As a small part of the balance section of EF mod's team I can say that the current goal is full steam release.
If any of you is interested in playing the "closed" beta you should ask http://steamcommunity.com/id/darcreaver/ for a key.
Having game on steam means easier updates for the team. Especially balance changes cuz they can be made and uploaded in a few minutes after a game showing that something is not where it should be.
Aye, I'm one of the Beta participants and the only thing holding me back from playing actively is the lag, perhaps some more optimization is needed? But yeah, other than that, and the low amount of people playing the Beta due to obvious reasons, I'd really love for the mod to become an official expansion if possible and for you guys to continue maintaining it on Steam.
As far as the release goes, as it's already on Steam I'm guessing it will be easy coming out of it's closed beta state or is it not that simple? I'm openly expecting it's release as well as the French update for the Great War mod, really sad to see that Blitzkrieg won't be joining the few mods on there tho, was hoping to have the top ones that are still being developed on there.