It's really not. You've basically captured the essence of how it works in what you've said!
The different hardness of rubbers is akin to when Pirelli rock up to an F1 race weekend with a 3 out of 5 selection of tyres (rated as C1 to C5). On a given day at a particular track a race car will have a finite amount of grip on any one type of tyre so let's say that on this particular day with a track temperature of say 40C it's the C3 tyre that gives the best grip. For that same car at the same track with a lower track temperature then a softer tyre will be better (eg the C1) on a hotter day you'd need a harder rubber to get the same grip (eg C5) because the hotter conditions will make the rubber deform more for a given speed/turning force.
The same is true for hop rubbers. On an average UK day a 60 degree rubber in a 350FPS gun firing a 0.28 bb will give good hop. In the same gun with the same power and same BBs in a winter game in Norway it won't give enough so you need a softer rubber. Likewise, take the same gun to a summer game in Florida and you'll need a harder rubber.
The tricky part is accounting for the variables in the gun itself - spring rate consistency, gearbox stiction, air seal, the stability of the hop unit (flex in the arm, deformation of the tensioner etc) bore quality in the barrel, all of which will have an effect in the consistency of the results. All the "marketing" is different companies trying to resolve the variations because airsofters want something that is reliable and consistent. The reason why there IS no consistency is that every manufacturer works to their own tolerances and goals and airsofters by and large are too dumb/gullible to work that out so you end up with what started out as a perfectly reasonable standard gun "upgraded" with loads of shiny bits from different manufacturers, none of which actually work properly TOGETHER.