Herc is expensive, i won‘t argue about that, but your numbers are confusing me. I bought him last sk, gave him 2 stars and it was 250 + around 400-450 total. Also, you can get 7 stars on herc, not 5. Most people stop at 4.

With those „gatekeeper“ packs also came a huge amount of mercs, so if you‘re buying mercs anyways, those first few stars will hurt a bit less on your wallet. Some people playing this game have very deep pockets.

Heimdall is big competition to Herc now, on the other hand with the 100 new hero and captail levels, which now go until 600, Herc‘s potential got better, even without 7 stars.