Sigh. I really don't understand why you people are so anti-features. I'll repeat you don't have to use the feature. Why would you possibly advocate for LESS functionality? Trophy's don't come close to incentivizing the kind of activity we're looking for, and if we have this problem, then other forums do. Why is distancing XF from vB a good thing when it means the willful removal of an excellent core function?
Now, I'm not fussed whether a reputation system is added or not, but there actually is a reason why less features can be better - and its one that I have seen people argue vB (and even IPB sometimes) suffers from: feature creep.
Remember that XenForo is developed by two people - two talented, experienced developers, yes, but only two people nonetheless. Every feature they have to support adds more bugs to fix, more combinations of settings that can cause these bugs, and more time adapting, extending, and amending the feature either to extend it or maintain support in future versions of the software. This is one of the reasons XF's modding scene is so valuable - things like galleries, blogs, reputation systems, and far more incredibly niche features can be added at an admin's whim without adding extra workload on the core XF developers, who are worked hard enough trying to deliver a top-class standard forum experience.
XenForo mods are amazing. Compatibility issues are low or nonexistent, and although we are all very rightfully worried about having to rely on an external developer to provide updates, bug fixes, and support for the mods, it's actually less of an issue than it would be on other platforms - I have multiple mods by developers who have not been active on XenForo.com for a while, and they all survived the transition from 1.3 to 1.4 without a hitch.
And of course there's the age-old chestnut, polished a thousand times in these hallowed halls: a feature that is vital to you is not necessarily vital to anyone else, let alone vital full stop. If you want a piece of software to do exactly what you want, then prepare to fork out for a custom solution - and trust me on this one, bespoke software is
not cheap.
When it comes down to it, the features that are added are based on the XF team's wishes, with their customers as a major input. They know what makes a strong forum experience for most of their customers, and they know what is popular and will remain so for the foreseeable future. Some features, as loudly as we may clamour for them, may not work with their plans for the software - and that's fine! Because XenForo is fantastic
because of this laser focus, not in spite of it.