How did I not see a beholder?

[Mighty Halfling]

14, and I saw the gorilla. I personally don't have a problem with Perception checks, though, because I've had the Combat Stress thing happen more than a few times in laser tag (with all the noise, it can be hard to notice people who are moving in such a way as to collide with you) and it represents things like you just looking the wrong way at the wrong time.

I mean, sure I saw the gorilla, but I could still nat 1 the Perception check against that assassin to my left...

I counted 13, but I may have lost that extra pass when I asked myself "Why is there a gorilla in the middle, and why are there 'S's written on the walls?"

 

[Starbuck_II]

I saw 13 passes and a gorrilla.
What is the correcr number?

 

[Merkuri]

I counted 13 and saw the gorilla right away, but that may have been because I was expecting something "funny" to happen so when I saw motion on the side of the screen I paid attention to it (without losing count). I've done too many of these things to trust them at face value so I had a feeling it was not about the number of basketball passes.

I'm usually completely oblivious, though. There have been several times when I've gone to the mall, been separated from the person I came in with, and realized as I was looking for them that I had no idea whatsoever what they were wearing - not their shirt color, not even whether they had a jacket or not - and I had been interacting with this person all day.

By the way, I suspect that even if you were watching the black-shirted people you'd still miss the gorilla because you're focused on the basketball, not the people themselves. I believe there were three people with each color shirt on, so you're just looking at the person who has the ball and the person he passes it to and are completely ignoring the third person (and the gorilla).

You know, I wonder how the results fell along gender lines. I could see that a hunter would want to be able to focus on its prey to the exclusion of everything else, but a gatherer would want to be able to notice everything at once, and back in the stone age the men were the hunters and the women the gatherers. I wouldn't be surprised if more men missed the gorilla than women.

 

[Byronic]

I counted 13 as well and had no problems seeing the gorilla. But then again I know how these things work so I knew something unusual was going to come by.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Ha! I saw it and figured it was just there to distract me from my counting!

I thought something similar - I caught it, but barely so...

 

[Umbran]

taking the article as fact, here's the summary:
IF the brain is directed to perform a task (like counting passes) , the brain will miss obvious things (like a gorilla), because it is hyper-focussed and is filtering out any input that isn't the target.

IF the brain is operating under normal circumstances, the brain will easily spot the gorilla. Thereby defeating the OP's argument.

If you are busy swinging a sword at the ogre right in front of you, I think that probably counts as hyper-focused. You need to roll to see the beholder when there's a whole lot of other stuff you're busy doing.

 

[ExploderWizard]

If you are busy swinging a sword at the ogre right in front of you, I think that probably counts as hyper-focused. You need to roll to see the beholder when there's a whole lot of other stuff you're busy doing.

Thats how I see it and why calling for random rolls during combat can be fun. The PC's won't know if its something happening or just a roll because you feel like it. Passive perception is a big winner here.

If a PC gets nervous and wants to take a more active look around while in melee then its an option:

1) Give up attacking to take a good look around for other threats.

2) Look around while still fighting but take penalties to defenses for a round due to distraction.

 

[Mark]

I believe that the number is 15. There's a point where the woman is hidden from view by one of the white shirt guys and a pass seems to take place unobserved by the camera.


Gorilla? huh?

 

[Janx]

If you are busy swinging a sword at the ogre right in front of you, I think that probably counts as hyper-focused. You need to roll to see the beholder when there's a whole lot of other stuff you're busy doing.

I had to fight everybody in my dojo to get my blackbelt. Then I had to fight several of them at once (all brown and above), including a fellow blackbelt candidate on my side.

It ain't hyper-focussed. It's seeing the entire field. I actually feel it as unfocussing, widening my vision, so I can see my entire enemy, and the rest of the field, so I can position him. It's the difference where a white belt looks at the spot he's going to hit you. An advanced student does not.

I think sniping would be more prone to hyper-focus (not paying attention to periphery) than sword fighting. Zooming in on one target, versus moving around and maneuvering the other guy.

Might be worth talking to larpers and martial artists. To see how often they get "surprised" by enemy combatants who should have been obvious.

Note, this is all different than tha bad guy who is trying to come up from behind (where you obviously can't see).

The scenario you're testing for is can a person in a fight/exploring a dungeon miss seeing an obvious threat (the gorilla in the basketball game).

I guarrantee you, the basketball players all saw the gorilla. They were not hyperfocused on the ball, they were focussed on the entire field, because they had to know where they were, the enemy was, and where their allies were.

 

[ExploderWizard]

It ain't hyper-focussed. It's seeing the entire field. I actually feel it as unfocussing, widening my vision, so I can see my entire enemy, and the rest of the field, so I can position him. It's the difference where a white belt looks at the spot he's going to hit you. An advanced student does not.

This is exactly why highly trained fighters should have an excellent passive perception. Its why I hate "class skills" so much. Basic observational training is fundamental enough so that everyone who risks thier lives adventuring should be able to select it without requiring a feat or other such hoop jumping.