Valve’s First Big Deadlock Reddit Ban Drama Was About Pause Abuse And Hardware IDs

On August 28, 2024, one of Deadlock’s first big Reddit moderation dramas arrived with a simple claim: Valve was handing out hardware ID bans to players abusing the pause function.

The thread blew up because it hit three nerves at once. Deadlock had a Dota-like pause system. Players were already discovering ways to be annoying with it. And the idea of a hardware-level ban sounded much harsher than the usual “behave or lose chat” warning most people expect from a playtest.

The useful distinction is this: the Reddit post documents a community reaction to a screenshot and player reports. It is not the same thing as Valve publishing a long enforcement explainer. But the reaction was real, and the community mostly treated the alleged punishment as a good sign. The basic mood was “good, get them out before this becomes normal.”

There was also a funnier side problem. League players kept pointing out that P is a natural shop key in their muscle memory, which made Deadlock’s pause bind feel like a trapdoor. A system built to protect disconnects suddenly had two classes of offender: the actual griefer freezing the game at the worst possible moment, and the poor imported League goblin trying to buy items like it was 2014.

That is why the post mattered. It was not just a ban story. It was an early culture story. Deadlock had not even become the huge public circus yet, and the community was already asking what kind of nonsense Valve would tolerate. The answer, at least according to the Reddit read of the moment, was “less than you hoped if your hobby is weaponizing pause.”

The thread aged into a useful archive marker: Deadlock’s drama machine did not start with ranks, streamers, or hero balance. It started with a button that was supposed to help disconnected teammates and immediately became a test of whether players could be normal about it.