Funny enough, that's exactly how I've felt about Atom for years, @brimwats. When I started trying out VS Code a month or so ago (precisely because Dendron seems so promising), my partner was floored. She's always used VS Code & I've always used Atom. What's holding you back from writing academic papers in it? I've been doing Atom -> Pandoc -> OpenOffice or LireOffice since at least Bloomington, so I might have suggestions if you have specific frustrations?