My problem with gradle is the built in Java dependency resolution is way too aggressive. If you change a class with a static constant it recompiles everything. Even if you don't, it will compile the whole dependency graph to handle some theoretical edge case when it would be enough to compile just the modified file 99% of the time. Oh well.

Personally, I would rather builds be slow than have my build mysteriously break when I'm in that 1%.

For me it depends. If I'm in a development session with lots of iterations where build speed is the bottleneck, I'd take my chances (I do anyway, have to resort to manually compiling individual files). For production/CI/other builds it's a different story, although those usually get built clean so it's not even a consideration.

if you are on a dev session with a lot of iterations, you really want to go the InstantRun (or JRebel) route.