Scrying The 4e Crystal Ball: Beholder News

Rich Baker has been one of the better sources of information on 4th edition through his blog. The party in his playtest group has reached epic levels, and in his blog he talks about their recent encounter with a beholder. Rich maintains that the new 4e version is the best version they've done in the 30+ year history of the game. I won't judge that until I see the quality of the eyestalks myself. Fortunately we were given a few snippets of info on just what the beholder is like in 4e.

• Beholders are a solo monster (well, we knew that from the earlier Dungeons & Dragons Insider cartoon)
• They are a challenge for 19th level characters - and even for a bit higher than that
• Eye rays get some new mechanics in the game to make them more playable
• Eye ray sample mechanic one: an aura that lets the beholder unleash one eye ray attack on each player in range
• Eye ray sample mechanic two: eye-fury, an attack allowing the beholder to unleash several eye ray attacks in a single action

I'm curious to see how some of these mechanics work, but I'll confess... I love beholders, so I'm also anxious to see.

[via Rich Baker's Blog]