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My personal feeling is that bar higher levels of points, the Hydra is no longer competitive. There are those that argue that the Hydra is still competitive; fitting it with a heavy bolter and if there are no enemy fliers or skimmers then just using it as flank cover for your chimera fleet. Not that many points down the drain.

However, whenever a flier does come on, say a vendetta or a scythe your hydra is going boom. Let's face it, the target priority will be very, very high if you have just one, and if the priority isn't there, it's not too useful against their army. If you bring 2 hydras, it does somewhat mitigate the risk of an alpha strike against your anti-air. Although it then becomes a major points sink.

The other two viable options we have, are vendettas and fortification quad guns. Personally I find fortifications distasteful as it goes against my army doctrine of being fully mechanized, thereby if I include them, all anti infantry fire will be focused on the men manning them. The last option that has come up is autocannon spam with bring it down orders. Again, not viable for a pure mech list leaving me to conclude, unless something changes it's vendettas or hybridization.

What are your thoughts on the level of competitiveness of the Hydra as opposed to it's other options? ~ discuss


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3 votes for it? Really? Aren't you guys worried about alpha strike by enemy fliers?

No alpha strike for something that won't be hitting the board before turn 2 at the earliest.

I think the fact that it's 4 TL shot and only 75 points make it still an option.
I love the Exterminator, but it's 2 times the price. I'm not 100% sold that they'll
be needed in the long run. As many possible fliers that are out there,can be coming to skies near
you, I'm seeing them needed later. Once peoples wallets catch up with the new hotness.

Are you serious? The hydra got BETTER. Like much, much better.

By alpha strike I mean the flier knocking the hydra out on the turn they come in.

The Hydra still averages more than 1 hit against ground targets every turn, which is OK.

It is going to come down to how good the vendetta is.

If three vendettas are auto-include in competitive lists, then we probably won't need a hydra unit.

If it turns out that all of the movement restrictions make vendettas less desirable, then I could see someone taking no vendettas and one unit of two to three hydras as a flyer answer.

If flyers turn out to be the only thing anyone takes, then a hydra unit could be fielded in addition to the three vendettas.

Let's take a tank that cost exactly as much as their infantry analogue, except make them much more fragile and give them BS1 against almost every target in the game.

Even with twin-linking, you're really only getting 1 hit with the gun most of the time. You might as well buy an armored sentinel with an autocannon against ground targets (but, of course, don't do that either).

Against aerial targets, they're now so flimsy that if your opponent is really threatened by them (which they won't be at all if they refrain from taking fliers), they won't be hard to pick off before they get a chance to really shoot at stuff. If not by the rest of the army, then by the fliers themselves. A vendetta coming in off the board from reserves and shooting its three twin-linked lascannons at a hydra is going to shut it down pretty dang quick.

In all, they get a big thumbs down now. A cheap tank that was good in every list against every army just became a flimsy tank whose role is now so specialized that most of the time they won't be doing anything.