Actually, those steps are the ones necessary to recover from a hard brick (re: the device is unusable because you did something you shouldn't have as root).
The actual process to root the device is simply running a few adb commands (so a prereq is having Developer Mode enabled).
Once you have ran the exploit, your root escalation is temporary until the device is rebooted or you take additional steps to persists your root privileges (thus, potentially leading you towards a hard brick).
source: The docs
Any ideas which version(s) are susceptible? I couldn't find it mentioned.