More machines fall to finding the thing that was already there than to a clever exploit. When a box is stuck, the fix is almost always to enumerate harder, not to reach for a more advanced technique. The winning path was usually visible at hour one and dismissed.
Why it holds
An exploit needs a target, and finding the target is enumeration. A service on a high port, a virtual host that only answers to its name, a comment in the page source, a readable share: each is a foothold that no exploit skill substitutes for. Enumeration also compounds. Every credential and hostname found sends you back to enumerate something new, so the surface grows as you work.
Where it breaks
Time-boxed competitions with a known single trick reward pattern recognition over breadth: a CTF challenge is usually one insight, not one more scan. And enumeration has diminishing returns; past a point you are re-reading output, not finding new surface.