It waits for Spelljamming Ships (ships that fly through space) to pass by then comes alive and snatches people off the decks to eat. Drifting within asteroid fields, at first glance it resembles an asteroid itself however its stony eyelid conceals its eye and ridges hide its toothy maw (the Astereater has no eyestalks).
The Astereater is a beholder-like creature from the Spelljammer campaign setting, which is set in outer space. Not all share the xenophobia of true beholders though most are still evil and cruel in nature. Beholderkin have a very wide range of appearances and abilities. As opposed to the Death Tyrant, Elder Orb, Hive Mother and Orbus described later, which are just variants, these are actually different species to true beholders. True beholders do not consider these aberrant beholders to be of the same race they view them as abominations and mockeries of the true beholder race and rarely if ever associate with them.īeholderkin is a subcategory of aberrant beholders comprising a very large number of beholder-like creatures. The unfying feature among beholders and the various aberrant beholders seems to be a simple, fleshy body with one or more grotesque eyes. Some of the creatures described below are relatively similar to true beholders, while others appear wildly different and have very different abilities. These are aberrant beholders, of which there are numerous different types. Some beholder strains have mutated far from the basic beholder stock. 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.īeholders worship their insane, controlling goddess known as the Great Mother, though some also, or instead, follow her rebel offspring, Gzemnid, the beholder god of gazes, who is allied with the illithid god Ilsensine.
They will sometimes take members of other, non-beholder races as slaves. 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.īeholders are extremely xenophobic, to the point of being engaged in a violent intra-species war with others of their kind who differ even slightly in appearance. 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. Many variant beholder species exist, such as "observers", "spectators", "eyes of the deep", "elder orbs", "hive mothers", and "death tyrants". The original Greyhawk booklet cover, featuring one of the earliest depictions of a Beholder.Ī 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 it was once described as "a big eye with a bunch of little eyes that eats adventurers for breakfast."Ī 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 motion of objects, charm animals, charm humans, cause death, induce fear, levitate objects, and inflict serious wounds.). The beholder is considered "Product Identity" by Wizards of the Coast and as such is not released under its Open Gaming License. Second edition supplements to Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, especially those of the Spelljammer campaign setting, added further details about these classic creatures' societies and culture. The beholder was introduced to the game in its first supplement, Greyhawk ( 1975), and is depicted on its cover (as shown in the section below).
6 Beholders in various campaign settings.
0 kommentar(er)
