Me and another player suffered two desertions in the match, one right as the match started, then one five minutes later with a lvl 1 simply ditching. We fought to the end (lost of course because the enemies don't scale back), but both got 1200 gold and faction for losing, as we got 600 of each for the desertions. He misses his blueprint (too bad).
Then, instead of getting to claim rewards, I got "you deserted your last multiplayer match and must wait a few minutes before you reconnect."
I got punished for desertion by... Playing the match to the end?
As Schneider would put it, "What... What the f---? What am I doing here?"