I posted a couple of pix to my randomizer site last night, and looking over the list of all heroes in the game, I noticed a trend. If you look at the hp of the original heroes, you'll see plenty of 30s and many high-20s. Rook City heroes were still relatively robust as well. Argent Adept seems to be the first victim to whatever is slowly killing the heroes though, because his hp is a low 24, and the trend worsens the closer we get to the shattered future:
Omnitron-X: 25 hp. Dark Visionary: 25 hp. Freedom Tempest, Price of Freedom Wraith, Golem Unity, all 25 hp. If the trend continues, Chrono-Ranger will barely be able to stand!
In all seriousness, I'm assuming that the hp have been dropping as the base powers have been getting better, which isn't a bad thing. Or maybe over time, the game designers have decided that the starting heroes had too many hp? I wonder if we'll ever see any true 30+hp tanks anymore.
I have always felt that the lower the HP, the more awesome the character, which is why Visionary is so fantastic in the base set. She has the lowest HP (along with Wraith and Tempet, who are also ridiculous).
Yeah, as much as I would love an unusually beefy hero (like 36 - 40 for some giant) I do agree it is more useful to have a versatile hero with low hp... a hero with 24 who can heal 10 points during the fight is better than a hero with 30.
That's true, but too low and you run out of options. With Golem Unity (25 hp), she can only use her power a couple of times (deal yourself 4 damage to put out a golem) while taking a couple of shots from the villain before she's in the red zone.
I donno about that. We played with Hakka tonight and watched him do 40+ damage to Akashbuta. In one hit. Savage mana is nasty. Course that is a special case. (And I as Unity then dropped 20ish damage on her? :P Poor tempest didn't do more than 11 :P)
But even without that special case, Hakka still can drop 10 or 11 damage pretty easily, and thats no small power.
yeah. so i figured out afterward. Still, unity did drop 20+ solid damage (stealth bot, swift both, champion bot, 2 platforms, 2 raptor bots, with a +2 damage boost from the environment)