So I just entered a depth 8 party lobby.
One +8 vitapod, and one +2 vitapod.
I'm thinking back to my run from Haven to Moorcroft. On every level of depth n, I saw one +n vitapod, and sometimes additional ones behind an energy gate.
So why two pods in a party lobby? You had the old system, but now? If you have 4 people playing, what's kinda expected?
How does a +8, +7, +6, and +5 vitapod sound? Too much health to start?
At +8 and +2, thre's a slight encouragement to solo -- the second person doesn't get much. At the very least, +8, +4, +1, and +1.
But as you'll be getting one more per level, or so it looks so far, that'll be quickly upgraded. So why not just start with the upgrade?
If the design invariant is: "One pod per level, players are expected to be declining slightly below the current depth in max health as the party gets bigger", then why not start the party that way?
I think it's more to encourage people to give the best vitapods to the sword+shield type players.
If everyone in the party were meant to be basically guaranteed to have the best vitapod possible on every floor, then there wouldn't be much point in the vitapod system anyway and they would just give people more max health automatically.