I would take a limited time 40% discount over a permanent 20 euro discount any day to be honest.
It's about customer loyalty, not just a huge invitation to buy in. Some developers prefer to reward their returning customers whilst others prefer to draw them in. These cross grades stack with the more libraries you own so for those incredibly loyal customers, I think you can end up getting this for 550 euros which would be over 30% off retail which is pretty generous for a new product.
I've been around in the sampling industry long enough to see developers start with this type of program and migrate to another program and in the process, they ended up hurting their loyal customers. So, to avoid that, I would expect Strezov Sampling isn't planning on changing their intro-pricing/cross grading system because they have built up a pretty loyal customer base of composers. I have reviewed and bought libraries from Strezov since they've been around and I can say that their focus has always been about creating something that fills the gaps in this industry and not with sub par software but with something that pushes the envelop of what has been done and they do it better, (re; Polyphonic True Legato, Divisi, their Syllabuilder Engine, etc). They don't release a library and move on. They continue to record and update their libraries with new and free content (re; Wotan's last update with Polyphonic Legato patches. Legato sampling costs a lot of money to make and program. They did this free of charge to existing customers.) So yeah, I'd honestly prefer them to continue on their current loyalty program because their customers will continue to benefit later down the road at any time, not just during an intro sale.
As far as the pricing goes and those who are peeved about how much it costs. Well, too bad I guess. Libraries that deliver playable concepts that have been gimmicks for the majority of the "workhorse" libraries out there has become a reality with Afflatus. Orchestral Tools, CineSamples, Cinematic Sampling, Spitfire Audio, etc have not been able to produce a remotely playable/programmable Polyphonic Legato engine that sounds great with little to no effort. Strezov Sampling HAS! They did it in 2016 with Freyja. Since then they've refined it with what is now in Afflatus. So, for me, Afflatus is in a whole other league since there is literally nothing on a market that comes close to what is offered here. You can't just compare this to Symphobia on the surface. It goes deeper than that. You can't compare it to Berlin Strings or CSS because it goes deeper than that. Sure, it's not a basic, conventional sound set that you'd find from one of the aforementioned developers because that's the point. This is something NEW. It's not been done like this in the past and new things have a cost. I'm certainly lucky enough to have received an NFR for this library but I'd pay the full price if I didn't. The library is going to become a staple in my template over the new few weeks as I reassess my virtual orchestra needs for my job. I'm still working on the review but hope to get it out soon for those interested. If you have any specific questions you'd like me to answer or demonstrate in my review, please let me know asap so that I can include them in the video. I know this is an expensive set of sounds and I'd like to be as informative as I can for ya'lls to make your decisions on whether or not you should get this library.
Cheers,
Chris