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Helion: The Melee Light Starter
Helion is the melee half of Aniimo's starter pair: a light-element physical DPS that wants to be in your enemy's face, stacking a Solar Halo and cashing it in for burst.
The short version
- Helion is a close-range physical DPS built for burst damage and aggressive combos.
- Its trait builds a Solar Halo through continuous attacks, which empowers its abilities.
- The kit is a leap attack, a spinning area-of-effect strike, an enemy pull and a self damage buff.
- Soleon is Helion's combat transformation, a temporary power boost rather than a permanent evolution.
- Helion and Lunara have mirrored stats, the same role, the same typing and maximum potential for combat rating.
- Lunara deals slightly less DPS than Helion, the price of its safer ranged style.
- Melee is dangerous, so Helion asks for careful positioning and timing.
Aniimo gives you two special creatures early in the story, Lunara and Helion, and uses them to teach the twining mechanic. In the beta both were categorised as special Aniimo. This is not a throwaway first pick.
Helion is the melee one. It is a close-range physical DPS built for burst damage and aggressive combos, and its whole design assumes you are willing to stand where the damage is.
Here is what it does, what it turns into, and how it stacks up against the ranged option.
Solar Halo rewards you for not backing off
Helion's trait generates a Solar Halo through continuous attacks, and that Halo empowers its abilities. Read that as a loop rather than a passive stat. You attack, the Halo builds, your abilities hit harder.
The consequence is positional. Continuous attacks mean staying in range, and Helion only threatens up close. Disengaging is not free. It costs you the thing that makes your kit good.
The kit: get in, hold them, hit harder
Helion's skill kit is a leap attack, a spinning area-of-effect strike, an enemy pull and a self damage buff. Four tools, and they read as one sequence rather than four separate options.
The leap closes distance. The pull brings enemies to you and keeps them there, which matters when your damage depends on continuous attacks. The spinning strike covers an area, so a pulled group is a better target than a single one. The self damage buff is the payoff, the thing you spend once the rest has set up. That is the combo-heavy loop Helion is recommended for.
Soleon is a burst window, not an evolution
Helion's combat transformation form is Soleon. Each starter Aniimo possesses a unique combat transformation form, and Soleon is Helion's.
What matters is the kind of upgrade it is. Starter transformations offer a temporary combat power boost rather than a permanent evolution. Your Helion does not become Soleon and stay there. You get a window of increased power and then you are Helion again, which makes transformation something you time rather than something you unlock and forget.
Helion or Lunara
The two starters share mirrored stats and the same combat role, differing only in play style and appearance. Both are light-element DPS units. Both possess maximum potential for combat rating, so neither is the trap pick on a stat sheet.
They also share the same typing, which means neither has a different elemental weakness. You cannot pick one to cover a hole the other leaves. The only real difference in output is that Lunara deals slightly less DPS than Helion, and that gap is the price of Lunara's safer ranged combat style.
So the trade is stated plainly. Helion's higher damage is paid for in risk.
Helion
- Close range physical DPS built for burst damage and aggressive combos.
- Kit covers a leap attack, a spinning area of effect strike, an enemy pull, and a self damage buff.
- Melee danger means positioning and timing matter.
Lunara
- Safer ranged combat style.
- Deals slightly less DPS than Helion as the balance for that safety.
- Same typing as Helion, so no different elemental weakness.
Who should pick Helion
Helion is recommended for players who favour aggressive, combo-heavy melee combat and high burst damage. If that describes how you play, the extra DPS over Lunara is yours to take.
The warning attached to it is just as plain. Playing Helion requires careful positioning and timing, because melee combat is inherently dangerous. You are trading a safe range advantage for damage, and you manage that trade every fight rather than once at character select.
Where to start
Pick Helion if you want to be the one closing distance. You get slightly higher DPS than Lunara, a kit that pulls enemies in and rewards you for staying on them, and Soleon as a timed burst window. You pay for it with positioning you cannot get lazy about.
Questions this answers
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Built from 15 facts gathered before launch, each checked against the sources it came from. How we know this, and who we learned it from.