I play vanilla pretty consistently for game testing and you really don't need the UI/qol things. The three mods I miss most are colored mood bars, wall lights, and deep storage. Everything else is just dressing.
Literally in the credits of the game he credits mod authors that gave permissions for mods to join the game. The animals mod author is listed in the art credits. This is just a factually incorrect line of reasoning that is verified within the very game. Tynan has already credited people.