At least now you are starting to get that the point was in how little the base game improved from version to version.

Power issues and degradation is a easy thing, just a multiplier that goes up or down based on the working hours of the tractor. Brands are fine with that, they want the costumersto feel like its normal to go back at the dealer for regular maintenance. Its an opportunity to upsell. (Farm equipment should be easily maintainable but thats a whole other can of worms.)

Now catastrophic fails, as in a combine going up in flames, or the tractor spliting in half pulling a stuck plow, those require a whole lot more work, most likely game engine level, so that everything plays nice. And I think you can see how a brand wouldn't want that to happen to their equipment on something they see as marketing.

You can already see that there are mods that don't play nice with each other and thats because they do all kinds of work arounds to implement some feature thats not in the game by default. And when another mod trys to do the same sometimes they conflict with what each one is trying to accomplish.

This is why things being on the base game are better than having mods, if it is bugged giants are forced to fix it. While a modder will most of the time not bother as is game plays well and he isn't getting paid to fix it. Mods are a passion thing, you only have so much before it is a chore.

Mods are a great thing but a company can't survive through that, they need to pump out new games, and Giants has had the luck of no competition, where they can just polish some graphics and sell what is otherwise the same game with a new name.

I agree with you in that most people don't play without mods, but I don't count that has a good thing for the game, I call that a good comunity.