Motivate.Trust Gaming Relegated From Upper Division After Playing 4v5 Due to Reconnect Bug

Motivate.Trust Gaming had to deal with an unfortunate incident during the final relegation Dota Pro Circuit (DPC) Southeast Asia (SEA) 2021-22 Tour 1: Division 1 match against Execration. Worawit "Q" Mekchai, the team's position four player, who was playing Mirana, reportedly experienced the "Reconnect" bug, which caused him to be permanently disconnected from the game. This resulted in Motivate.Trust Gaming playing a 4v5 game, with its players having to control Mirana in addition to their own heroes. The team, despite its best efforts, was unable to play optimally, which led to a defeat and relegation to Division 2.

The Reconnect bug, which causes players to accidentally press "Yes, Abandon Game", has affected both pro and casual games numerous times over the past year.

Motivate.Trust Gaming suffers from the Reconnect bug in crucial tiebreaker DPC game

OB.Neon dominated both Motivate.Trust Gaming and Execration in the first two games of the tiebreaker, so the two had to face each other in an elimination game. In the event of a loss, the losing team would be relegated to Division 2.

After a little over five minutes into the game, Q disconnected from the game. Soon after, the team noted in the all-chat that Q wasn't able to reconnect because of the infamous "Reconnect" bug. As a result, Natthaphon "Masaros" Ouanphakdee asked if the game could be remade, with Mark Anthony "Bob" Urbina, Execration's mid laner, scoring the two kills he had, but it wasn't to be and the game was unpaused with Mirana remaining disconnected.

Motivation.Trust Gaming began to play 4v5, and Souliya "JaCkky" Khoomphetsavong was farming really well on his safelane Wraith King, which gave some signs of hope. However, they were unable to overcome the odds and lost the match in 33 minutes. An unfortunate incident has resulted in Motivate.Trust Gaming becoming the second team after TNC Predator to be relegated to Division 2.

What is the Reconnect bug?

Players can experience the "Reconnect" bug after they disconnect from a game. Once they click the "Red Power" option in the top right corner of the screen after getting disconnected in order to restart the game, they should ideally see the "Quit Game" option. However, at times, if they are unlucky enough to encounter this bug, instead of the "Quit Game" option, they will see the "Yes, Abandon Game" option. Most players click on it quickly out of habit, causing them to abandon the game.

Several players, including Cedric "Davai Lama" Deckmyn playing for D2 Hustlers, Albert "eine" Garaev playing for Gambit Esports, and Rodrigo "Lelis" Santos playing for Quincy Crew, have reportedly been affected by this bug in the past year.

In July 2021, popular Dota 2 livestreamer Janne "Gorgc" Stefanovski encountered the bug a couple of times during his Twitch livestream.

Valve reportedly began working on a system that would allow players to reconnect to the crash point of a Dota 2 game in September 2021. There was evidence of this in the game's files as discovered by Matthew "Cyborgmatt" Bailey, Team Secret's Director of Operations. However, no further developments have been reported since then.