There are many items in Smite that replicate each other as physical and magical items. There is Witchblade and Runic Shield, there’s Void Stone and Void Shield. Hydra's Lament is the physical counterpart to Polynomicon. For those that don’t know what Polynomicon or Hydra’s Lament do, they increase the damage of a character's next auto attack after an ability. The passive makes Polynomicon one of the best late game items for a mage. However, Hydra’s Lament has never seen the same success as its magical counterpart.

Why Is That?

The reason that Hydra’s hasn’t been as successful is because physical characters don’t have the same damage potential from their items that mages do. There is no physical item that boosts their damage by 25% or an item that gives them a base one hundred damage. So physicals have to build more penetration and utility items rather than just pure damage like mages do. Another reason that Hydra’s Lament hasn’t been picked up is that the item has always had subpar stats compared to other physical items.

What Has Changed?

Hydra’s Lament received a few changes in patch 3.18. These changes gave the item 40 power and a passive that gives the wielder an additional 2.5 MP5 per 10% of their missing mana. That may not seem like much at first glance, but many assassins have to manage their mana wisely as their abilities can take up to a quarter of their mana bar in the early game due to their small mana pools. The new passive allows for characters to be more liberal with their abilities with the MP5 it provides.

That one change has made the item much more valuable for assassins to pick up, especially considering the auto attack enhancement was already valuable in early and mid game trades, but the item just wasn’t efficient enough to warrant purchasing. Hydra’s Lament also synergises really well with the core jungle item Jotunn’s Wrath, since both items have cooldown reduction that when combined give the character 35%. The penetration also allows the Hydra’s Lament proc to do more damage. Both items are also fairly cheap to buy, with Hydra’s only costing 2100g and Jotunn's Wrath costing 2440g. These factors make the items really good for a first and second item in a jungle build after boots.

Does This Make Hydra’s Lament a Must Build Item?

No, Hydra’s Lament, while it is cost efficient and has a good mana regen passive, is almost worthless if a character can’t utilize the auto attack enhancement. This makes the item less valuable on ADC’s since they will be focusing on auto attacking during a teamfight rather than weaving their auto attacks between their abilities. Hydra’s Lament is also less valuable on warriors since they will be focused on building more tankiness rather than damage, which makes the enhanced auto attack almost negligible in a fight even if the characters can weave auto attacks well.

Then Do Only Assassin's Pick Up Hydra’s?

Surprisingly, Hydra’s isn't even a great item for most assassins even if they have damage builds. Pure ability based characters like Bastet can’t auto attack weave that well since their abilities do most of their damage. The same reasoning also works with auto attack based characters like Bakasura and Kali since their strength lies in stringing auto attacks together to kill someone rather than using their abilities. There are also characters that don’t exactly fit into either category like Fenrir or Ne Zha, that can make use of Hydra’s but don’t have the same potential with their characters to deal damage consistently with Hydra’s passive and could instead build into other items to enhance their own playstyle. Instead Hydra’s Lament is perfect on assassins that build damage and have kits that promote auto attack cancelling.

Then Who Does Build Hydra’s?

There are a few characters that excel with Hydra’s Lament, they can all weave their auto attacks in their kit and can deal a ton of damage, they are Arachne, Hun Batz, Loki, Ratatoskr, Serqet, Susano and Thor. They all have very different combos and chances to use their auto attack cancels so some may be missed, but the most used combos will be explained thoroughly.

- Arachne

Combos:
2+aa+3+aa+1+aa+4
4+aa+3+aa+2+aa+1+aa
3+aa+1+aa+2+aa

Arachne’s kit allows her to play several different ways. An Arachne can build pure damage or pure tank and have varying degrees of success, but her strengths lie within her auto attack steroids on her one and three. In a burst build for Arachne, she can make use of Hydra’s Lament by making use of her auto attack cancels on those steroids. She can start an engagement with her CC’s by hitting a character with her slow from the two, then using an auto attack cancel into her three, with yet another auto attack cancel into her one. By this point the character will be dead or stuck in a cocoon so Arachne could just chase with her ult and get one last auto off if they manage to get away. The downside to the build is that Arachne can be kited very easily, so she may not be able to get all of the auto attacks off and she is also squishy so she can die easily if she is focused.

- Hun Batz

Combos:
3+aa+4+aa+2+aa+1+aa
1+aa+4+aa+2+aa+3+aa
4+aa+2+aa+4+aa

Hun Batz's passive has the same concept as Hydra’s Lament, as they both have an enhancement to the next auto after using an ability, The only difference is that Batz's passive is more crit chance rather than pure damage. However, Hun Batz kit allows for many opportunities to auto attack weaves during a fight, so he has many opportunities to crit with the Hydra’s passive up. He can use his three’s teleport to get a free auto, then use his ultimate to fear an enemy and make them slowly run away from the center of the ult and get another auto attack off. Next he can use his two, which has a long windup so the fear allows him to get an auto off after he lands. Lastly he can use his one to jump on top of an enemy if they manage to run away and get one last auto attack off while they are slowed by his leap. Hun Batz has many mana issues in the early game so he can’t just use his entire kit whenever he wants for poke, since his power spike comes at level five with his ultimate, so falling behind early forces him to change up his build order since he won’t be able to kill anyone with his damage with Hydra’s Lament.

- Loki

Combos:
1+aa+3+aa+4+aa+2+aa
4+aa+3+aa+1+aa+2+aa
3+aa+1+aa+2+aa+4+aa

Loki was the only character that would pick up Hydra’s Lament before it was buffed, and now that Hydra’s has been buffed the item is even better for Loki. Why? Because all of his abilities allow for auto attack cancels since they reset his animations. Loki can use any combination of abilities if he is close enough and make full use of the Hydra’s proc. For instance, he could initiate with his one’s stealth or his ultimate, get an auto attack off and then reset his animations with the three, get the auto off and reset the animation again with his decoy from his two and if the person still isn’t dead, he can chase them and get one last proc off from his stealth or ultimate, whichever one he didn't use to engage with. The one major issue with Loki is that he requires a person to be out of position to be able to kill them. During a teamfight, he can get his damage off but if he ever gets focused, he’ll die so staying grouped up counters most of what a Loki can do.

- Ratatoskr

Combos:
4+aa+1+aa+3+aa+2
1+aa+3+aa+2+aa
1+aa+2+aa+3+aa+4
4+aa+3+aa+1+aa+2

Rat has many different choices he can go. He can build pure tank and be a frontline hindrance for his team, he could go full burst and kill any squishy with his combo or anything in between. Depending on how you want to play Rat changes if you want Hydra’s Lament on him. It's best to build full burst if you are building Hydra's Lament since his kit has many auto attack cancels and CC that allows him to get his damage off easily. One combo he can use is using his ultimate to get a knock up into an auto attack, then using his acorns on his three, he can get a stun off and another auto attack. Rat can then use his dash on his one for a slow and get one last auto for free. The slow from the dash can then act as a setup into his protection shred from his two and Rat might be able to get one last auto attack off with the Hydra’s proc. Rat’s issue with having Hydra’s is that when he all ins a person, if they don’t die, he can’t do much until his dash comes off of cooldown so he can get killed very easily and his ultimate also has a long windup so he can be punished if he overextends with that build.

- Serqet

Combos:
2+aa+1+aa+3+aa+4+aa
4+aa+2+aa+1+aa+3+aa
2+4+1+aa
4+2+1+aa

Serqet is a strange character to pick up Hydra’s Lament on, as the auto attack enhancement both helps and hinders her passive. If you don’t know what Serqet's passive is, every ability she uses puts a stack of poison on a character and the more poison is stacked, the more damage Serqet does with her next auto attack on that character. This also means that Serqet has many opportunities to auto attack in her kit to get her passive and Hydra’s proc off. One of the most used combos is to use her two for madness and get her one off for free for some protection shred. Next, Serqet can ult and get her auto attack off while the enemy is getting repositioned. She can also then follow up on the kill with her leap to get one last auto attack off. She can choose to auto attack at any point during that particular combo. It all depends on if you want to stack the poison or get quick bursts of damage off with just one stack of poison multiple times.

- Susano

Combos:
3+aa+2+aa+4+aa+1+aa
2+aa+1+aa+3+aa+4+aa
4+aa+2+aa+1+aa+3

Susano is possibly the most mechanically challenging character on this list with the amount of auto attack cancels and weaves he can use through his kit. To start off, his one by itself has three different chances to proc Hydra’s Lament due to the nature of the ability. His pull also allows Susano to get a free auto attack off after he grabs someone, since they cannot react while they are in the air. Susano’s teleport also interacts with his kit in the same way that Hun Batz does since he can teleport to his target and get an auto attack off before they can react. Lastly, his ultimate can both knock up and pull people, so he has a few chances to get an auto attack off during the ability. So for a perfect combo, Susano can use his teleport to engage, get his auto attack off then use his pull to get another auto in and then use his ult to keep people near him. While they are stuck he can then use his one with auto attack cancels in between their casts and if the person ever gets away, he can just use the ult for a knock up. The major issue with Susano is that the auto attack cancels are very hard to consistently get off for newer players, so going for more power rather than Hydra’s Lament could end up doing more damage if you aren’t comfortable hitting every auto attack between his abilities.

- Thor

Combos:
4+aa+3+aa+2+aa+1
2+aa+3+aa+1
3+aa+1+aa+2

Thor is possibly the most controversial character on the list who can make use of Hydra’s since his kit and character lend themselves to be more bruiser than pure burst. Thor can be a good early game character for burst, but by the endgame will most likely be a tank and use his utility with his kit rather than his burst, One of the most memorable Thor auto attack weaving combos is ult auto into hammer auto into wall auto into spin since it does the most possible damage with Thor’s kit. The same combo can be used without the ult and instead go wall auto hammer auto spin. Both combo’s will most likely kill a squishy target if they are hit with every ability or force their relics, but once again since most Thors go full tank in the mid and late game, it's up to the player to build Hydra’s or not.

Hope this helps everyone learn how and when to utilize Hydra’s Lament, I wish you Happy Hunting!

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