I did get a decent iron a while ago, but I'm still inexperienced in general. I can do wires and simple through hole stuff without a problem. However when it comes to replacing a through hole mini-USB on the Yeti, I am out of my zone. Ended up destroying the two data pins' contact pads and now she's toast. :doh:
I got pretty decent soldering modchips into PS2s and Wiis for myself and friends. The Wii's pads especially liked to lift off. Bigest timp I can think of is having a light hand and using intermittent heating. Rather than holding I like to press, lift off, press, or use an iron where I could adjust the heat.
One of the little magnifying glass and clamp/arm kits can be pretty helpful too. Even when you don't need a magnifying glass per se, using one on small pads and contacts can make it a little easier to make sure you're just making contact and not pressing a ton or to see the second a pad has started to lift.
Everything can be soft-modded now so I haven't bothered in years though. I mostly liked modding to allow using cheats. Even though my PS3 is modded, all the games I have I bought off PSN or just ripped the discs to the HDD to speed up loading or use Artemis to reduce grinding in RPGs and such. I love those style games but don't have a lot of spare time so cutting out 'filler' of hours of grinding and getting to the story is a huge perk for me.