It’s been long overdue, you know it, I know it. But I suppose it’s better late than never! Squad 5 is a system that allows us to recognize and award those community members who contribute in notable ways, often going above and beyond what a typical member might do. Their contributions help inspire and fuel our community, guide the direction of the game, and even fix some of the toughest issues. Without them, the game would surely be worse off. Be sure to congratulate these members wherever you see them, and may their badges inspire others and demonstrate our appreciation for their awesome efforts. From everyone at UWE: Thank you!! Reminder that you earn each Squad 5 badge level, one round of awards at a time. Starting from Blue, then Silver, then Gold.

 Squad 5 Silver @Katzenfleisch For massive contributions to the game, whether it be to NS2’s codebase or his own community projects such as his revival of the Faded mod. For tackling tough goals like entirely rewriting Whips, Cysts, commander issues and other long-standing bugs. He never hesitates to go after the hardest of bugs and shows a great ability to pivot and adapt to feedback. A great person to coordinate with and someone who reminds us of what a great community we have!
 Squad 5 Blue @Nin For leading the way in the modding community. Great ideas, optimizations, and fixes with the hundreds of commits for NS2 and NS2+. His personal modifications range from maps, to balance mods, to entire game modes such as Siege and Marine vs. Marine, forming a massive chunk of NS2’s workshop and a huge part of our hearts. Nin also organized the March Mod Madness event earlier this year, proudly showing off his and other’s talented Natural Selection modding projects. He continues to work with Steelcap on optimizations that the rest of the team hasn’t even considered due to the amount of labor involved. Here’s to you and all you do for the community!
@Steelcap For his amazing ability to prototype fresh (or crazy) ideas at the drop of a hat, providing valuable feedback and balancing concepts, and for always lending a hand wherever he can. This guy never misses a single playtesting session, and even attends the ones he isn’t scheduled for. He also assists and supports the competitive community through CompMod, and is always looking to optimize or contribute useful ideas such as the Gorge Tunnel Control mod. Give this man a medal for his efforts!
@Ixian For great contributions to balancing and design, testing said ideas to ensure viability in comp as well as pub, and of course being the premiere caster for NS2 matches. Deftly guiding the design and the presentation of our beloved game, Ixian is a familiar face of comfort in the oft heated and chaotic discussion of balance in NS2, offering in-depth reasoning and empirical analysis where often there is none. We are all lucky to have him with us - thanks for all that you do!
@IeptBarakat For submitting detailed design mockups, internal concepts for user interfaces, detailed bug hunting and reports, mapping contributions such as a redesigned Eclipse, as well as feedback for other community projects. You find the small things that seem to always slip past others, or in the case of Zavaro, the things he just didn’t check. Iept has long been a member of the Natural Selection community, and is certainly one of the brightest stars in its Constellation. May the community continue to benefit from you burning twice as brightly, but hopefully for more than half as long.
-Ironhorse