I think you are overestimating the risks of hard forking in the first place.  I mean, think about the time, money and effort that goes into companies, or other for profit small mining operations, to develop ASICs... To keep actively knocking them off the network, I think, will dissuade people from even attempting I would think.

Using hard forks as means to maintain the decentralized nature of the coin is far superior than letting more centralization to occur imo.