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D&D Monster Study Proves Eyes Have It
sciencehabit writes with this excerpt from Science: "The dungeon is pitch black — until the dungeon master blazes a torch, confirming your worst fears. A Beholder monster lurches at you, its eyeballs wriggling on tentacular stems. As you prepare to wield your Vorpal sword, where do you focus your gaze: at the monster's head or at its tentacle eyes? Such a quandary from the role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons may seem like a meaningless trifle, but it holds within it the answer to a tricky scientific question: Do people focus their gaze on another person's eyes or on the center of the head? In fact, a father-son team has used D&D monsters to show that most people will look to another creature's eyes, even if they're not attached to a head."
I don't watch at eyes, I watch at boobs amirite?
It has been shown many times in studies that people are able to read a lot of emotion by looking at another person's eyes. Looking at foreheads doesn't give you a tactical advantage, but if you can look in someone's eyes you can see what they are feeling most of the time. You can also see where they are looking, and where their attention is at, which is critical. Of course, good magicians know this and look at the wrong things at the wrong times to mislead you ;)
Just because I can hook a shark from a boat, I do no offer to wrestle it in the water.
But the head IS a giant eye.
Technoli
How is this relevant to... anything?
Psych of eye contact out of scope.
Being in IT support, we see many people come in without eyes, or common sense, attached to their head. Many times, the head is firmly impacted in the nether regions but this malady is most common with upper management.
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I, and I imagine most slashdotters, look at my feet when interacting with other people. Especially women.
Makes sense. There's a survival advantage whether you're predator or prey, it doesn't matter if you can see it, it's whether or not it can see you. Being able to see its head, claws, or gelsacs is useful, but the thing that gives you a survival advantage is knowing whether or not it can see you. If you can see its eyes, it can see you. (The converse - if you can't see its eyes, it can't see you - does not hold unless you're a Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal.)
Car Analogy: Same as if you're driving on the highway past an 18-wheeler. If I can see the trucker's eyes in the side mirrors, he can see me. (I'll assume he can't for the sake of prudence, but it's possible he can see me). If I can't see his eyes in the side mirrors, it's my responsibility to position me vehicle in such a way that he can see me, and/or somewhere he can't hit me whether he can see me or not.
Always look at your opponents eyes, (if they're not highly skilled) they will usually look at an area before making a move in that direction.
"Kill 'em all and let Root sort 'em out"
That's what Mr. Miyagi said.
Most D&D players look at their shoes. The extraverted D&D player looks at the GM's shoes.
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If this "research" will qualify for the Ig-Noble awards next year.
So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
This is proof that D&D contains all the secrets to life, the universe, and everything!
For starters, did any of the participants in the experiments roll any savings throws? Lame.
Experimenter: "OK, you encounter a beholder, and... it gets initiative. You: it fires... (dice roll) a beam from eye-stalk number 7."
Participant: "Uh, OK."
Experimenter: "Roll the dice. No. No, the other one. Yeah. OK. I see you failed your save vs paralysis".
Participant: "Huh? (sees the taser in the experimenter's hand) No, wait!!"
Experimenter: Zzzzzaaap!
Experimenter: "Hm. He's not moving... oops. Hey. Did anyone roll a cleric? Anyone? What?!? Goddammit!
My gaze tends to gravitate to the lips as much as (if not more than) the eyes, especially in those I find attractive. I'm not sure what that means.
It should be obvious why another creature's - any creature's - gaze would be the focus of one's own: you need to see where the other creature is looking. If it's looking at you, then you might have a problem. This is completely unsurprising, as my cats always look directly at my eyes when they want to determine my focus and intent.
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Looka eye! Always looka eye!
anyone who has played a sport is usually told to watch an opponents eyes because people generally watch where they are going.
When I look people in the eye for too long, I begin to get uncomfortable and need to look away. Of course, talking with someone without looking them in the eye is awkward, so I've learned ways of fooling them into thinking I'm looking at their eyes when I'm not. I'll look behind their head, at their nose, etc. This way I don't get uncomfortable and they don't think I'm not focusing on them.
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Any time I need to focus on what a person is saying, or think about what I'm saying, I look away. If I look at their head/face/eyes I can't listen to what's being said. If I do the same while trying to explain something, I get halfway through my first sentence before I lose my train of thought and start rambling nonsense. I find that if I furrow my brow at the same time, the other person doesn't mind. However, if I just don't look at them, they get annoyed or think that I'm not really engaged in the conversation.
That's all well and good, but I have a damn hard time looking people in the eyes as it is. After long training, I've learned to look at the end of their nose so that it looks like I'm looking them in the eyes, but looking people in the eyes has always been hard. It seems like there is so much information coming in when I do that, that I can't concentrate on the conversation. Looking at the comments, I see I'm not alone. FWIW, I believe I have Asperger's; 42 years being me has led me to that conclusion.
Go for the eyes Boo, go for the eyes RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!!
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It is essentially a floating head - your vorpal sword won't do anything special.
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For the record, in DDO, I'm always in undead Lich (prestige) form so I'm immune to most beholder effects and then I dragon flyby in mid air up to the beholder and spray it with my ice dragon breath attack, which always 1-hits it regardless of the reflex save. It also casts through antimagic fields. So I'm mostly focusing on my quickbar actually, lol.
I've never felt comfortable looking into someone's eyes for more than a few moments at a time. I'm just overly conscious of "I'm looking at you, and you're looking at me, and you know I'm looking at you..." It's just weird to me. And once you've started looking into someone's eyes, it seems rude to then not look into them. Instead, I look at people's mouths while talking. Anyone else?
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I'm disappointed that I searched for this answer before posting it myself.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
Beholders don't lurch towards anybody, they sit back and zap away with things like disintegrate.
According to QI, most women will go straight to the face, whereas men tend to sneak a look at the crotchal region - and it doesn't matter if they're looking at a woman, a man, or even a dog.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
"Your eye is a lamp for your body." -Luke 11:34a
You're not looking at the center of the person, if you were doing that, the head wouldn't make sense. You'd stare at their chest. The point is not to look at a being's physical form necessarily, but rather to look them in the eyes, that is, to look at where they're looking from. You see them seeing you, they see you seeing them. Do you look a blind person in the eyes when you're talking to them? They won't look you in the eyes back, likely. Its about perspective, not about form.
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I'd be willing to guess that when it comes to the average D&D player, they have an extremely difficult time making contact with an inflatable doll (or action figure - what have you) let alone an actual female-type person.
have got no human grace.
Are you kidding me?? If this were true then all adventurers would meet their doom when they come across Medusa in a dungeon.....
"Gotta look at her eyes while I'm killing her! Gotta look in her eyes!" "AHHHHHH!"
If most people do this, then most people will, indeed, turn to stone!
I, personally, would not have the problem of losing experience points to her cause I would be focusing on her breasts.
... a beholder's primary eye *IS* in the center of its head.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
A basilisk or a Medusa would make the tests difficult to repeat.
We are all told while growing up to always look someone in the eye.
Who exactly needed to study this?
I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
nm
Gravity is the reason we perceive down as bad: our tree-dwelling ancestors evolved a sensible fear of falling to their deaths.
We see this in elevator design: the "down" arrow is red, because "down is bad -- the direction that tends to spill blood". The "up" arrow is green or white, because "up is good" (e.g. "up in a tree, where the lion can't get us").
Carl Sagan discusses this theory in The Dragons of Eden.
-kgj
"As you prepare to wield your Vorpal sword..."
Why would you use a vorpal sword on a Beholder? What are you going to cut off when you behead a beholder? A +3 sword of Abberation Bane would be more effective.
There were reports in the last year or so that Asperger's folks tended to fixate on the mouth, not the eyes, during conversation. This immediately made me self-conscious of doing the same thing.
Not, of course, that all D&D players have Asperger's. Or that fixating on a monster's eyes vs. mouth correlates with fixating on a person's eyes vs. mouth. Or that, to those with Asperger's, it's unusually difficult to distinguish people from monsters.
The one thing you never use against a Beholder is a Vorpal Sword. If you roll a natural 20, the sword cuts off the monster's head, but a Beholder is nothing but a disembodied head, so the sword goes swish as it goes under the monster.
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I'm sure this study is testing cultural bias, not human propensity. In Japan, for example, it's considered rude and direct to look into someone's eyes, and many people look at the mouth, or even slightly away.
However, for several years, I did train Kyokushin full contact Karate. My sensei insisted that when fighting, we should look at the opponents solar plexus as when fighting every movement of the opponent comes from an limb (Either arm or leg) attached and controlled by the torso. By focusing on the solar plexus, you have “advanced warning” of what the opponent is going to do, but the eyes can lie. Using our eyes to lie to the opponent was another thing our sensei told us how to do and tiny seemingly unimportant things can make quite a difference when fighting.
I wonder what fraction of the ones that didn't look at the eyes were Aspies?
" As you prepare to wield your Vorpal sword, where do you focus your gaze: at the monster's head or at its tentacle eyes? "
I would choose the eyes as they are presumably a softer target than the head. Doesn't apply to normal human interaction.
blindly antisocialist = antisocial
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