Do Beholder Beasts Have ears?

[ClintACK]

Actually, beholder flight isn't magical - they hover about with the use of organs filled with lighter-than-air fluids.

I acknowledge that D&D doesn't have to make physical sense. But this one is so nonsensical that it makes me want to bang my forehead into things.

Imagine the Beholder is a 10' sphere. Imagine it's entirely filled with hydrogen or helium. It displaces about 40 pounds of air. Which is fine if it's covered in a thin skin of aluminized mylar, and will burst with 1 hp of slashing or piercing damage. But it's not. It's a hundred square feet of tough inch-thick hide. (Estimated weight: 36 lbs.) Plus ten big thick eyestalks (at least a few pounds each). All those teeth. That giant anti-magic eye. And the whole inside is *not* just gas -- it can open its mouth (that's space filled with normal air) and it's got a brain and a digestive system in there. And muscles to move the eye stalks and mouth. It's got to be at least a hundred pounds, all told, of fleshy bits.

So it can't even float without magic. But if it could, the eyestalks would clearly dangle downward, unless he's got a counterweight in his chin. Perhaps the teeth and jaw are even heavier than I thought? And how is he propelling himself at 20' per round? Blowing air through tiny holes? The muscles and plumbing to do that will add still more weight. And how is he lunging fast enough to bite someone?

But, yes. I acknowledge that in D&D it's apparently possible for dragons to fly by flapping their wings and 26' tall bipeds (Storm Giants) to run and jump (unlike elephants). So maybe an incredibly magical creature doesn't use magic to fly, but instead fills internal bladders with biologically-generated helium. D&D physics is weird.