Oceania’s top Rainbow Six Siege competition, Oceanic Nationals, is returning for 2022 on March 25. Once three Stages long, it’ll be condensed down to two for the new year as a number of new organisations enter the Siege space.
Oceanic Nationals is returning for the third straight year in its current iteration, with the eight best ANZ Siege teams duking out for a five-figure prize pool across 2022.
The format has been condensed for this year, with the previous three Stages being reduced to two.
The first Stage will have a prize pool of $25,000 and follow the same best-of-one round robin into gauntlet-style playoffs format of last year. It’s set to begin today, March 25.
Stage 2 will take place later on in the year between June and August, with more details about prizing expected closer to the date.
The big format change is that there will now be promotion and relegation between Stages. Previously, OCL teams could only fight through the end-of-year promotion tournament for a slot — which FURY did successfully at the end of 2021. Now, the bottom-placed OCN team after Stage 1 will play the best OCL team for their spot in Stage 2.
Defending champions The Chiefs — who won all three Stages as well as the Season Finals in 2021 — have returned with a new-look roster minus Morgan “Fishoguy” Ishizaka and Jake “GodLgn” Harris (who are off to Bliss). The side has started off their APAC South campaign with a 2-1 record.
Wildcard, Knights, and Bliss have also returned, with the first two also joining Chiefs in APAC South.
However, four new teams will be lining up in 2022. This includes the newly-signed Vertex and Ground Zero (ex-FURY) rosters, as well as LFO squads Onami (ex-Rhythm) and LUDAVICA (ex-Overt).
There will also be an Oceanic Championship Series at the end of Stage 1 with all 16 teams across OCN and OCL taking part in the big bracket affair.
Snowball Esports will be providing coverage for Oceanic Nationals across the 2022 season, including interviews and the signature expert panel predictions.
Oceanic Nationals 2022 returns on March 25 at 7pm AEDT with Onami taking on Vertex. You can catch the action live on the Rainbow Six ANZ Twitch channel.
