Elder Orb

Elder Orbs are a very mature and powerful subrace of Beholder that are capable of living forever, barring unforeseen circumstances, and become some of the wisest, most cunning, and most ruthless of all beholders. They are slightly smaller than standard beholders, averaging between 4 to 6 feet in width. They have no ability to regenerate their eyes, and over time they will completely lose all eye ray function. However, being born with innate sorcerous powers, they are able to acquire verbal mage spellcasting abilities either by developing their own spells or buying or stealing spells from those who use verbal magics. During battle, they will use a combination of eye rays and spells to defeat their enemy.
==Locations==
===Underdark===
*Southern Tunnels - two different elder orbs are found within the area:
**The first elder orb is encountered upon entering the area and is accompanied by a beholder.
**The second is the elder orb on this page, which is encountered in the eastern side cave along with two beholders.
===The Abyss===
*Test of Fear - A trio of elder orbs along with two Gauths are encountered within this area:
**The first elder orb is this elder orb.
**The second two are these elder orbs.
===Abazigal's Lair - Iycanth the Mad Bondari===
*Elder Orb Cave
**Three of these elder orbs along with a solitary Gauth are encountered in this area.
===Watcher's Keep===
*Final Seal
**One of these elder orbs, a Death Tyrant and a Hive Mother are spawned as part of the fourth Green Globe scenario.
==Abilities==
This elder orb has use of seven different beholder eye ray capabilities as well as a bevy of wizard spells. They have more hit points than ordinary beholders and have 10% resistance to all magical effects (50% magic resistance) and 10% resistance to all melee and ranged attacks. It is also immune to backstab attacks.
If engaged in battle elder orbs will utilize their eye rays and wizard spells in the following manner:
===Eye Rays:===
*PC or Mage class seen: — Anti-Magic Ray
*General attacks: — Death Ray (target the party member with the highest remaining hit points)
*HP >65: — Cause Serious Wounds Ray (target any party member)
*HP >55: — Death Ray (target the second closest party member to the elder orb)
*HP >45: — Cause Serious Wounds Ray (target the party member with the highest remaining hit points)
*HP >35: — Slow Ray (target the second closest party member to the elder orb)
*HP >25: — Flesh to Stone Ray (target the third closest party member to the elder orb)
*HP >15: — Domination Ray (target any party member)
*HP >5: — Cause Serious Wounds Ray (target the third closest party member to the elder orb)
===Spells:===
*Spell immunity: — Minor Spell Turning 
*See enemy (battle prep): — Stoneskin and Spell Trap
*If silenced: — Vocalize
*Spell trigger: — True Sight, Remove Magic, Fireball
*Hit by weapon: — Stoneskin
*Battle spells: — Imprisonment, Maze (target nearest party member)
*Summons seen: — Death Spell together with Paralyze Ray
*Second summons seen: — Melf's Acid Arrow together with Paralyze Ray
*Target HP <60: — Power Word, Kill (target nearest party member)
==Gameplay==
*Both of the elder orbs in the Southern Tunnels will cast some spells to buff themselves, are capable of destroying summoned creatures, are able to counter being silenced, and make use of their various beholder eye rays as well.
==Gallery==
OG Imprisonment.png|Gorion's Ward has been mostly untouched by harmful Beholder Rays with the Shield of Balduran, that is until an Elder Orb casts Imprisonment. Game over.
Hell Fear 3.png|Three Elder Orb's and a couple of Gauth creatures are observed in the Test of Fear area in Chapter 7.
==Mod content==
===Mods:===
The Sword Coast Stratagems mod changes elder orbs, and they also get additional scripting refinements if the "Smarter Beholder" component is installed.
Elder Orbs are raised from a 9 HD creature to level 20.
The Unseeing Eye is reconfigured into an Elder Orb.
SCS and the Tactics Mod (as well as the Tactics for BG2EE mod) redesigns Vaxall from an ordinary beholder in the Twisted Rune Hideout as an Elder Orb as well.
With SCS Elder Orbs have use of mage spell casting and beholder eye ray attacks, usually both in the same round. Beholders have an always on permanent alacrity power allowing multiple spell casts and beholder eye beams in the same round - the usual timing restriction on this limits this to one spell and one eye beam ray per round, or two eye beam rays per round.
SCS Elder Orbs can see invisible and hidden creatures by script. They also have immunities to being Webbed, and Entangled as they levitate.
SCS Elder Orbs have additional spells available and can summon help like Mordenkainen's Sword creatures. They have spell protection removers such as Pierce Shield. Minor Sequencer, Spell Sequencer and Spell Trigger are prepared and can be instantly released by script.
They are unaffected by their own eye beams in case they were reflected. All SCS beholders have a Telekinesis Ray, that is used depending on the game difficulty setting, usually after a few rounds and seeks out the Shield of Balduran, Cloak of Reflection, and Cloak of Mirroring.
The player's game difficulty selection determines which Beholder Eye beams are used against the player. The deadlier beams like Disintegration Ray are used on "Hardcore" and "Insane" difficulty.
===Gallery:===
ST Second Elder Orb.png|A second Elder Orb in the Beholder Cave in Underdark chain casts preparatory buffs and summons two Mordenkainen's Sword creatures when a party member is detected.
Hell Fear SCS SR.png|Elder Orbs react to party member detection and launch prepared spell buffs and summoned help with SCS and SR mods in the Test of Fear area.
==External links==
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Category:Enemies