Experience 1: European Air War
When I gave up in frustration was when there were 3 different FMs along with a devout group of worshippers who fought each other in page-long flamewars in various boards. Not to mention that "the modders" went down the same road as it currently goes at AAA - no coordination, no simplification of the installation process and certainly attempt at creating "packages". It all got sacrificed for the false god of diversity. I even remember a "campaign mod" which required you to download some 20 "mod planes" separately from separate websites. That was the point when I was fed up to the back teeth and uninstalled EAW.
Experience 2: Panzer Elite
Essentially the same as EAW (minus the FM, of course). Even though there were attempts at combining efforts into packs the coordination stopped at the borders of the tight-knit groups. Essentially Mod A (i.e. Britpack) could not be used when you wanted to play Mod B (i.e. Ostpack). Of course it didn't help that the developer (who was willing to cooperate with the various groups) went bancrupt at a critical time.
Plus of course the chore of CFS2. Never regretted spending money on software more than for this POS.
These experiences taught me that "free modding" is essentially an exercise in frustration and often more about "the fiddlers" than about "the players".
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