Dan was kind enough to host me (great to meet you Matthew) on Sunday and I loved the course. I had not played it before either, but I was aware of Dan's sensitivity to some of the changes as we had discussed them previously. It would not surprise me if Dan's criticisms of the changes are quite mild compared to a faction of the membership. But is that really news? There are always going to be disgruntled voices when ANY change is made.
As for my impression of Dave's work:
I could imagine myself playing the course every day for a long time and having a blast doing it for precisely some of the reasons that others have criticized. There are features that are borderline and even some that probably shouldn't been included. In particular, there are contours (you might even call them mounds) on some of the green edges that will kick shots in God-only-knows what directions when hit. Did those contours really need to be included? Perhaps not.
As for #8, the day we played, the green was slow. We hit 3 mediocre shots of various shapes and trajectories and they all held the green as I recall. This goes back to the old thing about firm and fast. Assuming that the green will be left firm, if it is too fast, then it will be clown's-mouthy. Leave it at the right speed and it will be challenging and fun to play.
The thing about all of these new quirks for me though is that they provide an interesting little puzzle to try and figure out, which I believe was characteristic of the original design as well. This is an everyday members course from what I can tell, and it will definitely be interesting for the members to play it repeatedly. If there is an "unfair" bounce that happens now and again, well...this is golf.
As for the comparison to C&C, I didn't see that at all. And for contrast, I played Talking Stick North again the following day, so the two are quite fresh in my mind. Through the green, DF is nothing like TSN (or C&C designs in general). It is lay-of-the-land, but it is not minimalist. It has a very classic feel to it in the grassing lines. The course does not bleed into the native areas. You're either on the hole or you're off it in the desert.
Additionally, although the bunkers have more flourish than the old ones that I have seen in Dan's photos and in Brad's book, they do not look like Tom's bunkers or C&C's bunkers to me. There is just a different aesthetic there that calls to mind Golden Era classics for me, more than "new classic" designs. And above all, I didn't find the bunkering to look out of place, even in the instances where it bordered on being overdone.
Just in case none of the above made any sense, the bottom line is this: The course is a joy to play, and I want to play it again and again and again. So at that level, the combination of RL+DZ+Nature is a big hit with me.