I am sure there is NOT one player that will say the individual rewards for completing the 3rd floor of the Spire are in balance to the resources given away to do it.
I think the balance is fine, and find the costs quite cheap , at least at my level of play. YMMV
You are right, you won't find ONE player, cause now we are two
I go to the top weekly in 3 cities regardless if we get gold or not, cause I find it worth it just for the individual rewards. (And a few more in my fs go to the top too without getting gold, so I assume they do it cause they find it worth it, but I don't know since I have not asked).
The rewards in spire helps me continue to go to the top in spire - and do more in tourney. I autofight all the way, at least in my big cities, my smaller cities still have to cater sometimes):
* DAs helps my troops win
* Time boosters / supply instants helps me train enough troops
* Catalysts/spell fragments (and time boosters) helps me craft more:
** UUU/ELR/MMM helps my troops win
** Pet food to feed fire phoenix to help my troops win + brown bear to train enough troops
** Time boosters / supply instants as above
* Doing more in tourney means more KP to level my fighting wonders, blue/purple spells to get more supplies, plenty of relics to craft catalysts,...
And then I sometimes get lucky and get diamonds (both from spire and the crafting chest), magic buildings, genies,... (And of course the diamonds from the fellowship prices are an extra bonus).
And yes, sometimes I am unlucky and get rewards I can't use (e.g. portal profits and most of the artifacts), but on average I find it more than worth it to go to the top even without the fellowship rewards.
That doesn't mean I wouldn't like more rewards, but it wouldn't change how much I do in spire. (but I am not sure I find this likely, so
@JessMac if you want more rewards, then I think you need really good arguments to convince Inno to give you more).