Are you sure it's the endgame gear? I doubt anything you can get from secret realms can outclass ifrit domain dungeons or eclipse gear that has less penalties, better stats and unique skills. For example, Ember Crossbow has 0.1 attack speed, which is crazy for a weapon with 2000 range. Frostforged Tundra Armor with Aegis enchantment provides up to 55% damage mitigation, a lot of hp, freezes enemies that attack you and has no cooldown penalty which is extremely rare for a heavy armor. Legacy points is probably the only reason to clear secret realms.

I haven't got to Ifrit Domain, I got burned out of the game sooner than that. I based my loot estimations on the "Maps of Salzaar" guide. But the loot distribution is pretty bad for 10-20, and even in the best case scenario - it comes down save scumming one thing or another. Even if there is better gear, or if Secret Realms are for an achievement - it still means that there is balance disparity it still doesn't justify the Sultan requirement, because if you have taken the city and you are genghiskhaning the entire map - you PROBABLY are more than capable of beating some Heroic Statue-level miniboss. It's just a waste of time and a lazy design.

Unfortunately, many guides are written by people who don't have enough knowledge, or are outdated. That gear was the best before global rebalancing. That's why visiting secret realm requires jades and has a long cooldown. But later devs decided to change all items in vanilla game. So now secret realm gear is unique, but definitely not the best. Items from DLCs have better stats, unique skills or passivess. Even giant's armor from a normal dungeon is much better than any secret realm heavy armor because it has no cooldown penalty and boosts hp by 100%.

I think in most categories it's Eclipse gear > Tournament gear > Ifrit domain gear. Ironically, eclipse gear is probably the easiest to get because the only point when you need to reload is submitting clues to get access to specific boss. But it allows you to get the strongest equipment in entire game before day 60-70. Unfortunately, it also has the highest stat requirements, and some items are useful only for specific build or hero.

The same balance issue can be noticed in heroes. DLC and reworked heroes are in most cases stronger than vanilla if you can get good gear for them. For example, there are multiple heroes with white rose healer passives, but reworked Riq is superior to others if you spend some resources on her gear and additional arcana skills for passives. She can reach cooldown reduction cap, damage mitigation cap, her skills offer a lot of AoE healing, and her signature skill makes herself and allies around her literally immortal for 8 seconds with a short cooldown. DLC heroes are even stronger. For example, Jamila applies confuse to all enemies within certain range just because she exists.

I can understand burnout from this game. However, playing Nameless can be quite fun because you can choose any skill trees except Sultan, and also have Master arcana talent. Honestly, in most cases enchantments and skills are more important than gear stats, which makes nameless class extremely strong. Anyway, can complete entire game with average gear if you have good skill build, or good army and heroes. Perhaps you will decide to try it again after several months.

What the guy above me said. I'm on Epic d5, and just playing Nameless with Beserker, and run around with a lv12 Lone Wolf sword and lv10 Ghoul armor and can singlehandedly decimate armies