Persistent hero damage?

The very first game I played, we misplayed and had damage persist on heroes, after they leveled up.

It made the game very interesting, and heroes felt like stronger units; not unkillable super stars.

Has anyone else tried playing the game this way? I’ve since been playing the game by the normal rules, but I do kind of miss that feeling of killable heroes, and am curious how others felt (if they’ve tried it at all).

My first impression is that if I knew I could never heal my heroes except with the Healing ability, I would basically never use heroes in combat unless I knew I wouldn’t be using any of their spells that game (and I would also value the Healing ability much higher; Fuzz Cuddles would be one of my first techs each game playing as White). From what I recall reading/hearing of the game’s development, that’s the reason heroes do heal when they reach a new level band, specifically to allow you to use them in combat without having to worry about every scratch.

That said, calling heroes “unkillable” feels like a stretch. They only heal at new level bands, which means both that how easy it is to heal a hero varies quite a bit (compare Troq and River from the Starter Set for the extreme ends of that spectrum) and once a hero reaches max level they can’t self-heal anymore. At that point they usually have high stats, sure, but they’re suddenly much more fragile and have to attack more carefully. Because of that, when to level a hero is a much more interesting decision than it would be if that was how heroes always worked.

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I suppose; it’s not that they’re necessarily unkillable - they can just snowball out of control if they [Kill]+[Levelup]+[Heal] all in a single turn, and sometimes for free. Trading, then being rewarded with free healing, can feel really oppressive (since gold is so tight to find during a turn; leveling up can be hard, which means you’re killing enemies - and if you fall behind even slightly…).

That said, heroes that don’t heal could also draw out a game longer; exacerbating the differences in T3 unit strengths (Looking at you Anarchy:Pirate Gunship).

I suppose I never liked the Warcraft3 style heroes - where a single high level hero is more important than the hero behind it.

I guess I’ll have to play some games with it as an alternate variant, and see how balance plays out.

Definitely an interesting variant to try out. Sounds like a good shout for a map card idea that makes healing much better.

I feel like Green and White would be stronger starters under this rule change, with their strong buffs and healing options to let you try and use your heroes on the offensive, while Black will probably be less able to bully in the early game if it can’t safely lean on Vandy for as long.

That seems like a meta worth exploring at least (can you tell where my colour allegiances lie :wink:). Might try a few games with it and see what I think.

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I smell a potential map card!

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