I hate beholders

[spydar]

if this is already in a thread can someone please point me to it?


in the meanwhile....


POSSIBLE SPOILERS
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there's a point in the beholder lair, somewhere to the south eastery area, where you get pretty much abushed by 4 beholders an elder orb and few gauths. or, atleast I got ambushed. Now I've beaten them all but have been trying to do it without loosing party members so here's two questions:
1) what are the spells you would suggest against beholders?
2) when your party members have been pertified, or whatever it is that doens't kill them but immobolizes them, how do you dispell it?

[Dadams1]

Spoiler
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Get the cloak of mirroring from Sanhuagin City, and all you have to do is stand there and the Beholders will fire spells at you and they'll reflect back and kill them AHAHAHAHAHA!!! Ok, I'm done.

[Pirengle]

A description of party and gear would be nice, but hey... [img]tongue.gif[/img]

Since you're having a few problems, I'm assuming that you didn't pick up the cloak of cheese mirroring from the place Dadams mentioned, and that you didn't buy the shield of cheese Balduran from one of the bonus merchants.

From what I've seen, beholderkin can all do these things: anti-magic ray (removes buffing/protection spells), hold, horror/fear, some sort of cause wounds spell. Beholders can also dire charm and petrify, and probably maze. Elder Orbs do all that, can definitely cast maze, and as a special bonus, cast imprisonment. The priest spell Chaotic Commands can take care of most of a beholderkin's arsenal, as can a nice Death Ward.

The only way to dispel petrification is to cast the wizard spell Stone to Flesh or cast it from a green scroll of the same name. You can protect against petrification with the wizard spell Protection from Petrification. (NOTE: If you're in a romance with someone, try not to let them get petrified or imprisoned. Even if you cast the spells to free them, the romance is off.)

I have two suggestions.

--If you'd rather get it over and done with now, take 3 characters with good saves vs. spells and polymorph/petrify, buff them up (Chaotic Commands, Death Wards, free action, the works), and summon up a few friends. I recommend nishruu and hakeashar, but hardy elemental summons or a nice aerial servant wouldn't hurt. Maybe even the bears from the druid's Conjure Animals spell if you've got it. Try to reveal one beholderkin at a time, and stay in there with your pets. Your pets will not stand up to beholderkin by themselves. They are not chunkable summons, nor are they meat shields. They are gladly giving their lives to help you rid the world of the many-eyeballed monstrosities. Treat them with care.

--Or, you can wait on the beholder lair for a bit. (Trying to be as low-spoiler as possible, please bear with me!) If you haven't explored the rest of the main map, I suggest you do so. The plot of the chapter will allow you to safely come back, and if you let the plot run its course, you can come back better armed and maybe gained an experience level. If you decide to leave and return, follow the above advice. No doubt you've picked up a thing or two that might help you in this situation.

(PS: If you're in the beholder lair looking for a particular something, if you've hit the cluster of beholderkin in the southeast wing (arm? eyestalk?), you've missed it. The answer might be closer than you realize. )

[spydar]

well, I have that, but what always ended up happening was the rest of the beholders would come shooting out and see the rest of my guys and start attacking them.
maybe I'll just try it with the rest of them just hanging back a bit further...hmmm, has possibilities.....

[IronDragon]

I always hated that particular battle as well until I tired something radical.

Previously I had always buffed my party to the max, used the items of cheese and gone in swinging only to get my rear end handed to me by those gas bags.

Remote chance of spoilage:
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You were warned.

My answer to the gang of Beholders?.... Nalia

Yes Nalia

Equip Nalia with boots if speed, a fully charged wand of cloudkill and as many potions of invisibility as you can muster. (the staff of the Magi works here too) Make sure she doesn’t have her bow equipped or she will try to be helpful and shoot at an elder orb.

Sequester everyone else off somewhere far far away, near the entrance is good, give them a deck of cards or Twister to keep them occupied.

Down a potion of invisibility and go hunting gas bags. When you get near them get just out of sight AND near a corner. Shoot off a cloud kill from the wand and run around the corner. the second you shoot off the wand Nalia becomes visible and if the gas bags see her she is toast. Gulp another invisibility (or reinstall the staff) and have Nalia hold still.
The gas bags will get all upset and start hunting for their attacker. Not finding any attacker they soon float right back to their starting positions in the poison cloud. Repeat the process being careful to keep Nalia out of the cloud and to keep her out of sight.
As stupid as the gas bags are once they spot Nalia they somehow figure out where the rest of your party is and head straight for them.

Rest assured this will not solve ALL your problems. The elder orb is highly resistant to magic so while it may take a few points damage from the cloud it probably wont die from it.

Once all its friends are dead then you can take on the elder orb in the more traditional way. Buff buff buff and attack fast and hard.

Cheesy? You bet it is. But so is the shield of Baulduron.


Personally the main reason I’m wandering around a Beholder Lair in the Underdark is to get the Greenstone amulet not some slimy eyestalk.

[SixOfSpades]

The Way of the Warrior:
Use somebody with Stealth to get a single Beholderkin just within their visual range. Fire 1 shot, run like hell, and immediately go back into Stealth. The Beholder will have time to fire 1 shot at you, though, so it helps to have the Cloak of Reflection (NOT Mirroring), as their Lightning Bolts will prove ineffective. You'll still get whacked by their Cause Wounds, though, but their Hold and Slow you can pretty much ignore. If you happen to have a Paladin and a certain sword, you can have them do the shooting, equipping the sword just as they turn tail & run. Yes, it's time- and resource-consuming, but it gets the job done, because Beholders don't have Healing potions.

The Way of the Wizard: (Easy)
Polymorph Self. Check out the benefits of the various forms.

The Way of the Wizard: (Sexy)
Protect a Wizard with every buffing spell under the sun, including a healthy dose of Spell Immunity. Then, and this is important, Spell Shield. Ignore the description on Spell Shield--its ONLY use is to grant immunity to those #$*(@ing Anti-Magic Rays. For the entire duration of your Spell Shield, the Beholders will be unable to remove your buffing spells.

I've found that Summons are useless against Beholders--their infinite Death Spells means that all Summons except Gated ones are toast. Gauths, however, do not have Death Spell, so Skeleton Warriors would still do the trick there.

[Zuvio]

Originally posted by SixOfSpades: I've found that Summons are useless against Beholders--their infinite Death Spells means that all Summons except Gated ones are toast. Gauths, however, do not have Death Spell, so Skeleton Warriors would still do the trick there.

Ehm, what infinite Death spells? When I solo'ed a sorcerer, this was my anti-beholder strat: summon a wizards eye & scout the area for the gasbags. Summon a spider or two, send them in one by one. Every beholder should cast their Death Spell (compare number of cast Death spells to number of beholders). Send in the Skeleton warriors.

This was done with all patches and such installed. Now because of the AI scripts of the beholders, they will engage the skeleton warriors in melee combat, because of their high MR. But they only used 1 Death spell on my summons.

[SixOfSpades]

Must be a difference in versions/patches/BaldurDashing/ToB.

Lucky bastard. [img]tongue.gif[/img]

[Zuvio]

Originally posted by SixOfSpades: Must be a difference in versions/patches/BaldurDashing/ToB. Lucky bastard. [img]tongue.gif[/img]

LoL ! Though I had the latest versions of everything ...

[Dace De'Briago]

I think the death spells ability applies to beholders of elder orb or above.