Do I know if either of these scenarios is the case? No
Exactly. You're constructing elaborate fantastical lunacies to excuse a purely economic decision. Is the Dots team about to launch a game entirely unlike the three games they've already released? If you believe the histrionic member of the team who still posts here, very much not. They have a mission, they have rigid fences, and until there's a personnel change there's never going to be anything else.
If I wanted to buy a Toyota, and I told them I'd pay them $15K for the car right now, but they countered with an offer to make me wait a month and pay $30K to deliver the car, I wouldn't take that deal. But for Toyota it would be an absolute coup. The Dots team is double-charging people for games they don't necessarily want to support. They probably will, in that the devs have made it pretty clear what they're going to produce, which will always adhere to a predictable template, and that's a financially clever plan. From the perspective of the developer, this is lucrative genius. People get half of what they're paying for each and every month.
From the perspective of a potential supporter, it's different. "Pay me twice as much money for half the content" is the current business plan. Would I agree to that? No.