Grievous took me 4-5 months nonstop farming fleet store only.
Plo Koon is at 47/100 after a year of farming just his 20 energy cost node almost daily that has the mk5 stun cuff (don't even bother with his other nodes).
Ewok scout, clone sarge, fost, fotp took 5-6 months non stop. Shoretrooper took 8 months with a 80 shard pack boost. Baze 7 months with recent TB store boost. Krennic at 4 months and still have 100 shards to go.
Think I got 10+ months to go on Falcon, reaper, kylo ship.
Longest by far is Kit fisto and Geonosian Solider. They keep going to the bottom of the to do list. Almost 2 years now and they are both at 3*.
Jyn - because she Neeeeevvvuurrrrrr showed up in the Guild Shop - and I'd get impatient and spend my currency on something else and THEN she would show up - again and again. So glad though.
But this is only because I still have 60 something shards to go for Baze - 3*d hard node - yes!! Territory Battles, wait what? Need Hoth Rebel Soldier - what's that? Aww man, Baze on hold. Phoenix for Thrawn? Really, need Sabine or no? Best to be safe. Aww man, Baze on hold again. Mother Talzin?? - nahhhh, she's DS, won't be any good. :-)
Deathtrooper wasn't the longest, but was definitely the most frustrating. 16 energy cantina nodes are miserable enough. Add to that I had to put him on hold 3 separate times for panic farms I didn't want to do, and another pause because I was in desperate need of mods. It ended up taking just over 5 months.
Baze was probably the actual worst at around 7 month or so.
Mine was General Greavous. I had shown one of my friends that he was in the game and he told me to immediately farm him. Now at the time I had only 2 7* toons. Took me over a year of farming (along with other things) to get him to 7*. Now my next long farm is Nihilus......it took me 4+ months to just get him to 5*, but it's worth it (not because he's my only counter to the dreaded CLS) because he's awesome for soo many parts of the game.
Id argue that CLS was my longest farm, took basically since day one and just finished old ben like a week before the event came. But this might not be what you're looking for
Only counting everyone I've gotten to 7* already, Darth Nihilus took the longest. Even after they put his 4 or 8 shard item in shipments (free-to-play, saved daily crystals).
Current longest, have to be Sabine Wren and Hoth Rebel Soldier. All week, I've been getting 0/5 Shards for them each day. Most frustrating thing in this game to me is getting NO characters Shards when they only have one node. Even more so when I spend 50 crystals to refresh that node.
Grievous didn't take that long for me, only ever got him from fleets, never shard shop. Same with Vader (except the achievements), maul, Cody, echo, Rex, now doing the same with Fulcrum. For guild shipments, jyn didn't take too long, but jawa engineer has taken a while. 4 more shipments to get him to 7*.
"I am a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar." ~ Hoban Washburne
If the answer isn't lobot you're not doing it right
Lobot has two nodes on different sides (meaning you can get three daily activities from doing both) and both are medium cost.
Nihilus has one node at high cost that drops dumb gear, but at least he was a Marquee character when first released so you might have a head start depending on when you started playing.
Baze has one node at high cost that drops dumb gear and wasn't a Marquee, so unless you bought him in the Shard Shop for the while he was there, you're starting from scratch.
Compared to either of those, Lobot is a walk in the park.
Either Vader, Grievous, or Shoretrooper. I can't remember how long exactly it took me for each, but Vader was only achievs, Grievous was shard shop until 6* and a bit with fleet doing the rest, and Shore was like, 2-3 star (whatever he unlocks at) and the rest was entirely saving up shards and buying him from shipments. If I had to guess, Vader was 8-10 months, Grievous was 12-13, and Shore was about 9-10.
Replies
Plo Koon is at 47/100 after a year of farming just his 20 energy cost node almost daily that has the mk5 stun cuff (don't even bother with his other nodes).
Ewok scout, clone sarge, fost, fotp took 5-6 months non stop. Shoretrooper took 8 months with a 80 shard pack boost. Baze 7 months with recent TB store boost. Krennic at 4 months and still have 100 shards to go.
Think I got 10+ months to go on Falcon, reaper, kylo ship.
Longest by far is Kit fisto and Geonosian Solider. They keep going to the bottom of the to do list. Almost 2 years now and they are both at 3*.
But this is only because I still have 60 something shards to go for Baze - 3*d hard node - yes!! Territory Battles, wait what? Need Hoth Rebel Soldier - what's that? Aww man, Baze on hold. Phoenix for Thrawn? Really, need Sabine or no? Best to be safe. Aww man, Baze on hold again. Mother Talzin?? - nahhhh, she's DS, won't be any good. :-)
More like No-bot.
Baze was probably the actual worst at around 7 month or so.
Lobot has two hard nodes, which you can now farm 5x each for free daily! That's a bounty compared to the single 3x HR Soldier node that I farmed.
Time wise yes, he's pretty easy.
Sanity wise? He's a nightmare.
Current longest, have to be Sabine Wren and Hoth Rebel Soldier. All week, I've been getting 0/5 Shards for them each day. Most frustrating thing in this game to me is getting NO characters Shards when they only have one node. Even more so when I spend 50 crystals to refresh that node.
Grievous didn't take that long for me, only ever got him from fleets, never shard shop. Same with Vader (except the achievements), maul, Cody, echo, Rex, now doing the same with Fulcrum. For guild shipments, jyn didn't take too long, but jawa engineer has taken a while. 4 more shipments to get him to 7*.
Nihilus has one node at high cost that drops dumb gear, but at least he was a Marquee character when first released so you might have a head start depending on when you started playing.
Baze has one node at high cost that drops dumb gear and wasn't a Marquee, so unless you bought him in the Shard Shop for the while he was there, you're starting from scratch.
Compared to either of those, Lobot is a walk in the park.
He doesnt have a cantina node, only one hard light side node...