Hello LitnutsMO! You’re correct, anything outside of the v= and p= part of the DMARC record are not required (i.e. rua= is a feature if you want it).
And yes, I would strongly recommend that people starting with DMARC start with a p=none policy, as any emails that you are sending that are not successfully DKIM / SPF authenticated can fail DMARC and accidentally get caught in the p=quarantine or p=reject rules. This can be a very likely scenario for senders who are using multiple sending platforms such as Shopify, Google Workspace, Klayvio, Mailchimp, etc. as each of those sending platforms will need to have authentication setup correctly (aka be authorized to send emails on your behalf).