We’re stoked about entering the world of Rainbow Six Siege and we’re even more excited about our new team and their coaches. Entering the Australian region for R6 was a big decision and we have such high hopes for the players and for the ANZ community. We’re pumped to have them and we can’t wait to watch them play and represent Wildcard! We got to sit down and ask them a few questions in an effort to get to know them a bit better. Check out what they had to say!

How has working with Wildcard been so far? Are you as excited to work with us as we are to work with you?
Ethan: Wildcard has been extremely professional and welcoming so far, we are looking forward to the future under their brand.
Fluxx: Wildcard has made us feel right at home. They’re an organisation that we’re really proud to be representing, and they’ve given us an amazing opportunity to become the best we can.
syliX: Wildcard has been a great bunch to work with so far. Nothing but friendly interactions that really make us feel welcomed. I really look forward to developing the relationship between the team and the organisation.
Diesel: Everyone in the organisation has been great so far, we’re so excited to finally have a home and are ecstatic looking into the future under Wildcard’s banner.
Derpeh: I like how the owners have experience in the business as well, things have been running very smoothly thus far, and I hope to have success with Wildcard.
NeophyteR: I feel like everyone has been super friendly with us and making us feel comfortable. I hope to proudly wear the Wildcard brand and experience success.
EmoRin: Wildcard have been really friendly and it’s exciting to represent an organisation that cares about us as much as they do.

How did you get into R6?
Ethan: I’ve been playing FPS games from a young age, starting with Halo. Eventually I got interested in Siege after watching it on Twitch and seeing how different it was compared to every other FPS game and I knew I had to try it.
EmoRin: I have been playing FPS games for over 15 years on PC, the game I played the most is Counter-Strike 1.6 for at least 9 years and CSGO (Counter-Strike: Global Offensive) for a few years, I got bored of CSGO and that was when R6 came out so I decided to give it a go and it felt similar to Counter-Strike 1.6 with the mechanics so I have been playing ever since.
Diesel: I had been playing any type of popular video game growing up through my childhood like any regular kid, and then eventually got Siege for Christmas in 2015 on PS4 and instantly fell in love with the strategy and the intensity of the game and it just went from there.
Derpeh: I purchased Rainbow Six: Siege around July of 2016 with some mates that i used to play CS:GO with to try the game out. I ended up enjoying it at first, but I preferred CS:GO at the time. Eventually I came back after a break and haven’t stopped since!
NeophyteR: Been playing all sorts of FPS games over the years. Starting with Call of Duty, Battlefield, CS:GO and now R6. Started playing casually at first but soon got invited to play competitively and I decided to give it a shot.

How long have you been playing R6 for?
Ethan: I’ve been playing Siege since Red Crow, I made the switch to PC at the end of White Noise.
EmoRin: I’ve been playing R6 since it launched on PC Dec 2015, so about 3 years since I did skip 2 seasons of R6.
Diesel: I’ve been playing Siege since it’s release in December of 2015 and played casually up until switching to PC at the end of White Noise (around Jan 2018)
Derpeh: I’ve been playing since the end of the Dust Line Patch (July 31st 2016), I ended up playing the Skull Rain season,and the start of Red Crow (November 2016), Before I decided to take a break from the game for about 6 months to play CS:GO.I came back just as Operation Health started (May 2017), and I’ve been playing since that patch.
NeophyteR: I’ve been playing since Year 1 Season 3 (Operation Skull Rain). That amounts to over 5000+ hours of playtime according to Steam.

When you’re not playing R6 what are you playing?
Ethan: I try to avoid playing other games outside of R6 because for me it affects my own aiming ability, so usually I’ll be watching Twitch streams instead.
EmoRin: When I’m not playing R6, I sometimes go back to CSGO and play every now and then. I do enjoy playing RPG games and Rogue-lite games.
Diesel: I don’t play a lot of games outside Siege as this game is very demanding of your mechanics and maintaining a “brain for the game” but if I do play something, it’d be a fun multiplayer game like Deceit with mates.
Derpeh: I’m normally playing a game that is very chill to play, i.e. Rocket League, or the Total War genre, and FIFA.
NeophyteR: I don’t play many other games, if I do then it tends to be co-op titles that I enjoy playing with friends. Single-player games just don’t seem to entertain me as much as they used to.

What do your friends and family think about your professional R6 career?
Ethan: My mother is super supportive and understanding, whereas my father doesn’t really understand esports and isn’t very interested outside of the making money part haha.
EmoRin: At first my dad didn’t think much of it and wanted me to do something else with my life, but now I believe he is happy with how it all turned out.  All my friends and family have been very supportive with how I made it into the pro R6 scene.
Diesel: My family were a bit unsure of it all at first and just let me pursue it believing I knew what I was doing, ever since I went away to my first event my family have been super supportive and interested in it and it’s been great.
Derpeh: My family are very supportive about it, My brother is an avid LoL player, and he keeps up with the professional side of LoL, so he understands what I’m getting into, and is supportive about it. My mum is very supportive of me going professional, as she has taken time to drive me to the Sydney/Airport for events. My dad, on the other hand, is beginning to understand what I’m doing now that I’ve started to travel around for events.
NeophyteR: At first my family were skeptical about how much time and effort I put into Siege. That all changed after I qualified for the first ever ANZ LAN for Rainbow 6 and my family’s support has only been positive since.

Out of your 3 remaining match days in Pro League, who are you looking forward to playing the most? (Oddity, Fnatic, Zealous)
Ethan: I’m looking forward to our game against Fnatic personally, I think we have a great rivalry and every time we face each other it makes for an entertaining game.
EmoRin: I’m always looking forward to playing official matches, however, Fnatic is always going to be our toughest opponents in Pro League.
Diesel: Every game is so vital in Pro League to show up to every time and not drop points, otherwise it can ruin season come the end making Top 2, so I look forward to every single game and making sure we’re switched on. However, we have a great rivalry with Fnatic going so obviously you know it’s going to be a good game.
Derpeh: Personally, I always look forward to playing Fnatic and having a really good showing against them, but with that being said, Oddity is always a must-win game during the season, to guarantee the Top 2 spot.
NeophyteR: I look forward to playing against my old team Fnatic, they are always fun to play against and offer a serious challenge.

Who is your favorite operator? Why?
Ethan: My favourite operator at the moment has to be Mozzie, he has one of the coolest gadgets in the game, a secondary shotgun to do site construction and a C4.
Diesel: Smoke. Every day of the week. He’s been the strongest operator in Siege basically ever since release due to his shotgun being so strong for constructing the map to give your team advantages with rotations and such, as well as it just being great at close quarters with his secondary Smg-11, and his gadget is area denial which is so vital in a game like Siege.
EmoRin: One of my favourite operators would have to be Clash, she has a shield that she can push the enemy back and delay time.
Derpeh: Favourite operator has to be Maestro. Two cam’s that the attackers have to waste utility on in order to destroy them, a shotgun side-arm to help make rotates and the best gun on defence. He’s a menace.
NeophyteR: My favourite operator right now is Thatcher, His EMP’s are crucial to almost every attack round. With a solid primary, the L85A2, he can also perform well in a gunfight. Now he just needs an SMG-11 as a secondary and he’ll be even better.

Who is your least favorite operator? Why?
Ethan: My least favourite is Fuze, a 3 armor on attack with a pretty useless gadget.
EmoRin: Nøkk is one of my disliked operators as it would be situational to play her and would rely on trying to be stealthy, and she has no ACOG on attacker side.
Diesel: it would have to be someone like Fuze or Tachanka, both are 3 armour with very weak gadgets that leave you vulnerable as you need to be stationary which is detrimental in a game like Siege
Derpeh: Honestly, probably has to be Lion, let’s face it… who really likes Lion?
NeophyteR: Blackbeard right now offers very little to the attacker lineup. After several nerfs his face shield is too weak to be helpful in a gunfight. Combined with his slow sprint with the shield attached and mediocre gun he is boring to play.

If you could change anything about the game what would it be? Why?
Ethan: If I could change anything about the game it would be the engine, I hope there is an upgrade in the works.
Diesel: Just the way the game runs, if they were to polish the game and helped it run smoother it would be so influential from a competitive point of view.
Derpeh: I follow Ethan in this one, a new polished engine that is designed for an esports game, would unlock the potential of Rainbow Six and make it flourish.
NeophyteR: I honestly wish some of the operators were straight up deleted from the game, they can be useless, extremely frustrating to play against or feel unfair at times.
Fluxx: I’d love an improved game engine that increases the number of things you can do with the game, as well as the quality of the game. There’s different parts of other FPS games that I’d love for Ubisoft to integrate into Siege. CS:GO has a sandbox mode with unlimited ammo/utility; you can create community servers/maps for warming up ~  1vs1/retake servers. Battlefield has a lot of customisation options. It’d also be ideal if Siege was simply optimised better so that everyone could run it at more frames. An improved engine would also make everything smoother in opening up more possibilities for game balancing as well as fixing bugs, which Siege has had trouble with in the past after big patches.

What’s the most important skill to have when playing Rainbow Six Siege? Aim, Map Knowledge, something else?
Ethan: Communication and problem solving are the two most important things to have as a competitive player. Aim and reaction speed for someone that plays casually.
Diesel: Siege requires you to be an all-round player, for a competitive player to strive you need to have solid mechanics, but more importantly traits like understanding of the game, communication, teamwork, map knowledge etc.
EmoRin: A good skill in R6 would have to be Map Knowledge and Strategy since Siege is pretty unique with how you ATT/DEF, every round you play can be different depending on how everyone plays the game.
Derpeh: You really need to be an all-rounder in Siege. Communication, map knowledge, mechanics, and adaptability. You need to always overcome what the enemy is doing, and you need all of these abilities.
NeophyteR: Good aim can only take you so far. Having the ability to communicate well and having good map knowledge can win you many games.

Best advice you could give to someone who is learning how to play R6?
Ethan: Learn from every mistake, it’s a long process.
EmoRin: Map knowledge is always going to benefit you, it’s always going to be trial and error while learning R6.
Derpeh: Start off with gaining map knowledge, the best way to do this in my experience is to t-hunt. Then find a group of people that you can play with, and learn how to play and communicate.
NeophyteR: Take the time to learn the maps, be able to criticise yourself with every mistake.

For the coaches, what’s your favorite thing about coaching?
Fluxx: Seeing my team reap the benefits of what we’ve done in practice, and to see it flourish on match-day is a great feeling. Siege is more than just a shooter where you run around and try to click on as many heads as you can, there’s a lot of preparation that goes into improving your game as well as looking to disrupt your opponent’s, so the depth of the game means that there are always new things to discover, and always something new to learn.
syliX: I’ve always enjoyed the strategy aspect of the game. Seeing different tactics develop and evolve over time is always really interesting to see. As a coach, something that is really awesome to watch, from an external perspective, is the individual points of view and listen to the team’s communication when they are executing a tactic flawlessly. It’s moments like these that really make you appreciate how deep the game is.

What are your short term goals in R6 right now? How about long term?
Ethan: My short term goal for this team is to build more synergy, long term is making it to PL finals or a major.
EmoRin: I would love to make it to the Pro League Finals and eventually make it to a major event.
Diesel: Become a stronger team under this new banner and eventually make it to an international event.
Derpeh: Short Term is to improve as a team, and as a player, long term is definitely making it to an international event.
NeophyteR: To improve myself, to not make mistakes and keep learning. I would also love to make it to an international again in the future.
Fluxx: The goal for the short-term is to close out the online Pro League season strongly, and then work hard to book our ticket to the Season 10 Finals in Tokoname, Japan. In the long-term, I’d love to shape the team into one that’s always among the best in the region, and one that takes a spot to future international tournaments.

We’re expecting great things and we’re so excited to finally be apart of the R6 community. You can catch the team live for their first matchday under Wildcard tomorrow at 8:00PM AEST (6:00AM EST)! If you’re able to swing by the stream, which you can watch here https://wildcard.gg/r6/, show them some support and love and flash that #stackthedeck pride!