You don’t HAVE to take advantage of everything it offers 
Go simple, one box, get some fun, and wait for the moment where you tell yourself you miss a poly synth. Don’t anticipate this.
A dedicated time with one box, pushing it to its limits, is the best way to learn.
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EDIT : As pointed out by @LyingDalai below, Digitakt does monitor and allow for sampling of inputs during playback, though does not have any looping function (or similar).
And if your goal is to put the guitar down when using your new DAWless box of magic, then I think you will not have to worry about it, and you will probably enjoy it a lot
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This is false: you can monitor the input (either left, right or both summed) and you can perfectly sample yourself while the sequencer is running.
But indeed, DT is not a looper.
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Ah nice, thanks for letting me know, I will edit now to avoid confusion! 
Great news!
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Yes, totally agreeing with this.
These are even life lessons, not just for new pieces of gear you just bought but I feel theres a more deep message to it.
Thanks again for reminding that life should be taken at ease, with calm and one thing at a time, analogy with one sound per step, maybe 
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Just a question … have you ever worked with a MPC?
What makes me asking is that having MPC and Ableton/Push I would not say that for me the workflow is very similar. If I have my MPC X in front on the desk and connected as the master to a couple of instruments via MIDI, my workflow is much more smooth, more listening, and music centered compared to working with Ableton. But that’s only my subjective opinion.
I actually never worked with one so my thoughts are for sure biased on reviews and hypothetical theories.
The MPC X looks like a crazy complete machine though! I can imagine having a very different approach with it than with a DAW. Although I’ve been reading that for MPC live and the One that it’s like having a DAW but in a tiny screen.
Although of course, everything is subjective, as you said, to personal taste in the end.
Maybe one day I’ll go with for the Live or the One to have a complete music production and recording set.
But for now, one machine at a time to master before going for the next.
Have you tried the Live I or II or the One?
Nothing can beat DAW for producing music with a linear workflow. The new MPCs are very cool but yeah, too close of a DAW, I have much more power in my 10 years computer than in theses new MPC.
But, if you want make music differently, there is good pieces of hardware that can achieve this, and I think the Elektron are the most original and versatile way to get inspired.
If you hesitate between an Elektron and other brand, go for Elektron. It’s top build quality with regular OS update and no box are become obsolete, even the discontinued.
So, buying an Elektron is like having the right tool you keep for life.
Which Elektron ? Depend on your style and how you are ready to invest but yeah Digitakt and Octatrack are the more versatile to start with.
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Digitakt it is 
besides… What I really dislike about the elektron samplers is the lack of polyphony.
My music is very dependent on pad sounds.
A polyphonic elektron sampler would be the best standalone
If you want to record you guitar and other stuff, OT is MUCH better, much closer to a DAW than DT. I have both. I wouldn’t record my guitar with DT, I’m not even sure to keep it.
OT can be controlled via a footswitch, record as a looper.
8m28s stereo recording time vs 32s mono for DT (and automatic normalise I dislike).
Recordings can be played and mangled directly.
8 recorders with different sources, that can be triggered with the sequencer (rec trigs).
Pretty good audio editor.
Slices.
More fx, complex fx routing possible.
…
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No … but I have an oldschool MPC 5000, which was the last in the line of stand alone machines before all those “controlers”, and since some time I work on the MPC X.
I love to have all those encoders with scribble strips, which are changing according to the screen. I often use the MPC X as a MIDI-recorder, buildng up patterns with a keyboard without the need to stop the sequence.
The touch screen is handy for slicing samples, but I do the most work with the pads, the buttons, and the encoders. For me the screen is excellent for having some overview about what I’m doing … or if I quickly want to edit some sample content or MIDI …
The touchscreen on the MPC One isnt that much used, you have a lot of buttons to interact with it. I would say in an 80 /20 ratio, or maybe 90/10 ratio even. You could always use the list editor, and use the scroll wheel to edit its parameters. Maybe have a look on the actual workflow of the MPC One, and see which shortcuts work. Its not too different from NI Maschine, but with a better approach to create full tracks imho, and its relatively stable when used within its specs. (use some send fx on groups, and not reverb on every pad.)
The sampling on the MPC one, is also very effective -if you want to sample via an external midi foot controller - that is also possible to map to record /arm.
This is all solid advice, though if you start to get into setting up send / return effects then your 80/20 screen use ratio is going right out the window… but I think the way to approach the screen is as a method of enabling additional controls without resorting to excessive menu diving or endless unlabeled shift button functions that you have to memorise. You have to use the screen to set up send / return chains, but it’d be significantly worse if you had to do it all through a tiny monochrome screen and a set of multifunction buttons - an approach that can work OK on Elektron gear because of its focused approach, but would be much trickier with the broader scope of the MPC.
But, crucially, I don’t think the screen on the MPC is used as a crutch for a lack of effort elsewhere - it adds value and convenience, and I think it’s implemented sensibly. I had my doubts about it, bit in practice it doesn’t get in the way - more often than not, it prevents things getting in the way.
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I’ve been traveling down the DAW-less road without even realizing it, I just had DAWs. I love my Digitakt, it’s the only box that I’ve purchased twice and kept. Of course, DAW-less doesn’t mean you have to have one box to rule them all. You could expand the Digitakt with a good mono and/or poly with deep cc support, such as a Waldorf Pulse 2 and a Yamaha reface. Or perhaps grab a DSI Prophet Rev2 and use the bitimberal / split function and have everything you need in one external synth.
Yes. If you want to make complete tracks on one machine, the MPC Live 2 excels at this. However, I find the OT much more inspiring. Also, I didn’t like dealing with the MPC touchscreen but, that’s just me, I don’t like touchscreens in general (I use a smartphone but I don’t enjoy it at all). The MPC does have a Looper so you could set it up to loop your guitar but the OT just has so many other ways to accomplish this. I will say this about the MPC Live 2: the battery and the built-in speakers are awesome. That’s really what I miss about it.
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IMO if going without a DAW the main focus should not be to talk about particular pieces of gear. It should be about “which workflow shall be supported” in the first place.
If there is a machine, which might be great in its own right, but one of the major steps of my workflow takes deep digging into this machine … or even worse … needs to apply some “workaround” or “tips & tricks” to get it done, I would stay away from it …
IMO a tool should support often repeated steps of my workflow taking as little as possible head scratching, and should best be applied like a natural extension of my mind and body … if this makes any sense …
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as strange as it sounds, that is true in some way. i realized exactly the same the other day. OT is very uniqe thing to be replaced by software, but everything else is conveniently covered by DAW/synths. imagine OT + Reaktor for example
Do you want a DAWless setup or a DAW in a box? IMO there’s a distinction. MPC Live is basically a DAW in a box, has many of the same features but a lot smaller screen and less features overall. I personally don’t get the appeal. I would rather get an MPC as a sampler and a laptop with a DAW for just recording your outboard gear.
A true dawless setup IMO means you don’t actually use a DAW or a DAW in a box, but instead use sequencers to control your gear and record everything in stereo, a performance rather than tracks to be edited later. For that purpose, a Digitakt or an Octatrack as the brains of the setup are perfect. Maybe add a Blackbox sampler or not, you could just record everything to a Zoom, 4-track or a DAW or w/e the recording medium of your choice is.
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I understood that you need a laptop to get the most of the OT 