Rainbow Six Siege Shares First Details On New Operators And Operation Para Bellum Update

Rainbow Six Siege is quickly approaching its second season of Year 3, and Ubisoft has teased some of the new features it will have in store for players. Ahead of its full reveal next week, the publisher shared some details about the game's next big update, Operation Para Bellum, which will introduce new Operators, a Pick & Ban system, and more on PS4, Xbox One, and PC.

Headlining Operation Para Bellum are two new Operators. Ubisoft still hasn't shared many details about them just yet, but the publisher did reveal that they will both be Defenders. That stands in contrast to Siege's most recent pair of Operators, Lion and Finka, both of whom are Attackers. Fans recently discovered files for two Italian Operators named Alibi and Maestro within the PC version, although whether those will turn out to be the new Operators in question remains to be seen.

In addition to the new Operators, Season 2 introduces the aforementioned Pick & Ban system. As its name implies, this feature gives players the ability to counter opponents by banning certain Operators from play, which Ubisoft says will provide "an extra layer of strategy between teams."

Finally, Season 2 will bring with it a new map, intel gadget, and a number of gameplay tweaks. In particular, Ubisoft is adjusting dropshotting and introducing a new counter defuser animation. The full reveal of Season 2 will take place on May 19-20 during the Rainbox Six Siege Pro League Finals, which will be streamed on the game's Twitch channel. In the meantime, you can read more about Operation Para Bellum on Ubisoft's website.

Siege's most recent update, 1.2, arrived last week on all platforms. It didn't introduce any new features to the game, but it did make some big balance changes, particularly to Lion, who many players felt was overpowered. Ubisoft also adjusted damage dealt by light machine guns and fixed a variety of bugs. You can see the full list of changes that update made on the Siege website.