You can make your substantive points without any of that, and if you had followed the HN guidelines in general, you would have:
"Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith."
"Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something."
Maybe try changing how you talk about the price a bit on the page. No one's going to be put off by knowing there's a lot of free content, and then later on you have a one-off fee to continue playing. But they will be put off if they don't understand how any of the pricing works, and if they feel like there's a catch you're not telling them about.
I get what you're trying to do, you want to offer something on the cheap and that's great. Just be open about when the payment is needed, and what that payment is. You'll likely get more sign ups from being open about it up front.