@xza8,
Many reasonable responses to your query, don't know what else is left to add for rational discourse. All I've got to offer is anecdote.
My personal experience is this: I had to make the Tesla sales guy understand that I really, really wanted the Plus package. He insisted that it wouldn't make a difference to ordinary driving. I suspected he was right -- and I'm definitely an ordinary driver! -- but he was completely missing the point. Dammit, it's *MY* mid-life crisis and I'm getting every option on the list!(*) One friend, who is a BMW enthusiast and also a Tesla fan, cruelly pointed out to me that the Plus package would be wasted on me, but he'd be happy to take me to the track sometime and show me what could be done with it.
So, I figured, OK, I'm not going to understand/feel much if any benefit, but heck, everyone knows that chicks dig a guy with a Plus package
.
Then a couple of months ago I took the car in for a service day to attend to some minor items that had accumulated. The Service Center loaned me a P85. Great car! But I **immediately** felt the difference in handling, especially in the behavior of the rear end of the car, and under acceleration. More recently, I've also experienced my 19" snow tires (Hakka R2s, great tires, with Rial wheels) versus my 21" PS2s (the OEM tires and wheels from Tesla), and WOW, there's another major difference. I now officially miss the 21" performance tire season of the year.
So the happy surprise for me is that the Plus package and 21" wheel combination makes a difference in handling that turns out to matter to me. I also believe that the P85+ with the performance tires is a tad faster off the line than the P85 with 19" tires (but that's an unquantified feeling, I have no measurements). I'd be hard put to buy a P85 at this point, having experienced the P85+. Better not to try the Plus at all.
Of course, there IS a serious difference in cash outlay between the two variants, which can easily trump all other considerations. And my wife notices all the chicks eyeing my Plus, so that's a benefit, too.
Alan
(*)What a great sales experience to have a sales representative try to configure the car that would be best for me versus its cost! I think it was pretty obvious that I could afford to buy options galore, rust packs and the like. I don't recall Audi, BMW or Mercedes ever trying to talk me *down*. The sales experience was every bit as special as the service experience and the car itself.