Wednesday, February 7, 2018

Ecology of the (Lernaean) Hydra

In mythology, the hydra was a unique monster that terrorized Lerna. In fantasy gaming the hydra has been expanded into an entire species, one that is typically depicted as a naturally occurring animal with a place in the local ecology (which I find highly questionable). I was elated to discover that Rolang proposed a compromise between the two views: every hydra grew from the severed head of another hydra, going back to the original Hydra still living on Lerna.


The Hydra is a many-headed water dragon, the only one of her kind, who lairs in the marshes of Lerna. Many adventurers have tried to slay the beast, but all have failed. This is not surprising, as her last head is immortal. (Fun fact: hydra is the feminine form, hydrus is the masculine form.)

There are many stories of the Hydra's origins, but nobody knows for sure where she came from. Different stories claim she is the child of the dragoness Echidna and the giant Typhon, hatched from a dragon's egg imbued with the essence of a root troll, or even the obscure goddess of venom.


The other heads of the Hydra, however many there are at the time, are not immortal. They remain alive and sentient after being severed, and such heads will attempt to escape while their attacker is still occupied with the Hydra. If given the chance, these heads will grow into smaller, weaker copies of their progenitor. Their heads, too, will try to survive when severed. Each generation of hydra is smaller and weaker than the one before it, until eventually they are reduced to a tiny, octopus-like thing that cannot regenerate.

Possibly because of their regenerative ability, hydras are prone to mutation. They may have any number of legs for walking, spade claws for burrowing, fins for swimming, or wings for flying. They may have poisonous, corrosive, flammable or otherwise harmful blood. Their may breathe acid, toxic gas, fire, frost, lightning, venomous spit or a different type of damage for each head!


Breath weapons are typically denoted by a head's scales: black sprays acid, blue shoots lightning (aka electrohydra), green exhales toxic gas, red throws fire (aka pyrohydra), and white breathes frost (aka cryohydra). A hydra may have a single type of head, any mixture of heads (aka dracohydra), a weaker or absent breath weapon in the smaller varieties.

Hydras may share the anatomy of any other species of snake or snake-like creature; e.g. the hydralisk (aka basihydra) has the heads of a basilisk, while the behydra resembles a behir. While hydras cannot reproduce or hybridize in the sexual fashion (although this may be due to their nature as severed members and Hydra herself may very well have ovaries and genuine offspring somewhere), they seem able to assume the characteristics of other serpents through mysterious means (consumption? mimicry? fusion? who knows!). Even the otherwise immortal nagas and couatls are not immune! (Rumors circulate that a hydra, named "Herensugue" by the Basques, that found its way to the lower planes now has the winged heads of vargouilles.)


A persistent mutation is the schism hydra (credits to Warcraft). These hydras have unstable anatomy: instead of losing heads, they will split into two equal halves like puddings do.

Hydras lack a genuine ecology: they cannot truly reproduce themselves, their flesh is too toxic to eat, and they tend to dominate their environment like an invasive species. (Possible plot hook: a hydra has developed extreme throat cancer, causing it to constantly expel tumors that grow into new smaller hydras; if this "mother hydra" isn't killed quick, the hydras will grow into a voracious plague destined to consume the world.)

Dread Eyebeast, Monsters of Porphyra

There are a number of other monsters with manes of serpents, such as Cerberus (guardian of hell and fabled grandfather of all hellhounds), kamadan, thessalmonster, draconid, gohl and the dread eyebeast, among others. They are sometimes called hydras, but most of the time they do not appear related to the Hydra. (Although the tales claiming that Hydra is a child of Typhon also claim that Cerberus is her brother.)

Relevant research links


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