How can Sunny is able to fly?

[Precure]

Is it due to some kind of inner magic? Or it's just the gas, as claimed by several forum members? My search on internet gives me contradictory information.

[InvisibleBison]

According to the Monster Manual, "[a] beholder's body is naturally buoyant. This buoyancy allows it to fly at a speed of 20 feet."

[KorvinStarmast]

Or it's just the gas, as claimed by several forum members? A steady diet of pinto beans and jalapeños covers most of that.

[elros]

According to the Monster Manual, "[a] beholder's body is naturally buoyant. This buoyancy allows it to fly at a speed of 20 feet."
That would explain why V is able to fly faster than Sunny can turn.

[Living Oxymoron]

That would explain why V is able to fly faster than Sunny can turn.

This is a very good point.

[brian 333]

Helium, not hydrogen, or they would be a race of Hindenbergs.

I played them as distant relatives of gas spores, so their floating was not magical in nature but came from gas bladders. Your campaign may have different rules.

[Emanick]

A beholder is actually just a Koffing that has received a special eyestalk-laden coating that contains an artificial eye. That explains why beholders have never managed to take over the world: they eventually evolve into Weezing before their plans can advance that far, and a Weezing is too hard to apply the beholder coating to.

[skim172]

Beholders have 8 independently moving eyes at the tips of 8 independently moving tentacles. The amount of neurons and brainpower required to receive, process, and combine eight separate visual inputs would be incredible. I think we can reasonably assume that the majority of their body mass would be taken up by their extremely large brain and very complex nervous system required to operate their visual processing. The rest of their body is taken up by their giant central eye and the huge mouth - which would require considerable musculature itself.

The amount of hydrogen needed to lift a Beholder's considerable mass would be enormous. There simply is no way they could also incorporate a large enough gas bladder to be able to provide enough upwards buoyancy ... under Earth-like circumstances.

But maybe the Earth of the Stick-verse isn't like our Earth.

1) Perhaps the Earth of the Stick-verse has much, much denser atmosphere than our own. So Sunny requires only a very small gas bladder.

2) Perhaps the Earth of the Stick-verse is actually really, really tiny and thus has negligible gravity. We just haven't noticed because everyone in the Stickverse is incredibly heavy - they all have skeletons made out of gold or something - except for Sunny.

3) All the scenes we've seen so far in the comics are actually taking place underwater. Extremely clear water. People in the Stick-verse all have gills.


Alternatively, it's something to do with magnets. Magnets are some kind of witchcraft that can solve everything, according to the many reputable free energy wackos that I subscribe to on Youtube.

[Emanick]

Beholders have 8 independently moving eyes at the tips of 8 independently moving tentacles. The amount of neurons and brainpower required to receive, process, and combine eight separate visual inputs would be incredible. I think we can reasonably assume that the majority of their body mass would be taken up by their extremely large brain and very complex nervous system required to operate their visual processing. The rest of their body is taken up by their giant central eye and the huge mouth - which would require considerable musculature itself.

The amount of hydrogen needed to lift a Beholder's considerable mass would be enormous. There simply is no way they could also incorporate a large enough gas bladder to be able to provide enough upwards buoyancy ... under Earth-like circumstances.

But maybe the Earth of the Stick-verse isn't like our Earth.

1) Perhaps the Earth of the Stick-verse has much, much denser atmosphere than our own. So Sunny requires only a very small gas bladder.

2) Perhaps the Earth of the Stick-verse is actually really, really tiny and thus has negligible gravity. We just haven't noticed because everyone in the Stickverse is incredibly heavy - they all have skeletons made out of gold or something - except for Sunny.

3) All the scenes we've seen so far in the comics are actually taking place underwater. Extremely clear water. People in the Stick-verse all have gills.


Alternatively, it's something to do with magnets. Magnets are some kind of witchcraft that can solve everything, according to the many reputable free energy wackos that I subscribe to on Youtube.

Since we know beholders are extremely magical creatures whose eyes run on magical energy, I think both the most obvious and the most likely answer is "it's magic." There's no reason why magical energy can't be crushed into a very small space, as far as we know, so I buy that most of the beholder's body really is that buoyant, and thus its brain and nervous system don't have to occupy very much space.

[Tiltowait]

Beholders have 8 independently moving eyes at the tips of 8 independently moving tentacles. The amount of neurons and brainpower required to receive, process, and combine eight separate visual inputs would be incredible. I think we can reasonably assume that the majority of their body mass would be taken up by their extremely large brain

Maybe the brain is stored in hammerspace the Astral Plane, it's like astral projection in reverse.
Now there's an adventure hook, you're a mercenary team of ... uh, copyrighted creatures, hired to cut the silver cords on some scary monster's astral brain.

[Dion]

They’ve been flying around in a silly wooden boat for the last 7 years.

I don’t think this universe has the same buoyancy rules ours does.

Edit: oh wow! They met Julio and started flying around in the impossible airship in comic 389/390! We’ve had 15 years to get used to the silly in-universe buoyancy rules. I’m not going to worry about a beholder.

[Yanisa]

Since we know beholders are extremely magical creatures whose eyes run on magical energy, I think both the most obvious and the most likely answer is "it's magic." There's no reason why magical energy can't be crushed into a very small space, as far as we know, so I buy that most of the beholder's body really is that buoyant, and thus its brain and nervous system don't have to occupy very much space.

However, it isn't magic. The flight ability of beholders is classified as an Extraordinary Ability (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm), which are specifically described as "nonmagical, though they may break the laws of physics".

So any theories about magic, or different universal proporties are useless. A Beholder could function in an anti magic field on Real Life earth as if, according the writers. We are better off not to think about it. :smalltongue:

[Emanick]

However, it isn't magic. The flight ability of beholders is classified as an Extraordinary Ability (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm), which are specifically described as "nonmagical, though they may break the laws of physics".

So any theories about magic, or different universal proporties are useless. A Beholder could function in an anti magic field on Real Life earth as if, according the writers. We are better off not to think about it. :smalltongue:

I wasn't saying that a beholder's buoyancy was magical. I was saying that magic it makes it possible for it to float, because it theoretically allows the area that should be taken up by the brain, nervous system, etc. to be much smaller. Thus, plenty of its body volume can be freed up to be filled with lighter-than-air gas.

Also, beholders come into being through explicitly magical processes, which means their biological structure can be as ridiculous as you want it to be - their bodies are inherently unnatural and did not develop through any kind of coherent process like evolution.

Is there an actual way to make its body make physical sense under real-world physics? Maybe not, but you can at least try and make it as believable as possible, and the existence of magic helps with that, IMO.

[RatElemental]

Also, beholders come into being through explicitly magical processes, which means their biological structure can be as ridiculous as you want it to be - their bodies are inherently unnatural and did not develop through any kind of coherent process like evolution.

I'm pretty sure beholders are aberrations, which means they came into existence due to the influence of the far realms. Which is where all the stuff that's even weirder and scarier than anything else in D&D lives or comes from. They can tell physics to sod off, it's weird cthulhu magic.

[Emanick]

I'm pretty sure beholders are aberrations, which means they came into existence due to the influence of the far realms. Which is where all the stuff that's even weirder and scarier than anything else in D&D lives or comes from. They can tell physics to sod off, it's weird cthulhu magic.

I'm not sure how compatible the existence of the Far Realms is with the OOTSverse cosmology. It could exist, but it's not intuitively to me clear how.

Also, I'm told that, according to Lords of Madness, apparently beholders reproduce by dreaming other beholders into existence, which means that as far as I'm concerned, their very existence is inherently magical and unnatural (though not necessarily in a "Far Realms" sort of way). That said, the Forgotten Realms wiki claims that beholders give birth in a natural, albeit weird and asexual way, so maybe that has been retconned or something.

[pearl jam]

spiders also have 8 eyes, albeit without the eyestalks, but they don't have, to my knowledge, abnormally large brains to handle them, thus I'm not sure it's a reasonable assumption to make that beholders' brains must necessarily be abnormally large to handle their eyes. they don't have any other limbs that require managing, for instance.

[hamishspence]

Also, I'm told that, according to Lords of Madness, apparently beholders reproduce by dreaming other beholders into existence, which means that as far as I'm concerned, their very existence is inherently magical and unnatural (though not necessarily in a "Far Realms" sort of way). That said, the Forgotten Realms wiki claims that beholders give birth in a natural, albeit weird and asexual way, so maybe that has been retconned or something.

It's Lords of Madness (3E) that has the "natural, albeit weird, way" and 5E that has "dreaming into existence".

[Metastachydium]

Beholders have 8 independently moving eyes at the tips of 8 independently moving tentacles. The amount of neurons and brainpower required to receive, process, and combine eight separate visual inputs would be incredible. I think we can reasonably assume that the majority of their body mass would be taken up by their extremely large brain and very complex nervous system required to operate their visual processing. The rest of their body is taken up by their giant central eye and the huge mouth - which would require considerable musculature itself.

The amount of hydrogen needed to lift a Beholder's considerable mass would be enormous. There simply is no way they could also incorporate a large enough gas bladder to be able to provide enough upwards buoyancy ... under Earth-like circumstances.



spiders also have 8 eyes, albeit without the eyestalks, but they don't have, to my knowledge, abnormally large brains to handle them, thus I'm not sure it's a reasonable assumption to make that beholders' brains must necessarily be abnormally large to handle their eyes. they don't have any other limbs that require managing, for instance.

Meanwhile, the West Indian fuzzy chiton has literally hundreds of eyes. It's also, well, a mollusc. You can imagine how brainy it is (spoiler alert: not really).
The point made is nevertheless valid: beholders are large, fully sapient organisms, from which we can infer that they have a high-powered, sizable brain. BUT! Beholders also have an unusual anatomy. Why couldn't they have an unusually shaped brain? For instance, an empty sphere lining their body, packed with neurons very tightly to reduce volume. Much of the space inside their bodies can, in the meantime, be occupied by a system of bladders and tubes, full of high-pressure low-weight gas.
(Other than that, though, yeah, aberrations tend not to make much sense, so it stands to reason that nor do beholders.)

[Riftwolf]

I'd just like to point out that Belkar's head canonically accounts for over half his body weight. The only logical explanation is he subconsciously uses psychic power to levitate his head to prevent his neck breaking. As this still functions in an antimagic field, it's an extraordinary ability. Sunny has far more braining than Belkar so can consciously manoeuvre it's psychic field.
Or, yknow, it's stick comic physics, not a real world scenario.

[Dion]

On earth, at sea level, a cubic meter of air weighs about 1.25 kilograms.

If Sunny is about 2 meters in diameter, that means she would displace about 4 cubic meters of air on earth, or about 5 kilograms.

So if she were buoyant on earth, she and everything she caries together couldn’t weigh more than about 5 kg / 11 lbs.

[Dion]

Sunny has far more braining than Belkar

I think this solves the problem right here.

[hamishspence]

On earth, at sea level, a cubic meter of air weighs about 1.25 kilograms.

If Sunny is about 2 meters in diameter, that would means she’s would displacing about 4 cubic meters of air on earth, or about 5 kilograms.

So if she were buoyant on earth, she and everything she caries together couldn’t weigh more than about 5 kg / 11 lbs.

Given that Lords of Madness lists 4000-5000 pounds as normal for an 8 ft diameter beholder, I think it's safe to say that they fiddle the laws of physics somewhat.

A point is made of how a beholder's internal organs float when removed from the body, despite the fact that they do not contain much air or natural gas - but that "freakish buoyancy" only lasts for 12 hours, unless the organs are preserved via gentle repose spells.

[brian 333]

Hydrogen as a bouyancy mechanism would make them explosively flammable. Their internal structure might be made of lithium... Oh. Wait.

That leaves helium. The next gas is nitrogen and it's exactly as heavy as air.

So, the beholder brain is non-centralized and virtually every cell in its body is a neuron, with perhaps specialized ganglia at each eye for independent local control.

The interior of every cell in its body is not filled with protoplasm: the genetic material of each cell lines the inner cell wall. The center of every cell, (which is also a neuron,) is a helium-filled ballon which allows the cells of its outer integument to be slightly heavier than air while having a rubbery toughness. To compensate for this, there are special bouyancy cells in the upper half of the sphere which are larger, but which have muscles like the chromataphors on a squid's skin allowing the beholder to compress and expand the cells to control buoyancy.

The large mouth is not for eating people, it is for masticating helium-bearing rocks. Beholders live underground to be near such rocks. Its mouth also allows it to gulp air and expel it from its hundreds of bronchial tubes which feed fresh air to the cells for respiration. Control of the air outlets allow the beholder to use jet propulsion to move.

The muscles of the buoyancy cells can 'shiver' to warm the helium for greater buoyancy and the bronchial tubes can force air through them to cool the helium. Helium can be expelled at dire need, but it takes a lot of chewing to replace, so beholders would rather carry smooth, shiny rocks under their tongues as ballast.

They have no anus. The mouth serves as their digestive organ, and undigestible materials are spit out.

Beholders are not animals, they are fungi. They are genetic relatives of the gas spores, and their procreation method is similar. As the time of their death approaches they begin to amass a bed of organic matter and they expel masticated but undigested helium-bearing rock into the mix. Since certain minerals and compounds are more abundant in neural tissue, they crave brainy creatures to add to their stockpile. If possible they keep one or two alive to tend and turn the mulch.

In the final stage of their life they become sessile and settle into the mulch with only their eyestalks showing. They sprout rhizomes that then spread through the mulch and bud.

Although hundreds of buds form, only the first half-dozen to become motile actually become beholders because the late bloomers are tasty sources of vitamins, minerals, and much-needed helium. The dying parent is also a good source of delicious helium, and the offspring that develop the use of their antimagic eye first generally get the most. Leaving the nest early risks being a runt, while waiting too long risks being eaten.

In a beholder colony that desires to expand, budding youngsters are taken away to minimize cannibalism and fifty surviving offspring can result rather than the more typical 1-8.

Runts and late bloomers can happen, but beholders typically eat them. Those which escape can sometimes survive for a time in less hospitable locations, but to successfully procreate these creatures must eventually find a source of hydrogen-bearing rock.

TLDR: Beholders are rubber balls filled with billions of helium balloons.

[Dion]

I think it's safe to say that they fiddle the laws of physics somewhat.


That’s preposterous!

Next you’ll tell me that hitpoints are ridiculous, and no matter how many experience points O-Chul has earned by killing things in combat, he still wouldn’t be able to swim in a vat of acid.

But here we are. Beholders float and O-Chul swims around in acid.

[Riftwolf]

Hydrogen as a bouyancy mechanism would make them explosively flammable. Their internal structure might be made of lithium... Oh. Wait.

That leaves helium. The next gas is nitrogen and it's exactly as heavy as air.

The wiki entry for beholders (which I can't find atm) listed a magical lighter-than-air inert gas that the beholders digestive system produces that accumulates at the top of the beholders head. So the real question is how is Sunny flying upside down without a mouthful of toots.

[Precure]

The wiki entry for beholders (which I can't find atm) listed a magical lighter-than-air inert gas that the beholders digestive system produces that accumulates at the top of the beholders head.

So, it's BOTH because of the inner magic and the gas. :smalltongue:

[Dion]

It’s a quantum mechanics thing, like Bioshock Infinite.

[JonahFalcon]

This entire conversation reminds me of this.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xfHERb4QDs

[OracleofWuffing]

Found a Lords of Madness book.

Perhaps the most unusual shared feature of a beholder's internal organs is their freakish buoyancy. Even when separated from the remainder of the body, these organs float like balloons, despite the fact that they rarely contain any appreciable volumes of air or natural gas. [...] This natural buoyancy allows a beholder to fly, its motions and movement controlled by bursts of air expelled from its thousands of spiracles.
So, it's not so much a "Gas Bladder and Orifice" system, but that a beholder's internals are made of an aerogel-like material and it has and is constantly using thousands of exhaust orifices in every which direction.

Of course, this is assuming that Sunny is a beholder, which has yet to be proven in-universe. :smallwink:

[Dion]

Found a Lords of Madness book.

So, it's not so much a "Gas Bladder and Orifice" system, but that a beholder's internals are made of an aerogel-like material and it has and is constantly using thousands of exhaust orifices in every which direction.

Is that the same Lords of Madness listed above that says beholders are 8 feet in diameter and weigh 4000-5000 lbs?

Assuming they're perfect spheres (and also assuming a "pound" is the same in all universes) that would make a beholder about 0.24 g/cm^3.

That makes a beholder:

* 1/4th the weight of a person the same size (so they are fairly light)
* 80 times heavier than aerogel
* 185 times too heavy to float like a balloon.

It's very possible this Lords of Madness book doesn't tell the whole story.

Perhaps beholders have some type of repulsor device that allows them to float, like a star wars land speeder.

[OracleofWuffing]

Perhaps beholders have some type of repulsor device that allows them to float, like a star wars land speeder.
It is possible, as the text also states that there are several organs with unidentifiable functions.

As an infamous movie probably meant to say, "According to all known laws of aviation, there is no way that a beeholder should be able to fly. Its wings are too small to get its fat little body off the ground. The beeholder, of course, flies anyways. Because beeholders don't care what humans think is impossible." :smallbiggrin:

[Dion]

It is possible, as the text also states that there are several organs with unidentifiable functions.


I postulate that the repulsor effect that allows Sunny to fly is also responsible for The Oracle's precognition, because Quantum Mechanics.

(I'm pretty sure this is the same quantum effect that causes paladins to not fall when they kill innocent goblins.)

[Peelee]

As an infamous movie probably meant to say, "According to all known laws of aviation, there is no way that a beeholder should be able to fly. Its wings are too small to get its fat little body off the ground. The beeholder, of course, flies anyways. Because beeholders don't care what humans think is impossible." :smallbiggrin:

Man, that always gets me riled up. The valedictorian of my high school used that quote in her speech. I don't care about its supposed message, it's blatantly wrong. If a bee is not able to fly by the laws of aerodynamics, then the laws of aerodynamics are clearly incorrect. YA DONE MESSED UP, AA-RON ANTOINE MAGNAN.

Alternate scathing final line: I once got the rare opportunity to sit in on a presentation by E. O. Wilson. And you, Antoine Magnan, are no E. O. Wilson.

[RatElemental]

I vaguely remember seeing a documentary when I was a teen that had something about how insect wings flap back and forth generating lift both ways, and that was probably how they flew. This was before I ever heard the quote about bees not being able to fly, so I was very confused when I finally did.

[skim172]

spiders also have 8 eyes, albeit without the eyestalks, but they don't have, to my knowledge, abnormally large brains to handle them, thus I'm not sure it's a reasonable assumption to make that beholders' brains must necessarily be abnormally large to handle their eyes. they don't have any other limbs that require managing, for instance.


Meanwhile, the West Indian fuzzy chiton has literally hundreds of eyes. It's also, well, a mollusc. You can imagine how brainy it is (spoiler alert: not really).
The point made is nevertheless valid: beholders are large, fully sapient organisms, from which we can infer that they have a high-powered, sizable brain. BUT! Beholders also have an unusual anatomy. Why couldn't they have an unusually shaped brain? For instance, an empty sphere lining their body, packed with neurons very tightly to reduce volume. Much of the space inside their bodies can, in the meantime, be occupied by a system of bladders and tubes, full of high-pressure low-weight gas.
(Other than that, though, yeah, aberrations tend not to make much sense, so it stands to reason that nor do beholders.)

My reasoning isn't just based on the number of eyes, but rather that they are eight separately articulated eyes that move independently of one another, on the ends of independently articulated tentacles, meaning each eye can point in any direction at any time. Spiders may have eight eyes, but those eyes are fixed in their location and don't move independently. As far as I know, the only animal with independent eye movement is the chameleon.

Imagine having eight cameras, which may be looking at completely different things at the same time. And you have to process the input and combine all eight into an understanding of the world around you. You can't just focus on one image at a time - you have to focus on all eight at once. And that has to happen instantaneously.

In addition, you also need to send back the precise motor signals back to all eight tentacles and eyeballs to control their movement and focusing - and again, it needs to be more or less instantaneous.

I just think that to do all that would require a considerable amount of brainpower. Yes, the obvious answer is just "it's magic", but I assumed the point of this exercise is to run a "What-if" thought experiment on how to make a giant fleshball fly IRL.


But I guess we won't really know the answers - at least, not until we finally break into the secret labs underneath the headquarters of Wizards of the Coast where they keep their captured Beholder specimens.

[Metastachydium]

I postulate that the repulsor effect that allows Sunny to fly is also responsible for The Oracle's precognition, because Quantum Mechanics.

(I'm pretty sure this is the same quantum effect that causes paladins to not fall when they kill innocent goblins.)

It's a lot more simple than that. The entirety of Sunny is comprised of quantum information and s/he keeps quantum teleporting back to where s/he was whenever s/he would fall faster than the eye can follow.


My reasoning isn't just based on the number of eyes, but rather that they are eight separately articulated eyes that move independently of one another, on the ends of independently articulated tentacles, meaning each eye can point in any direction at any time. Spiders may have eight eyes, but those eyes are fixed in their location and don't move independently. As far as I know, the only animal with independent eye movement is the chameleon.

Imagine having eight cameras, which may be looking at completely different things at the same time. And you have to process the input and combine all eight into an understanding of the world around you. You can't just focus on one image at a time - you have to focus on all eight at once. And that has to happen instantaneously.

In addition, you also need to send back the precise motor signals back to all eight tentacles and eyeballs to control their movement and focusing - and again, it needs to be more or less instantaneous.

I just think that to do all that would require a considerable amount of brainpower.

Well, chameleons have independently moving eyes that give them all-around vision and that doesn't give them stellar cranial capacity compared to other lizards of similar size.


Yes, the obvious answer is just "it's magic", but I assumed the point of this exercise is to run a "What-if" thought experiment on how to make a giant fleshball fly IRL.

So did I (since it's explicitly not magic, but rather an Ex ability).


But I guess we won't really know the answers - at least, not until we finally break into the secret labs underneath the headquarters of Wizards of the Coast where they keep their captured Beholder specimens.

[Ominous music starts playing in the background.]

[KorvinStarmast]

I'm pretty sure beholders are aberrations, which means they came into existence due to the influence of the far realms. Which is where all the stuff that's even weirder and scarier than anything else in D&D lives or comes from. They can tell physics to sod off, it's weird cthulhu magic. +1. (They were originally about 3' in diameter as created by Terry Kuntz, however, they have grown with the edition bloat in D&D to where they are now quite sizeable, just like everyone's HP is bigger too)
Or, yknow, it's stick comic physics, not a real world scenario. True, and apparently not accepted by those asking about it. :smallsmile:


The wiki entry for beholders (which I can't find atm) listed a magical lighter-than-air inert gas that the beholders digestive system produces that accumulates at the top of the beholders head. Back to my earlier point about a steady diet of pinto beans and jalapeños. :smallwink:

I vaguely remember seeing a documentary when I was a teen that had something about how insect wings flap back and forth generating lift both ways, and that was probably how they flew. Someone did some very high speed photography and showed the unique mechanism of a bee's wings; quite interesting to anyone interested in aerodynamics and the creation of lift. (Humming birds do something similar but different during their hovering, and I swear they sound like large insects ... my wife puts out multiple humming bird feeders, so we get quite a few visits).

[Metastachydium]

my wife puts out multiple humming bird feeders, so we get quite a few visits).

Know that you are in an enviable position!

[Jason]

Regular 3.5 beholder's have 10 eye stalks and one central eye in the body, for a total of 11 eyes. Sunny only has 8 eyestalks. Either it will grow two more, it lost two at some point, or Sunny is not a standard beholder.

According to Lords of Madness they are "naturally" buoyant and they maneuver by expelling air from thousands of tiny spiracles. They also are said to have almost no sense of touch and have no sense of taste at all.

Also, they absorb tiny amounts of magic just by looking at it, and their brain stores this magic and uses it to power the eye beams. They like to have lots of different forms of magic items to study as they are different "flavors" to them.

[KorvinStarmast]

According to Lords of Madness they are "naturally" buoyant and they maneuver by expelling air from thousands of tiny spiracles. Right. They fart a lot out of many orifices. See my above point on pinto beans and jalapeños.

They also are said to have almost no sense of touch and have no sense of taste at all. With no sense of taste, and taste being related to smell, I'll warrant that they have no sense of smell which, see above, goes right along with farting to move around. A beholder's lair would be eye watering to visit.

[Peelee]

A beholder's lair would be eye watering to visit.

Note to self, new idea for monster: onion golem. Slashing and piercing weapon attacks inflict normal damage but incur an AoE Con save for being blinded for 1d4 rounds, with the DC rising in proportion to the amount of total damage dealt.

I could have totally helped the Giant write Dungeonscape.

[Jason]

The spiracles are also how the beholder breathes and they can smell through them. Lords of Madness does say that their sense of smell is poor, nowhere near as sharp as a typical human's.

[Willie the Duck]

On earth, at sea level, a cubic meter of air weighs about 1.25 kilograms.

If Sunny is about 2 meters in diameter, that means she would displace about 4 cubic meters of air on earth, or about 5 kilograms.

So if she were buoyant on earth, she and everything she caries together couldn’t weigh more than about 5 kg / 11 lbs.

This of course assumes that Sunny's internal volume does not exceed their external volume. :smallbiggrin:

[Dion]

Can we all agree that sometimes WotC puts out absolutely silly sourcebooks?

Somehow beholders started as terrifying aberrations that share nightmare space with Cthulhu, and then morphed into farty gas bags who seem to be the inspiration for one of the lamer Rick and Marty episodes.

An episode about a sentient fart.

“Hey guys, I bet we could sell a book about farts!”

[DavidSh]

This of course assumes that Sunny's internal volume does not exceed their external volume. :smallbiggrin:
I see it pleases you to be joking.

Buoyant force is the surface integral of the air (or other external fluid) pressure times the normal vector, and so only depends on the geometry of the surface and on how air pressure varies with altitude. It is independent on the geometry of the interior. Weird non-Euclidean space distortions, as long as they are restricted to the interior, have no effect on the buoyant force.

[Metastachydium]

Note to self, new idea for monster: onion golem. Slashing and piercing weapon attacks inflict normal damage but incur an AoE Con save for being blinded for 1d4 rounds, with the DC rising in proportion to the amount of total damage dealt.

I could have totally helped the Giant write Dungeonscape.

If that's the one with the original acid-breathing sharks, I'll have to say I agree.


I see it pleases you to be joking.

Buoyant force is the surface integral of the air (or other external fluid) pressure times the normal vector, and so only depends on the geometry of the surface and on how air pressure varies with altitude. It is independent on the geometry of the interior. Weird non-Euclidean space distortions, as long as they are restricted to the interior, have no effect on the buoyant force.

Evil spirit begone!

[brian 333]

My reasoning isn't just based on the number of eyes, but rather that they are eight separately articulated eyes that move independently of one another, on the ends of independently articulated tentacles, meaning each eye can point in any direction at any time. Spiders may have eight eyes, but those eyes are fixed in their location and don't move independently. As far as I know, the only animal with independent eye movement is the chameleon.

Imagine having eight cameras, which may be looking at completely different things at the same time. And you have to process the input and combine all eight into an understanding of the world around you. You can't just focus on one image at a time - you have to focus on all eight at once. And that has to happen instantaneously.

In addition, you also need to send back the precise motor signals back to all eight tentacles and eyeballs to control their movement and focusing - and again, it needs to be more or less instantaneous.

I just think that to do all that would require a considerable amount of brainpower. Yes, the obvious answer is just "it's magic", but I assumed the point of this exercise is to run a "What-if" thought experiment on how to make a giant fleshball fly IRL.


But I guess we won't really know the answers - at least, not until we finally break into the secret labs underneath the headquarters of Wizards of the Coast where they keep their captured Beholder specimens.

You should take a look at the humble (and tasty) brown shrimp. It has two independently moving multifaceted eyes. It has two long sensory antennae and four shorter ones which are all chemo-sensors, (superior taste/smell,) tactile sensors, and quite possibly micro-electrical sensors. It has ten independently operating legs, it has mouthparts with tiny hands and a half dozen masticating parts.

How does it process all of the information it receives, (far more and more kinds of information than we lowly mammals perceive,) with a brain the size of... Well, I've eaten thousands of them and never saw a brain of any kind.

Decentralization. Each part has ganglia which controls that part, and only the data that the central brain needs is passed on. So eye movement and perception is separately controlled at each eye, and the brain gets regular updates. The antennae do their thing and the brain only hears about the unusual stuff.

Antanna 1: "Feel something hard. Feels like a turtle. Smells like a turtle.

Brain: "What do you think, eyes?"

Left eye: "Round, large, green."

Right eye: "Movement!"

Brain: "Oh crap, it's a turtle! Tail!"

Tail: "I'm on it! Hasty retreat in progress!"

[Precure]

According to Lords of Madness they are "naturally" buoyant and they maneuver by expelling air from thousands of tiny spiracles. They also are said to have almost no sense of touch and have no sense of taste at all.

Hold up, if they basically have no sense of touch, why and how do Elan's trick worked on Sunny? (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1240.html) :smallconfused:

[Riftwolf]

Hold up, if they basically have no sense of touch, why and how do Elan's trick worked on Sunny? (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1240.html) :smallconfused:

Elans a high level bard. When he paints a picture in someone's mind, it encompasses senses that person has never known.



Antanna 1: "Feel something hard. Feels like a turtle. Smells like a turtle.
Brain: "What do you think, eyes?"
Left eye: "Round, large, green."
Right eye: "Movement!"
Brain: "Oh crap, it's a turtle! Tail!"
Tail: "I'm on it! Hasty retreat in progress!"

I thought this was going to segue into a Blade Runner reference.




An episode about a sentient fart.

“Hey guys, I bet we could sell a book about farts!”

The main difference being Abe from Oddworld never possessed a beholder.

[Dion]

I see it pleases you to be joking.

Buoyant force is the surface integral of the air (or other external fluid) pressure times the normal vector, and so only depends on the geometry of the surface and on how air pressure varies with altitude. It is independent on the geometry of the interior. Weird non-Euclidean space distortions, as long as they are restricted to the interior, have no effect on the buoyant force.

Beholders clearly have non-Euclidean *exterior* surfaces.

Their bottoms are bigger than their tops.

Flying upside down involves a *lot* of farting to maintain buoyancy. Serini is going to pass out soon from methane poisoning.

[Jasdoif]

Note to self, new idea for monster: onion golem. Slashing and piercing weapon attacks inflict normal damage but incur an AoE Con save for being blinded for 1d4 rounds, with the DC rising in proportion to the amount of total damage dealt.Caramelize THIS (Ex): Whenever an onion golem takes slashing damage from an opponent's attack, it can unleash a 15-foot cone of tear-inducing spray as a swift action on its next turn. The cone deals no damage, but creatures in the area who need eyes to see must succeed on a Reflex save (DC = 10 + highest slashing damage taken since its last turn) or be dazzled for 5 rounds, and must make an additional Fortitude save (DC = 10 + half the golem's hit dice) or also be blinded for one round.

Dousing the onion golem in water, such as by casting create water above it, negates this ability until the next time it takes slashing damage.

[KorvinStarmast]

The spiracles are also how the beholder breathes and they can smell through them. Lords of Madness does say that their sense of smell is poor, nowhere near as sharp as a typical human's. Further support for my hypothesis. :smallcool:

[brian 333]

Beholders clearly have non-Euclidean *exterior* surfaces.

Their bottoms are bigger than their tops.

Flying upside down involves a *lot* of farting to maintain buoyancy. Serini is going to pass out soon from methane poisoning.

Serini is the counterweight that disrupts Sunny's metastability. So long as she was centered at the top Sunny was stable, like someone standing in a canoe. When Serini leaned over, Sunny tipped, and so long as she hangs on to the eyestalk Sunny is going to remain upside down.

Now, if I could figure out how she reloads that crossbow one-handed and still gets her full attack...

[Neponde]

Note to self, new idea for monster: onion golem. Slashing and piercing weapon attacks inflict normal damage but incur an AoE Con save for being blinded for 1d4 rounds, with the DC rising in proportion to the amount of total damage dealt.


Caramelize THIS (Ex): Whenever an onion golem takes slashing damage from an opponent's attack, it can unleash a 15-foot cone of tear-inducing spray as a swift action on its next turn. The cone deals no damage, but creatures in the area who need eyes to see must succeed on a Reflex save (DC = 10 + highest slashing damage taken since its last turn) or be dazzled for 5 rounds, and must make an additional Fortitude save (DC = 10 + half the golem's hit dice) or also be blinded for one round.

Dousing the onion golem in water, such as by casting create water above it, negates this ability until the next time it takes slashing damage.

This struck my funny today, thanks :smallbiggrin:

[brian 333]

An army of Onion Golems mounted on Horse Radishes.

They may not do a whole lot of damage, but the infantry that exploits their breakthrough will have coup de grace opportunities everywhere.

[littlebum2002]

Beholders have 8 independently moving eyes at the tips of 8 independently moving tentacles. The amount of neurons and brainpower required to receive, process, and combine eight separate visual inputs would be incredible. I think we can reasonably assume that the majority of their body mass would be taken up by their extremely large brain and very complex nervous system required to operate their visual processing. The rest of their body is taken up by their giant central eye and the huge mouth - which would require considerable musculature itself. .

An octopus's arms can all move independently, which would be an astonishingly difficult feat for a brain and a central nervous system, so most of their neurons are in the arms themselves so they basically have 1 big brain and 8 small "brains". Perhaps the [INSERT CREATURE NAME HERE]'s eyes work the same way

[Timy]

Everyone of you clearly don't know the power of negative mass.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_mass

The Beholder mass listed in the book is clearly the inertial mass.

And Beholder are constructed from an external enveloppe of positive gravitational mass and a nucleus of negative gravitational mass (and emptyness inbetween)

And so, lite atoms have a neutral electrical charge, Beholders have a neutral mass charg and can therefore float without the need of any magic !

[Dion]

Everyone of you clearly don't know the power of negative mass.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_mass

It’s much simpler if we just assume that the beholder has a non-Euclidean surface topology.

As I’ve mentioned, buoyancy is approximated by measuring the amount of atmosphere displaced (I.e, the internal volume of the beholder).

But as other have mentioned, buoyancy *really* the sum of all the pressures on all surfaces of the beholder at the same time.

it’s just a happy accident that in our own universe the exterior surface of a creature usually wraps around the interior volume of that creature in a simple way so buoyancy is related to volume.

But maybe not for beholders!

If the bottom of a beholder is bigger than the top, then more of the atmosphere is pushing on the bottom than the top, and away they float!

And don’t try to tell me about flux and residue and all that Euclidean garbage. We’re talking MC Escher physics here.

[Willie the Duck]

I see it pleases you to be joking.

Buoyant force is the surface integral of the air (or other external fluid) pressure times the normal vector, and so only depends on the geometry of the surface and on how air pressure varies with altitude. It is independent on the geometry of the interior. Weird non-Euclidean space distortions, as long as they are restricted to the interior, have no effect on the buoyant force.
True, but it depends on where they keep their mass. I was making a 'beholders are Tardises' joke that clearly didn't land.


Evil spirit begone!
Be kind. This isn't a competition.


It’s much simpler if we just assume that the beholder has a non-Euclidean surface topology.

As I’ve mentioned, buoyancy is approximated by measuring the amount of atmosphere displaced (I.e, the internal volume of the beholder).

But as other have mentioned, buoyancy *really* the sum of all the pressures on all surfaces of the beholder at the same time.

it’s just a happy accident that in our own universe the exterior surface of a creature usually wraps around the interior volume of that creature in a simple way so buoyancy is related to volume.

But maybe not for beholders!

If the bottom of a beholder is bigger than the top, then more of the atmosphere is pushing on the bottom than the top, and away they float!

And don’t try to tell me about flux and residue and all that Euclidean garbage. We’re talking MC Escher physics here.
Klein bottles float, who knew!

[Riftwolf]

Everyone of you clearly don't know the power of negative mass.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_mass

At first I thought you meant negative space, and that beholders are made of Kirby Dots. It'd explain so much...

[Bohandas]

Maybe the rest of their body is just lightweight enough to be lifted by bouyant gas

[Kamunami]

Beholders have 8 independently moving eyes at the tips of 8 independently moving tentacles. The amount of neurons and brainpower required to receive, process, and combine eight separate visual inputs would be incredible.


Meanwhile, the West Indian fuzzy chiton has literally hundreds of eyes. It's also, well, a mollusc. You can imagine how brainy it is (spoiler alert: not really).

I was actually thinking about octopi regarding this line of logic, and they have actual brain matter in each of their tentacles, allowing for more flexibility and independent action. Maybe rather than all a beholder's eyes and tentacles feeding into a big ol superbrain, it shares the load with a bunch of mini-brain parts inside the tentacles. I honestly wouldn't put them all that far off from some sort of magically spliced octopus.

[RatElemental]

Having lots of little brains is more in line with abberation biology than one big superbrain anyway,

[Metastachydium]

This isn't a competition.


True enough. This is WAR!

[danielxcutter]

Wait, is Beholder flight Ex or Su?

[Yanisa]

Wait, is Beholder flight Ex or Su?

It's Ex. Same for it's all Around Vision (i.e. having multiple eyes).

The eye beams and eye cone are classified as Su.

I also like that Extraordinary Ability (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm) are "nonmagical, though they may break the laws of physics". :smalltongue:

[Metastachydium]

I also like that Extraordinary Ability (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm) are "nonmagical, though they may break the laws of physics". :smalltongue:

Yeah, that's almost as good as the epic applications of skills (I mean, swim up a waterfall? It's not magic. Animate a rope to move and act on its own? Guy who does so is just really skilled.)

[RatElemental]

Yeah, that's almost as good as the epic applications of skills (I mean, swim up a waterfall? It's not magic. Animate a rope to move and act on its own? Guy who does so is just really skilled.)

My favorite one is being so good at balancing on stuff you can walk on clouds.

[Jasdoif]

My favorite one is being so good at balancing on stuff you can walk on clouds.I like squeezing through a gap too small for your head to fit through. It's a classic (http://freefall.purrsia.com/ff2300/fc02218.htm).

[Bohandas]

The amount of neurons and brainpower required to receive, process, and combine eight separate visual inputs would be incredible.

Like a spider

EDIT:
Or possibly opabinia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opabinia)

[skim172]

I like squeezing through a gap too small for your head to fit through. It's a classic (http://freefall.purrsia.com/ff2300/fc02218.htm).

This is why we need to evolve collapsible skeletons.

[Peelee]

This is why we need to evolve collapsible skeletons.

Hardly. We need to be supported by a system of fluid-filled bladders that-

[danielxcutter]

...That what?

[Peelee]

...That what?

Dunno, Kif was always rudely cut off.

[skim172]

Dunno, Kif was always rudely cut off.

Yes, yes, you're a big squishy wuss.