In my opinion the devs should shoot for smaller patches and quicker releases to avoid this kind of thing. One bug in one feature ends up delaying the entire patch for a few days when the players have already been waiting for a couple months. Combat reworking and new content I can forgive, but did we really need to wait this long just to get player search or repair adjustments?

Although I suppose with the horrible patcher in place large and infrequent patches might actually be better after all!