Any word on when the next patch is due out?

Yep the gameplay and the narrative are constantly at odds with each other over this.  The narrative tells us that Ryder is a young wide eyed greenhorn with, at best, limited combat experience.  The gameplay on the other hand shows Ryder being some kind of warfare prodigy and the open class system makes Ryder the most badass warrior to have ever strapped on armor with the ability to master not just all combat skills, but also all biotic and all tech powers simultaneously.  From a gameplay perspective Ryder is far more badass than Shepard ever could have dreamed of being.

Aside from changing the story there isn't any real way to solve this since BW, for whatever reason, feels that they NEEDED to have such a heavy emphasis on the shooter part of the game because they felt like they NEEDED to have a tacked on multi-player component.  I disagree with that "need" but there it is.  For the narrative they were pushing a game focused much more heavily on exploration and discovery instead of combat would have served them far better.

At the very least I personally think the Kett shouldn't even have been in the game.  It destroys that new kid jumping into the explorer role feel of the game.  There should have been a much larger and more varied presence of wildlife threats on the worlds as your main focus for pew-pewing stuff.  Used the Roekar, or whatever they were called, as sort of your antagonist, a few outposts of exiles here and there.  The Kett at best should have been a looming threat instead of an endless horde of Trooper #212342343 to be mowed down with wild abandon.

There is just way too much of an emphasis on combat in the game to sell the explorer atmosphere of the narrative.