfed, updated, or balanced?
[01:06:22] Can I just say yes to all those?
[01:06:27] Because, yeah, we're looking at it right now.
[01:06:31] Not in this patch, but it's definitely a focus.
[01:06:33] Yeah, because, again, listening to the community and looking at this stuff.
[01:06:37] Now, I'll say yes, but you don't know which one of those that I said yes.
[01:06:41] Yeah. Yeah. No, it's cool. Um, yeah, I'm just sorry. There's a
[01:06:46] lot of stuff coming in now. Um, again, I don't know if we can
[01:06:49] say anything here. You kind of hinted at it before Josh, but
[01:06:51] like someone's asking, when are we getting knocked Zofia and
[01:06:54] Yana buffs? That I'm not gonna spoil. Yeah. No, um, see, the
[01:07:00] final thing with that, there are a few levers left to to
[01:07:02] play with on these operators and to take a look in. Um, but
[01:07:06] I'll be honest, if we get to the point where those
[01:07:08] levers aren't making the needle move the way we need
[01:07:10] then it falls in that new kind of like re like a rework territory right and I think
[01:07:16] that's that's honestly like I can see that conversation in the community where
[01:07:19] people are like all this needs to be a remaster or rework this and the reality
[01:07:23] is we want to track a couple more leaders before we we go that far okay but
[01:07:28] that's how much care we have for each one of our operators that we don't want
[01:07:32] any of them to be questioned for their position in the game we want them to
[01:07:35] be like yeah they're awesome at XYZ I love that they're in my roster I'm
[01:07:39] Super pump that I have learned to play them because again, if you have a deep operated roster and you can just swap through
[01:07:45] Target ban me all day long. It's not gonna matter. You're gonna run out of bands
[01:07:48] So it's and that's ultimately as long as each offer to like owns their own little space, right?
[01:07:54] I guess is the point. Okay. Cool. Um, and then another question here
[01:07:58] Could we see secure area or hostage come to unranked or have a weekly highlight?
[01:08:04] Well, that's interesting. So we announced at the SI that we were looking into, you know, where does hostage faith ultimately secure is in that same conversation.
[01:08:14] Looking globally at those, the three game modes that we have today, like right now they're just lumped into quick match, and you have an option to kind of turn them on or off.
[01:08:23] Most people have turned them off and then they just forget what their settings were.
[01:08:26] settings were. And then after that they just go and they click quick match and they play bomb.
[01:08:31] Trying to highlight those modes because there are core modes that have been around for a long time.
[01:08:35] Like hostage is dear to my own personal heart because it was like the reveal trailer right like
[01:08:39] they were paying hostage. So you know trying to see if we can kind of capture the magic
[01:08:44] of those modes and try to highlight them. You know we talked about having fun with the
[01:08:47] siege cup you know like that could be a potential away but we are looking at ways that we can
[01:08:52] and support those modes more than we are today.
[01:08:57] But I think at the end of the day,
[01:08:59] learn this through the dual font,
[01:09:01] is that those modes need to be played.
[01:09:03] So how can we highlight those modes?
[01:09:04] How do we give them the space that they need to succeed
[01:09:09] and make sure that we can service them?
[01:09:11] And what we've heard from players,
[01:09:13] we actually did some workshops recently is that
[01:09:15] at the end of the day,
[01:09:16] there needs to be some kind of competitive edge
[01:09:18] with these game modes,
[01:09:19] or else they just kind of fall flat.
[01:09:20] So when we're looking at that more directly,
[01:09:23] it's like, okay, how can we kind of support that
[01:09:25] in the future?
[01:09:26] We have nothing to announce today.
[01:09:27] Okay.
[01:09:28] Go ahead.
[01:09:29] Well, I think the ultimate, like everything Chris said
[01:09:30] is like bang on.
[01:09:31] And then the reality is we recognize that bomb
[01:09:33] is the central pillar of siege.
[01:09:35] Right.
[01:09:36] Like there's no denying.
[01:09:37] But hostage is secured very much could be supporting
[01:09:40] around that central pillar.
[01:09:42] And that's honestly where we're looking into
[01:09:44] because we want to have that flexibility
[01:09:46] within the ecosystem of the game.
[01:09:49] Very cool.
[01:09:50] looking through more questions here. This one's kind of always a hot topic. So I guess I'll ask it for you guys
[01:09:55] since you've been asking. Are you adding a cogs back to defenders?
[01:10:02] I don't know if you probably can't answer that directly at all. But so I'll say this, I'll say that the like the
[01:10:09] point has been like, obviously, like it's been a point that we've talked about for while it's come up a
[01:10:14] It's not falling on deaf ears, if that makes sense.
[01:10:18] This is something we are actively listening to and making sure that we're finding ways in which we can do this.
[01:10:27] I mentioned we're looking at sites, so I know I'm being vague.
[01:10:30] No, it's okay.
[01:10:31] I mean, you can't always say exactly, but we're looking at it.
[01:10:34] See, there you go.
[01:10:35] I think that's the point.
[01:10:36] And I'm looking through to see if we've got more questions coming in.
[01:10:40] in not seeing anything. I want to get people like a couple of minutes to see if they have anything
[01:10:46] else they want to ask, but anything else you want to add on all the topics we discussed today that
[01:10:49] maybe you feel we might have missed or? I think honestly like just how much players enjoy these
[01:10:55] conversations, you know, and the types of topics that they'd want to see. Like we have lots of
[01:10:59] developers here on site that we can be talking to, talking about, you know, whether it's the
[01:11:03] universe and the lore, talking about, you know, our menu structures, talking about anything
[01:11:08] that they'd like to know about the game. Obviously Josh and I are always available, but there's other
[01:11:13] developers there here that can add a lot more insight into game development or sieges development,
[01:11:20] if you will. So just hearing about the topics that players want to hear with these live streams,
[01:11:26] I think that would be interesting. Absolutely. Yeah, so guys, keep your messages coming in.
[01:11:30] I think we're going to wrap up now, but thank you so much for tuning in to this community
[01:11:34] checkpoint. We will have another one very soon into the future. We're going to continue
[01:11:37] covering player protection is going to be an important focus for our community checkpoints.
[01:11:40] And of course, other topics like Chris was saying, anything else you guys want to hear about,
[01:11:44] please let us know. But for now, we are signing off. Thank you so much for coming out and hope
[01:11:49] I hope you have a great day.
[01:11:50] Thank you.