Shadar Kai: The Magic Begins (Patreon)

• The Good: MtoF's shadar-kai are pretty good, as WotC stat blocks go.
  • Spells as part of their multiattack
  • Cool modular abilities
  • Traits that are mostly usable in combat.
  • Uniqueish weapons
• The Bad
  • Fey Ancestry is mostly redundant with their charm immunity.
  • No low-CR versions. Humanoid species need mooks.
  • Spellcasting. As warlocks the Gloom Weaver and Soul Monger aren't as bad as some offenders, but they've still got a load of stuff on their stat blocks that has no reason to be there, and are missing a lot of things that really need to be there.
  • There's some wild damage ranges on some of these. The Gloom Weaver can be expected to do 118+ dpr at CR 9, and the Shadowdancer is doing 96 dpr at CR 7. Those numbers are bad and wrong.
• The Fix
  • All shadar-kai got a trait called Pain Focus, which lets them dash or make a melee attack as a bonus action when  bloodied, and a trait called Creeping Apathy, which drops their AC for a round if they take a break from hurting people or being hurt.
  • A fight vs Shadar Kai is now a fight about keeping the arena well lit. Many of their abilities can be counteracted with a bright light, but they also have a lot of ways to get rid of those bright lights, or making you feel less enthusiastic about lighting them.

The Shadar-Kai Warrior is our CR 1 mook. It's got a sickle that messes up concentration, and a recharging ability to bind a creature in darkness that wears off if illuminated.

The Shadowdancer is a downscaled CR 3 version of the MtoF one, though it gains the trait Backswing, which gives it advantage on its next attack when it misses, and it teleports as part of its multiattack now, instead of as a bonus action. Don't worry about this fella getting a downgrade, though, I've got a proper CR 7 chainboi in the pipeline.