I will probably 6* Pain Keeper, Coldheart, and Uugo next so I can progress deeper into dungeon content, but I'm pretty locked out of anything other than picking off stupidly lesser powered teams in Arena, which is super frustrating because I need the medals for progress missions.  Any ideas?

Based on the level of that gear, I wouldn't be stressing about competing in arena right now. 

It will be very difficult to compete missing banners, and having gear at only level 8 and 12.

In your position I would be focusing the dungeons and resource collection. You need fully leveled gear and fully equipped champions. Start there. Work on Spider progression and farming spider until you have the accessories and silver you need  

After that you'll need a well designed team, fortunately you already have Lazarius and Deacon, which paired with another speed booster will be about all you need.

Focusing dungeons is the way to go. 

Other than that, just pick off the teams you can and treat all other matches as a learning opportunity.

Coldheart and Apothecary are both good rank ups for your dungeon progression. Uugo might be less important before those as she's harder to book, and you already have a 60d AoE Dec Defense champ in Deacon. 

Apothecary and Coldheart as rares are just going to be cheaper to ascend and book and can both help a good deal.

So just pick off the weak that pop up (accept what the Arena gives me) and focus efforts elsewhere?  You realize that's not really a great pep talk, right?  😁

Anyway, I do have Paragon, so I may develop him and cheeseball my way through Spider.  That seems to still be a legit thing to do.

Well then it's good that I'm not trying to biggen you up, and instead trying to help you be more competitive long term. :D

This game is a resource collection and management game more than it is anything else, tbh. Getting those dungeon farms going is very important for your long term success. Even better, a good dungeon team can do a decent job in CB and also progress some in Doom Tower. :)

Fair, I get you're telling me what's good for progression.  I appreciate that.

Question: support or nuke role for Lazarius?  He's actually my best 12-3 farmer by a long shot, and I prolly won't be able to readily book him more than 1 of his forms.  He seems to be begging to be a support dude with buff/debuff/revive/shield in his first form.  I don't know, but his alternate doesn't seem to have much steam for damage without books and more ascension.

He needs more ascension for sure, that's part of the things to be trying to farm. And yeah, I remember how painful it is to farm pots for that first team. So I know what pain I'm instructing you to do. Haha

But he'll just do WAY more damage as his gear improves. And when he can actually wear all the gear, cause it looks like he's missing both an amulet and banner right now. 

Overall, the books have less importance than I think you're giving them. I used so many unbooked champs to beat Faction Wars, for example. Just made sure they were in good gear was all.

Elhain in relentless and retaliation gear as maxed on crit that I can afford right now (warmaster mastered) is my best nuker at this time and highest damage dealer in CB without a viable poisoner.  Only Adelyn does as much, but that's only because of her high Brimstone stick-rate on CB.  I'm still only getting 22-24ish million on two keys on easy, so it's still not very good.

It's Laz in his support role that keeps me in the fight with pumped/upright champs.  The damage is - so far - secondary to him as support.  That's primarily why, farming and CB, that he seems to wanna be default form.  HH talks about him as a damage dealer, but I've seen how much more the Sacred Order mythical does personally (got blitzed by him solo 😵‍💫), but I have a ways to go before I have to truly pick a lane.

You need to understand that even a poorly-geared arena team is going to be at 200+ speeds. Anyone who actually invests in their team can easily get 250+.

Your speeds of 100 mean they're getting 2-3 turns for every turn you get. There's no way you have a chance.

Here’s the deal.  I 100% accept speed is an enemy.  Half the battles I lose is due to speed.  The other half (when I go first) that I lose is due to silly toons like Corvis or some other synergy racket where someone at my account level either got stupid lucky or blew a wad to have a team that is geared and balanced to a point where Elhain doing 20k plus in AoE is laughed off like it was nothing…all on a 50k powered team.  Elhain does great for what I have on her (the best crit and multiple turns I can achieve at this point), but I don’t see a way to glass cannon her AND speed her to 250+ at the same time.  I straight-up don’t have that gear yet. 🤣. And if I go all speed, then a lot of the battles I do win evaporate/go away because I now don’t do as much damage.

In my turn, Deacon is speeded as fast as I currently can with speed gear, Laz as speed lead so Deacon can DEC DEF.  Adelyn comes up second and often sleeps their biggest nuker.  Then, Laz goes third to buff Elhain into her A3 or A2, depending, and buff block the other team.  So, the sequence is right, when I get my turn.  Sometimes it’s not fast enough, or is too pure-damage to get through their layered defenses.  It seems I still just don’t have enough Xs to cover all the Os.  I’m still scratching my head on this.

So, toons and gear do also contribute to getting my @$$ kicked.  I get harleQuinn‘s advice on farming better accessory gear.  I just got an entry-level Iron Twins team up and running this weekend, and I will tool around to get higher in spider, and I’m aggressively grinding ascension forts.  And you can see the 4* and 5* toons that I am grinding advancement.  All the 3* that suck are next to get to 5* so I can food them for keepable champs.  So, I am farming the crud out of 12-3.  I guess time, patience, and gear farming are my best friends because I don't have the budget to buy it, that's for darn sure.

Message heard. 😊

As I've said in another thread of yours - you play the game in your own way, and that's fine.

But if you want to play the game "properly", you should be doing absolutely nothing other than farming food and farming Dragon 20. Twins is a massive waste of time for you right now.

Not all gear being equal, what is the set that makes dragon tops over other dungeons?

Nothing. In fact, most would probably argue FK20 is better. But Dragon 20 is by far the easiest and fastest to get on auto-farm.

Yeah, the reason dragon is recommended is purely because it is the easiest dungeon to progress in with a general, non specialized team.

Although as far as sets, Speed and Accuracy gear are quite helpful early, although accuracy for sure gets replaced easily by Perception set pieces from the Forge.

And you are correct that patience is the key... continuing to progress day by day. The game is a 240 mile ultra marathon, not the 100m sprint we all started the game thinking it would be. :)

Hmm, I have been crafting 4-5* Perception gear, mostly because the ingredients are easily farmable at low FW levels and Adelyn's chase perception set has done wonders for her as part of advanced quests items.  Nice to see that's not a wasted effort.  Are the speed or accuracy (or something else) charms better to add into the pieces, or does that differ by set piece (like crit rate for gloves for example)?

Don't use them on 5star gear.

Oh, snap.  Just go base stats, no charms unless 6* gear?

And, is there a place to farm charms?  I've been accruing them, but I really don't know where. 😏

Nowhere to farm them, no. You get them from events/tourneys, and rewards from places like doom tower / sintranos.

Save your charms for the 5-6* rolls, you'll end up using quite a lot of them.

Roger that, will save.  I think I've been getting them from - of all things ironic, given OP - as rewards for Arena tourneys and Champion promotion events.  The Arena tourneys tend to have less accrual amounts so I get higher in them faster.  I just relentlessly refresh all night to up the wins.