Deadlock is still early in development, so some players have been able to play however they like without any kind of punishment – but the newest update should stop that.
Valve is working on a brand new shooter, one of the hero variety, if you hadn’t heard, but it being still in the testing phase means that Deadlock doesn’t quite have all the kinks worked out yet. However, when it comes to things like players just abandoning matches for no good reason, there wasn’t a system that disincentivized such behaviour. As part of the game’s September update, this has now been changed, with some punishments coming into effect in certain instances. For example, if a player has exhibited bad behaviour or abandons games too often, they can now be placed in a secondary queue that’s less likely to find a match.
If they want to be freed from this low priority queue, they’ll have to play a few rounds before being put back into normal matchmaking. On top of this, it’s now possible for players to also lose access to matchmaking altogether, as well as being able to talk in voice and text chat, pausing, or reporting other players for abuse. It’s incredibly important for online games to have punishments in place to discourage players with bad behaviours from doing things that cause other grief, as shooters aren’t exactly always known for their kind and welcoming communities.
This latest change also brought in some big general changes too, one of the biggest being matchmaking times being 24/7 (it was previously limited to certain times). The minimap also had some substantial changes, though after some player feedback it was quickly reverted.
One thing Valve still needs to work on is its cheating issue, but again it’s early days, so presumably this will come in time.