Nope. DCB covers most of your expenses and at places where it's not accepted, you've the SBI cashback.
The Ace is better than cashback for offline spends, but unless you've a significant amount of offline transactions where DCB isn't accepted, you don't need the Ace.
If you're getting Ace LTF...
I had Elite as my primary card for a few years and when I got a DCB, asked SBI to make it LTF I'll close it. They sent me the steps to close it. No retention, nothing.
I wouldn't trust paytm because they're known to have data breaches. They are also known to be scammy and to sell user data to whoever pays them. I do use GPay for contactless payments though, works like a charm.
Tried this method for Magnus and used DCB statement, which has a ridiculous limit. They got back asking for last two ITRs and I shared them. Magnus limit increased from 2.62 to 5.00
It took like 3 weeks, but yeah, worth the time for almost 2x increase in limit.
Fair enough.
Do try asking the CC to waive off the annual fee for the year (instead of asking directly for LTF). Some banks do honour it, especially if you've some decent spends on the card or you have a good relationship with the bank.
Happens at bunks that have low volume of CC transactions. So highways and tier 3/4 cities. In bigger cities, the bunks have more competition and since they earn more per litre of fuel than the MDR, they'd much rather charge 1% MDR and have repeat customers instead of losing them to another bunk...
What is your strategy for holding so many cards that have annual fee, for which you won't reach the spend based waiver? If the offers and discounts don't make up for the annual fee, it might not be worth holding the card. Same thing, if you're gonna have to manufacture spends to hit the fee waiver.