The scenario described only occurs if they’re using host names for their upstreams, and that hostname is no longer resolvable. It results in an error during config parsing, preventing reloads and fresh starts. Moral of the story: don’t use DNS names in upstreams unless you’re sure they’ll always resolve I guess.
That's tough: we do docker compose, so upstream = named container, and so init can be wonky (ex: dev). We have started strangling Nginx out for caddy bc this + LE (no pay gate on ssl autorenewal). These are increasingly basic things for modern apps.