[FlareCDE]

There is no real definitive answer, as you can write a bad mod with or without Ace. Your milage may vary. When people advertise Ace mods, they frequently say "It's like this mod, but runs better." Which always frustrated me to no end. I mean, running better is great, but to me, features are more important.

I pointed this out in the Fubar comments awhile back. Back when someone was advertising Fubar on the official forums, if instead of simply saying "Titan panel sucks, Fubar is better," they had pointed out many of the useful features Fubar has over Titan, I probably would have switched then and there. Instead they just piled more angst on the already annoyed attitude I had towards Ace in general.

I have noticed a difference lately in the attitudes of Ace authors and users. I don't know if this is due to one specific person's presence, so I won't point fingers. But lately I've seen a pleasant change in how their addons are advertised, with a focus on features in addition to programming quirks. I haven't heard the canned "libraries make things faster" comment recently. In addition, I've seen a lot of the use of embeddable libraries and modularization, two things I do really like. Ace mods tend to do what they say they do, and nothing more, which is good for me.

I don't use all Ace mods. Some of the mods I use are known to be system heavy, with good reason. Some are fairly well designed, even not being Ace mods. But if there's an Ace mod that can provide functionality I'm seeking, I'm more likely to pick it up over other mods.