Confused about Dom3 Release news

[tinkthank]

Hello!
I have been gone for some time, and by chance checked out the dom2 boards (referred by NTJedi for some info on an OT Oblivion thread), and by chance saw the news regarding the upcoming dom3 release.
On the one hand, I am happy for Illwinter that they have solidified their project and got what I hope is a decent contract with Shrapnel. Nice! I always like to support a nice indy company. Currently, I am happy with Stardock.
On the other hand, I am somewhat crestfallen after having read the official announcement, visited Illwinter's site (nothing there), and checked out everything Shrapnel says about dom3.
The main things seems to be the new races and the split in three eras. (Not really news, since we all knew this more than a year ago.) Since "more" is not really what I was looking for (certainly not "more races"), I was looking for what is new to dom3 vs dom2. The vast number of things to do is listed -- but all those things were part of dom2. Any image can be a map -- sounds familiar. New graphics were mentioned -- and the screenshots indicate that work was done on some effects and some background terrain effects, but the sprites look otherwise identical. (Who cares, we arent into Dominions for the graphics anyhow.) But what gameplay things are new? There is vague mention of only 3 elements that caught my eye: Less micromanagement, more streamlined interfaces, and better AI. Screenshots showed very familiar interfaces to me (the list of spells was in most parts identical), so I can hope there is more and better to come; I would love, however, to hear more about what will offer "less micro" other than the autotax feature mentioned. As to the AI -- how will it be better? The AI in dom2 was severely lacking (which isnt surprising, considering how complex the game is), but what have they done to change it? Considering that the basic gameplay seems to be identical to Dom2, and no patches for that have been released in the last year, it seems odd.
I took a brief look at the thousands and thousands of suggestions in the Wishlist thread, finding my own (methought: reasonable) ones, and am surprised to find none of these mentioned (with the exception of the inclusion of Indian-flavored nations). Perhaps many features will be included, and I will see.
Nevertheless, I am confused, since I thought the release news was intended to get people to pre-order the game. But since it is against my religion to spend over 50 dollars on an expansion pack -- and to me, dom3 looks to be a nice dom2 expansion pack -- , I cannot purchase this game without seeing a demo. So if people know more, how come they remain silent?
Is dom3 more than a dom2 expansion pack with more nations split up into 3 eras and better modability?