Hydra — guide (Clan Boss)
Guide: Hydra
In short
Hydra is the clan boss fight against a multi-headed monster: every head has its own HP pool, its own turn meter and its own dirty tricks, and cutting one off triggers a death effect instead of just removing it from the board. Your result is measured in damage dealt before the team wipes, so you are farming damage, not a clean kill. Chests pay out gear, accessories and shards, and the weekly clan competition adds a scoreboard on top.
Mechanics
- The number of heads depends on the difficulty, and each one acts on its own turn meter. A decapitated head stops acting, but after a few of its turns it comes back — you cannot lock the fight down permanently, only keep cutting.
- Heads ignore control: Stun, Freeze, Sleep, Provoke, Block Active Skills, Block Passive Skills, Fear, True Fear and Petrification do nothing, and turn-meter reduction, HP swap and HP balance are blocked as well. Control teams are dead weight here.
- The Head of Torment punishes champions without Veil by slapping on True Fear that cannot be blocked or resisted, and its AoE grows with the number of debuffs sitting on your team.
- The Head of Suffering puts Ally Protect on the other heads, lands unresistable Weaken and Provokes your highest C.DMG champion — it both shields the others and tears your damage dealer apart.
- The Head of Mischief steals every buff from your most-buffed champion, drains turn meter and redirects most attacks aimed at it onto another head unless it is under Hex.
- The Head of Decay stacks Poison and Leech and then detonates Poison, while the Head of Wrath builds a Vengeance counter from every hit you land and answers with buffs plus an AoE.
- Damage caps: Poison is reduced by roughly 90%, HP Burn ticks are capped, skills scaling from MAX HP are capped at a small slice of a head's HP, and reflect / Giant Slayer damage is capped too. Poison nukers and MAX HP nukers are traps.
- Decapitation effects are mostly in your favour: shields for your team, damage to the remaining heads, turn-meter drain on the heads, and removal of Fear with Perfect Veil on two champions.
What your team needs
- Speed first: 200+ on damage dealers and 220+ on support so you actually take turns between head activations.
- Accuracy: roughly 200-250 on the lower difficulties and 300-350+ on Nightmare and above — heads carry extra RES, and a missed Decrease DEF or Hex wastes the run.
- Bulk: 45-60k HP and around 3k DEF on supports, one healer or reviver, and shields to eat the AoE spikes.
- Debuffs that matter: Decrease DEF and Weaken for damage, Hex to control Mischief, HP Burn as your main damage engine. Not Poison.
- Utility: cleanse for Poison and Leech, Block Debuffs where you can, and Decrease ATK to blunt head hits.
Teams
- Starter: Skraank + Geomancer + Uugo + Inquisitor Shamael + Rector Drath. HP Burn from two sources is the damage, Uugo covers Decrease DEF and cleansing, Shamael deals with the Fear pressure from Torment, Drath keeps bodies on the field.
- Mid-game: Ostrox Boneglaive + Geomancer + Uugo + Demytha + Vogoth. Same burn core, but Demytha's damage mitigation and Vogoth's healing-on-hits let you survive a longer run and score higher.
- Endgame: Mithrala Lifebane + Underpriest Brogni + Teodor the Savant + Cardiel + Taras the Fierce. Mithrala's Hex stops Mischief redirecting your damage, Brogni's shields carry the team through AoE turns, Teodor brings the burn damage, and Cardiel and Taras add safety plus single-target punch.
Common mistakes
- Bringing a Poison team — Kael, Akemtum and friends lose up to 90% of their damage output here.
- Bringing MAX HP nukers such as Husk, Royal Guard or Acrizia: their signature damage is hard-capped against heads.
- Ignoring Mischief — without Hex most of your attacks get redirected and the run ends with a fraction of the expected damage.
- Stacking buffs blindly — Mischief steals them, spreads them across the heads and turns your own support into the boss's support.
- No cleanse against Decay: Poison sitting on your champions gets detonated for the whole team.
Tips
- Build for Speed first and Accuracy second; damage stats only after both thresholds are met. Speed and Perception sets are the default on supports.
- Lifesteal on damage dealers is a cheap way to stay alive if you have no healer; Relentless only if the champion already survives well.
- Do not bother with Stun or Toxic sets — heads are immune to control and Poison is gutted.
- Set auto-battle priorities so cleanse and heal fire before damage, and disable AoE skills that feed the Wrath counter when a head is about to pop.
- Pick a kill order: Hex and kill Mischief early, or clear Decay first if Poison is deleting your team.
Best champions
rated for: Hydra
5Acrizia
5Bayek
5Cardiel
5Cecilia The Red Hope
5Firrol The Barkhorn
5Glorious Pallas
5Klaazag Keyhulk
5Krisk the Ageless
5Leonardo
5Lydia The Deathsiren
5Marichka the Unbreakable
5Marius the Gallant
5Geomancer
5Whisper
5Inquisitor Shamael
5Ostrox Boneglaive
4.5Akemtum
4.5Rector Drath
4.5Stonebound Thisbe
4.5Umbral Enchantress
Ratings 0–5 for this content from our database. Full ranking: champion catalog sorted by content.
More details
Hydra stats and drops
Hydra Head Skills
Head of Torment
A1 — Spectral Fangs:
Attacks 1 enemy. Has a 50% chance of placing a [Fear] debuff for 2 turns. This debuff cannot be blocked or reflected.
After the first attack, attacks all enemies under [Fear] or [True Fear] debuffs.
A2 — Curse Storm:
Attacks all enemies. Damage increases by 25% for each debuff placed on the enemy.
Omnipotent Specter [Passive]
When attacking enemies not under [Veil] or [True Veil] buffs, places a [True Fear] debuff on them for one turn. This debuff cannot be blocked or resisted.
Decreases damage received from [Poison] debuffs by 90%. Decreases damage received by all Hydra heads from AoE attacks by 10%.
Damage from skills whose scale is based on the enemy's MAX HP cannot exceed 10% of the head's MAX HP when attacking that head. Damage received per tick from [HP Burn] debuffs cannot exceed 20,000 HP. Damage received from reflected damage, the Warmaster mastery, or Giant Slayer cannot exceed 50,000 per attack.
Immune to [Stun], [Freeze], [Sleep], [Provoke], [Block Active Skills], [Block Passive Skills], [Fear], [True Fear], and [Petrification] debuffs. Also immune to HP exchange, HP balancing, duration increase, and Turn Meter reduction effects.
Decapitation [Passive]:
Each time this head is decapitated, removes all [Fear] and [True Fear] debuffs from all enemy Champions, then places a [Perfect Veil] buff for 2 turns on 2 random enemy Champions.
Head of Suffering
A1 — Crippling Jaws:
Attacks all enemies. Places a 25% [Weaken] debuff for 2 turns. This debuff cannot be resisted.
Does not place a [Weaken] debuff on enemies with [Strengthen] buffs.
A2 — Pain Thirst:
Applies a 50% [Ally Protection] buff to all heads except this one for 2 turns, then applies a 30% [Reflect Damage] buff to this head for 2 turns.
Also applies a [Provoke] debuff for 1 turn to the enemy with the highest C.DMG.
A3 — Share Suffering:
Attacks 1 enemy. Places a [Pain Link] debuff for 3 turns, then grants this head an extra turn.
Almighty Suffering [Passive]:
Increases the Resistance of all Hydra heads by 50.
Decreases the damage all Hydra heads receive from AoE attacks by 30%. Decreases damage from [Poison] debuffs by 90%.
Damage from skills whose scaling is based on the enemy's MAX HP cannot exceed 10% of the head's MAX HP when attacking that head. Damage received per tick from [HP Burn] debuffs cannot exceed 20,000 HP. Damage received from reflected damage, the Warmaster mastery, or the Giant Slayer mastery cannot exceed 50,000 HP per attack.
Immune to [Stun], [Freeze], [Sleep], [Provoke], [Block Active Skills], [Block Passive Skills], [Fear], [True Fear] and [Petrification] debuffs. Also immune to HP swap effects, HP balancing effects, duration increase effects, and Turn Meter reduction effects.
Scale Plunder [Passive]:
Places a [Shield] buff on all enemy Champions for 2 turns, equal to 30% of their MAX HP, when this head is decapitated.
Head of Delusions
A1 — Thieving Jaws:
Attacks the enemy with the most buffs. Steals all buffs from the target and reduces their Turn Meter by 50%
A2 — Cursed Storm:
Places a [Buff Spread] effect, removing all buffs from this head and placing them on all heads. The duration of all spread buffs is changed to 2 turns.
Omnipotent Mischief [Passive]:
Has a
75% chance of redirecting an enemy attack to another random head. Does not
occur if this head is under a [Hex] debuff.
Decreases damage taken by all Hydra heads from AoE attacks by 10%.
Damage from skills whose scale is based on the enemy's MAX HP cannot exceed 10% of the head's MAX HP when attacking that head. Damage received per one tick from [HP Burn] debuffs cannot exceed 20,000 HP. Continued
Fugue [Passive]:
Each time this head is decapitated, fully depletes the Turn Meter of all Hydra heads.
Head of Woe
A1 — Dripping Jaws:
Attacks all enemies. Places three 5% [Poison] debuffs for 2 turns. Also has a 75% chance to place a [Leech] debuff for 2 turns.
A2 — Leech Disease:
Attacks all enemies. Places a 5% [Poison] debuff for 3 turns. Instantly deals damage from all [Poison] debuffs to each enemy under a [Leech] debuff.
A3 — Blinding Smog:
Places a [Poison Cloud] buff on all Hydra heads for 2 turns. This buff cannot be removed or transferred.
Bloat [Passive]
Deals damage to all heads under [HP Burn] debuffs when this head is decapitated.
Almighty Mist [Passive]
This head receives double damage from [HP Burn] debuffs.
Decreases damage received by all Hydra heads from AoE attacks by 10%.
Damage from skills whose scale is based on the enemy's MAX HP cannot exceed 10% of the head's MAX HP when attacking that head. Damage received per tick from [HP Burn] debuffs cannot exceed 40,000 HP. Damage received from reflected damage, the Master of War mastery, or the Giant Slayer mastery cannot exceed 50,000 HP per attack.
Immune to [Stun], [Freeze], [Sleep], [Provoke], [Block Active Skills], [Block Passive Skills], [Fear], [True Fear], [Poison], and [Petrification] debuffs.
Also immune to HP exchange effects, HP balancing effects, duration increase effects, and Turn Meter reduction effects.
Head of Wrath
A1 — Gnashing Jaws:
Attacks all enemies. Places a 50% [Poison] debuff for 2 turns.
Passive effect
Each enemy hit received increases the [Vengeance] counter by 1. When the [Vengeance] counter reaches 15, this head receives a [Vengeance] buff, a [Block Debuffs] buff and a 15% [Reflect Damage] buff for 1 turn, then attacks all enemies. [The [Vengeance] counter is reset each time it reaches 15. Enemy hits are not counted while the [Vengeance] buff is active on them.]
A2 — Furious Roar:
Attacks all enemies. Places a [Provoke] debuff for 1 turn. Also places a 50% [Increase ATK] buff on this head for 3 turns.
Decapitate Effect [Passive]
Deals damage to all heads when this head is decapitated. If this head is decapitated under the [Vengeance] buff, the damage dealt to all heads is increased, and there is a 25% chance of placing a [Leech] debuff on all heads for 2 turns.
Almighty Wrath [Passive]
Decreases damage taken by all Hydra heads from AoE attacks by 10%.
Damage from skills whose scale is based on the enemy's MAX HP cannot exceed 10% of the head's MAX HP when attacking that head. Damage received per one tick from [HP Burn] debuffs cannot exceed 20,000 HP. Damage received from reflected damage, the Warmaster mastery, or the Giant Slayer mastery cannot exceed 50,000 HP per attack.
Immune to [Stun], [Freeze], [Sleep], [Provoke], [Block Active Skills], [Block Passive Skills], [Fear], [True Fear], [Poison] and [Petrification] debuffs.
Also immune to HP exchange effects, HP balancing effects, duration increase effects and Turn Meter reduction effects.
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