Domains of Delight: An In-Depth Review
Where Are Those Rules?
They’re in the Domains of Delight: A Feywild Accessory, sold on DM's Guild to raise money for Extra Life. In fact, the image of Yarnspinner in TWBtW shows the link for the product. Written by Adam Lee based on material developed by Perkins, Jeremy Crawford, and Ben Petrisor, Domains of Delight contains the material on how the Feywild works that TWBtW needed.
The Wild Beyond the Witchlight isn't just Wizards of the Coast's latest Dungeons & Dragons adventure. It's the first official, full-length adventure from WotC set in the Feywild. While often mentioned, the counterpart to the Shadowfell has gotten much less attention through the editions...
www.enworld.orgThe Basics
It starts with an overview of the Feywild that addresses the Seelie and Unseelie Fey, how weather, spells, and domain borders work in the Feywild, as well as the need for a guide. The Fey rules of Reciprocity, Hospitality, and Gifts get a closer look, which is also very beneficial if you're running TWBtW.After devils, contracts with Fey are probably the toughest in D&D so Fey contracts and how to make one gets a look—including accidental contracts. If your players tend to be murder hobos they might have a problem in TWBtW because in the Feywild killing a creature with fey contract can force you into fulfilling that person's contract. How to break a contract is addressed, followed immediately by information on fey curses. No, that's not a coincidence.
As with Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft and its explanation of how to make a Domain of Dread, creating a Domain of Delight begins with creating the archfey that rules it. In addition to guidance on appearance and personality it also addresses possible Fey Court allegiances, obsessions (remember, the Feywild is a place of heightened emotion so archfey can be just as obsessive, if not more, than Darklords), their signature magic and what magical gifts they may bestow.
Archfey and their Domains
For archfey stat blocks, they make it clear that stats are only necessary if you think there will be a fight. DMs also don't have to stress about making the stats from scratch. Instead they direct the reader to the section in the Dungeon Master's Guide on modifying stat blocks, or just use a CR 5 or greater stat block from a Beast, Elemental, Fey, Giant, Humanoid, or Plant creature type. I like recommendations for how to make a DM's life easier, and I'm all for reskinning but a little more advice would have been nice.Then once you have your Archfey, it provides advice on selecting the domain's theme, geographical features, the residents of the domain, and its weird magic effects. To bring the domain to life, examples of the sort of drama that could be affect the realm are detailed like Fomorians causing problems or the Archfey accidentally offended the Queen of Air and Darkness or such.
Travel to, from, and within the domain is very important. If the players don't have a plane shift spell, they'll need a fey crossing to travel to and from the Feywild, and they can be customized all kinds of ways from crystal caves to mushroom circles. Travel within the domain isn't necessarily easier. Distance and travel time can be fluid—especially if the Archfey wants to confound the players. Shortcuts within the realm can be equally weird, like whistling while walking backward.
And, of course, your players might not be the only visitors to the domain. A d8 chart also provides ideas for other travelers they may encounter.
Putting It All Together?
The chapter “Putting it All Together” technically doesn't explain how to do that. Instead it presents the example of the domain Fablerise, ruled over by the Archfey Yarnspinner.This lawful good NPC looks like a giant spider but don't judge by appearances. This kindly archfey loves stories and carries books with him in a silken bag. Awakened animals abound in Fablerise, and Yarnspinner spends hours after hours reading stories aloud to his subjects, which they enjoy and love to discuss. Yarnspinner will even create a silken hut for visitors who need a safe haven—so long as the visitors don't harm Fablerise residents.
Domains of Delight concludes by reprinting adventure aids from TWBtW such as the story tracker and the role-playing aid cards. It's probably easier for DMs to print these items from the PDF instead of photocopying them.
The art is gorgeous and consistent with the art in TWBtW. In fact, I think the art here is extremely useful to demonstrate what Prisneer and other Domains of Delight might look like since the hags of the Hourglass Coven have rewritten Prismeer in their images after dividing it into Hither, Thither and Yon.
Should You Get It?
I have very mixed feelings about Domains of Delight because it's a betwixt-and-between product. While I love that WotC supports the charity Extra Life and will create products to raise money for for this children's charity, I feel like this is the wrong product to do it. This material is so key to presenting the adventure properly, pulling it out for a separate product feels awkward. At the same time, it feels a bit skimpy. I wanted more material akin to what's in VRGtR.It especially feels weird since Yarnspinner is featured in TWBtW because Fablerise accidentally encroaches on Thither. So TWBtW had a gorgeous piece of art showcasing Yarnspinner, but you have to go to Domains of Delight to have sufficient info. I would have much rather had most of this material in the TWBtW book, and gotten a few sample domains and adventure seeds in Domains of Delight. That way it would be optional yet still attractive to buy—especially if you want the option to easily print the story tracker and adventure aids. Still, Domains of Delight only costs $8 and goes to a good cause so I feel weird even complaining about it. The logic of it just bothers me.
Despite my reservations, the content in Domains of Delight: A Feywild Accessory is good and useful. While I hope that we get more Feywild content in the future and a full guide like Ravenloft did, until that day, this supplement provides essential material for creating your own Feywild adventures and benefits a good cause. That's a win/win.
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