Inspired by: https://twitter.com/Rimmy_Downunder/status/1686188323164028928
Transcription:
A stick figure pondering: "Hm. If only there was a platform for my desktop application"
The stick figure stepping over many native GUIs to pick up Google Chromium.
The stick figure: "Ah! Here we go!"
They removed it in a recent update because they were told to by the FTB team. There's a legacy FTB section for much older packs, but it doesn't have the pack I want to play.
I mean, worst case scenario, you could always try and use the launcher just to download the mods/install and then cut and paste the Minecraft install over to your launcher of choice. That said, I don't know for certain if that works largely because I've never really played any FTB modpacks, and I've always been EXTREMELY picky with Minecraft launchers for a very similar reason (Curseforge's official app has ads and I don't trust that "Overwolf" thing they also make you install to not be spyware data harvesting).
Interesting. Turns out I'm still using version 6.3, which is the version just before they removed the ability to download FTB packs. Thanks for the heads-up, I'm certainly not updating now.
One thing I can confirm is that if you can find a way to install release 6.3, FTB downloads still work perfectly fine.