Fen Hydra

With the Fen Hydra it was very early on established that it would be a Ullar unit. There are actually three different Generals with who the hydra would easily fit in with. As a monster that devours people, it does fit into Utgar's monster theme. As a savage wild feral creature (jungle/swamp at that) it actually would fit into Aquilla's primal theme. And as a magical green reptilian it fit into Ullar's fantasy forest theme. Ultimately because it is a green reptile (with a yellow underbelly), just like the Venoc Vipers, the Armoc Vipers, the Venoc Warlord, Charos and even the D&D Greenscales, it was decided that this unit fit best in an Ullar Army. You can easily see the visual synergy if you place the Fen Hydra among a group of Utgar units and then amongst a group of Ullar units. When in an Utgar set up, the hydra stands out like a sore thumb, there isn't any green in Utgar's army and hardly any reptiles outside his red dragon (classic only here). While the hydra really fits in well in an Ullar set up, perfectly meshing with Ullar's Vipers and other green reptilians. So in addition to a proper jungle vine card, the Fen Hydra gets changed to Ullar.

Species stays the same. We considered briefly making this beast a viper. But vipers have arms and hands and even with multiple heads, a hydra viper should have arms too. But as a classic monster, like trolls and giants, a hydra isn't out of place among classic Heroscape's fantasy monsters.

Type is changed to a proper unique hero.

Marauder never made any sense, a Marauder is a bandit. To be a Marauder is to rove and raid in search of plunder, to raid or pillage for spoils. This makes absolutely no sense for a animal monster. Several classes were debated: Warlord, Beast and Devourer. Warlord was considered because it would be really nice to have a second warlord option for Ullar, but as Warlord the hydra would bond not only with the Armoc Vipers but also the Roman Legionaries. Combined with Hydra Heads, this means a potential eight attacks in a single turn. This seemed a little game breaking. Technically you can do the same thing with two different squads of Ashigaru combined with the Shogun-type hero - for 300 points. Romans plus hydra would be 170 and the hydra can hit harder then any of the others. So in the end warlord was discarded. Beast was considered for awhile, after all Beast is a perfect description of this figure, but bonding with the Arrow Gruts does mean 7 attacks, all technically at range too. Ultimately it was decided that Devourer would work best for this figure. Hydra are devourers after all in mythology and its a nice nod back to the hydra Utgar origins in theat the Dumutef Guard enhances Devourers. The only slight thing here is that Ullar is suppose to be one of the Good Generals and having a devourer does seem slightly dark.

Ferocious as a personality is fine for a hydra.

For size, he was left as a Huge 8. His model is actually a little small for a huge and it was considered for quite a while that he should be converted into a Large 7. However he is bigger then a Dumutef Guard.

Abilities, stats and point cost are all fine and don't need to be tweaked or changed.

Finally on the Basic side his home planet is made to be one of the original Heroscape Worlds, Feylund.



Stats

 * Life: 4
 * Move: 5
 * Range: 1
 * Attack: 4
 * Defense: 6
 * Point Value: 120

Abilities

 * Hydra Heads: When this Fen Hydra attacks, it may attack up to 4 times. Reduce the number of times this Fen Hydra can attack by 1 for each wound marker on this Army Card.


 * Reach: If an opponent's figure is within 2 spaces of this Fen Hydra, and its base is no more than 3 levels above this Fen Hydra's height or 3 levels below this Fen Hyda's base, this Fen Hydra may add 1 to its Range when attacking that figure.


 * Slither: The Fen Hydra does not have to stop its movement when entering water spaces.