GM experiences with a Hydra encounter?

[Wonton]

So I'm tempted to make an encounter out of a hydra (for a level 4-5 party, let's say). Any experienced GMs wanna give me any advice on hydras? Does the "cutting off heads" mechanic actually work or do the PCs usually just try to ignore that and burn through its hit points?

[BlueEyes]

Well. If you just attack the body, you'll see no effect until it's dead. But if you attack the heads, you'll at least lower the number of potential attacks the hydra could make on the PCs. and you can ready actions to attack the heads in case you can't reach the body (or don't want to get too close for some reason).
So attacking heads is better if you can destroy them fast enough (before they regrow).

[sonofzeal]

My only experiences have been... brutal. Characters have died each time. If the hydra is getting into melee range of a single PC, that PC is generally going to be in for a whole bunch of accurate attacks that add up to a huge pile of damage. Since chopping off heads only really works in melee anyway (sunder and slashing weapons and all that), this makes it... inadvisable at best. Unless you can take out multiple heads before it gets a round to attack, you're usually best off simply alpha-striking the bastard and praying its hp runs out before yours does. And that's best done from outside melee range entirely, if at all possible.

[Othesemo]

Characters die. Especially if you make it a cryo/pyro hydra. Really, it all comes down to the PCs going nova, and then either killing the beast or being brutally killed themselves.

[BlueEyes]

Accurate? Lol.

[Grail]

I have never seen PC's target the heads, they've always gone for the body. Hydras have low AC, but decent HP. Still, a concerted attack from the PC's will put one down quick enough.

It's true though that if you begin the encounter at close range, they are lethal. Hydra's are size category: Huge though, so they shouldn't be surprising party members very often, if at all. Even if the PC's can't see one, they should hear something that large moving around. Given one or two rounds of ranged attacks, PC's can do enough damage to mitigate the threat of it in melee as it should only last 1 round after that.

[Wonton]

I figured as much. That's probably why Pathfinder reduced the heads' damage from d10 to d8, reduced its hp, and reduced the Fast Healing from 15 to 5.

I'm guessing that the best way to do a hydra encounter would probably be with lots of warning ahead of time - i.e. a "A dangerous reptilian monster with 5 heads lurks in the swamp" type thing where the party can prepare for it. That way they also wouldn't end up with the problem of having not enough fire or acid damage available.

[Khedrac]

I have played in and run a Living Greyhawk adventure where the party could fight a hydra (don't recall the head count) at low level (APL 4 iirc).
Those with fire damage went for heads, which those without went for body - which given the regen was not optimal tactics.

What made the fight surviable was the room had a 10' ceiling. Although the adventure did not spell this out it meant the hydra was squeezing, and that attack penalty made all the difference do the melees who went in to kill it by body damage.

[some guy]

I once let a party of 5 level 6's fight an hydra with, I believe, 8 heads. They survived. I think their ray of enfeeblement made the fight much easier. They didn't target the heads. Summoned animals also made the fight easier for them.

But I also was unsure how much of a killer the hydra would be so I ran 2 mock battles as preparation. Those went a lot worse. With that many attacks, battles can really be unpredictable.

[KillianHawkeye]

In my experience, PCs rarely take the Improved Sunder feat, and aren't too keen on sundering even when they face a monster specifically designed for it. The fast healing can really keep the hydra alive for a while, too.

[ThiagoMartell]

I recently ran one. It was getting quite ugly, then the fighter hit with a x4 critical and saved the day. Other than that it was basically the hydra knocking down one person per round and the monk softening it up for that lucky crit.
EDIT: Before we get the cries of "lol underpowered Monk", this is a Pathfinder Monk. Martial Artist archetype, Dragon Style and Dragon Ferocity feats, Str 22 (5th level). 1d8+10 base damage, 1d18+13 in the first unarmed strike in the round, flurries at bab 5 and gets +2 to attacks from Exploit Weakness.

[Krazzman]

We once were put into an arena with one. I was playing a Warlock, the other player a shadowdancer... let's just say we battled that thing for half an hour intime! before we jumped out of the anti magic shield... it was pretty damn boring. Afterwards our DM said that he won't use a hydra ever again.

[Togo]

It's quite rare that someone competant at doing sunder attacks is not also competant at doing damage. Going for the body is usually better.

Hydras have the same problems that Trolls do at lower level - they can do a lot of damage in a full attack, and thus kill an individual PC quite quickly.

Grappling works very well against them, since it stops them getting so many attacks, and they're not very strong.

[sonofzeal]

Hydras have the same problems that Trolls do at lower level - they can do a lot of damage in a full attack, and thus kill an individual PC quite quickly.
...with the added problem that they have pounce, except on steroids.

[Dire Panda]

In all my years of DMing I've never seen a PC take Improved Sunder ("Why would I destroy my own loot?"), so throwing a hydra at my party last week was inexcusable in hindsight. The damn thing never rolled under a 14 on its first full attack and tore through the party meatshield like tissue paper. One round of fast healing later the rest of the party realized that attacking the body was futile. With the only real fighter-type bleeding out at -8, the day was saved by creative thinking: "Can I ready an action for when it bites me? I want to shove a grenade down its throat." (This is a steampunk-ish campaign, so grenades are available) I ruled that this could in fact blow off a head but would result in the bite attack automatically hitting, and that you'd still need to cauterize the stump. We ended up with one party member standing, the rest at various negatives, a dead hydra, and no grenades left.

Moral of the story, the Hydra sidebar is absolutely correct: they are 'difficult to defeat by conventional means.' What the MM left out is that their CR is only appropriate for a party with access to tricks like Improved Sunder or a way to prevent it from closing to melee. Other parties of 'appropriate' level will be slaughtered.

(Interesting side note, I once played a necromancer who controlled a zombie hydra. Before every battle he'd "buff" it by cutting off its heads and letting the number double. The severed heads made fun 'props', too - "Damnit, who keeps putting these in my Bag of Holding? Was it you, Mekkar?")

[Arctura42]

So, I feel kind of awkward putting my experiences here as they are absolutely outside the realms of ordinary. That being said, I can't exactly end this post without telling the story now. So here goes nothing.

My PCs have outright killed every single hydra they've come up against in less than two rounds, without taking any damage whatsoever.

To be perfectly honest, I'm of the completely insane ilk of GM who let his players use whatever source they want so long as I get to see it and can interpret/balance/ban things accordingly. The party consisted of 4 specialized gestalt characters (I say specialized because I took away the restriction on not taking two prestige classes and added a specific feat to generic feat mechanism). The first combat was in a smallish room when the party was level 4, and the second was underwater and the party was level 6.

Combat 1 began with the hydra out of range of the party. Grease was cast, the hydra tripped. The hydra then attempted to get up and then take another move action to get in range of the party. The party dealt damage to the hydra, and then Deja Vu was cast. The hydra, incapable of doing any damage, simply died to hp damage before it could do anything.

Combat 2 began with the party underwater, warped in from an alternate dimension within range of a 12-headed cryohydra (might have been 12, don't remember). First round, one person did 8 charisma damage, and the other cast a quickened heartache and then performed a coup-de-grace using shocking grasp. The hydra died before its turn in the initiative.

After that I never threw a hydra at the party again.

Again, completely insane, I know.

[ThiagoMartell]

To be perfectly honest, I'm of the completely insane ilk of GM who let his players use whatever source they want so long as I get to see it and can interpret/balance/ban things accordingly.
They are killing hydras left and right and you think it's balanced...?
Well, if they are all doing it, I think that is balanced, in a way. If everyone likes to breeze through encounters while playing in God Mode. *shrugs*
iddqd was there for a reason, after all.

[Tyndmyr]

So I'm tempted to make an encounter out of a hydra (for a level 4-5 party, let's say). Any experienced GMs wanna give me any advice on hydras? Does the "cutting off heads" mechanic actually work or do the PCs usually just try to ignore that and burn through its hit points?

Hydra's are a nova-style encounter. They move slowly and have jack for long ranged options, but pack a big hit up close. Therefore, if encountered at a distance, they tend to be obliterated at range. However, if *not*, they tend to leave a mark for their CR.

Usually cutting off heads is less efficient than burning through hp. Unless heads are counted as separate targets for say, burning hands. That changes things notably, but the single creature with multiple targets thing is a bit of a mechanical oddity in this way.

Edit: On the balance issue, he's doing gestalt, so that accounts for a significant amount of power boost. I'd expect a party of gestalt chars to have notably more options for dealing with a non-traditional encounter like this.

[Soranar]

Hydras can be brutal. Unless your team is warned and prepared for the fight, there's a good chance one of them will do something stupid and get himself killed.

It's like fighting a glass cannon, if you manage to kill it quickly you should be ok but let things drag out for any amount of time and you'll be losing players.

1 particularly unlucky team nearly got TPK after the Barbarian Ubercharger went in the negatives HP while charging (5 AoO, 2 crits, every attack hit and rolled high damage...). Suddenly they had to deal with a 15 reach monster that kept making it's Will saves (like I said, unlucky team).

[Gandariel]

A quick correction would be having the fastheal make sense.
5-headed one has 10+1/head
can't it just be 3/head?
makes a little more sense.

also Fireball hits all the heads AND the body?

[Aegis013]

also Fireball hits all the heads AND the body?

The monster entry doesn't say the heads are separate creatures, but does say they have their own hit point pools. However the heads can only be severed with a slashing weapon, which may be interpreted that the last damage to finish off the head needs to be a sunder attack with a slashing damage weapon, or that all of the damage needs to be sunder attacks with a slashing damage weapon. To interpret it as fireball deals no damage to the heads, or does but they must be finished off by a sunder attack via slashing weapon would both be reasonable, in my opinion.

[Wonton]

A quick correction would be having the fastheal make sense.
5-headed one has 10+1/head
can't it just be 3/head?
makes a little more sense.

also Fireball hits all the heads AND the body?

1) You have to realize it's based off their original number of heads - it's not like their Fast Healing is reduced if you lop off a few heads. So the change you suggested would actually buff Hydras with 6+ heads. Considering 90% of the responses in the thread are "hydras nearly killed all my PCs", I don't think that's a wise course of action.

2) Monster Manual specifically brings up that area effects damage the body, not the heads.

----

So, the general idea I'm getting here is that a single CR-appropriate hydra is basically a really badly designed encounter. It will either die from range before it gets close to do anything, or it will get in range and likely one-shot the PCs. :smallannoyed:

Now, I'm not a professional or anything, but I think in game design circles that's called a "binary design" - i.e. something that either performs really well or really poorly, with no inbetween. Sounds like I should maybe just think up another idea.

[whibla]

So, the general idea I'm getting here is that a single CR-appropriate hydra is basically a really badly designed encounter. It will either die from range before it gets close to do anything, or it will get in range and likely one-shot the PCs. :smallannoyed:

Now, I'm not a professional or anything, but I think in game design circles that's called a "binary design" - i.e. something that either performs really well or really poorly, with no inbetween. Sounds like I should maybe just think up another idea.

I'm slightly suprised by the responses, but I guess there's a tendancy to remember, and relate, the extremes. To my mind I would not call it a badly designed encounter (per se - depends on the encounter, rather than the monster really), but one that tests the party's knowledge, and co-ordination.

In terms of base numbers a CR 4 hydra, assuming it gets into melee with your 'tank' is getting 5 attacks, at a +6 to hit. Most 4th level 'tanks' are likely to have an AC of around 20. That equates to 1 or 2 hits a round, for a mere d10+3 damage each. Now consider that that 'tank' might have a blur spell cast on them, giving them additional avoidance. The hydra only has 55 (ish) HP's, and while fast healing 15 is nasty, I'd expect a reasonable group of 4th level characters to be doing at least twice that amount of damage, and possibly much more (if they blow some single use items or are obscenely optimised), in a round. In other words, the hydra stays up for 3 rounds, causes enough damage to be concerning on a single character, requires the group to use some of their spells, and likely healing afterwards, but...unless the group charges in provoking multiple attacks of opportunity, isn't likely to prove a party killer.

I'd actually call that fairly balanced. Even if the group manages to stay at range (bearing in mind reduced movement rate in a swamp) they will likely use some of their spells or consumables in defeating it. In what way is this a bad encounter?

[Wonton]

Good points. Though there's still the issue that the the iconic way of defeating a hydra is by chopping off its heads and burning the stumps - whereas mechanically, that is so difficult that everyone just resorts to beating on it until it dies.

[Vegan Zombie]

My group has a gentlemans agreement: you don't need Improved Sunder to sunder the heads without provoking AoOs. Last time we fought one, our Frenzied Berserker was sent in loaded to the nines with buffs and a reach weapon and took down the cryo hydra single handedly. Mind you we all blasts it from afar, but he chopped off all the heads before we could kill it.

Also, this gentlemans agreement keeps the caster from polymorphing into the damn things all the time :smallbiggrin:

[LadyLexi]

Hydras are a really big pain for some parties and nothing at all for others. I would recommend understanding your group before throwing it as against some parties there is a very slim chance of victory. I mean, a group of veteran players who discuss their group tactics should be okay, but a group of sub-optimized newer players might not be able to handle it.

I've seen a party lose three people on a Hydra fight, I've also beaten one without any other party members. So, really only you can know your group and what they can handle.

[JustPlayItLoud]

In my experience tossing out "there's a hydra over yonder" leads to binary encounters. Either they stay back and waste it, or wade in and suffer heavy losses. Hydras are such a cool, classic, iconic, and fearsome monster that I feel it's doing them a bit of a disservice to not create an exciting encounter around one. Maybe it gets a drop on the party somehow, and they have to choose to retreat and use the environment to their advantage or just duke it out.

To me, the core concept of the hydra is that it's sort of a hybrid encounter. It's like a single monster so some area damage and battlefield control spells are only minimally effective. It has more hit dice and thus better saves, so it's more likely to make its one save than a group of lower hit dice monsters are to make theirs. But it also has elements of multiple opponents. It's difficult to simply overwhelm physically since it has so many attacks and fast healing. And it can easily overcome a single opponent's biggest weakness, the action economy. A hydra gets multiple actions (well, multiple attacks anyhow, but attacks are the only actions most hydrae ever need to make) and can deal quite a bit of damage.

I still don't like the way area damage effects them. I think each head should take a portion of the damage, but still need damage of an appropriate type to be killed.

[eggs]

It's a crazy binary fight. If players can capitalize on their slow movement or lack of flight, ranged attacks or pinpointing perception skills, the hydra doesn't even get a chance. If players can't target those defenses, the long reach, multiple attacks and fast healing can be a bit much.

[LordBlades]

They are killing hydras left and right and you think it's balanced...?
Well, if they are all doing it, I think that is balanced, in a way. If everyone likes to breeze through encounters while playing in God Mode. *shrugs*
iddqd was there for a reason, after all.

Killing hydras has very little to do with balance. A hydra is a monster of one strength melee damage) and a lot of weaknesses: slow, can't fly, has no ranged attack, has horrible will saves.

Any time the hydra can't bring it's only strength to bear (start close and/or some PCs move slowly due to heavy armor) and/or the party has a way to exploit any of the numerous weaknesses encountering a hydra is trivial.

A mounted archer that encounters a hydra outside (a hydra's natural habitat is a marsh, so slim chance of encountering one indoors) can easily keep between 80 ft. (hydra run range) and 110 ft (longbow increment) and shoot his bow while being 100% safe from a hydra who can only move 80 ft. max if it performs the run action. Is mounted archery overpowered?

[Telok]

Hydra encounters punish bad decision making and reward good decision making.

The primary difference between a hydra encounter and a batch of standard mooks is that the tolerance for bad decisions is lower, while the rewards for good decisions are higher.

[ThiagoMartell]

Killing hydras has very little to do with balance. A hydra is a monster of one strength melee damage) and a lot of weaknesses: slow, can't fly, has no ranged attack, has horrible will saves.

Any time the hydra can't bring it's only strength to bear (start close and/or some PCs move slowly due to heavy armor) and/or the party has a way to exploit any of the numerous weaknesses encountering a hydra is trivial.

A mounted archer that encounters a hydra outside (a hydra's natural habitat is a marsh, so slim chance of encountering one indoors) can easily keep between 80 ft. (hydra run range) and 110 ft (longbow increment) and shoot his bow while being 100% safe from a hydra who can only move 80 ft. max if it performs the run action. Is mounted archery overpowered?

If they are meeting hydras under conditions that favor them all the time, that's a balancing problem all the same. If they are meeting hydras with full resources all the time, that's a balancing problem all the same. I never said anything was overpowered. I said if your players are breezing through encounters all the time, you're doing a terrible job at balancing encounters.

[LordBlades]

If they are meeting hydras under conditions that favor them all the time, that's a balancing problem all the same. If they are meeting hydras with full resources all the time, that's a balancing problem all the same. I never said anything was overpowered. I said if your players are breezing through encounters all the time, you're doing a terrible job at balancing encounters.

That's true, I merely wanted to point out that a hydra would be a very poor balance benchmark due to it's binary nature.

Also, some of the weaknesses of the hydras are quite hard to mitigate as a DM. for example, If you want to make a tougher encounter you can make sure the party encounters a hydra in a confined space they can't bypass, but it's much harder to make sure they encounter it once they've exhausted all their Will-or-suck spells.

[Kudaku]

I actually ran a 5-headed Hydra encounter on Sunday - it was the endgame fight to an arch of three sessions where the players were seeking out the monster that lurked at the bottom of a city's immense network of underground aqueducts (because of a dare from an npc of all things). A major point in that story line was that no one could agree on what kind of monster it was, but most described it as some kind of dragon. The one person who actually saw it in recent memory only saw one head while the rest of the body was submerged, and so the players descended reasonably certain they were going to encounter a dragon, probably a black one.

I had left a few tips and pointers around the storyline for the players to catch on to the fact that it wasn't quite as straightforward as they thought it would be, and my players actually caught on - very happy about that. After realizing they were going to fight a Hydra they prepared by seeking out a sage to gain knowledge on how to fight hydras, stocked up on flasks of acid and alchemist's fire, and used a wand of Enlarge Person to help counter its size and reach.

For the record, this is a party of two fairly traditional beatsticks (dwarven Fighter, human Cavalier), slightly underpowered artillery (human Sorcerer who focuses on Necromancy and Touch Spells) and a human Cleric who pretty much exclusively uses healing and buffing spells. All characters are lvl 4.

I modified the Hydra somewhat by giving it the Giant template (increasing its size to Gargantuan and boosting its strength and constitution while lowering its AC), but I didn't adjust the bite damage according to the new size. Honestly the Hydra is scary in melee as it is, with the new size its bite damage went through the roof.

The encounter with the hydra happened on a series of crumbling arches about 10 feet over a colossal underwater lake, which the hydra lurked in.

The first two rounds one player (the cavalier) focused on decapitating a head while the fighter and the sorcerer both focused on dealing damage to the body - using Enlarge Person and ranged spells to reach the body lurking in the water underneath the arches. However as soon as the hydra started feeling the hurt (one head sundered) it simply dived and lurked at the bottom of the lake as the fast healing restored it to full health - it also gained an additional head here as the players were too slow to apply acid to the stump bringing it up to a grand total of 6 bite attacks.

While the hydra was gone the players used wands of Infernal Healing to restore their health and lay a different play for how to counter the monster.

When it reemerged with full health the players used delay actions to line up the initiative rounds so that the fighter and cavalier could go first with Sunder Attempts, immediately followed by the sorcerer using Spontaneous Immolation (I ruled that this spell dealt equal damage to the body and each stump since it seems halfway between a ray spell and an area of effect spell). The cleric was at the lowest initiative, ready to jump in should someone take too much damage.

The fight wore on with the hydra heads gradually disappearing. At the end the Sorcerer was completely out of spells and down to using his 0-th level acid spell, the cavalier was at -3 but benefiting from infernal healing, the cleric was using the Heal Skill for all it was worth, while the literally 0 HP dwarf finally cauterized the last stump with a bottle of Alchemist's Fire before immediately collapsing due to HP damage.

In the end I'd say the fight felt suitably exciting and very very challenging - though with 5 or 6 players it would probably have been significantly easier. It could really have gone either way at a number of points during the fight and if the players hadn't been forewarned and prepared with consumables it would probably have been a complete wipe.


I did admittedly change the template of the hydra somewhat and the terrain definitely worked in its favor, but I still feel that the hydra is a tricky encounter to balance.
As others have mentioned, hydra fights are very hit-and-miss. Because of the nature of their abilities they will absolutely tear your face off in melee, but if you can get range on them you'll probably win and flight spells makes the entire encounter a farce. I used the environment to give the hydra a significant advantage over the players, and that's most likely why the fight was both very demanding and incredibly fun.