I started out trying to go plugin free since I wanted to avoid bloat, but eventually gave in once I found plugins that eased bottlenecks in my workflow with a barebones vim.

Though I love the plugins I use now, I do agree that it makes sense to be fairly comfortable in a plugin-free vim before installing a ton of them.

I wrote a blog about this topic a month or so back:

http://blog.bugreplay.com/post/149712686514/how-i-learned-to...