I've maxed my crafting skills, and I've taken advantage of the loops, but I still haven't broken my game. The reason is mostly that my self-control kicked in when it came time to choose my enchantments. I resisted fortifying my combat skills, instead choosing things like waterbreathing, increase carry weight, etc. My enjoyment of the game was actually increased, because I like the process of crafting, creating potions and (especially) poisons, and enchanting, but also because having the excellent equipment freed me up to choose non-combat perks, like pickpocketing, speech, etc, rather than maxing out the damage- and armor rating- increasing perks.
Armor rating isn't really an issue, since there's a damage reduction cap (iirc, 80% reduction, reached at 567 displayed armor rating, with 4 pieces of armor equipped), but if you smith your weapons endlessly, enchant your armor with fortify combat skills enchantments, etc, you can break your game (unless you enjoy smashing through enemies, which is fair enough). You can break your game that way without taking advantage of the loops; and you can take advantage of the loops without breaking your game that way.