Reproducible ~5-8s crash after successful hook install ("Unexplained Game Exit" / EndedWithoutReason) — independent of mods, elevation, Game Bar, and third-party drivers

[ahmetaking47-stack]

Environment

• OS: Windows 10, build 10.0.19045.6466 (locale: tr-TR)
• LTK Manager versions tested: v1.14.3, v1.15.1, v1.15.2 — all exhibit identical behavior
• Reproduced on two separate days (2026-08-31 and 2026-09-02)

Summary

Every successful DLL injection across two logging sessions ends in Unexplained Game Exit / verdict=EndedWithoutReason within 5-8 seconds of game found; hook installed, regardless of mod count/content or manager version. League launches and plays completely normally whenever the patcher is not engaged at all — 0/10 successful sessions while patched, 100% stable unpatched.

What's been ruled out

I've spent several days isolating variables one at a time. None of the following change the outcome:

• Mod count/content — tested with a single mod (Yorick only) and with 5 simultaneous champion mods (Yorick, Caitlyn, Ezreal, Kayle, Khazix). Same crash, same timing, both times.
• Manager version — v1.14.3, v1.15.1, v1.15.2 all reproduce it identically.
• Elevation / RUNASADMIN mismatch — confirmed via the manager's own log (Injector elevation = false (opt_in=false, league_admin=false, manager_elevated=false)) and manually verified: "Run as administrator" is unchecked on League of Legends.exe, RiotClientServices.exe, and LTK Manager itself.
• Windows compatibility flags on League.exe — repeatedly cleared via reg delete "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\AppCompatFlags\Layers" /v "C:\Riot Games\League of Legends\Game\League of Legends.exe" /f. The diagnostics tab occasionally re-flags this, but clearing it has no effect on this specific crash.
• Xbox Game Bar / Game DVR background capture — already disabled system-wide before any of this testing started.
• A third-party kernel-mode driver (a modified/re-signed Bluetooth A2DP driver, loaded via a self-signed certificate added to Trusted Root CA / Trusted Publishers) — fully uninstalled, both associated certificates removed, system rebooted. No change.
• Vanilla League with the patcher never engaged — completely stable across every test.

Steps to reproduce

1. Launch LTK Manager, enable one or more champion mods, start the patcher.
2. Launch League of Legends and load into a game.
3. Patcher finds the process, injects the DLL, and redirects WAD files successfully (see log excerpt — everything looks healthy up to this point).
4. ~5-8 seconds after hook installed (within ~1 second of the last WAD redirect), the League process disappears. No crash dialog, no exit code, no dump reason. LTK logs dll detached and records an Unexplained Game Exit incident.

Log excerpt — 2026-09-02, v1.15.2, 5 mods active

2026-09-02T04:32:14.076726Z  game found; hook installed tid=18292 pid=6716
2026-09-02T04:32:14.304248Z  INFO [ltk-host] injected: dll attached
2026-09-02T04:32:19.986240Z  INFO redirected wad: DATA/FINAL/Bootstrap.windows.wad.client
  ... (all wads redirect cleanly, including Champions/Yorick.wad.client, Caitlyn.wad.client,
       Ezreal.wad.client, Kayle.wad.client, Khazix.wad.client)
2026-09-02T04:32:20.732009Z  INFO redirected wad: DATA/FINAL/Champions/Khazix.en_US.wad.client
2026-09-02T04:32:21.519420Z  dll detached
2026-09-02T04:32:21.519433Z  INFO [ltk-host] game exited: dll detached; awaiting next instance
2026-09-02T04:32:21.572013Z  INFO Incident recorded: Unexplained Game Exit id=2026-09-02T07-32-13 verdict=EndedWithoutReason

The same manager instance reproduced it again 46 seconds later on the very next launch (id=2026-09-02T07-33-07), same ~6.3s timing, same "everything redirects cleanly, then dies" pattern.

Log excerpt — 2026-08-31, v1.15.1, single mod

2026-08-31T05:47:46.525407Z  game found; hook installed tid=4568 pid=17060
2026-08-31T05:47:46.719080Z  INFO [ltk-host] injected: dll attached
  ... (base wads + Champions/Yorick.wad.client redirect cleanly)
2026-08-31T05:47:51.645816Z  dll detached
2026-08-31T05:47:51.645833Z  INFO [ltk-host] game exited: dll detached; awaiting next instance
2026-08-31T05:47:51.662002Z  INFO Incident recorded: Unexplained Game Exit id=2026-08-31T08-47-46 verdict=EndedWithoutReason

8/8 successful injections that day ended the same way, plus one injection-host-level failure logged as:

Injector error: Host injection failed: The injection host exited unexpectedly. It may have crashed or been blocked by antivirus.

Both sessions also show the usual AH wad scan failed c0000229 for {ahri,caitlyn,ezreal,karthus,morgana,urgot} (opted out): skin0 is another skin: ... lines. These appear identically in every session regardless of which mods are actually enabled, so they don't look related to the crash — nothing about them changes between a 1-mod session and a 5-mod session.

Windows Event Viewer correlation

In the System log, a DistributedCOM Error 10010 ("did not register with DCOM within the required timeout") shows up at the exact same second (local time) as two separate game found; hook installed events (checked on 2026-08-31: 08:45:34 and 08:47:46 local, both exact matches). I haven't captured the specific CLSID/server name from the event body yet — happy to grab that if it would help triage.

No matching Application Error (Event ID 1000) for the actual League of Legends.exe PID shows up in the Application log for any of the crashes — the process disappears without leaving a normal fault/exception trace.

Possibly related

This might share a root cause with:

• Create SECURITY.md #169 (Patch 26.9 — Patcher Issues FAQ)
• cslol manager doesnt let u play tft when its on #255 (Troubleshooting FAQ - v1.10.0)
• Mod Skin over Any skin, not just the base one. #226 (closed as duplicate of Create SECURITY.md #169 — similar "compatibility flag keeps coming back" report)

Wasn't able to confirm overlap with the open "patcher lifecycle & overlay" issue, but the symptom (100% reproducible, clean injection, abrupt exit a few seconds later, no exit code) seemed close enough that a fresh, fully-isolated report felt worth posting either way.