I'm willing to throw all of my belief in this because I know Denny has spent a lot of time and effort trying to find ways to make the best beer. I know everyone's taste is different but I would stitch Denny's comment onto a throw pillow if I had the talent to do so.
I totally get that part and I see both sides of this, don't get me wrong. But conducting experiments on brewing is time-consuming and many of us have not done it and I am at a point where I don't like to leave stones unturned. I think there is a culture in homebrewing where newbies come onto forums and get help from more experienced brewers and the newbies want to get to the point where they become part of the answers as opposed to part of the questions... they want to pay it back. That's not a bad thing unless people say things that they don't know for sure are true. I have seen it myself where people give answers to questions that they're not qualified to answer and that can be very problematic... so I'm at the point where I question things unless some amount of testing has been done. Denny has done decoction experiments and declared decoction unnecessary or let's just say "not worth it" while others think that decoction makes the best beer...so how do you know?
With regards to the modification of the malts, that is fact, not echo chamber or anecdotal evidence. It's information directly measured by the maltsters and gathered scientifically. You don't need a step mash.
Like I said though, doing a decoction very well might make the best beer for that particular beer, but it's going after the last 0.5% of intangible benefit. I'm not telling you not to do a decoction or step mash. I'm saying it's not necessary to do the step mash or decoction to make wort. In fact I don't think you could make the same beer by doing both a single scarification rest on one and a decoction on the other side by side, but I'd chalk that up to inexperience in decocting a mash and lack of ability to accurately control mash temps for the steps. If you had an electric or gas RIMS system, I'd say you might have a chance, but not under normal homebrewer type equipment conditions, you'd most likely end up with similar, but not totally the same, beers.