D&D (2024) Humanoids in the MM...

[Paul Farquhar]

are we assuming that means the majority of goblins anywhere else are fey?

Yes, the vast majority of goblins are fey. If they are not it is because they have become too distant from their Feywild ancestors.

Unless they publish a couple of adventures where the PC's hang out in friendly goblin villages

In Call of the Netherdeep players hang out in a friendly goblin village for the whole of the first chapter. It's not clear if the goblins are fey or not, since the players are not expected to fight them, so most do not have stat blocks. A couple use NPC stat blocks (e.g. priest).

 

[Yaarel]

OK, but what vibes? Centaurs don't seem more "fey" than goblins (if anything the opposite is true, now).

Many of the Greek place spirits (Greek daimon, Latin genius locii) are Fey, not because of Greek but because of British traditions since the medieval period. When they read the Pan-Euro literature, including Greek mythology, the British often explained the foreign concepts using local British analogies, including "fairie" and "aelf". These Fey terms were written as notes in the margins of the pages of the medieval books.

Also, the term "fairie" literally means "magic", so any kind of magical creature was described as being "fairie". In this way, beings like nymphs, satyr, and centaurs are all solidly Fey.

Of course, goblins are strictly "fairie", being unseelie sprites from the realm of fairie.