Beholder (Dungeons & Dragons)

Beholder
Beholder
Characteristics
Alignment	Lawful Evil
Type	Aberration
Image	Wizards.com image
Stats	[No Open Game License stats]
Publication history
First appearance	Greyhawk (1975)

The beholder is a fictional monster in the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game. Its appearance is that of a floating orb of flesh with a large mouth, single central eye, and many smaller eyestalks on top with deadly magical powers.

The Beholder is among the most classic of all Dungeons & Dragons monsters, appearing in every edition of the game since 1975. Different breeds of beholders have different magic abilities. Beholders are one of the few classic Dungeons & Dragons monsters that Wizards of the Coast claims as Product Identity.

Publication history

Unlike many other Dungeons & Dragons monsters, the beholder is an original creation for D&D, as it is not based on a creature from mythology or other fiction. Rob Kuntz's brother Theron O. Kuntz created the Beholder, and Gary Gygax detailed it for publication.

The beholder was introduced with the first Dungeons & Dragons supplement, Greyhawk (1975), and is depicted on its cover (as shown in the section below). It is described as a "Sphere of Many Eyes" or "Eye Tyrant," a levitating globe with ten magical eye stalks. The beholder later appears in the Companion Rules set, in the Dungeon Masters Companion: Book Two (1984). In 1991, it appears in the Dungeons & Dragons Rules Cyclopedia.

With the release of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 1st edition, the beholder appeared in the first edition Monster Manual (1977), where it is described as a hateful, aggressive, avaricious spherical monster that is most frequently found underground. Ed Greenwood and Roger E Moore authored "The Ecology of the Beholder," which featured in Dragon #76 (August 1983). Second edition supplements to Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, especially those of the Spelljammer campaign setting, added further details about these classic creatures' societies and culture. Beholders feature prominently in the Spelljammer setting, and a number of variants and related creatures are introduced in the Spelljammer: AD&D Adventures in Space campaign set, in the Lorebook of the Void booklet (1989). It also appeared in the Monstrous Compendium Volume One (1989), and is reprinted in the Monstrous Manual (1993). The book I, Tyrant (1996), and the Monstrous Arcana module series that accompanies it, develops the beholder further. I, Tyrant expands the information on beholders through details of the race's history, religion, culture, settlements and psychology, and more.

Based on Tom Wham's depiction in the first edition Monster Manual, TSR artist Keith Parkinson characterized its popular appearance with plate-like armored scales and arthropod-like eyestalks. Jeff Grubb cites Keith Parkinson's artwork as the inspiration for the beholder-kin created for the Spelljammer campaign setting. The Beholder's xenophobia towards other subraces of Beholders was added after Jim Holloway submitted multiple designs for the Beholder's spelljamming ship and Jeff Grubb decided to keep them all and used xenophobia to explain the differences in design style.

The third edition of Dungeons & Dragons included the Beholder in the Monster Manual (2000) with the expanded monster statistics of this release. Beholder variants appear in Monstrous Compendium: Monsters of Faerun (2001). The beholder then appears in the revised Monster Manual for the 3.5 edition (2003). The mindwitness was a sample creature of the half-illithid template using a beholder as the base creature, featured on Wizards of the Coast's website on August 14, 2003. The beholder receives its own chapter in the book Lords of Madness: The Book of Aberrations (2005). With the release of the fourth edition of Dungeons & Dragons, the beholder once again appears in the Monster Manual for this edition (2008), including the beholder eye of flame and the beholder eye tyrant. Variants of the beholder also appear in Monster Manual 2 (2009), and Monster Manual 3 (2010).

Licensing

The beholder is considered "Product Identity" by Wizards of the Coast and as such is not released under its Open Game License.

Description

The original Greyhawk booklet cover, featuring one of the earliest depictions of a Beholder.

A Beholder is an aberration comprising a floating spheroid body with a large fanged mouth and single eye on the front and many flexible eyestalks on the top.

A beholder's eyes each possess a different magical ability; the main eye projects an anti-magical cone, and the other eyes use different spell-like abilities (disintegrate objects, transmute flesh to stone, cause sleep, slow the motion of objects or beings, charm animals, charm humans, cause death, induce fear, levitate objects, and inflict serious wounds). Many variant beholder species exist, such as "observers", "spectators", "eyes of the deep", "elder orbs", "hive mothers", and "death tyrants". In addition, some rare beholders can use their eyes for non-standard spell-like abilities; these mutant beholders are often killed or exiled by their peers. Beholders wishing to cast spells like ordinary wizards relinquish the traditional use of their eyestalks, and put out their central anti-magic eye, making these beholder mages immediate outcasts.

In 4th edition, different breeds of Beholders have different magic abilities. Beholder Eyes of Flame only have Fear, Fire, and Telekenesis Rays ; Eyes of Frost are the same, with fire replaced by frost. The Beholder Eye Tyrant is mostly unchanged from traditional beholders, but the Death Ray causes ongoing necrotic damage rather than an instant kill, and the Disintegration Ray does not automatically kill its target. Other Beholder types each have their own set of abilities. In this edition, the Beholder's central eye no longer cancels out magic, instead dazing or giving some vulnerability to its victim.

Society

Beholders are extremely xenophobic. They will sometimes take members of other, non-beholder races as slaves; however, they will engage in a violent intra-species war with others of their kind who differ even slightly in appearance. This intense hatred of other beholders is not universal; the most prominent exceptions are Hive Mothers, who use their powers of mind control to form hives with other beholders and beholder-kin. Beholder communities in the Underdark often, when provoked, wage war on any and all nearby settlements, finding the most resistance from the drow and illithids.

Beholders worship their insane, controlling goddess known as the Great Mother, though some also, or instead, follow her rebel offspring, Gzemnid, the beholder god of gases.

Some beholder strains have mutated far from the basic beholder stock. These are aberrant beholders, of which there are numerous different types. These aberrants may have differing abilities and/or appearances but the unifying feature among beholders and the various aberrant beholders seems to be a simple, fleshy body with one or more grotesque eyes.

Campaign settings

Forgotten Realms

Beholders are especially prominent in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting, where they infiltrate and seek to control many sectors of society—many beholders are allied to the Zhentarim, some work with the Red Wizards of Thay, and a particularly powerful beholder, known as "The Eye" or "Xanathar" controls Skullport's influential Xanathar's Thieves Guild. Beholders also compete to control the Underdark from where most of them originate, with their base of power in the City of the Eye Tyrants, Ootul.

Spelljammer

According to Ken Rolston, the beholder and the mind flayer "win starring roles as intergalactic menaces" in Spelljammer, and notes that the beholders, "with their abundant magical powers, are perhaps the most formidable warrior race of the universe, but fortunately they are too busy slaughtering one another to present a big threat to other spacefaring races".

Beholders in the Spelljammer campaign are common antagonists, like the deadly neogi and sadistic illithids. However, one thing prevents them from being the most dangerous faction in wildspace: the beholders are engaged in a xenophobic civil war of genetic purity.

There are a large number of variations in the beholder race with some sub-races having smooth hides and others chitinous plates. Other noticeable differences include snakelike eyestalks or crustacean like eyestalk joints. Some variations seem minor such as variations in the size of the central eye or differences in skin colour. Each beholder nation believes itself to be the true beholder race and sees other beholders as ugly copies that must be destroyed.

Lone beholders in wildspace are often refugees who have survived an attack that exterminated the rest of their nest or are outcasts who were expelled for having some form of mutation. The most famous lone beholder is Large Luigi, who works as a barkeeper on the Rock of Bral.

Beholders use a large number of different ship designs. Some of these ships feature a piercing ram but others have no weaponry. All beholder ships allow a circuit of beholders to focus their eye stalks into a 400-yard beam of magical energy. These ships are powered and navigated by the "orbus" (plural "orbii") race of beholders, who are stunted, albino, and very weak in combat.

Eberron

Beholders served as living artillery during the Daelkyr incursion, using the terrible power of their eyes to shatter whole goblin armies. In Eberron, beholders do not reproduce naturally and have not created a culture of their own — they are simply the immortal servants of the daelkyr. Most continue to serve their masters, commanding subterranean outposts of aberrations or serving as the hidden leaders of various Cults of the Dragon Below. Others lead solitary lives, contemplating mysteries or studying the world. Such lone beholders may manipulate humanoid communities, but their actions are rarely driven by a desire for personal power.

Members of the Cults of the Dragon Below believe that these creatures function as the eyes of a greater power. Some insist that they serve Belashyrra, a powerful Daelkyr who is also known as the Lord of Eyes. Others claim the beholders are the eyes of Xoriat itself — that while they serve the daelkyr, they are conduits to a power even greater and more terrible than the shapers of flesh.

Variants and kin

Information about beholder variations and related creatures has been made available in Dungeons & Dragons publications.

Name	Description
Eye Tyrant	Standard Beholder with 10 eyestalks with Charm Monster, Charm Person, Death, Disintegration, Flesh to Stone, Cause Grievous Wounds, Telekinesis, Sleep, Slow, and Fear and its central eye produces anti-magic cone.
Elder Orb	A rare stronger and bigger variant of the traditional beholder born once out of every several hundred regular Beholders that is around 15 feet in diameter. These creatures have a very long lifespan and are more powerful than traditional beholders. Elder Orbs are skilled at arcane magic though not to an extent of Beholder Mages(unless it becomes one).
Hive Mother	These are even rarer than elder orbs. Hive Mothers also knows as Ultimate Eye Tyrants are gender-neutral like other beholders, rather than female. Their name stems from the fact that they have the ability to magically dominate other beholders. Hive mothers has no eyestalks, but its magical eyes are protected by hooded covers in the flesh of the creature's body, so that they cannot be severed. The central eye has 15 hit points. Hiver Mother's eyes can use Charm Monster, Charm Person, Disintegrate, Sleep, Fear, Finger of Death, Flesh to Stone, Slow, Telekinesis and Inflict Critical Wounds.
Orbus	The orbus is either a genetically bred or a stunted and immature form of the standard beholder. It is only found in space aboard the tyrant ships in Spelljammer campaign.
Observer	An observer has a spherical body about 6 to 7 feet in diameter, covered with a tough, chitinous shell. The shell’s a mottled purple and pinkish color, and can be 2 to 3 inches thick in places. Unlike beholders, observers have three mouths spaced evenly around their lower hemisphere, and three main eyes spaced evenly around their equator. Six minor eyes on stalks ring their dorsal surfaces. Observers support their bodies by means of an innate levitation ability. The observer’s mouths actually consist of powerful, retractable stalks that can reach things up to 5 feet from the main body. Each of the creature’s main eyes projects a powerhl ray of telekinetic force that can have one of three effects: First, it can simulate Bigby’s forceful hand, driving back one creature at the rate of 20 feet per round. Creatures weighing up to 500 pounds can be so affected, and creatures between 500 and 1,000 pounds cannot advance closer to the observer while its gaze remains on them. Creatures over 1,000 pounds can advance only at the speed of 10 feet per round. Second, the gaze of the main eyes can be used to strike telekinetic blows inflicting damage equal to 1d12 points plus the victim’s AC. Third, it can automatically deflect all physical missiles fired at the creature from the 120 degree arc in front of the eye. The main eyes have a range of 100 yards. Each of the six smaller eyes can create the following effects against a single target: domination (30-yard range), enervation (30-yard range), fear (50-yard range), finger of death (30-yard range), magic missile (3 missiles, 50-yard range), Otiluke’s freezing sphere (cold ray inflicts 8d4+16 points of damage). The powerful eyes of observers are the equivalent of a true seeing spell to a range of 100 yards, except that the monster can’t determine alignment by sight. This means they can’t be deceived by illusions or invisibility. observers are also powerful psionicists, in possession of potent telepathic and psychokinetic abilities. An observer usually relies on its magical abilities first, but should those fail or a subtler means of attack be required, it’ll fall back on mental attacks. Observers enjoy experimenting with telepathic attacks against nonpsionic creatures and take a fiendish pleasure in permanently wrecking a foolish opponent’s psyche.
Examiner	Examiners are scholars and clerks involved in spell and magical item enhancement, research, and creation. They can use any artifact or tool as well as humans, and they can wield up to four items at a time. An examiner is a beholder-kin that is a 4-foot diameter sphere with no central eye and only four small eyes, each at the end of an antenna, mounted atop the sphere. They have one small, lamprey-like mouth on their ventral surface. The mouth is surrounded by four multi-jointed limbs ending in gripper pads. An examiner’s true strength lies in their talent with manipulating objects both mundane and magical, and their ability to wield magical items. Most examiners maintain a collection of magical wands which they use when needed in combat, although they prefer flight whenever possible, working to maintain the arsenal of the beholder hive. Examiner has 4 eyestalks with Enlarge or Reduce, Identify or Legend Lore, Transmute Form (similar to a Stone Shape spell, but works on all types of nonmagical, nonliving material) and Spell Reflection as a ring of spell turning. All spell-like effects are cast at the 8th level.
Lensman	A lensman has one eye set in the chest of its five-limbed, starfish-shaped, simian body. Beneath the eye is a leering, toothy maw. Four of the five limbs end in three-fingered, two-thumbed, clawed hands. The fifth limb, atop the body, is a prehensile, whip-like tentacle. Its chitin is soft and there are many short, fly-like hairs. Lensmen are the only kin to wear any sort of garb – a webbing that is used to hold tools and weapons. Their preferred weapons are double-headed pole arms. Their role in beholder society is that of menial labor, and they are treated as semi-mindless drones. Few lensmen ever strive above this lot, and advanced lensmen are rare. Similar to a beholder a lensman’s eye has power. They are able to fire off an eye ray from their single eye up to 60-ft as a standard action each round. Their eye can have one of the six following powers (although some come in pairs of effects) Remove Fear, Scare (no hit die cap), and Rage (only 1 ability at a time), Cure Moderate Wounds, Dispel Magic, Tongues, Minor Image, Resist Energy (only one energy type active at a time, using another version will instantly end all previous instances). regardless of effect their caster level is 6.
Watcher	Cowardly creatures by nature, watchers are semi-sentient beholder-kin. They are used as scouts and, as their name suggests, watchers by their more intelligent kin. A watcher appears as a 6’ diameter sphere with three central eyes. On the ventral side of the orb is a long, barbed tentacle, which extends from just behind the watcher’s mouth, and on the dorsal side is a ring of six eye spots and a compound eye. Watchers are 6-foot-diameter spheres with three central eyes arranged around the circumference of the sphere. These eyes are huge and unlidded. On the crown of the sphere is a compound eye and a ring of six eye spots that make it difficult to surprise a watcher. A large tentacle with a barbed prehensile pad extends from the ventral surface, right behind the small mouth with its rasp-like tongue. Watchers feed on carrion and stunned prey. They are information gatherers and are the least brave of all the eye tyrant races. Each of a watcher’s main eyes has two powers, and the compound eye on top may draw on three different abilities. The six eye spots have no special powers. Each of a watcher’s main eyes has two powers, and the compound eye on top may draw on three different abilities. The six eye spots have no special powers. Main eyes: True Seeing and ESP, Advanced Illusion and Demi-Shadow Magic, Telekinesis 1,000 lb. and Teleport. Compound Eye: Message, Tongues, and Suggestion.
Astereater	A giant Beholder-kin from Spelljammer campaign living in outer space. The astereater has none of the intelligence or magical abilities of the beholders. In appearance, the astereater resembles a large round boulder with a one large central eye and large mouth filled with pointed teeth. The skin of the creature is virtually identical in appearance and consistency to rock. Astereaters speak the language of beholders and the common tongue.
Caco Beholder	They are 10 feet across and instead of eyestalks they are adorned with curved upwards facing horns. Their central eyes are green and seem to pulsate with electricity.
Death Tyrant	A Death Tyrant is an undead beholder that has retained some magical ability. These creatures are used by powerful wizards as guardians; they are almost never encountered near other beholders, who find them abhorrent.
Death Kiss	This creature’s eyestalks are replaced with blood-draining tentacles, and its body roils with a powerful electric aura. The Death Kiss, or “bleeder”, is a fearsome predator found in caverns or ruins. Its spherical body resembles that of the dreaded beholder, but the “eyestalks” of this creature are bloodsucking tentacles, its “eyes” are hook-toothed orifices. They favor a diet of humans and horses, but will attack anything that has blood. An older name for these creatures is eye of terror. The central body of a death kiss has no mouth. Its central eye gives it 120-foot infravision, but the death kiss has no magical powers. A death kiss is 90% likely to be taken for a beholder when sighted. The 10 tentacles largely retract into the body when not needed, resembling eyestalks, but can lash out to a full 20-foot stretch with blinding speed.
Kasharin	An undead beholder that can pass on a rotting disease which killed it.
Ghost Beholder	Dead Eye Tyrant who came back as a ghost.
Doomsphare	Ghost-like undead beholder is created by magical explosions.
Director	Directors resemble beholders, but their central eye is smaller. They possess only six small eyes on retractable eye stalks these eyes have Magic Missile (as spell , 2/round), Burning Hands (as spell at 8th level), Wall of Ice (as spell), Slow (as spell), Enervation (as spell), Improved Phantasmal Force (as spell). A director’s central eye has the power of deflection – all frontal attacks on director suffer a -2 penalty to the attack roll and damage is halved. The director also gains a +2 bonus to all saving throws against spells cast by those in the field of vision of the central eye. Directors have a fanged mouth below the central eye and possesses three clawed, sensory tendrils on their ventral surface. These tendrils are used to cling to the mount and link with its limited mind. A director is often found dwelling in a beholder community led by a hive mother or an overseer. A director uses three clawed tentacles to bond with monstrous vermin mounts. Directors are a social, warrior-beholder, and breed specialized mounts. They mindlink with their mounts to better control them.
Eye of The Deep	An eye of the deep rarely comes into conflict with true beholders, for this aquatic variant dwells deep underwater. It has only two eyestalks(Disintegrate and Death), but its massive pinchers make it a dangerous combatant.
Eye of Shadow	Beholders who spent too long in the Shadowfell. It has eye rays that blind, do thunder damage, and immobilize. It can also teleport and become invisible.
Eye of Flame	These beholders serve more powerful beholders. They have fire rays, telekinesis rays and fear rays. When they die they explode in a fire burst.
Eye of Frost	A cruel beholder who lives in solitude.
Eyeball	An eyeball is a Tiny beholderkin with four eyestalks; they are popular familiars in some wizardly and sorcerous circles. They only have 4 eyestalks (charm person, Charm Monsters, Sleep, and telekinesis).
Beholder Spawn	These are 4th edition minions (they have a single hit point). They fire a single eye ray that does 11 damage of a single type (fire, force, etc).
Gauth	A gauth is a beholder-kin that feeds on magic as well as flesh. A gauth has six eyestalks with Disintegrate, Telekinesis, Death, Drain Magic, Polymorph and Flesh to Stone (one of which is used to drain magic from items) and four feeding tendrils. The most obvious feature of a gauth is that its central eye (which affects the viewer's mind) is surrounded by a ridge of flesh and many small eyes used for sight.
Gouger	A gouger’s ten eyestalks are magically useless. Its central eye retains the antimagic properties of true beholders, and four small legs hang from the creature’s underside. A gouger’s most hideous feature, though, is its long, barbed tongue, which is adept at temporarily neutralizing beholder eyestalks.
Gorbel	Gorbel is a wild, clawed beholder-kin lacking magic but with the nasty habit of exploding if attacked.
Overseer	An overseer is the most dangerous of the known beholder-kin. Rivaling the power of a hive mother, an overseer resembles nothing so much as a large, fleshy tree with mouths on its trunk and eyes on its branches. Overseers resemble fleshy trees. They have 13 limbs, each of which ends in a bud that conceals an eye; one of these limbs forms the top spine, and three yammering mouths surround the spine. There are eight thorny, vine-like limbs that are used to grasp tools and for physical defense, inflicting 1d10+2 points of damage each. Overseers sit on root-like bases and can inch along when movement is required. They cannot levitate. Overseers are very protective of their health and always have one or two beholder guards and at least a half dozen directors protecting their welfare. Overseers are covered with a fungus which changes color as the overseers desire, commonly mottled green, gray, and brown. Overseers may use any physical weapons or artifacts. The powers of their 13 eyes are as follows: (all magical effects are cast at 14th level) Cone of Cold, Dispel Magic, Paralysis, Chain Lightning, Telekinesis 250 lb. weight, Emotion, Mass Charm, Domination, Mass Suggestion, Major Creation, Spell Turning, Serten’s Spell Immunity, Temporal Stasis.
Spectator	A spectator is an extraplanar beholderkin with four eyestalks(fatigue, inflict moderate wounds, hold monster, and suggestion), their central eye can act as spell turning and reflect spells back at the caster. Somewhat mild and even-tempered, spectators have even been known to form friendships with other creatures, a trait that no other beholderkin or true beholder ever displays. They are smaller in size usually around 6 to 7 feet in diameter.
Beholder Mage	Through ritual destruction of its central eye, a beholder can learn to channel and use magic much more quickly and efficiently than can almost any other race. Only true Beholders can become Beholder Mages.
Mindwitness	Mindwitness is a Beholder infected with Illithid tadpole and transformed into a Mind Flayer hybrid.

Reception

A reviewer for Arcane magazine described the beholder: "11 eyes, paranoid, xenophobic, having a taste for live animals and being deadly with magic."

Wizard magazine's top 100 greatest villains ever list selected the Beholder as the 99th greatest villain. Rob Bricken from io9 named the beholder as the 1st most memorable D&D monster.

The beholder (gauth) was ranked sixth among the ten best mid-level monsters by the authors of Dungeons & Dragons For Dummies. The authors described the true beholder as an iconic creature of the game, "What could be more fantastic than a giant floating eyeball with little eye stalks sticking out, all of which shoot magic rays?" Of the gauth, the authors say "its ability to inflict a bewildering variety of damage on a party of heroes is unparalleled... until they fight a true beholder, that is."

Appearances in other media

• The Beholder has appeared in several films and television programs:
  • Two Beholders are seen briefly in the 2000 motion picture Dungeons & Dragons.
  • The Dungeons & Dragons TV cartoon series featured a Beholder in the 1983 episode Eye of the Beholder.
  • A Beholder also appears in the interactive movie Scourge of Worlds: A Dungeons & Dragons Adventure.
  • The Futurama episode How Hermes Requisitioned His Groove Back features a Beholder who guards the Central Bureaucracy. He is a Grade 11 bureaucrat who begs the Planet Express crew not to tell its supervisor that he was sleeping on the job. He has another cameo in Lethal Inspection, still working at the Central Bureaucracy.
• Beholders appear in a number of Dungeons & Dragons computer and video games, most notably the Eye of the Beholder series. Beholders appear regularly throughout the RPG Baldur's Gate 2. All but one of these are hostile. The non-hostile individual is a Spectator, which the player has to persuade to be allowed to retrieve an item from a chest it is guarding.
• The online comic Planescape Survival Guide features a Beholder as one of the main characters.
• A Beholder appears briefly in The Order of the Stick along with a mind flayer as a joking reference to the non-inclusion of "product identity" monsters in the Open Game License materials and SRD.
• The beholder Xanathar appears as a playable lord in the Scoundrels of Skullport expansion to Lords of Waterdeep.

D&D Miniatures

• A Beholder is featured in D&D Miniatures: Deathknell set #32 (2005).
• The Beholder Eye Tyrant was included as a random packed figure in D&D Miniatures: Dangerous Delves (#5/40) (2009).
• The Beholder Ultimate Tyrant was available as a visible piece Legendary Evils set (#6/40) (2009).

Further reading

• Cagle, Eric. "Worshipers of the Forbidden." Dragon #296 (Paizo Publishing, 2002).
• Collins, Andy, Bruce R. Cordell, and Thomas M. Reid. Epic Level Handbook (Wizards of the Coast, 2002).
• Demokopoliss, Dougal. "The Ecology of the Spectator." Dragon #139 (TSR, 1988).
• Greenwood, Ed. "The Ecology of the Eye of the Deep." Dragon #93 (TSR, 1985).
• Mearls, Michael. "Eye Wares: Potent Powers of the Beholders." Dragon #313 (Paizo Publishing, 2003).