Desert Hydra

With five huge heads independently biting and spitting acid at its foes, the Desert Hydra is one of the most devastating warbeasts the Skorne Empire has ever captured and conditioned for war. Each head can release a focused spray of highly corrosive acid or snatch up opponents to be devoured by its gaping, hellish jaws. Flesh hooks protruding from beneath armored plates keep the beast maddened with pain, spurring it to further carnage even after suffering multiple decapitations.

Basic Info

Abilities

• Template:Pathfinder
• Template:Circular Vision
• Template:Multiple Heads
• Template:Regeneration
• Template:Snacking

Weapons

Acid Spray(s)
File:Gun icon.jpg		RNG			ROF			AOE			POW
		SP 8			Template:Star			Template:-			14
Template:Star Variable ROF, refer to the Multiple Head rule. Template:Corrosion Damage Template:Continuous Corrosion
Bite(s) Template:Star
File:Sword icon.jpg		RNG				POW				P+S
		2				4				18
Template:Star Variable number of attacks, refer to the Multiple Head rule. Template:Critical Grievous Wounds

Animus

{{Category: Template:Sandstorm }}[[Category: Template:Sandstorm ]]

Theme Forces

• Template:Disciples of Agony
• Template:Masters of War
• Template:The Exalted
• Template:Winds of Death

Thoughts on the Desert Hydra

Desert Hydra in a nutshell

The Desert Hydra is a wrecking ball that costs more than two heavy warbeasts, but moves fast, hits hard, shoots a lot, and has an animus that as a spell is better than many that appear on warcasters & warlocks. In essence the Desert Hydra does what any good gargantuan should do: threaten most of the table while supporting your own army's delivery. If it has a weakness, it is the same weakness all huge bases share, they can be seen through anything and don't scale well into dedicated efforts to destroy them. It's a lot of points for a lot of beast and there's nothing wrong with that.

It’s animus and the animus of the Basilisk Krea is the main way to make sure it gets into the action, offsetting it’s rather conservative, HP, armour and defence. In terms of fury use this is expensive, but at least the rest of the force reap the benefits also.

Combos & Synergies

• Paingiver Beast Handlers provide fury management and make it an effective melee warbeast when it needs to engage by buffing its STR and providing a free charge.
• the Desert Hydra scale extremely well with buffs of all stripes, so casters specialized in buffing warbeasts can get a lot of mileage out of the Hydra. That including speed buffing warlocks like Xerxis2 or Morghoul1 ; damage-enhancing one like Morghoul2 or Makeda3 ; or resilience-enhancing warlocks like Zaadesh2 or Zaal1.
  • the only one who does all this in 1 package is Xekaar
• Its animus work on minions, and provide a very different effect than the usual armor or defense stacking that Skorne warlocks tend to do.
• The Hydra can spray straight though Croak Raiders without hurting them.
• Supreme Aptimus Zaal can make ample use of this warbeast if he can afford the points. A Huge base to hide behind is not a hindrance to casting, and being able to utilize the feat for Ancestral Rage tokens while also taking advantage of Inviolable Resolve stacked with either a Basilisk Krea animus or gnawing pain from an Agonizer massively extends his viability.
• The Cyclops Shaman is an obvious piece to include with the Hydra. Early on, it lets you use all the fury on the Hydra aggressively, while the Shaman Sandstorms. Later on, he can copy animii like Rush
• The Hydra loves mass debuffs that cover big sections of the board, such as those provided by the Hermit of Hengehold or Morghoul2's Mortality.

Drawbacks & Downsides

• The statistics on the hydra are all at the point where they become really good once buffed but aren't special else. In other word, the hydra want quite a lot of support.
  • In particular, the Hydra is relatively fragile baseline, and its healing abilities can only be used if it survive a turn. Agonizer and Basilisk Krea help a lot here.
  • You probably also often want access to Rush or to another speed enhancer, as threat 10" is somewhat light but threat 12" begin to be a real problem to your opponents
• the Mammoth can pay back its points cost much easier due to its range advantage, admittedly at the cost of the support animus.
• Most colossals and gargants like to stay behind and shoot to be brought to the frontline once big threats to it have been neutered. The Hydra cannot do that because it's short ranged, and consequently put itself in danger more often and quicker than most gargants.
• Disciples of Agony means that Skorne is extremely lush with hard-hitting heavies. There are too many combinations to list of pairs of heavies which compare to the Hydra in melee output, but don't put so many points into a single model.
• Unlike something like a Blightbringer, the Hydra cannot be used as just a support stick. Include it only if your list make good use of a melee colossal.

Tricks & Tips

• As a huge-based model, the Hydra is immune to Grievous Wounds. Watch out for effects that prevent healing but are not Grievous Wounds. Things like Entropic Aura/Entropic Force, the Vulcan's Miasma of Death, Mortality such as seen on Morghoul2, or the Greylord Escort's Fell Curse.
• The Hydra has an excellent animus, well worth casting from either your warlock or a Cyclops Shaman.
• You can walk and make 5 breaths, or charge and make 4 breaths, to reach to a model who is behind a bunch of other. It's a way to put the last lousy point of damage on a caster; it doesn't hit hard, but it reaches very far away.
• You can heal a startling amount of damage in a turn. An average of five damage from the regen plus two from each infantry model you snack (and then there's the Paingiver Beast Handlers using their Medicate ability). It's not quite a Mountain King, but it's close.

Other

Trivia

• The rules were released in Hordes: Devastation (2015), but the actual model wasn't released until 2017.01
• This model was only ever released in the new hard plastic (HIPs). A mold defect means that the left side of three of the heads is missing the flesh hooks. Much moaning was heard from the skorne community.
• Nonetheless, it's one of the prettiest models in the skorne line. Also a lot of work to paint.