Beating the Spectator Beholder

[nitey]

Did a search on how to defeat this beast and I didn't see anything, so here is how I did it.

The spectator wants to unparalyze the drow that are around it so you need to take them all out first (there are 7). You can smash some of them, but the easiest/safe way is to use magic missile. You may have to rest once or twice depending on your party, but you have to take them all out. Then the key to my strategy was to use Lae'zel's ability to do a ranged attack that Frightens it. If you miss on the first attempt, then use action surge and try it again. In my party I had two members with this ability, but Lae'zel hit on her first shot. This buys you two rounds where it doesn't get to attack. By the time it was able to attack I had it down to 2 hit points and although it paralyzed two of my party, I was able to finish it off with a final magic missile attack from Gale that hung back and dashed into range, fired off a spell and dashed back. I had to use one speed potion with Astarion at the beginning of the fight but other than that, normal attacks caused enough damage to take it down.

Anyway, wanted to post this as this method worked and actually in the end, it wasn't even that hard of a fight. If I had used Bless before hand, I might not have even suffered the two paralyzations at the end of the fight.

Just a note, the beholder doesn't appear unless a party member approaches the gold on the mat, so one party member has to get close enough to start. I did this in combat mode so I was able to control the start of the fight.

Note to Larian: No loot on the beholder! Come on! There should be at least one decent magic item nearby.

[Cyroy]

Have Wyll or Yourself as a Warlock on the party. Let someone cast faerie fire or guiding bolt at the Spectator to get that advantage on the hit. As Warlock hex the Spectator and then blast it with scorching ray. Should delete about half it's HP in one blow.

[TheBlueFox]

If you're having trouble theres a weapon specifically made to kill this guy.

Get the spear shaft from the dead true soul dwarf who died from the owlbear.

Get the spearhead from the owl bear

Combine them to make a beholder slaying spear that deals extra damage to beholder and blinds on hit

[SnarkOne]

No guide on this?

Alright. I'll have a guide ready in less than 12 hours...

[nitey]

Actually had that weapon, but never got close enough to use it. Honestly, never even considered it, next time! Thanks!

[Telsker Sonpos]

Use Menacing Attack from Battle Master to frighten the Spectator. It just stopped attacking my party after that. Fun fact, that's also how I killed the hag in 3 rounds in her house (she doesn't use invisiblity potion or flee if she is frightened and you're in her melee range).
Like other people said, destroy the drow statues with Eldritch Blast, and one of the best burst of the game is Hex + Scorching Ray, so be sure to bring Wyll if your MC is not a Fiend Warlock.

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Weirdly, this isn't even one of the harder fights in the game (unless you allow the Spectator to un-petrify all of the Drow). If you alpha strike it and keep it CC'd the entire fight, you don't even need to kill the Drow first, but it doesn't hurt just to stay safe. I feel like this fight should actually be harder.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQCAqp73Vno

[SnarkOne]

Originally posted by SnarkOne:

No guide on this?

Alright. I'll have a guide ready in less than 12 hours...

Sup...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdMit7pIwzk

[javelin98]

How do you kill the petrified drow without awaking the spectator? No matter what I try, attacking any of the drow in any way causes the spectator to appear and wipe out my party.

[TheBlueFox]

I don't know if you CAN defeat the drow without the spectator appearing. They're sort of linked. BUT you CAN defeat the spectator without waking up the drow if you do it fast enough

[Ronin Gamer]

If it's even possible to kill the petrified drow, it may not be a good idea to do so since you can have a conversation with one of them that will give you information about the area later in the deep. If you value that info and possibly a regular fight, you may wish to focus fire the beholder. Honestly it's not THAT difficult. It's a step up sure, but not the hardest thing I've fought in the EA.

[sax pain]

YOU CAN SUMMON A SPECTATOR TO FIGHT THE SPECTATOR
WATCH THEM KILL EACH OTHER

nah but fr you can summon a cat (for some reason, the spectator doesn't register cats scratching his prey) It's a bit tedious, but you can destroy all drow statues except one, you should throw basilisk oil on the last one. (I think one is in the hag house) The newly de-petrified drow will be friendly to you and will start combat with the newly-appeared spectator, then use your cat to attack the spectator. This stops the turns from going and you can make a surprise attack with each party member individually. Another thing you can do is go into the shroom village first and through specific dialogue get sovereign glut to follow you. He can ressurect a monster to fight for you, which means you can FIGHT ALONGSIDE THE ALMIGHTY BULETTE. With all this, you should frankly be able to stomp the spectator

[Noctoculus]

The Drow are being mind-controlled by the spectator. You don't have to kill them, light damage will break the spell and they'll help kill the spectator.

[Wurm65]

I kept my party up in the Selunite Outpost had my ranger shoot one of the drow and bam the beholder spawned in and teleported right to us. It didn't even last through the first round. EDIT And it unfroze the one drow you need to talk to about the forge before it teleported, so that made life rather easy.

[Rex is back, baby!]

Shadowheart did the heavy lifting for me that fight. She feared it and then cursed it :3

[Zackerie]

I just attacked it until it died, it didn't rez more than 2 drow.