Rainbow Six Siege’s Operation Void Edge is finally live.
The Y5S1 update delivered a reworked version of Oregon, adjustments to the balance of some characters, and general quality of life and game health improvements. Most of the new additions made their way to the Test Server last month, but the latest live version will also include a series of minor nerfs to Ela and will finally re-enable Clash.
More importantly, Operation Void Edge added two operators to the game: Iana and Oryx. Both characters have refreshing gameplay elements and great utility. In typical Siege fashion, Year 5 Season Pass holders can play both operators as soon as they’re released, while the rest of the players need to wait another week to purchase them.
Here’s everything you need to know about them.
Iana
Iana is Void Edge’s attack operator. Her unique gadget is the Gemini Replicator, which creates a controllable copy of the character—like a moving version of Alibi’s Prism. The hologram can’t shoot, melee, or use gadgets, but it produces sound and can misdirect opponents. It allows her to scout ahead without being punished and has two main purposes: intelligence gathering and playing mind games with the enemy team.
Players must be careful when using the Gemini. Deploying the hologram has a visible animation in which a shiny yellow silhouette is rendered before actually converting into a shadow copy of Iana and can draw attention to her position. Each hologram runs on a small timer and there’s a cooldown between each use, which increases if the decoy is destroyed by enemy fire.
She’s a two-speed, two-armor operator who can choose between Nomad’s ARX200 and Ash’s G36C as a primary. Her loadout allows her to carry frags or smokes and both can be used for different situations. Using a frag to blow a hole in a wall can give players room to rotate with the hologram, while the smoke can be used as a distraction or give her enough time to deploy the decoy.
Iana has a handful of counters. Mute’s Signal Jammers will disrupt her holograms, similar to how it impacts drones in Siege. Players’ cameras will initially get the trademark interference effect, and if they still charge in the direction of the jammer, the decoy will destroy itself.
Bandit can also prevent her replica from entering an area by electrifying the barbed wire on the floor. The current will zap the decoy away and destroy it instantly. The hologram can’t shoot and is forced to find a way around the blockade.
Castle and Valkyrie are also two relatively minor counters to the operator. Castle’s barricades prevent the replicas from entering areas and pinging a decoy through Valkyrie’s Black Eye cameras won’t mark their location—a telltale sign that the character is a copy.
Oryx
The brutish defender doesn’t rely on subterfuge and deception to go into battle. Oryx is all about bull-rushing his opponents and moving quickly to gain an advantage on them. In fact, he doesn’t even have a gadget, in the most literal sense of the word.
His unique ability is called the Remah Dash and it allows him to sprint clean through breakable walls, creating a big, Oryx-sized hole in the wall—like a Looney Tunes character or the mascot for a certain brand of juice. Busting through breakable walls deals self-damage, however, so use it sparingly or ask your Doc for some health before rushing in.
His Remah Dash allows him to break through walls and to cover short distances quickly. Additionally, it’s a great countermeasure to Montagne’s towering shield. Just one well-placed tackle can bring the operator down on his back, making him an easy target. But Monty isn’t entirely helpless. A well-placed melee attack can kill Oryx before the impact lands.
Mobility is a vital aspect of Oryx’s kit. He can climb broken hatches, giving him great vertical mobility, or he can choose to hang from the edge and scout. This makes it easy for the character to reposition to get away from incoming threats or to lurk around waiting for their next unsuspecting victim.
Oryx is a two-speed, two-armor operator who can choose between the SPAS-12 shotgun or the MP5 SMG as his primary weapon, accompanied by the hard-hitting Bailiff 410 or the reliable USP40 as a sidearm. He can use barbed wires to slow opponents down or bulletproof cameras to gather intel.
Brute strength and mobility are two of his main advantages against his opponents, so operators who can punish those aspects can make his playstyle harder. Lion or Jackal can spot a moving Oryx, for instance, and negate the surprise value of an ambush or a tactical retreat. Nomad is also a threat to Oryx since he can bull-rush straight into one of her airjabs when making a quick rotation. The blast will send him reeling onto the ground and make him an easy target or at least alert attackers to his presence.
