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Message: <blockquote data-quote="StreamOfTheSky" data-source="post: 5740124" data-attributes="member: 35909">You can't have it both ways.You want to treat all of the hydra's "parts" as one creature, yet were unwilling to let fire damage to its heads translate into damage to the body.  That's hypocritical.Either the heads are all separate entities and each eat the damage, or it's all one creature and the damage goes straight to its "tied pool" of hp -- the body.What the hell is the point of using a higher level area blast like fireball over a lower level single target blast like scorching ray (which also does more damage...) if the area affect only downs one head?<s>My answer: Hydra rules are wonky.  Either the fireball sears each head, or the damage is translated once to the body.  Pick.  I'd have all the heads asplode.  Fireball seems like the perfect spell to use against a hydra, good on the PC for having it prepared/known.</s>EDIT: Nevermind, RAW is very clear."Any attack that is not (or cannot be) an attempt to sunder a head affects the body."Even if you're punching a hydra in one of its faces, it's body damage.  The neck/head thing only applies when sundering, otherwise all damage goes to the body.  With one exception:"Fire or acid damage from an area effect may burn multiple stumps in addition to dealing damage to the hydra’s body."If you've actually hacked some heads off, area fire/acid damage DOES hit each stump separately AND the body.  So yeah, houseruling an area spell that "can't hurt the body" to be hitting only one head makes no sense and is grossly deviating from RAW.</blockquote>

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