I think some did forget over the course of the discussion that the civ franchise isn't a pure value for money thing. At least, it's not for a lot of ppl.
For example: I started playing CivI in 1991, with one of my closest friends. We both really got hooked up, and the Civ franchise accompanied our friendship over the years, bc we often play a game when we meet again. And I'm not talking buddy here I'm talkin two decades of trust-with-my-life friendship. The point is, the franchise has an emotional quality for a lot of ppl, so grievances with it tend to be taken more seriously. I was seriously p*ssed with the lousy PTW so I never bought C3C.
Still, the multiplayer seems to work fine so far on IV, so I won't complain on that part. But making us buy the expansion to get the last vanilla patch and making me spend money for being able to keep on playing free mods feels like a personal rip-off to me, bc like I stated in the OP the only really interesting thing included is the Vassal-State feature. If they beefed up WL to make it interesting for all players not only the scenario buffs I'd shut my mouth and buy the thing.