It’s not about panic mode. This is how the Unearthed Arcana playtest process has worked since all the way back in the D&D Next days. It’s not a secret - WotC has openly and repeatedly said this is how it works, but for some reason people keep being surprised when WotC does exactly what they keep saying they’ll do, and keep doing.
It’s very simple: if the general response is “unsatisfied,” they don’t consider the idea good enough at base to be worth iterating on to bring it up to “satisfied.” On the other hand, if the general response is “satisfied,” they consider it a worthwhile idea, and are willing to do some iteration to try to bring it up to “very satisfied.”
We can certainly argue about whether or not that’s a good policy, but they’ve been very consistent in it for the past decade. Whether you think it’s a good policy or not, it should at least be clear that the most effective way to engage in the playtest process is to vote “very satisfied” if you want to see something preserved as-presented, vote “satisfied” and give feedback if you want to see something iterated on, and vote “very dissatisfied” if you want to see something abandoned entirely. “Dissatisfied” is mostly an ineffective response for achieving any specific goals; it moves the needle towards the thing being scrapped, but not as much as “very dissatisfied” does. I guess maybe pick that option for things you don’t really want, but could live with if they make it in?
