When the topic is "level gating is bad" one is kind of forced into taking "level" and "gating" into account, right?
But yes, I'm well aware of the use cases for those "ignored perks" and maybe Charismatic Nature ought to maybe give a stamina regen buff in single player, as most leaders tend to get a little high off their own fumes, so to speak.
As I said, 'my' end game is typically well past level 300, so I have used everything you've listed as in-game goals, but as I also said, I've done shorter playthroughs to experiment with the early game and build orders. I put over 4k hours into a19 alone, and probably half that on each alpha going back to a15, and another 500 into a20 so far, so maybe my perspective is a little different than the average player, I can't help that.
Although, I have done the math I'm not really a min/maxer as I tend to play reactively to the situation i.e. putting points into what I need at the time rather than sticking to a script. Those decisions are always informed by the knowledge that I can always just level up more if I need something else later though.
And the thing about playing longer games and leveling higher is that you find out sooner or later that the Zs keep scaling for a long time and that OP feeling that you can get early game is more of an illusion than a reality. That maxed out tree by level 50 just doesn't perform the same against the Zs that spawn at higher game stages, yeah?