Conjure Woodland Beings: Now It’s a Party

Usable By: Druid, Ranger

Spell Level: 4

School: Conjuration

Casting Time: 1 action

Range: 60 feet

Duration: Concentration, up to 1 hour

Components: V, S, M (one holly berry per creature
summoned)

You summon fey creatures that appear in unoccupied spaces that you can see within range. Choose one of the following options for what appears:

One fey creature of challenge rating 2 or lower
Two fey creatures of challenge rating 1 or lower
Four fey creatures of challenge rating 1/2 or lower
Eight fey creatures of challenge rating 1/4 or lower

A summoned creature disappears when it drops to 0 hit points or when the spell ends. The summoned creatures are friendly to you and your companions. Roll initiative for the summoned creatures as a group, which has its own turns. They obey any verbal commands that you issue to them (no action required by you). If you don’t issue any commands to them, they defend themselves from hostile creatures, but otherwise take no actions. The GM has the creatures’ statistics.

At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using certain higher-level spell slots, you choose one of the summoning options above, and more creatures appear: twice as many with a 6th-level slot, three times as many with a 8th-level slot.

Review by Sam West, Twitter: @CrierKobold

‘“Tubble, bubble, boiling trouble, conjure him warts and make his love buckle! EeeHeheHehe- heh?” POOF!’ - Nanny Stinkshoal, Sea Hag, upon being abruptly abducted by Conjure Woodland Beings

When people complain about summoning spells, I regularly see Conjure Woodland Beings at the center. I personally think summoning magic is doomed to be contentious for as long as it relies on the wildly inconsistent CR system.

Some of the conjure spells require a caveat. As written, the caster picks the CR, then the DM picks the monsters that are summoned. This can make the spell a headache for many DMs to manage. I’d highly recommend working with your DM out of game with your expectations from the spell. If you are a DM, I highly discourage you from keeping pixies as a summonable option, because, well…

Pixies are busted. They are overloaded with once per day casts of spells first through fourth level. In terms of spell slots, casting Conjure Woodland Beings and getting pixies is offering you thirty-two 1st level slots (Detect Evil and Good, Detect Magic, Entangle, Sleep), sixteen 2nd level slots (Detect Thoughts, Phantasmal Force), sixteen 3rd level slots (Dispel Magic, Fly) and sixteen 4th level slots (Confusion, Polymorph). All this just costs one 4th level slot. If you were going to cast Confusion or Polymorph anyway, you might as well just summon some pixies and get seven extra uses PLUS the rest of the spells at their disposal. Polymorph already is game warping for many tables. Having seven extra attempts at transforming a specific creature into a squirrel is game breaking.

Concentration is a limiter on the power of the pixies, but only barely. Each has their own concentration meaning you can have access to all the concentration effects at once. One casts Fly on you, one Polymorphs the enemy successfully, the rest can have varying detect abilities up, and you’ve still got some pixies to spare.

If you’re a player and want the magic of summoning fey, this spell can still satisfy that fantasy in a far more fair way. For the other players and the DMs sake, I’d advise avoiding summoning pixies.

A pair of dryads bring a ton of utility to the table. Each offers you three casts of Goodberry and Entangle, and one cast of Barkskin and Pass without Trace. Fey charm can prove invaluable at coercing unwilling enemies into malleable mindsets. Tree stride allows dryads to excel at long distance messaging, and their ability to chat with plants, animals, and people that speak elvish and sylvan also makes them exceptional translators and information gatherers.

Sprites are “fair” pixies. Heart sight is whatever, but their poisoned shortbows offer a means of taking down creatures without needing to deal hundreds damage. Forcing up to eight saving throws around likely poisons whatever creature you need poisoned. As a bonus, sometimes that creature drops unconscious. The best part about their shortbows is there is no limit to their uses; every round sprites can pepper enemies with poisoned pricks, dropping creatures unconscious all over the place. They also can turn themselves invisible at will, making them double as excellent spys, alarms, and ambushers.

Summoning a lone sea hag is dangerous and certainly evil, but can make for some incredible narrative moments. Commanding a disguised sea hag to enter into a full room of people as a fey fear death bomb can be a not so subtle way to send a message. Their attacks are lackluster, and don’t offer a lot of utility outside their death glare and horrific appearance.

Satyrs and blink dogs are getting lumped together here because neither is particularly good. Blink dogs come with a teleport (that notably excludes people riding them) which can have niche uses for infiltration. In combat, they’re basically just fast bite attacks. Satyrs without their pipes are just magically resistant beat sticks. If one in the summoned group has pipes, they become fairly interesting, but that requires a lot of work between the player and the DM to make happen.

Without Volo’s, this list is tiny. There isn’t great variety in what pops out of the summoning portal when you conjure things here. If you and your DM do end up allowing pixies, the game will bend to your whim any time you roll them, while other times you’ll end up feeling disappointed you didn’t get pixies. If you’re going to take Conjure Woodland Beings, take it knowing the spell is problematic for a lot of people, and even the “fair” options (dryads, sprites) can make some encounters moot and bring far more power to the table than anyone else is ready for.

5e Spells

Conjure Woodland Beings: Now It’s a Party