...Of Hydras and Martial Strikes

[Lycanthromancer]

A single attack (not just a full attack action, but one single attack) by a hydra consists of one bite for every head it has, including attacks of opportunity.

If you were to polymorph a martial adept into a hydra, or a hydra took Martial Study, or you were a psychic warrior with metamorphosis and a few levels in martial adept, or an egoist with a psicrystal with Martial Study that you intended to transform, which would be the best strikes for this?

Crusader's Strike seems like a good one. Heal your whole party at the end of each battle.

Steel Wind and Flashing Sun, for even more attacks.

Foehammer, for ignoring DR and getting up to +24d6 extra damage.

Drain Vitality, to basically eviscerate a foe with Con damage.

Tactical Strike, to move your whole party up to 60 feet, and deal up to +24d6 extra damage.

And those are just the first level strikes. There are more.

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By the way, blame an amalgamation of myself and Snakeman830 for this one.

[Icewraith]

I thought the whole point of Hydra Slaying Strike (setting sun 8ish) was it stopped monsters from full attacking, preventing the hydra from hitting with all heads?

[Lycanthromancer]

I thought the whole point of Hydra Slaying Strike (setting sun 8ish) was it stopped monsters from full attacking, preventing the hydra from hitting with all heads?

You're the hydra with the strikes. Not every opponent is going to have the HSS from level 7 on (when you can access polymorph).

[DragoonWraith]

A Hydra's Standard Action attack may attack once for each head, but Martial Strikes don't. They all (IIRC) specifically say "make a single melee attack" - and that's what you can do. You used your Standard Action to do it, so your other heads do nothing. Strikes do not activate on attacks (or else you could use four during a Full Attack), nor do they activate your normal Standard Action attack routine, they specifically allow you only to attack once. Snap Kick, IIRC, gives an explicit exception to this, but other than that, no.

[Icewraith]

No, just remarking that since this is the first time I've noticed that, the wording of the maneuver seems particularly poor. It would be like having

Iron Golem Slaying Strike. Targets with a breath weapon must save or lose access the the breath weapon for 2d6 rounds.

[Thrawn183]

The best you could hope for is the boosts that add fire damage to every attack.

[Irreverent Fool]

A Hydra's Standard Action attack may attack once for each head, but Martial Strikes don't. They all (IIRC) specifically say "make a single melee attack" - and that's what you can do. You used your Standard Action to do it, so your other heads do nothing. Strikes do not activate on attacks (or else you could use four during a Full Attack), nor do they activate your normal Standard Action attack routine, they specifically allow you only to attack once. Snap Kick, IIRC, gives an explicit exception to this, but other than that, no.

This. The standard action you take to initiate the maneuver is your standard action. You can't take two different standard actions (normally). However, a hydra might benefit significantly from a number of the swift action boosts such as Burning Blade (+1d6 fire damage +1 per IL to each attack until the end of the round) or Defensive Rebuke (any enemy you strike this turn provokes AoO's from you if they attack anyone else). Similarly some of the stances can be quite deadly.

Heck, one level of warblade and a Hydra can pick up Punishing Stance, or you could simply modify the feats and pick it up with Martial Stance.

Edit: Ninja'd!

obnoxious
sig

[Runestar]

I thought the whole point of Hydra Slaying Strike (setting sun 8ish) was it stopped monsters from full attacking, preventing the hydra from hitting with all heads?

Ironically, hydra-slaying strike has no effect on a hydra because it can already attack with all its heads as an attack action, and thus has no need of the full-attack routine which said maneuver disables.

I am not sure if the strikes apply to every head, or if only one head gets the benefit. It can still be used well, martial spirit lets you heal 2 hp per hit, mithral or steel whirlwind would let you attack with all your heads against each foe adjacent to you, burning blade line is just nasty with all those heads...

It seems that boosts mostly boosted. Now you make me wanna stat out a hydra martial adept...

[Cog]

Attack: This line shows the single attack the creature makes with an attack action.

Unless this has been errata'd, those multiple attacks are definitely a single attack action.

[Coplantor]

So, what about a hydra with disciple of dispater lvls and improved critical Bite with the Blood in the Water stance?

[true_shinken]

So, what about a hydra with disciple of dispater lvls and improved critical Bite with the Blood in the Water stance?

A bite attack is still not made of metal...

[Oslecamo]

Unless this has been errata'd, those multiple attacks are definitely a single attack action.

If that was true, then an hydra with 16 BAB full attacking would attack four times with each head.

[Coplantor]

A bite attack is still not made of metal...

I knew there was somethign wrong with it...

[PairO'Dice Lost]

If that was true, then an hydra with 16 BAB full attacking would attack four times with each head.

Natural attacks don't get iteratives, so you can still have it get only one attack routine while counting the whole thing as an attack action.

[Akal Saris]

Hmm...going by the interpretation that this works, then the next question would be if effects that say "deal 1d6+1 on your attack" meant 1d6+1 for each bite or only after you made all of your bite attacks and at least one hit. I lean towards only gaining the extra damage once as a more logical interpretation.

L1:
Steel Wind: seems to work well with this interpretation. Do 12d6 to 2 foes.

L2:
Foehammer/Mountain Hammer: From personal experience, DR really sucks for a hydra.
Emerald Razor: Good for this as anything else

L3:
Insightful Strike: If you do Concentration dmg for each bite, it's amazing. If it replaces the whole sequence with 1 check, it's horrible

L4:
Ruby Nightmare Blade: This one seems to work fine. Make the check, deal 24d6.

L5:
Disrupting Blow: 12 chances to prevent a foe to act. Mm.
Dazing Strike: Same as above.
Elder Mountain Hammer: More DR breakage.
Dancing Mongoose: Would 1 more bite per head count? Probably not.
Flanking maneuver: If it's 12 AOO's, awesome. Otherwise eh.

L6:
Desert Tempest: Jackpot!
Irresistible Mountain Strike: 12 chances to prevent a foe to act.

L7:
Avalanche of Blades: This one seems perfect for a hydra.
Hydra Slaying Strike: For when the DM throws your evil doppelganger at you
Ancient Mtn Hammer: DR, yadda yadda, ...
Swarming Strike: Potentially awesome like flanking maneuver.

L8:
Diamond Nightmare Blade: This one should work, and boosts dmg to 48d6
Adamantine Hurricane: Potentially a ton of attacks for 12d6, also should work.
Girallon Windmill: Another one that seems to work pretty clearly

L9:
Strike of Righteous Vitality: This is really too good to pass up

Hmm...looking at it, a warblade/JPM seems best for this situation. Maybe Something like Warblade 1/Wiz 5/Jade Phoenix Mage 10/Abjurant Champion 4 would work well, gets BAB +17 and CL 17.

[Flickerdart]

A bite attack is still not made of metal...

Get fillings? Be a Half-Iron Golem Hydra? Hydra Effigy? The plausibilities are endless!

[Eorran]

Why not just go Rogue?
Sneak attack on all your bites! For added funny, you're a Huge, multiheaded dragon-like thing that snuck up on someone and tore them apart before they knew you were there.

The uber-crocodile?

[Coplantor]

Why not just go Rogue?
Sneak attack on all your bites! For added funny, you're a Huge, multiheaded dragon-like thing that snuck up on someone and tore them apart before they knew you were there.

The uber-crocodile?

Dragon fire adept for a freking lot of breath weapons?

[Lord of Syntax]

Why not just go Rogue?

I'm gonna go rogue for a minute...

[Escheton]

I knew there was somethign wrong with it...

just take him to an openminded expert with profession(dentist) and get some (magic) grills

[KillianHawkeye]

You'd need more than a basic Hydra for this. Hydra's only have 2 Intelligence, which isn't enough to take class levels.

[Runestar]

You'd need more than a basic Hydra for this. Hydra's only have 2 Intelligence, which isn't enough to take class levels.

Fiendish template easily gives them 3 int, or any other template which improves their int, such as half-dragon.

Alternatively, a hydra with martial study feats. As if robilar's gambit wasn't dangerous enough on a hydra already.

[Lycanthromancer]

You'd probably get more out of a martial adept hydra if it was a martial adept first. No increases in CR or LA for polymorph effects.

Also, jade phoenix mage (psion edition).

[Draken]

Get fillings? Be a Half-Iron Golem Hydra? Hydra Effigy? The plausibilities are endless!

Draconomicon has a metal item that dragons use to boost up their bite attacks.

[BadJuJu]

The best you could hope for is the boosts that add fire damage to every attack.

Girrelion rend or the one that gives you additional offhand attacks. Any of the boosts that give bonus damage really. Really bad is Thicket of blades.