Gloves of the Gladiator...

[WingedDog]

Originally Posted by zzcat

Earth meld and similar spells will slow down hydras but can't kill them. For many nations your army will route before they can deal enough damage.

That's why he said

Originally Posted by chrispedersen

skelly spam

[Squirrelloid]

Also, cavalry charges are pretty effective. Sure, hydrae will eat quite a few lances, but you'll reduce them to nothing but a poison cloud pretty fast, and i doubt a hydra would last more than 2 rounds against cavalry.

Earthmeld will break up the hydra formation so you can engage them 1-2 at a time.

[Baalz]

I found, amusingly, a N9 blessing to be very effective with Pyth's hydras. You really need to berserk if you're using groups smaller than 4, their morale is low enough that you tend to route way too often for my taste otherwise even when you're winning. The extra protection and regen makes the final form hugely tougher to bring down. I think I was using it along with a W bless - which even more than the extra attacks gives you the defense to avoid a few hits tilting you further in the direction of making it hard to overcome your regen. The extra attacks though, also mean you can clear a second square every other turn - which works almost 50% better vs skellispam. This lets you comfortably expand with a single hydra (avoiding the toughest indies, of course). This is also not only a great blessing for the serpent cataphracts, it gives them quite a bit of leeway to play around with the hydras without dying every time they chase down the enemy (they move so much faster than the hydras they usually don't sit around with them for long if you're careful with your placement).