The Gauntlet.... Really?

Unknown

In terms of reward the later nodes are your 500/250/recruit token/something else (crit boosts?) so putting recruit token at 200 iso that puts an expected value of 240 or so per node for first clear (and half of that after that), which isn't bad but most of them required at least some boosts to beat unless you're sitting on a lot of time for health pack to regen.

The cover rewards are more than generous for anyone that isn't maxed out. Even the whole 'require BP to get BP' deal isn't as bad as it sounds because if they required Beast instead people would just complain they don't have Beast either, and any node with Beast as essential is going to be much harder than BP as essential because he's a much weaker character. The selection of essential heroes are at least all workable so you don't have a case where it's just 2on3.

Ironically maxed out rosters also face the hardest challenge on top of not needing most of the rewards in the first place. This should be addressed somehow.