Staff of the Frost Hydra

Staff of the Frost Hydra

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Statistics

Type	Summon Weapon
Damage	100
Knockback	Very Strong
Mana	20
Tooltip	Summons a powerful frost hydra to spit ice at your enemies
Rarity	8
Sell	20

Template:Summoned

Not to be confused with Frost Staff.

File:Hydras.png

Frost Hydra firing.

The Staff of the Frost Hydra is a Hardmode post-Plantera minion summoning weapon that summons a unique stationary creature (the "Frost Hydra") for one minute at the cost of 20 mana. Once summoned, the Frost Hydra fires a magic ice ball when enemies are within its roughly 60-tile range, acting as a stationary turret. It will automatically angle its head up and down, and turn left and right, to target enemies in any direction. The Staff of the Frost Hydra is always found in the Frozen Chest within the Dungeon, which must be unlocked with its corresponding Frozen Key.

The summoned Hydra inflicts Minion damage, but is different from traditional Minions in that it does not count toward the maximum Minion count, does not move, and only lasts for one minute.

The Frost Hydra can be summoned anywhere on the visible screen, even if blocks completely separate the player from the point clicked. It cannot, however, be summoned in the air, and will instead appear on the closest block or platform below the summoning point.

As the Frost Hydra does not count toward the Minion cap, it will not cause any traditional minions to despawn; though summoning a second Hydra will always cause the first to disappear, even if the player has Minion bonuses.

The best Modifier for this weapon is Ruthless. The Mythical modifier presents a wider array of stat bonuses, but most of these apply to the initial summoning, and not to the resulting Frost Hydra. Additionally, minions cannot deal critical hits.

Notes

• Once cast, the player can switch to another weapon and the Hydra will remain.
• The Frost Hydra provides a large burst of light on its initial appearance. Its projectile also produces moderate light.
• When first summoned, the Hydra will move any overlapping enemies out of the way with knockback, but will not do damage until a few moments have passed.
• The Hydra can be summoned within solid blocks, which can be used to find ores and caves.
• It will not shoot at players in PvP, but if summoned on top of a player, or if a player runs into one, it will deal full damage and disappear.
• Its projectiles do not pierce.
• The Frost Hydra inflicts summon damage, so only Minion bonuses apply to it, rather than magic weapon bonuses; though magic bonuses will affect the Staff's initial summoning (eg. decreased Mana use).
• The Frost Hydra creature measures approximately 4 tiles wide by 3 high and is semi-transparent.
• The Frost Hydra remains even if the player dies.

Tips

• The high damage, versatile remote placement capability, and lighting effect makes this Staff a valuable auxiliary weapon.
• The remote capabilities of the Frost Hydra make it useful for battles and invasions, since it can be placed and left alone to slay enemies while the player does other things, such as making purchases, hiding, or fighting enemies in a different location.
• The Frost Hydra will fall when blocks below it are removed, making it useful for guarding the player while digging vertical tunnels.
• The Frost Hydra can be extremely strong in PvP because it is possible to summon on a player over a wall to kill them easily.
• The Frost Hydra can also be useful in exploring caves as it can be summoned inside blocks and emits light.

Trivia

• The Frost Hydra is potentially a reference to the Diablo 3 Frost Hydra spell, which behaves rather similarly in several ways.

• Hydra.png

  Hydra

History

• 1.3: Can now be summoned on platforms.

• 1.2.4.1: Now requires 20 mana.

• 1.2.3: Fixed precision with hydra staff in reverse gravity.

• 1.2: Introduced.

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