Adding a placeholder mods.toml file as directed in its wiki prevents Forge from loading the mod jar as expected, but this mods.toml file is not checked by Forge with Connector, so any dependencies set there will be ignored. This prevents authors from having Forge-specific dependencies like Connector Extras.

Can you please provide an example + reproduction? If Forge picks up the file, it should check its dependencies, too.

Reproducible with this version of Inline Tooltips that ships with a mods.toml, specifying a dependency on Inline. Without Connector, the game will crash with a warning that Inline is required, with Connector the game will crash when it attempts to use a class from Inline.