DaviddesJ said:
They have done a tremendous job of making the game modifiable. I don't think this additional level of functionality is really reasonable to expect, and it's unfair to attack them for "mishandling" the matter.
Hardly, Firaxis is a business like any other. Are you suggesting that they made it modable for some altruistic philosophy? Its more likely because its what their customers want or expect.
But to address this in a more general sense, modable games are not done for the users benefit, thats just a bonus, this is done because the benefits during the development process make this added level of abstraction beneficial. The programmers aren't defacto designers and the designers don't have to pester the programmers about bugs in their tools, when they can just go right into the data and modify it themselves (without specialized tools, as was done in the past).
As an analogy, a car has an easily accessible hood to get into the engine compartment, despite the vast majority of users never once needing to get in there. This is not an altruistic thought for the many car entusiasts, its done for simple potential utility.
But anyway, I disagree with your basic thought. Its one thing to ignore security its another thing altogether to inappropriately apply it. For one the current option is "No Cheats" which disallows the builtin editor but also ignores all user assests, the "cheats" apparently. One such popular "cheat" is a clock and turn timer, another are textures based on beautiful natural imagery. Those are horrible and vile cheats. And should be disallowed with a "No Cheats" option.
I also disagree with your sentiment because I know they are more committed, than you would suggest, to the integrity of their game. They have to be if they wish the multiplayer aspects to be taken seriously. And in addition to other things like the better handling of ingame knowledge (fog of war, resources visiblity, etc) I'm convinced it will turn out better. But I have to prod in any event cause thats my right as a customer.