The hand loaded ammo for a lot of weapons is very good.
Match Load for the AMR gives +15% damage and reduces spread (less DT loss) ... so it can make the difference between killing or not killing your target.
Spread is for... spread. As in the radius where your bullets go while shooting. Problem is, AMR's spread is 0, there's nothing to reduce.
But yeah, HL ammo is amazing, and you can turn all the basic ammo you get into heaps of it.
Workbench lets you make Max Charge and Over Charge ammo for EW, Powder Charges which act as frag mines (very nice if you liked placing traps everywhere), Stimpacks, Weapon Repair Kits (amazing for the rarer stuff, and easily replaces the Jury Rigging perk) and so on.
Campfires let you make food without stat penalties (for hardcoe), Hydra (weightless Doctor Bags), Slasher (stacks with Psycho and Med-X), Wasteland Omelet (restores 400+ HP in one serving), Poisons (unmitigated, long lasting damage that makes EW's Flamer/Incinerator burning damage look like a joke in comparison, not to mention potential debuffs for more difficult encounters), et cetera.