High-CR fey?

[BeefGood]

I have MM and Volos and there are not many high-CR fey creatures. Am I missing some, or are there more in a different sourcebook?
The context is I’m working on an adventure for Tier 3 party. I’d like the big bad guys to be druids conjuring fey but there don’t seem to be many options. A few hags and the korred.

EDIT Substituted correct name “korred”

[Callak_Remier]

Korred I believe you mean.
Also feel free to adapt from older editions
If need be
Master of the Hunt perhaps

[Eragon123]

I think the third party Tome of Beasts from Kobold Press has some high CR Fey. And it's fairly critically acclaimed on the internet.

[Unoriginal]

The seasonal Eladrin of the Mordenkainen are the highest CR Fey, I think.

[MaxWilson]

I have MM and Volos and there are not many high-CR fey creatures. Am I missing some, or are there more in a different sourcebook?
The context is I’m working on an adventure for Tier 3 party. I’d like the big bad guys to be druids conjuring fey but there don’t seem to be many options. A few hags and the korred.

There aren't too many (Summer Eladrin is the toughest at CR 10, unless you go for third-party products like the Tome of Beasts), but you can build a pretty tough adventure out of what's already there. Play around some with https://kobold.club/fight/#/encounter-builder, set Sources to all of the books you own, set the Type to Fey, and hit the "Random Deadly Encounter" button a few times.

A couple of notes on fey tactics: Annis Hags can deal incredible amounts of melee damage. One hit with Crushing Hug does 9d6+5 (36) damage immediately, and forces you to use your action or something to break the grapple or you'll take another 9d6+5 points of damage at the start of the hag's turn, at which point she can either release the grapple and then Crushing Hug you again, or can switch to e.g. Dashing away with you to drag you behind a corner and feast on your flesh. You can basically think of it as a single attack for 18d6+10 (72) points of damage plus a grapple, but with a chance to escape half the damage if you act quickly. This is even more incredible if you realize that Crushing Hug is an attack, not just an action, so an Annis Hag has a 72-HP opportunity attack!

Hag covens have access to Counterspell, which can really mess up a typical counter (Fireball) to swarms of wolves/Needle Blights/whatever.

A Twig Blight may not sound tough on its own, but if it can Help an Annis Hag get advantage on her Crushing Hug, it's totally worth doing.

Korreds obviously have incredibly nasty ranged attacks and are good at summoning meat shields and restraining enemies to grant advantage for everyone. They wouldn't naturally work with hags but if a summoner is compelling them it's plausible.

Darkling Elders can cast Darkness to supercharge themselves and any regular Darklings (because blindsight + Darkness = advantage on attacks, disadvantage to attackers, and in the case of Darklings it even increases their damage).

Quicklings obviously excel at hit-and-run attacks on the back line to break concentration and make frontline PCs feel like they need to Dash back to protect their buddies.

Redcaps are more mobile than you'd expect them to be, because they have a nasty attack which basically combines Dash + attack + knock prone.

If you build an adventure which looks something like this:


1. Initial skirmish, 3 Redcaps + 7 Quicklings (cost: 8,750 XP). Only Redcaps show themselves initially (Quicklings have Stealth +8 and should be hiding in various places around the encounter area) and you hear their boots shaking the ground from quite some distance away. After frontline PCs move to engage the Redcaps and PCs start casting spells, Quicklings then reveal themselves from hiding on round 2 and strike for the back lines. Any Quicklings or Redcaps that survive will join future battles.

2. (Unwilling) Defenders at the gate, 2 Summer Eladrin (cost: 17,700 XP) who will not let the PCs pass but are willing to let them leave peacefully, but if so the hags will be warned and next time encounters #2 and #3 will be combined.

3. Brains of the operation, hag coven (2 Annis, 1 Bheur) with 2 Yeth Hounds and a Yeti (cost: 31,400 XP). There are six terrified, traumatized children in cages, and one empty cage. The hags are making some kind of stew. If the PCs retreat, tomorrow there will be only two children in cages, and there will be a Darkling Elder and four Darklings added to the Hags' forces.

Total cost: 57,850 XP

you've got an adventure which uses up just slightly more than the full day's XP budget for a party of four 13th level PCs, gives two potential places where PCs could take a short rest (especially if they use Rope Trick or similar), and yet has plenty of potential to be quite hard for the PCs if the DM plays the monsters with lethal cunning--which is justified because these are intelligent monsters.

Don't get me wrong, it still still be quite easy for 13th level PCs if the PCs likewise play with lethal cunning--5E is easy by default and has lots of tactics for players to exploit--but there are enough monsters there to make things plenty difficult by 5E standards. If the PCs don't play with lethal cunning they could have a tough fight on their hands and maybe even lose.

[BeefGood]

Thanks everyone for the helpful advice, especially MaxWilson for the creature analysis and the adventuring day.
I will check out Tome of Beasts.

[Ninja_Prawn]

(How did I not see this thread before? :smallsigh:)

Tome of Beasts does have a lot of fey. To be honest I'm not a huge fan of it though... Maybe it's just a question of taste.

If you find you want an alternative source for feywild monsters, you could check out my Fey Folio (https://www.patreon.com/posts/fey-folio-17893628). It'll cost you all of $1, but doesn't have anything above CR12. Maybe it'll be useful though.

[Finback]

In addition to Tome of Beasts, Kobold Press has also now released the Creature Codex. It has 29 fey, of which 10 are CR10 or higher (even as high as 20 for Baba Yaga). There are also several high-CR celestials you could easily re-skin, such as the Monkey King (coming in at 21).

[Asmotherion]

Korred I believe you mean.
Also feel free to adapt from older editions
If need be
Master of the Hunt perhaps

Damn, I remember this b@stard. Faced him as a Halloween special (Freddie Vs Jason Style) back in 3.5 with a Demilich. Even alone he's tough, but with his hounds he's Unbeatable. Love to hate him!