Dungeons & Dragons’ newest publication contains a much-needed statblock for a quintessential creature – an archfey. Next week, Dungeons & Dragons will release its newest book Candlekeep Mysteries, a collection of 17 short stand-alone adventures. One of the strengths of Candlekeep Mysteries is its diversity – the adventures contain in the book feature a variety of themes, mysteries, and Forgotten Realms locales. Not only does Candlekeep Mysteries send players to places like Tashalar and the Shadowfell, it also adds a variety of different Fifth Edition stat blocks, ranging from the gingwatzim to powerful monks. Another creature that appears in Candlekeep Mysteries is an archfey, marking the first time that one of these powerful creatures has received a Fifth Edition statblock in a Wizards of the Coast’s publication.
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While ComicBook.com won’t spoil the name of the archfey or what adventure it appears in (as that would potentially ruin the central mysteries of one of the stories in Candlekeep Mysteries), we can state that the archfey is a powerful creature that can be used outside of these adventures as a potential “big bad” for a Tier 2 or even Tier 3 campaign. The archfey’s abilities are relatively basic – the creature has legendary actions, legendary resistances, and lair actions, as well as two main attacks – a claw attack and a ranged attack capable of poisoning targets. The archfey also has an AOE attack that they can use if multiple foes are close to them.
While the Feywild gets mentioned in multiple Dungeons & Dragons adventures and rulebooks, the fey are incredibly underrepresented in official Fifth Edition material. There are only 46 fey statblocks in material published by Wizards of the Coast and only one of those creatures – Trostani, a dryad from the Magic: The Gathering setting of Ravnica – has a CR above 10. Considering that warlocks can make pacts with archfey and many spells involve the summoning of fey creatures, it makes sense that Dungeons & Dragons provides some more official support for DMs who want to build a campaign centered on the Feywild. While the Feywild still needs to be fleshed out in official D&D material, this at least provides DMs with a starting block for building a campaign set in the Feywild.
For those looking for more Feywild material, Kobold Press has published numerous fey creatures in their various monster compendiums. Additionally, the DMs Guild contains numerous publications either set in the Feywild or contain statblocks that further flesh out various fey creatures.
Candlekeep Mysteries goes on sale on March 18th. Pre-orders are live on Amazon now.
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