How do you feel about cover letters?

How do you feel about job applications that ask for a cover letter? Do you skip them if theyre not required?

It seems to me that requiring a cover letter could create an adverse incentive where more qualified employees who have more options would not want to spend the time to write one when theres other applications that dont have that same requirement.

Do you personally write cover letters when an application requires one? Or would that requirement make you pass over that role?