Ok guys, got some info.
Gonewild let me poke around his updated car and we initially had some trouble collecting data and that's because they changed quite a bit 'under the hood'.
Before, the BMS would decide how many bars to show, and the VMC used a battery capacity value as a basis for it's range estimates.
After the update, the VMC now uses the battery capacity value to calculate both range and the bars.
I can tell you with great confidence that the battery warnings and turtle mode come at the same battery capacity as before the update so they did not take any capacity away. Of course they could have "remapped" this capacity value but my semi-educated guess is they didn't.
I believe that what they did is added more padding to the bottom end of the range and SOC bars. They moved the gauge's range from 0 to 100% to 10 to 100%. So now there is an extra 10% (or whatever, I don't know the exact number) below the zero point. But keep in mind: It's still usable just like it was before the update! It just means the battery warnings will come at a lower *displayed* range/bar value. I personally believe that nissan thinks a 2 mile range and no bars is a stronger incentive to get some juice than a low battery warning when you still have 18 miles and 2 bars left.
I will need some extended time with a car to figure out exactly how much it changed (any volunteers?) . I did a couple tests and did see that you now lose bars at a higher battery level than you did previously, but I'd like to map it out.