Empty Steam DLC... that a thing?

So I have a game on steam and im trying to plan ahead. I have a plugin that lets me check if a player owns a dlc. Thats fine. What im wondering about is if a player has a dlc item, and another player does not but can still see the item… theoretically that means that i just do a normal update with all the new content, then do a check on each player if they can equip it or not (if they own the dlc or not)… in essence the dlc doesnt actually contain any content and is an empty download? Is that correct? It makes sense when I think about it like that but at the same time it seems wrong :sweat_smile: is it possible to include a new map in the dlc (also i have no idea how to go about this if it even is a thing, how do you package just a portion or element of a game???) or is that pointless and in reality all dlc’s are empty with the content in an update for everyone with a check of dlc ownership?

I hope that makes sense and someone can clarify things :pray: :slightly_smiling_face: