S28 Proposal - Beholder - Unique Monster - Boss

General Discussion
1

4K Poster

https://i.ibb.co/bj4fGwm/beholder.jpg

Without text (Wallpaper)
https://i.ibb.co/mtps65K/beholder-wallpaper-fantasy-art-dnd.jpg

Beholder

Unique Monster / Boss
Eye tyrants either live alone, or enslave other creatures to control vast evil empires under their despotic nature. Their central eye emits a broad field of energy that can nullify the magic of its foes, while their eye stalks blast with rays the unfortunate heroes.

Variety

There are lots of shapes and colors among Beholders:
https://i.ibb.co/0Xgn3x4/beholders-variety.jpg

2

Oh man, the memoriesā€¦ the M E M O R I E S of fighting a Beholder in Ad&D 2nd Ed. If played right, they would pwn just about anything that isnā€™t a god. Of course the DM couldnā€™t do that or else the campaign would be done.

They already, kind of, exist in WoW and have been used in many TSR/WoTC computer games. I like the monster, itā€™s fun. However, lets keep it out of Diablo. The other games can have it.

On another note, I remember Diablo 1 and 2 monsters being converted to AD&D back in the day. That was actually a lot of fun.

Hey.
Yeah?
Lets play Diablo?
Okay, let me fire up the Compter. Iā€™ll get my Barbarian.
No, not computer. Table top.
Table top?
Yup. Here are the Diablo monster manuals.
SWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEET
Want to kill some goatmen?
Oh yes I do!
LETS DO EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEET!!!
YEAHHHHH!!!

Thanks, Isend. I needed that trip back in time to the good old days of gaming.

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3

Well, some Diablo 3 monsters affixes include lasers, so why not a Beholder firing lasers ?

If we donā€™t want lasers, why not just casting spells, firing poisons clouds, use its jaws to bite player, ā€¦etc.

In Diablo 4 it could be a world boss.

Imagine multiple heroes trying to decimate an enormous Beholder.

That would make an epic fight ! :grinning:

4

Yeah, that would make for an epic world boss fight. Maybe the large eye would negate all non-physical resistance? Or decrease by 80%. Something major. Then other eyes would cast different elemental aoe spells in the coneā€™s effect. Other eyes would try to be clever and cast weaker elemental spells on the Beholderā€™s flanks and from behind.

Maybe there could be many smaller eyes, all over the Beholderā€™s body, that turn into biting mouths that deal physical damage with a really low chance of a debuff or weak poison. If you get a debuff, then there is a moderate chance that you get more stacks, to a max of 5 or 10. Nice little dot on top of all the other nasty stuff.

So many ideas. Yes, lazers. Many lazers. Yes, fire walls and balls. Yes, frozen orbs and blizzards. Yes, lighting bolts and clouds. Yes, poison pools and rain. Yes, rocks or stone slabs. Cover all the damage types.

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5

more mob mechanics would be welcome. the cooler the better obviously, captain obvious.

6

ā€œBeholderā€ with its appearance and power suite is Closed content and requires a license from Hasbro/WotC to use as-is. Otherwise, a variant must be created that doesnā€™t look quite the same nor have the existing abilities.

Welcome to the world of copyright/trademark/intellectual property.

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7

100% True. Not even Pathfinder (3rd ED D&D clone using open source material) has them. WoW does, kind of, but they are, like you said, a variant, so itā€™s okay.

Wizards of the Coastā€™s Open Gaming License states that the following monsters are Product Identity:

  • beholder
  • gauth
  • carrion crawler
  • displacer beast
  • githyanki
  • githzerai
  • kuo-toa
  • mind flayer
  • slaad
  • umber hulk
  • yuan-ti

Yeah, HASBRO, good grief. When I found out that WoTC (bought TSR) was owned by a friggen toy company, I nearly lost it.

Poor D&D, such a fun game, ran into the ground. I can understand AD&D 2nd Ed. (before and after skills and powers) not holding up to ā€˜newerā€™ players, but 3rd ed was just :face_vomiting: at best. 3.5 Ed. soon after people spent 100ā€™s if not 1,000ā€™s of dollars on the new content was even worse.

I didnā€™t hear ONE positive thing about 4th Ed. either and heard 5th Ed was just okay. I think there is a 6th, if not a 7th, Ed. already? Seriously? Ugg.

The golden age of gaming (tabletop and computer) is DEAD. However, the silver (possibly even the bronze, copper, or tin) age has a few gems in it, Diablo being one of them. So, all is not lost.

Hopefully D4 will have some cool new(ish) monsters for us players to kick around endlessly for loots, loots, and more loots. I donā€™t want to know too much about the game, I want to be pleasantly surprised when I roll my Barbarian in the new instalment of the Diablo franchise.

8

Well, have you tried Divinity Original Sin 2 and Baldurā€™s Gate 3 from Larian Studios ?

9

Nope. I havenā€™t played any of them.

I heard of Divinity, but not enough to want to play it. There was always another game to play, mainly for me it was Diablo 2:LoD and WoW, but a few other offline games in the same genre. I am thinking about the Heroes of Might and Magic series.

I do plan on playing the Baldurā€™s Gate series, but I donā€™t know if I want to play Icewind Dale 2 first. I played Icewind Dale a bunch of times because itā€™s a fun game. I played Planescape: Torment once after reading the book. I think GoG has BG seriers, so I should at least buy them so I have them on my computer just in case GoG no longer has them available to purchase. That would be my luck, I waited too long.

The only thing I played that was Baldurā€™s Gate related, was a mod for D2. I canā€™t remember if it was pre or post LoD. It was fun, but the mod was buggy as hell and I ended up scrapping it.

10

Most of the games in the Baldurā€™s gate Series are pretty old now, hard to play even remastered. You can look recap videos if you want to know the story.

As a a new player in the series, the best is probably to start with Divinity Original Sin 2.

Divinity Original Sin 2 is in promotion today.

$30 (-38%) on Instant Gaming

Instant Gaming does massives buys of Steam keys, thatā€™s why its cheaper.
I buy nearly all my games with Instant Gaming since I discovered it.

https://www.instant-gaming.com/fr/997-acheter-gog-com-divinity-original-sin-ii-pc-jeu-gogcom/

I spent 100+ hours on it to finish the story once, so spending $1 = 3 hours.

Check the video to see how the game looks.

The story is about you starting as a slave, gradually accepting you god legacy, and making choices about it.

Will you be a protective hero or a malevent one ?

The game does not judge you. :yum:

ā€“

As for Baldurs Gate 3, Larian Studio developped it after the great success of Divinity Original Sin 2, it was so good that Wizards of the Coasts gave the licence to Larian Studio to develop the next Baldurā€™s Gate.

While it is still in Early Access, I spent 160+ hours on it.

Check the 5th video which is the most representative of the story

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1086940/Baldurs_Gate_3/

The story is about you being infected by an Illithid parasite (process known as ceremorphosis). Your quest starts on finding a healer, you will meet lots of enemies and companions, and I suspect when the game will be fully revealed that the upper vilain (The Absolute) is an Illithid Elder Brain.

Baldurs Gate 3 is expected to be fully released in 1 year.

As Baldurs Gate 3 is still in Early Access, it is best to start with Divinity Original Sin 2 first.

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11

They made BG turn basedā€¦ no! Just eww!

12

Indeed, DnD is turn based during combats.

In combat, Divinity Original Sin 2 and Baldurā€™s Gate 3 are more turn-based RPG than ARPG.

But only in combats.

Outside combat, you are free to move, jump, steal, kill, exploreā€¦ etc. in real time :slight_smile:

13

Sounds so awfully terrible.

14

So the proposal isā€¦to add one uniqueā€¦pretty underwhelming no?

15

It is obviously not enough to make a season.

This is not a seasonal theme, but alterations Iā€™d like to land in an upcoming season.

I submited 2 other proposals for S28:

Necromancer / Bone Spirit

Monk / Raiment of a Thousand Storms

16

op outcraps himself again

the doom-creators would like a word with you

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17

Beholder is a copyrighted monster for D&D.
You can still use it but you need to call it something else and make it look slightly different.

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18

Right but look at your title for this thread. There is zero info as to why this boss is added, what does it bring? Why is it different? Why does it enhance D3?

Iā€™m sure we could all add a million mob type enemies but what does it bring?

If it enhances another thread on Seasonal ideas then link it because I have not seen your other threads but this is proposed as a S28 idea and there is zero substance.

19

It brings destruction !

But seriously, it could bring a tiny story.

Which means you would have to defeat many monsters before defeating the boss.

Beholders are like Elder Brains, they are manipulators.

20

Playing a random map in Heroes of Might and Magic III while D3 is down for maintenance. I chose the Dungeon Overlords and guess what one of their creatures is?

A Beholder. The upgrade being Evil Eyes. Same model with the big eye and the stalks of little eyes.

Edit.

WoTC bought TSR in 1997 and Heroes of Might and Magic III was released in 1999.

Soā€¦ either they got permission from WoTC or they were sneaky and got this monster in the game without them knowing it.

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