That's a good observation, though I'd say here that two things could be true at the same time. But, I do personally believe that most of the reported nerfing is the case of your chart + latent evidence-less complaining. Honeymoon phases are real.
You can't just dismiss something backed by careful measurements by throwing a truism at it. What is this honeymoon phase? Can you quantify it? If not, how are you sure it's real?
Where are these careful measurements? Are you 100% sure they don't change the harness between runs and have a large enough sample size to be statistically significant?
I'm not sure I'm arguing what you think I'm arguing. I'm not arguing against measurements. I'm saying that it's relevant to recall that honeymoon phases exist in the general human behavior, whether it applies here or not.
