Personally, I almost always to reload every time, and offset this by demanding an awesome SSD and a decent system otherwise. Maybe check email quickly while the splash screen is up. Usually, my time fixing an issue is outweighed by the time launching 3ds Max ...
However, for very "tweaky" changes, where you need to apply many small adjustments quickly, you can use the "Apply Code Changes" feature of Visual Studio. Have you tried it? It requires one change in the C/C++ section of the project properties, set Debug Information Format -> Program Database for Edit and Continue.
Of course, when you only need to tweak one variable, you can simply apply a new value from the watch window. Sometimes I introduce local variables into the code, adding if() statements or other logic switched off them, so I can play around with control flow without changing the code. Dunno, I used to be bothered by slow load times back in the day of spinning disks. Somehow it doesn't bother me anymore. Nowadays, slow compile times are often more frustrating.
Happy coding,
Michaelson Britt
