Of course, you have to do what's in your own comfort zone, and your reasons all make very good sense. I guess no luck getting BA to ticket it on the old Japan rates?

At the end of the day it's not a massive price jump for DONE3, and still very good value at the new prices. (as long as the yen remains suppressed but that's going to get a lot more expensive if we ever get back to the 115-125 / $ range)

I myself though am going to have to think long and hard about how important DONE4 and 5 are going forward. In South America and Africa until we get new OW members in each, you can realistically only get 1 or 2 points if you use a surface segment and they are roughly $1000 price hikes at each interval except ex-Norway. That was the true beauty of ex-CAI, the DONE5 was barely much more expensive than a 4 or even 3 so why not throw extra continents in there. I know of course business class flights into and out of Africa or South America are worth way more than $1000, but not sure I'm personally getting that much value out of them vs. a well optimized DONE3 like you posted yesterday. Oceana is easily a region though that someone could get massive value out of the extra continent, but not necessarily maximizing miles flown. I'm very much looking forward to FJ joining next year and explore some more off the beaten path islands when I'm able to take an extended holiday. That'll be an excellent use case for a DONE4 from somewhere or maybe even a Circle Pacific (I see they are still offered from Japan but have never attempted to price one). (Yes, I know FJ can currently be on a DGLOB34, but I would never get an itinerary I was satisfied with under 34k miles).