That will depend upon the mission. A lot of the present electric aircraft projects focus on a training or sports role for the aeroplane, for which getting to a workable height to do whatever it is the pilot wants to do, so doing so with as much energy as possible once there is very helpful.
Clearly for A-B/transport missions, then yes, it's going to be a more complex set of problems to solve, but actually solving energy to height first isn't a bad starting point for tackling those also.
G