Prior to Missions and the Hall of Heros, we had to trudge through the low heat/CR pre-Basil depths in the Arcade. The payoff? Access to the lucrative depths beyond his domain, not to mention a peek at his exclusive recipe offerings.

Obvious problem is obvious. But I'll state it anyhoo. Missions allow you to easily skip straight to Depth 24, getting straight to the "good stuff." Many of the recipes you'll ever need at are the Hall of Heros making visiting Basil not as necessary.

Solutions? I don't know... Simplest thing might be to just remove the linear payout progression. The primary reasons for its existence are moot.