D&D 5E The Next D&D Book is JOURNEYS THROUGH THE RADIANT CITADEL

We peered, poked, squinted, flipped, and enhanced the teaser image that WotC put out last week, and it turns out we got it right -- the next book is, indeed, Journeys Through the Radiant Citadel.

Wraparound cover art by Evyn Fong​

Through the mists of the Ethereal Plane shines the Radiant Citadel. Travelers from across the multiverse flock to this mysterious bastion to share their traditions, stories, and calls for heroes. A crossroads of wonders and adventures, the Radiant Citadel is the first step on the path to legend. Where will your journeys take you?

Journeys through the Radiant Citadel is a collection of thirteen short, stand-alone D&D adventures featuring challenges for character levels 1–14. Each adventure has ties to the Radiant Citadel, a magical city with connections to lands rich with excitement and danger, and each can be run by itself or as part of an ongoing campaign. Explore this rich and varied collection of adventures in magical lands.

• Thirteen new stand-alone adventures spanning levels 1 to 14, each with its own set of maps
• Introduces the Radiant Citadel, a new location on the Ethereal Plane that connects adventurers to richly detailed and distinct corners of the D&D multiverse
• Each adventure can be set in any existing D&D campaign setting or on worlds of your own design
• Introduces eleven new D&D monsters
• There’s a story for every adventuring party, from whimsical and light to dark and foreboding and everything in between

Slated for June 21st (update - I just got a press release which says it's June 21st "in North American stores"; I'm not sure what that means for the rest of us!), it's a 224-page adventure anthology featuring a floating city called the Radiant Citadel. The book is written entirely by people of colour, including Ajit George, who was the first person of Indian heritage to write Indian-inspired material for D&D (in Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft). Around 50 POC writers were involved in total in various ways.

The Radiant Citadel is on the ethereal plane and is carved from the giant fossil of an unknown monster. A massive gemstone called the Royal Diamond sits at the core, surrounded by a bunch of smaller Concord Jewels, which are gateways to the Citadel's founding civilizations. DMs can link any world to the citadel by placing a Concord Jewel there.

The Citadel, unlike many D&D locations, is more of a sanctuary than a place of danger. The book's alternate cover features a Dawn Incarnate, a creature which is the embodiment of stories and cultures.

D&D 5E - Here's Radiant Citadel's press release

Dropped in my inbox a short while ago, if you want the official announcement. It's the same info as in the news article on the front page. Dungeons & Dragons Invites You to Explore the Radiant Citadel Journeys Through the Radiant Citadel is a new collection of short adventures set in wondrous...

www.enworld.org

The adventures are as follows:

• Salted Legacy
• Written In Blood
• The Fiend of Hollow Mine
• Wages of Vice
• Sins of Our Elders
• Gold for Fools and Princes
• Trail of Destruction
• In the Mists of Manivarsha
• Between Tangled Roots
• Shadow of the Sun
• The Nightsea’s Succor
• Buried Dynasty
• Orchids of the Invisible Mountain

UPDATE -- the press release contains a list of some of the contributors: "Justice Ramin Arman, Dominique Dickey, Ajit A. George, Basheer Ghouse, Alastor Guzman, D. Fox Harrell, T.K. Johnson, Felice Tzehuei Kuan, Surena Marie, Mimi Mondal, Mario Ortegón, Miyuki Jane Pinckard, Pam Punzalan, Erin Roberts, Terry H. Romero, Stephanie Yoon, and many more."

Regular cover by Even Fong

Alternate Cover by Sija Hong​

 

[BookTenTiger]

New things can also be bad. Fortunately humans have evolved the capacity to assess and make judgements on things before we experience them.

I won't get into an off topic conversation about teaching here, but I do love to talk about education. So if you (or anyone else) wants to chat about it, feel free to PM me!

 

[Yaarel]

Some parties meet each other at the tavern. Some parties meet each other while going shopping.

 

[Tonguez]

For the three unknown Settings:

• Dominique Dickey is African American
• Stephanie Yoon is Korean
• Jane Miyuki is Japanese

So we have:

• 4 African-American Settings
• 5 East Asian & Pacific Settings
• 3 Latino/Mesoamerica Settings
• 3 Central/South Asian Settings

Pretty cool mix!

Theres a Pacific setting?

 

[eyeheartawk]

This thread is heavily characterized by people's inability to accept that they aren't meant to buy every single D&D product that comes out.

No one cares if you don't like the books released this year. There's other people who play D&D who I'm pretty sure haven't liked some of the books you have bought as well.

Seriously, you guys have gotten soooooo many books so far, so many adventures that retread or reintroduce old content, and you think its right to say that books like these are a bad direction and shouldn't exist?

Especially when in Ajit's interview, he talks about wanting to make a book where he can see people like him in it. The white privilege in unironically stunning.

Please show me anywhere in the thread where anybody makes that argument.

The two most common criticisms I see are about tone (via the cover) and the fact it's not Sigil. The fact that it's a book created by people of color is a fact exclusive from the criticism, as in, they do not intersect.

I would argue that portraying any and all criticism of this book as some sort of racially motivated bias is equally stunning.

Do you really think if this book was written by an all white authorship that those two exact criticisms wouldn't be evident in this thread?

 

[Faolyn]

It's a bazaar scene, what do you want from it?

Shoplifters being pilloried?

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I didn't read my first copy of the Silmarillion until it fell apart because I wanted to be depressed by it

“It's like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were. And sometimes you didn't want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it’s only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn’t. They kept going, because they were holding on to something. That there is some good in this world, and it's worth fighting for.”

Perfectly chosen quote.

To read that and think that the work is somehow not uplifting…

 

[doctorbadwolf]

To me, the Radiant Citadel cover is like a spot illo that accidentally made its way to the cover. I don't care if that dorky creature escapes with its ill-gotten produce. I wouldn't care as a player, and if I described that scene as a GM, it'd be of no interest to my players. And the environment pictured? Again, who cares? A bazaar! Not a backdrop for tales of derring-do, however grim or hopeful

This surprises me more than anything else in this discussion.

Man I use bazaars/markets all the time. My favorite “intro to D&D” adventure’s first opportunity to fight and/or chase some critters happens in a mercado. There are Fey disguised as geese stealing people’s stuff. It’s great!

 

[eyeheartawk]

It's a bazaar scene, what do you want from it?

A stand selling Black Lotus?(it better not be Haga)

A camel getting punched?

 

[Scribe]

Do you really think if this book was written by an all white authorship that those two exact criticisms wouldn't be evident in this thread?

Considering the number of similar complaints about The Wild Beyond the Witchlight and whatever the Strixhaven book was called, I'd say its safe to say people would have commented about the art style, tone, and feel regardless.

In fact if Wizards had not specifically made note of the authors, I highly doubt it (authorship) would have come up at all.

 

[Remathilis]

A stand selling Black Lotus?(it better not be Haga)

A camel getting punched?

Wizards can't sell Black Lotus anymore, it's on the reserved list.

Black Lotus | Alpha | Card Kingdom

Alpha: Black Lotus. This is the most expensive and iconic Magic card in existence. It is currently banned in Commander, Legacy, and restricted in Vintage.

www.cardkingdom.com