So I know that all beholder consider themselves to be the perfect/ideal beholder which is why they kill all other...

Now step into this cage and embrace your new master.

iirc Lords of Madness does state that Beholders tend to surround themselves with cults of worshippers of other races, so theoretically this could work

They are aberrations, magical at that, so it doesn't necessarily need to be that easy.

They're hyper intelligent wizardballs. Why wouldn't they?

There's two explanations given depending on how far back you go and what edition.

One is that beholders asexually split and produce a bunch of smol beholders, and immediately eat or laser the bulk of them for not looking 100% like itself.

The other is that when a beholder manages to fall asleep, he might dream about a beholder. That dream beholder actually becomes real. It gets kind of bonkers.

Oh it's even better than that. At some point in beholder's life, it fertilises itself. It becomes even crazier and hungrier as it incubates dozens of little eyeball monsters. Eventually it coughs out its womb, chews it off and kills any of its offspring that it decides don't look enough like it. Only the fast and the handsome survive.

Why would it care that people tell it the obvious truth that it already knows? If somebody who you wanted to kill suddenly told you "Oh my god, you have two legs! There can be no mistake! These are the twoest legs to have ever existed!!", would you be impressed, let alone impressed enough to spare the disgusting creature? Neither would be the beholder. It doesn't need a confirmation of an obvious truth, especially from creatures which are themselves a huge affront to beauty. If anything, it's suspicious that something so horribly ugly finds you so beautiful. All the more reason to kill it quickly.

>They're hyper intelligent wizardballs. Why wouldn't they?
Murder orbs that vaporize every other living thing out of instinct would probably have little use for or grasp of the sharing of ideas and emotions

Beholders are insanely vain. They'd probably put you in a cage and soak in the compliments until they lasered you in a fit of accidental paranoia/rage

They need to learn those spells bruh.

They speak many languages per ruleset anyways.

As a GM: YES! I would fucking love it!

>Beholders are insanely vain.
How does that contradict my point? Insecure people need flattery, but beholders are so delusional that they're far beyond this need.
>Oh my god, the grass is green!
>Yeah, why would I give a shit?

...

I don't think you've encountered many Culter Dei

Sheherazade reloaded, Beholder edition
The 1001 times I bullshited enough the big ball and wasn't disintegrated

I told you not to make waves.

Behold everything you wanted to know about their reproduction in one handy image.

So how do you run beholders as PCs?

Aren't they also ridic paranoid? So you'll just end up making them suspicious and violent, rather than just violent.

FUCKING GROSS

Every time they dream of another beholder, another beholder pops into existence. Sometimes in such proximity of its progenitor there is an instant fight to the death.
Either that beholder keeps being replaced when it dreams of a stronger beholder that kills it, or it dreams of a beholder slightly further away that results in a new beholder without the imediate death match.

In Fifth Edition, Volo's Guide to Monsters has it that a beholder can sort of dream another beholder or variant beholder into existence. It doesn't happen often, but sometimes when a beholder sleeps, it dreams of another beholder, and this can cause a new beholder to appear out of thin air, fully grown. If it dreams of itself, it might spontaneously create a colony of miniature beholders that look like itself. It might have really vivid, creepy (even for a beholder) nightmares, creating an especially horrific beholder variant.

I prefer autopregnancy and egg sac thing.

What happens if you somehow restrain a Beholder and tattoo it? Now it looks different than it did. What does it do?

>sample names
>manglecramps

Downer was a fun comic.

From Faiths and Pantheons.

...

In Lords of Madness it describes the gestation quite handily. Beholders cannot eat while pregnant, and the birth in itself is rather exhausting. So the beholder is extremely tired, and the offspring scampers to safety before the parent recovers

The thing about how beholders reproduce by dreaming of other beholders seems like arbitrary weirdness to me. It's a creative way that a magical creature could reproduce, but it doesn't fit them specifically, because a beholder doesn't have any other powers related to dreams or imagination; creating things out of dreams has nothing to do with its other powers or themes.

Fucking love Beholders. Favorite D&D monster, hands-down. Everything about them is weird and disgusting and horrifying and insane.

No, they literally don't. Beholders' eye beams are an inherent ability. Lords of Madness provided rules for beholders becoming true wizards, but it involved blinding their main eye (thus destroying its antimagic properties) and replacing their regular eye beams with the spells that they learn.

Beholder Mage first appeared in the 3.0 Monster of Faerun book.

Lords of Madness and the other later 3.5 books tended to compile older but popular stuff from 3.0.

Unless the minds eye counts as an eye with the power to create beholders

I think they look pretty cute.

I'm glad this thread exists because I just got a really stupid idea to try and create a Beholder PC. How would you go about handling it, Veeky Forums? I have some eye-deas but I'd like to present you with the challenge of creating a beholder pc.

I have an idea where a beholder invents a human persona to morph into/create an illusion of so he can blend into civilized society owing to a crushing defeat sustained when an adventuring party destroys his lair. Either that or some alchemist attempts to create a "dalek" and programme it to destroy other daleks while attempting to be a civilised member of society.

bruh

How do you intend to make the beholder's mind work with the rest of the group?
Even if Loyal Evil, a beholder is has so many psychological issues he would be cited in half the DSM-V.

They have Charm Person, they can get generic compliments anywhere. Compose them an aria or it'll just be "Shut up, baby, I know it" and more rays.

There is allegedly a lawful neutral variant of the beholder in 5e? And it's watered down, power level wise so it's certainly worth looking into. I think it's called a Spectator.

I guess a good starting point is to try it as a one-off character who got into a fight with a bigger beholder and lost, getting turned into a confused amnesiac human in the process, but still retains the xenophobic nature and seeks vengeance on the other beholder. He joins the party who would be on a mission to kill said beholder, and at the battle, transforms into his true form. He would also be racist to everyone who isn't human in his human form?

The spectator has been extant since 2nd edition, you know. 5th edition literally has nothing new.

I think he would find his current form ugly as fuck and would try to make it more beautiful, for example dressing his hairs like 4 dreads with fake eyes and cie.
A spectator would be easier to play, still a challenge but in a RP-heavy game it would be very fun with all the possible quirks.
Aren't spectators sometimes liked by contracts, for example to keep a treasure? It could have been contracted to protect a NPC or a PC, or a mcguffin the group seeks/protects.

Yup, sorry, just saw that bit while researching. Don't know TOO much about Beholders atm, I just like their aesthetic to start as well as their xenophobic traits.

Hmm, a contract certainly seems like a good step. I guess creating a successful Beholder type pc is even more so dependent on one's relation with the DM and weaving it into certain plot hooks and the like.

I'm wondering how realistic it is if Spectators and/or Beholders are capable of learning some kind of polymorph or illusion magic to allow them to blend into towns so that the whole militia doesn't get assembled every time the party needs to rest.

If you want the GM to agree, the less powers generally found only in monsters, the best. So a monster mind in a human body which tries to behave quite humanly will be more likely accepted than a monster mind and a monster body hiding in a human apparence.

Spectators basically channel the Insanity of Beholders into Obsessive compulsive disorders based on their contracts.

They'd basically be Monk.

I've seen beholderkin type for third edition. A monster much smaller and kinder than the real thing with non lethal variants of its powers and an adjustment level of +5. Can't remember the name of the critter right now. Kind of cool but my DM did not want it in on the excuse that he didn't want to handle a race related arc.

The funny thing is that it was either in a traps book or a fortress book, official, not third party.
So technically, they're not beholders, they become different species if they cease their omnicidal efforts and change alignments/sanity levels.

That's fucking gay, just attack the beholder, faggot.

...

>gender neutral
Anyone know any other good RP systems? I am through with DnD.

user, something being gender neutral is fine if they're literally an asexual species. That should only be a problem from something coming from a species that uses sexual reproduction like humans.

This isn't some dipshit asking you to respect their pronouns, this is a magical ball of hate and murder that gives no shits about gender because they have no reason to.

We all know why they fucking put "gender neutral" in there and that's cucking out to the SJW's who ruin absolutely everything they put their fat, greasy hands on.

Fags. I'm buying MYFAROG have fun with your cuck shit.

Based

In that case, what about Paladin?

To that end how can we make a beholder who can shape shift into human form without breaking the game? And what level should he be by that time?

Act evangelical or islamic.
Not necessarily terrorist, but whenever anyone ever mentions anything related to your god you raise your eyestalks to the sky and PRAISE [DEITY]

> Well, we need to get going before the sun -PRAISED BE PELOR!- goes down.

If you arent playing homebrew settings, you'd need to be a Paladin of the Great Mother though.

By changing the game to fit in the beholder, so a fully-monster party.
High level because a beholder can rely on at least three very powerful stuff at high level: antimagic, flying, powerfull spell-like abilities.
As a GM I'd remove the at will quota of antimagic and eyes' spells and replace with per day use. Especially the motherfucking antimagic cone (if you play a true beholder).

If you play a spectator, a planeshift mid-level setting would fit quite well.

My DM refuses to have us encounter a beholder until he can figure out how to flawlessly mimic Krang from TMNT's voice because he thinks that's the sort of voice a beholder should have.

Should I drop out of his game?

No, that sounds amazing. Convince him that skeletons talk like skeletor, and that liches sound like the movie version.

>"Tell me of the loneliness of good, He Man. Is it equal to the loneliness of evil?"

Movie Skeletor was fucking real.

No that dm is dope. Really you should question if you are worthy to play.

I don't want that kiddie sjw cuck meme shit in my D&D.

>kiddie sjw cuck meme

I hope you're talking about krang and not Skeletor.

Krang. I'm not playing D&D to deal with fucking references and humour. It fucking serious fantasy; I don't want to hear shit that no one but cucks liked.

>muh dnd
the fuck are you even on about?

I think you just answered your own question.

You sound like a great person to play with. I'm sure you're group really enjoys your company.

It was a rhetoric question for

I'm the only fucker there who's there to just play the game. I don't give a shit if your cocksucking paladin made some cuck vow to not slay the innocent or some shit; if a village needs to be raid, I'm fucking making this fuckers raid a village. And fallen paladins get better abilities anyway; I'm doing him a fucking favour. Same thing with the fucking rogue who's not trying to mug and rob people who aren't in his guild or alignment.

Don't even get me start on them letting a dyke cunt in the game. If it weren't for me, they'd fucking fall apart. But having some fucking children cartoon reference in a game like D&D is a fucking travesty and I refuse to be part of it.

depends on the DM.

It was a major plot point in our campaign, that the beholders were gathering and we had to find out how to defeat them.

The big bad had found an artifact from the first age that represented the perfect ideal of beauty of the beholder, in this case, around 500 beholders.

She then united them under the banner of this perfect being and of course all the beholders thought this perfect being looked identical to them so they went along with it without question. This being IS perfect in every way. They look like me.

Anyway, we catch on to this, and my barbarian ends up smashing the statue while the rogue screams out of her faux beholder illusion "No, I AM THE MOST BEAUTIFUL ONE"

This set them all off and what went from an army of united beholders turned into a bloodbath pretty quick.

It sounds like you just need to take a step back and calm down.

The alt-right was a mistake.

>muh D&D

im sure they'll do fine without you, user

I can't even tell if you're just pretending to be retarded. Good show.

I don't know about that, but I remember one campaign were I hired a beholder. The DM gave us a metric fuckton of gold and I only spent a little of it because he gave me a macguffin staff that did all the things I wanted already. So eventually we go face off against a beholder, and before we attack it, I realize I have upwards of a million gold so I ask it how much money it wants for the magical sword it was guarding, and to help us take on the evil demon lord that's plaguing the land. I give it a good half of my gold and it joined us on our quest.

I'm not sure if that should have worked or not (I'm not familiar with proper beholder lore) but it was pretty neat at the time.

Beholder that animates a suit of armor in order to act as a knight like in all the tomes and grimoires it has read over and over until the idea of being a chivalrous knight slaying many-armed giants and defending the honor of a fair maiden has bored its way into its mind

What does this have to do with krang?

>doesn't want children's cartoon references in D&D

Nigga, D&D is caked with that shit. Portable Holes and Bags of Holding are absolutely inspired by Loony Tunes sight gags and most of the "original" D&D monsters were based on toys Gygax and Anderson used to represent the monsters they didn't have a real figure for.

Only cucks, niggers, women, and leftist give a shit about nostalgia. All this nostalgia bullshit only skyrocketed when Onigger got into office. I'm not having my hobby ruined by it.

What if making america great again is nostalgia?

>Like if you just stumbled across one accidentally, would saying shit like "OH MY GOD, YOU ARE THE PERFECT BEHOLDER. TRULY YOU ARE THE MOST BEAUTIFUL AND IDEAL STANDARD THAT ALL OTHER BEHOLDERS FAIL TO MEET" buy you any time to escape or de-escalate the situation?
According to Volo's guide, I think so.

It saddens me this never got reprinted in a collected hardback version. I only have a pdf that I cobbled together some years ago, and I think it's missing a few pages.

I've got a .cbr with everything except part 16 in it. Part 16 is in dungeon #15. I'm just a scrub and haven't googled how to fix that up.

I can post them if you want.

Your DM is right. Let him perfect his Krang voice, and stay in the game.

Go for it.

At the very least other fa/tg/uys might appreciate being exposed to it.

>sendspace.com/file/16trlj

Downer the comic. Sort of good. Sort of goofy. Lots of cool art.

If I were to make a semi-friendly beholder, you damn well know it would be flamingly homo.

>The unprepared adventurers find themselves "eye to eye" with a beholder.
>Fearing for his life the bard stammers "Y-you're the most beautiful beholder I have ever seen"
>The beholder, taken aback for a moment, seductively brings an eye stalk to his lips and responds with "Oooooh my... What an intelligent and perceptive creature has happened upon my home. Tell me, are you a man of the arts to have such good taste? Perhaps a poet? Stay a moment... enduuuuulge me with your musings."
>Force the bard to make up poetry on the spot for the beholder.
>Correct him periodically when he tries to compare the beholder to something like a rose with comments like "You mean to tell me that I am not more bulbous than a common rose? That my stalks are no more... luxurious?"
>Continue until the party decides that death is less painful or the bard sets up a second date with the beholder and escapes.

It would be uncomfortable for all parties involved and that alone is half the fun.

Thanks but the Dungeon Magazine is missing part 16.

>my d&d
But he's the DM, it's his. If you don't like it leave and make your own group

You just sound like someone who can't have a good time, I am really impressed there are people who can stand your presence for a session of d&d

I get feeling that he's baiting. I don't think someone acting like that will get to stay in a game for long.

Fuck, I'd been approximating the Beholders to Daleks all this while I never figured some of them might be as narcissistic as I am. Great stuff bruh!

He's most likely a That Guy who they have around because he's and experienced player who the DM knows and thought they would help with the finer nuances of the game.

Assholes like him also just stew at the end of the table in their own bullshit and then explode at some point and ruin the game for everyone, which he'll most likely do when the DM starts gurgling like Krang when some shadowy figure is making threats as an "oh shit" set up for his players.

Had something similar happen to me in a Star Wars RP when one guy just suddenly exploded and tried to kill my character and throw us out of his friends apartment when the B Team I was part of for our infiltration mission that session didn't want to completely derail the game with him. He assumed we had been plotting against him when we were passing notes as a side team to coordinate our part of the mission when the GM was talking to his team and thought that we were ruining the game by not playing just like him.

The book describes them as warping reality in other ways, although it doesn't actually specify how.

If you wanted to run with it, the best way would be to assume that many of its powers are it warping reality in some way, usually focused through sight.

A Beholder floats, despite being heavy, because it cannot imagine falling, so it warps reality to keep it aloft.

It uses telekinesis by staring at things and warping space until it moves where the Beholder wants it to go, etc.