Blizzard is planning to issue a fix for one of Diablo 4's most frightening risks, which should protect Hardcore players from the prospect of dying if they're disconnected from the game. A current focus of major frustration within Diablo 4's Hardcore community is that disconnecting from the game can lead to a player's permanent death. Blizzard can hardly guarantee that disconnects will no longer happen in Diablo 4. As such, it's worked out a way to protect players in Diablo 4 from the threat of a death while disconnected.
Hardcore mode in Diablo 4 is the game's most exhilarating challenge. If a player dies in Hardcore mode, it's permanently deleted. Both the character's progression and gear will be gone, and the character can no longer be played. Death in Hardcore mode is Diablo 4's most serious consequence, so the possibility of dying due to a server issue or internet outage is frightening to most players. And it does happen. Diablo 4's first Hardcore player to reach level 100 died to a disconnect.
During Friday's Diablo 4 Campfire Chat, Blizzard directly addressed concerns regarding Hardcore disconnect deaths. Diablo 4 game director Joe Shely confirmed that Blizzard does have a fix planned to address the issue, though it won't be arriving in the near future. The fix will force players to use a Scroll of Escape if they disconnect, rescuing the player from danger if they have a Scroll of Escape in their inventory.
The Scroll of Escape is a Hardcore-exclusive item in Diablo 4. It's designed specifically to give Hardcore players a method of escaping a bad situation, or at least a way to get out of the game quickly, if necessary. Using it will immediately teleport the player back to town. Once it's implemented, it should ensure that deaths from disconnects are extremely rare. The possibility of lag deaths or server issues where the disconnect doesn't go through until after a player dies will still exist, though.
As far as solutions go, this is about as good as can be expected for Diablo 4 Hardcore players. The game can't do anything before it senses a disconnect, and the Scroll of Escape will be used immediately after a disconnect occurs. That's as good as it gets. The change has to come hand in hand with server stability issues, though, but it's safe to assume Blizzard is doing everything it can to make improvements to Diablo 4 servers, too.
The big catch here is that Blizzard says that the change won't be applied to Diablo 4 soon. It's expected to be delivered around Season 2. Season 1 of Diablo 4 won't start until late July, meaning it could be four months or longer before the Scroll of Escape Hardcore fix is implemented. It's unclear why there's such a substantial delay, but it's likely because updates for Season 1 have likely already gone through certification and can't be changed. Still, the fix is coming eventually.
Diablo 4 is available now on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.