Yes you are allowed to use mods in ranked. You will probably be interested in this https://exodusesports.com/article/the-ethics-of-mods-in-competitive-play/
If they work for you, go for it. I never liked auto factory because it doesn't pick the right units for the situation, so it isn't much help. At some levels of skill you will benefit from it, but then you just get bumped up to harder matches.
What's the difference between "YES" and "Mods are part of the game"?-) Anyway, mods and especially being able to use them in ladder is one of the best features of this game. Or the saving grace, really. I don't think I'd have bothered to play for long without Hotbuild, at least. If you allow some mods, then it becomes really hard to draw the line. So best not to draw it at all. Simulation is run on the server, so everything allowed by the server is fair game. (Well, at least everything allowed by the modding API.) Generally speaking, if there are UI mods that make the game more fun by reducing pointless micro (anything that can be done automatically without much thought), then those features should really be part of the base game.
I view "Mods are part of the game" as more of a statement that it's silly to say they shouldn't be in it.
i still keep my opinion ragarding mods such as ubermap in which the player who uses it is in a advantage comparred to the one who doesn´t and as such rather unfair matches happen ..
All Ubermap does provide you the same information that PiP does without the ability to rotate a fully three-dimensional rendering and no ghosting. But all the information is provided by the system.
speaking about the pip itself not by using it in conjuction with you mainview .. you don´t need the mainview for ubermap ...
yea .. and? what does that have to do with my statement of ubermap showing 100% on it´s own while the pip does only so with the mainview .. if you only use the PIP that´s still only up to 50% of a map you see at any time .. even if you have 2 PIP´s each again still shows 50% of a planet the overall point is the same ... the person who uses ubermap may have a better advantage over the person who doesn´t have the mod ... to me the question is who decides what mods are ok to use, who´s gonna tell the new players which mods they can or should use and what about the players that don´t want to use mods because they are unsure weither the opponent may not have access to said mods .. other players may not care .. my point is varius people using varius mods may lead to uneven matches .. more so than the general skilldisperaty each player may have on his own ...
I picked "mods are a part of the game" because that is just a technical fact. As the resurector of the colored fab spray mod which is now stock on PA, I have a very personal experience of this. The Economy efficiency meter you have between your metal and energy is also originally a mod : https://forums.uberent.com/threads/rel-economic-efficiency-ui-mod.52613/ I really don't care to recreate the list of what elements in your present-day PA are actually originally mods here it must strech to the hundreds. And the list is going to continue to grow. these mods you complain about today will be vanila tomorrow. This is a debate ever-present on PA, FA and even AOTS and the result is always the same: mods stay.
Since the PAMM is now in-game, everyone can see and use all the mods. I think it is fair for all player to use or not use the mods.
So either client mods would have to be banned or no one uses mod's, then we would have no modding community, then features from mod's would never end up in the game. Sounds kinda dumb to me. Also i think the PA mod's mean more to player retention than 1v1 ranked.