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​

 

[Micah Sweet]

There are great questions, and worth exploring. I just don't see a good reason for WotC to have emphasized the unreality aspects of the setting in VRG. Really rubbed me the wrong way.

 

[Faolyn]

He said it hasn't been THAT good again, not good period. While it could have been stated more politely, to my ears that still sounds like an opinion.

"I feel like" usually isn't a phrase people use when trying to state objective facts.

Fair enough. I stand corrected.

 

[Remathilis]

There are great questions, and worth exploring. I just don't see a good reason for WotC to have emphasized the unreality aspects of the setting in VRG. Really rubbed me the wrong way.

To be fair, lots of horror has an unreal dreamlike quality to it. I found Ravenloft the hardest to run when it tried to straddle the line between personalized prisons and functional interconnected campaign world. It could have worked as a horrific but plausible setting (like Innistrad) or it works as a collection of horror funhouses, but trying to do both expose the flaws of each.

 

[Parmandur]

At one point in D&D's history, it was a rule that elves could not be raised from the dead because they lacked a soul. They could be resurrected using the 7th level spell or equivalent or reincarnated also using the spell. I wager no one would argue elves lacked free will or consciousness.

Yeah, yikes.

 

[Micah Sweet]

To be fair, lots of horror has an unreal dreamlike quality to it. I found Ravenloft the hardest to run when it tried to straddle the line between personalized prisons and functional interconnected campaign world. It could have worked as a horrific but plausible setting (like Innistrad) or it works as a collection of horror funhouses, but trying to do both expose the flaws of each.

I prefer the version that leaned into a coherent setting, like late 2nd ed and especially the 3rd ed Arthas materials.

 

[Remathilis]

I prefer the version that leaned into a coherent setting, like late 2nd ed and especially the 3rd ed Arthas materials.

Yeah, that is the point I found its glaring artificial nature to be jarring. The coastline that just disappears. The moons that change number and appearance as you cross borders, the changes in topography, the giant hole in the middle, etc. If this is supposed to be a world where commoners haul grain from Leskar to Vallaki, it needs to look more like a regular D&D world, but with werewolves rather than goblins.

Cycling back, I wonder if the Radiant Citadel is going to be a more blended/melting pot community or will it be a piecemeal setting with the rural south, ancient China and North Mexico just being neighbors, metaphorically speaking.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Yeah, that is the point I found its glaring artificial nature to be jarring. The coastline that just disappears. The moons that change number and appearance as you cross borders, the changes in topography, the giant hole in the middle, etc. If this is supposed to be a world where commoners haul grain from Leskar to Vallaki, it needs to look more like a regular D&D world, but with werewolves rather than goblins.

Cycling back, I wonder if the Radiant Citadel is going to be a more blended/melting pot community or will it be a piecemeal setting with the rural south, ancient China and North Mexico just being neighbors, metaphorically speaking.

I appreciate the differing opinion. It worked great for me, and having it ripped to literal shreds in VRG really hurt, and honestly eroded my appreciation of WotC in general.

 

[Mind of tempest]

Yeah, that is the point I found its glaring artificial nature to be jarring. The coastline that just disappears. The moons that change number and appearance as you cross borders, the changes in topography, the giant hole in the middle, etc. If this is supposed to be a world where commoners haul grain from Leskar to Vallaki, it needs to look more like a regular D&D world, but with werewolves rather than goblins.

Cycling back, I wonder if the Radiant Citadel is going to be a more blended/melting pot community or will it be a piecemeal setting with the rural south, ancient China and North Mexico just being neighbors, metaphorically speaking.

is it too much to ask for a bit of both? I like a melting pot but some clear neighbourhoods would also be nice with the melting pot being the mixed areas?

 

[Faolyn]

As I said, I have no problem thinking about my game world. That particular idea, and the to my mind horrible implications of it, could have used some story development from the people who dropped it into their how to do horror in D&D book.

There are great questions, and worth exploring. I just don't see a good reason for WotC to have emphasized the unreality aspects of the setting in VRG. Really rubbed me the wrong way.

Because honestly, Ravenloft kind of suffers when reality gets in the way. A lot of the domains don't actually make a lot of sense or even become boring when you try to make them realistic. A couple of examples:

Darkon. It's shtick was that it inevitably rewrote the memories of anyone who stayed in the country for more than a few weeks. And Darkonians knew that, and as such were said to be loathe to leave their country, lest they discover they weren't real. Realistically, this means that nobody from other countries would ever want to enter it, since people who do go in often don't return, and sometimes, those who do go mad because they suddenly have two competing sets of memories in their heads. Darkon should be shunned by outsiders, and it's biggest cities should be on the borders--and that's not the case.

Richemulot. It's a country filled with a freedom-loving, tyranny-hating populace who are pretty eager to fight for the cause... and which borders directly on Falkovnia, a freedom-hating, tyrant-led country. And yet, there was very little, if any, thought given to Richmuloise thinking much about it. The Gazetteer even pointed out that Falkovnians just didn't even think about fleeing into Richemulot. Because the setting both demanded that the domains remain separate while also trying to have them interact as if they were normal countries.

Hazlan. No magic allowed under penalty of death! <Conjunction Occurs> Lots of Magic allowed! And... people are pretty OK with that, it seems. And the increase of magic doesn't seem to have done anything about Mulan/Rashaman relations, either, even when sorcerers, who don't need training, became a thing in 3e.

Falkovnia. Between the random murders, frequent disease, high infant mortality rate, frequent military deaths, death penalty for almost any crime, the monsters (including an organized group of sadistic vampyrs), and Drakov's insistence on having someone tortured to death each night for his dining pleasure, how is there any population left? Actually, this is a question that a lot of domains left unanswered, like with G'Henna, where everyone's reproductive organs should have shut down due to malnutrition ages ago. Made even worse if you take the various Van Richten's monster hunting guides into account, since some of them (like Werebeasts) specify just how much the monsters have to eat.

And so on. When I run Ravenloft, I generally have to handwave these bits of unreality aside. 5e is more extreme, yes, but considering the Core actually rearranged itself after the Conjunction, it's nothing new.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Because honestly, Ravenloft kind of suffers when reality gets in the way. A lot of the domains don't actually make a lot of sense or even become boring when you try to make them realistic. A couple of examples:

Darkon. It's shtick was that it inevitably rewrote the memories of anyone who stayed in the country for more than a few weeks. And Darkonians knew that, and as such were said to be loathe to leave their country, lest they discover they weren't real. Realistically, this means that nobody from other countries would ever want to enter it, since people who do go in often don't return, and sometimes, those who do go mad because they suddenly have two competing sets of memories in their heads. Darkon should be shunned by outsiders, and it's biggest cities should be on the borders--and that's not the case.

Richemulot. It's a country filled with a freedom-loving, tyranny-hating populace who are pretty eager to fight for the cause... and which borders directly on Falkovnia, a freedom-hating, tyrant-led country. And yet, there was very little, if any, thought given to Richmuloise thinking much about it. The Gazetteer even pointed out that Falkovnians just didn't even think about fleeing into Richemulot. Because the setting both demanded that the domains remain separate while also trying to have them interact as if they were normal countries.

Hazlan. No magic allowed under penalty of death! <Conjunction Occurs> Lots of Magic allowed! And... people are pretty OK with that, it seems. And the increase of magic doesn't seem to have done anything about Mulan/Rashaman relations, either, even when sorcerers, who don't need training, became a thing in 3e.

Falkovnia. Between the random murders, frequent disease, high infant mortality rate, frequent military deaths, death penalty for almost any crime, the monsters (including an organized group of sadistic vampyrs), and Drakov's insistence on having someone tortured to death each night for his dining pleasure, how is there any population left? Actually, this is a question that a lot of domains left unanswered, like with G'Henna, where everyone's reproductive organs should have shut down due to malnutrition ages ago. Made even worse if you take the various Van Richten's monster hunting guides into account, since some of them (like Werebeasts) specify just how much the monsters have to eat.

And so on. When I run Ravenloft, I generally have to handwave these bits of unreality aside. 5e is more extreme, yes, but considering the Core actually rearranged itself after the Conjunction, it's nothing new.

Oh, I know. Everyone has a line though, and 5e's blowing up of the setting when it had been explicitly moving the other direction last time we checked in crossed it for me.