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Proton auth timeout

WARDOGS on Linux: kicked with an authentication timeout

Published Updated Data as of Season 1 · 10 Sept 2026

This one is not your machine

There is no fix. Bulkhead confirmed on 4 September 2026 that Linux is not supported and that Proton support will not be ready for launch.

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What you see

The game launches under Proton and plays for three to five minutes, then kicks you with "Authentication timed out (1/3)".

Also reported as: steam deck · linux support · authentication timed out

What to do instead

The cause is not on your machine, so reinstalling and verifying will not reach it. These are the things that actually help while it lasts.

  1. 01 Accept that there is no client-side fix yet

    Confirmed

    Steam lists Windows as the only supported system. That the game starts under Proton at all does not mean it is supported, and the anti-cheat is what ends the session.

  2. 02 Watch for a Proton announcement rather than trying Proton versions

    Confirmed

    Bulkhead said on 4 September that it is "still working on Official Linux Proton compatibility" and will update its stance once that is confirmed. Cycling through Proton builds and launch options will not get past the anti-cheat in the meantime.

  3. 03 Refund if this was why you bought it

    Confirmed

    Bulkhead has said so itself: "please, refund the game if you mistakenly bought it thinking you would be able to run Linux via Proton on September 10th." A pre-order sits inside Steam's standard refund window.

Did this fix it for you?

Notes from other players who hit this code. Say what worked, what did not, and which region you are in — a fix that only works in one place is worth knowing about. Best-rated first, and there is no time limit: an answer from the first beta is still an answer.

No comments yet. Be the first to say whether this worked.

This is the most-requested platform change the game has, with a Steam thread running to nearly three hundred replies asking for Linux support from the start. The honest position today is that it does not work, the timeout is the anti-cheat ending your session, and no amount of configuration gets round it.

That question closed on 4 September. A Bulkhead developer pinned a thread to the Steam forum — past two thousand replies and still active as of 22 September, nearly two weeks into Early Access — that reads in part: "We do not officially support Linux and we cannot commit to having support for launch. We are still working on Official Linux Proton compatibility." Nothing in the pinned post itself has changed since 4 September, and no newer official statement has surfaced elsewhere. The same post asks anyone who bought the game expecting to run it via Proton on 10 September to refund, and says the August tests worked under Proton "by happen stance" rather than by design. The statement in full, and what anti-cheat the game runs →

This page describes the August betas, which ran on Easy Anti-Cheat and let a Proton session start before ending it a few minutes in. The September build stops earlier, at the launcher, with "an anti-cheat module could not be downloaded or installed" — that message has its own page, and it is the one to read if you are on the current build.

Source

KingHoward (Bulkhead), "UPDATE: Linux Compatibility", WARDOGS Steam Discussions, 4 September 2026 ↗

If that did not do it