As a dude who has been Guard and AD. I can tell you that complaining is part of life. You are never going to be 100% happy with how any organization, big or small, is run. Having said that, AD has some serious issues. Manning, deployments, assignments, retention, toxic leaders, scandals, just to name a few. The Guard has its problems too, however it was always on a micro level and much easier to handle, especially for those that were part timers and could just walk out the door middle finger held high and come back a month later as if nothing had happened.
As far the Reserves, I put their QOL between AD and the Guard, as I have heard of some shady stuff going on there lately like 365 deployments and crap like that. This would never fly with the Guard.