It was because I needed to run validation over the inputs sent to the server, and then update other data which the user themself did not have authorization to access.
You can validate the data with Firebase rules. The other data can be updated with Firebase functions. They listen for state changes on the relevant data and then update the data that the user does not have access to.
I'm sure it's technically possible, but things were starting to feel hackier and hackier and already the latency was a no-go, so the value proposition was becoming less convincing. I'm still using it for user auth though, that seems to work well so far.
Appwrite is really meant to live happily beside your stack. Honestly, disable and rip out the containers you don't need, they're all stateless, and loosely coupled. You can disabled them in console.
Use what you find useful. I often use Appwrite just for Auth + Avatar/profile management. Something I do for every app... something that I find painful to do for every app :P
