Lots of other games gives free stuff cause they are actually growing....kaw use to give out loads of xtals...guess it is declining.
the devs had a global event where you had to collect wisps or something and everyone who contributed got a reward like a spyglass , that's probably the closest you'll get to having a activity based reward
from what i understood the op to mean was that you logged in and got the rewards for being active and the last time we had something close to that besides spending a arm and a leg was that event , and the dragon egg event