I used Stow (some years ago) until I discovered the XDG directory spec. It can be a bit more painful on macOS, but generally enough respects it that it makes more sense to me to use it by default and fix/carve workarounds for what doesn't than to use tools like Stow to essentially put everything in the latter category.

That said, I don't imagine it was built for 'dotfiles' as everyone is and will discuss it being used for, so perhaps it does deserve to live on.