I fell into the 3’rd party trap in 92 and 96 and will never do so again until we have runoff elections for all public offices including president. Ideally, nobody should ever have to fear to vote his first choice, at least on a first ballot, and nobody should ever hold any public office with less than 50% of the vote. But we don’t live in an ideal world yet.
Never did, going back to the early elections with Adams and Jefferson smearing each other. Worst system in the world, except for all the others.