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​

 

[Vaalingrade]

I thought the next D&D book is supposed to be called Shadow of the Dragon Queen? What did I miss?

Necromancy.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

This is a trade hub City composed of well...I've gone at length at that but virtually nonexistent crime (or criminals let alone crime lords...), but if you can't see why that is a bit out of the norm (like way beyond) I can't explain it to you. Plus it makes for a pretty boring place since it's cutting off a lot of story seeds. Granted maybe they don't report their actual crime statistics

You should read some Becky Chambers and see how much story one can generate from utopian/Solarpunk settings.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Plus, Radiant Citadel struck me as the real kid friendly D&D setting. I mean people point to Wild Beyond the Witchlight as kiddie but I think it is not, it is not, it is quite dark with the potential to be very dark, depends on how you want to run it.

I dunno.

"Hey, kids, let's talk about societal trauma in a post-slavery society" is darker than anything I've seen in Witchlight.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Still missing the point. This is a commercial product. It's supposed to appeal to a wider audience

No, their total catalog is supposed to appeal to a wide audience.

No one expected Descent to Avernus to include family friendly, no-violence options.

This book is offering a different experience.

They're not all going to be for everyone, and no one would likely want many of those books anyway, as they'd end up pretty bland and flavorless.

This is the golden age of RPGs and D&D supplements. There are a million folks on DMs Guild, DriveThruRPG, Kickstarter and at Kobold Press, Monte Cook Games and many, many more besides who are happy to offer you something to your liking. At any given time, there seem to be about a dozen grimdark D&D settings and supplements on Kickstarter alone, to say nothing of the back catalog that's accumulated.

If Radiant Citadel isn't for you, you have choices that are almost certainly much more your jam.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

unlike RC there are still 'bad' dwarves, criminals, crimelords, cultists...tons of adventure seeds.

There's plenty of conflict within the Radiant Citadel itself, even if it's not the standard stuff.

 

[Azenis]

There's plenty of conflict within the Radiant Citadel itself, even if it's not the standard stuff.

The council is essentially untouchable, any intrigue (like with the court of whispers) can't easily resort to the usual things intrigue plots do (rendering those agents to little more than listening posts or employers to hire someone for adventures outside the RC as the big stuff is off the table barring special circumstance), the incarnates little more than McGuffins with no conflict coming from them, the Shieldbearers...ugh but again largely only a seed for outside the RC, and the laughable topper is the 'random' d4 table of possible Radiant Citadel Adventures (all of which are focused on actors or things/external forces outside the Citadel!!!).

I've read it, have you? Where's this 'plenty of conflict'? I mean I guess there is plenty of adventures I could run about defusing a petty family feud and food festivals. Like I repeatedly pointed out already, the nature of the place puts a hard thumb down to limit the stories & possible plots available. As is, the most interesting thing about those @14 pages is how my PCs will interact with it.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

I dunno.

"Hey, kids, let's talk about societal trauma in a post-slavery society" is darker than anything I've seen in Witchlight.

Point of view I guess, "Actual child slavery and the Peter Pan/Robin Hood figure trying to rescue them is an actual monster that will eat them if it realises its true nature. (from memory and I may have got some details wrong)

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

If you can't find story potential in mortals living under the rule of seemingly immortal composite spirit beings who speak with the voices of long-dead ancestors, a dragon ruling a city and trying to keep from getting into open conflict with an angel and a city full of refugees, that's on you.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Point of view I guess, "Actual child slavery and the Peter Pan/Robin Hood figure trying to rescue them is an actual monster that will eat them if it realises its true nature. (from memory and I may have got some details wrong)

There's a lot of peril like that in traditional children's literature. It all depends on how it's presented at the table, I suspect.

 

[Azenis]

If you can't find story potential in mortals living under the rule of seemingly immortal composite spirit beings who speak with the voices of long-dead ancestors, a dragon ruling a city and trying to keep from getting into open conflict with an angel and a city full of refugees, that's on you.

Thought so. Nice deflection but not my point. It's the stories I can't logically tell here if I run it 'as is'. And it doesn't provide anything like a unique hook I haven't seen dozens of times.