Explosions, Fire, Smoke, and such
 

As I was going through some of the Maya tutorials built into the program, I noticed that there are many fluid effects such as fire, explosions, and smoke that you can import. Does this mean that because these things are here, any person creating 3D graphics never needs to create these things, merely modify the existing templates given? I mean, this sounds good because these things look very difficult to create, but it almost seems too easy.

The examples are just that. Examples.

You would almost never use those in production, as you would usualy need to tweak some aspect of the shot, as well as optimize the fluid container, render modes, etc. to get it to render faster, look better, etc.

However, as a learning tool, and as a small stepping stone for your own effects, go for it:)