Of course it would be foolish to assume that Larian is going to abandon the massive impact that fan interaction with romance and sex in the form of fanart, fan fiction and discussions had on the wider appeal for the game.
That doesn't mean that they are completely blind or oblivious to the fact that they need a solid game underneath to sustain it. Most people, even gooners, are not going to grind through hours of boring writing and frustrating encounters and game mechanics for a few minutes of smut. People were perhaps drawn in by hearing about the sexy elf vampire, but they got into the story and learned to enjoy the mechanics and character progression of a pretty deep crpg for a casual gamer, because those things were solid, engaging and fun.
As someone who enjoy the more tactical and classic crpg mechanics, I didn't feel like the developers abandoned me to exclusively cater to a different audience. There were things that was certainly aimed at other audiences for sure, but also stuff like honor mode for those of us who wanted more strategic gameplay to sink our teeth into. The fact that every decision they made was not made with my specific tastes and interests in mind does not mean that I was ignored, just that other audiences were also included.
