With the amount of time, art and lore spent in making of the heroes, It would be a waste to just discard those heroes, especially when they are the heroes that are the more well known out of Amplitudes games, which is why the heroes from ES2 should be placed in ES3 (IF ES3 is in the works).

for example.

The Hissho Faction would retain its 4 heroes, Senya Snowridge, Butska Graysand, Kogewa Brightblade, and Tsuyu Saltcliff.

But ontop of that, ES3 would introduce 2 new Hissho heroes, a pacifist hero and ecologist hero, so there would be a hero for each party.

This would be the same for every other faction, retaining its heroes from ES2 while adding heroes aligned with parties that the ES2 Factions did not have.

It would help add consistency to the Endless space franchise, (ES2 was a reboot of ES1), Allow ES3 to have more content while allowing Amplitude to Make new heroes without as much time or money and divert more resources to other sections of the game.

I also forgot to mention other benefits, It would make ES3 a actual sequel, not a reboot like ES2, Same people, same ships, same planets and setting, but More content to add without having to replace already existing content, no need to replace what ain't broken. It would also help keep things familiar to players while giving people something new.

eh, to be honest as long as the 4 ES2 Hissho heroes return, ill be happy, then The devs can pick whoever else they want back or not.

Thats why i said (if ES3 is in the works)