This preseason, the NFL tried extra points from much further out, but they were still routinely made. The success rate at the current distance, with the ball snapped from the two yard line at the center of the field, makes the attempt a foregone conclusion. Though many things can go wrong, they almost never do at the professional level. NFL head coaches are risk averse; they rarely make any decisions other than the orthodox, so they are less likely to be critiqued after the game and can shift the blame on the players when things go wrong (tip of the hat to Gregg Easterbrook). They resisted the 2 point conversion and still rarely try them.
A possible solution that is certainly more complicated than the current one but which would make every approach to the end zone more of an adventure, is this:
If a touchdown is scored and the ball can be touched down in the endzone, rugby style, even if the ground knocks the ball loose: automatic 7 points. If 8 points is needed, can try conversion by two point rules, but for only 1 point. Failure takes a point off the board or gives the opponent the ball at its 40 yard line instead of a kickoff (the scoring team gets to decide which option).
If possession of the ball is maintained into the end zone, with feet/knees/buttocks/arms touching the area of the end zone, but the ball never touches the field surface, current rules apply: 6 points, with option to kick for one or a play for two points at current spot.
A "Break the plane" touchdown (see the famous Drew Brees poke of the ball across the line) with no other body part touching the end zone proper, would only be 5 points, with option to kick for 1 or 2 only, thus 8 points not possible. A play with the player in possession of the ball only knocking down the pylon would also only be 5 points. In my opinion, and many others', these sort of scores cheapen the touchdown, but they should still be worth something. A variation would be the team declining the 5 points to take the ball right outside the goal line for whatever downs remained for the potential for a "proper" touchdown.
The rules for the non-kick conversions would stay the same.
There are too many field goals (yawn) and kickers are too good. Those of you of a certain age will remember when the goalposts hung right over the goal line, with the base in the end zone in play. The NFL moved them back partly for safety but also because kickers were too good and field goals could be made without crossing midfield.
I would like to see one of these solutions, or combinations of them, to limit field goals. 1. Field goals from inside the red zone are worth three points and a kick-off opportunity. Outside the red zone, they are worth only 2 points (a team should be rewarded for advancing the ball farther down the field) and, whether or not they are made, the opponent gets the ball without a kickoff at the site of the spot/kick. 2. The variant of this is that the opponents can always take the ball, rather than allow a kickoff, at the site of the spot. This would preclude the current less gutsy take-the-field-goal-and-onside-kick way of losing when down 11 points or less, especially when inside the 10 (the opponents would always get the ball at least far enough from the end zone to do kneel-downs to kill the clock).
All of these ideas give the players and coaches more to think about and lessen the number of kick-offs and extra points, win-wins all around....