I feel like I'm taking crazy pills, as this is very much not my experience. The game definitely has rough edges, but I found it fun and did a couple full playthroughs before setting it down. And the first expansion is always a flavor pack. It said this in the preorder, it's been that way since CK2, it's what they said would happen in the dev diaries. I can't say it's one of their better flavor packs, but this whole conspiracy theory take is strange to me.

Could the game be in a better state: yes. Should they have pushed back the flavor pack for more QoL free patches: yes. Is it a shitty game: No