According to Sage Advice magical darkness only blocks darkvision if the description specifically says so. Then as Gloom Stalker level 9 you can Summon Fey (Tricksy) and order her/him/it to use it‘s fey step: darkness repeatedly at you and attack all enemies that come close to you. Because of Umbral Sight your darkvision works looking out, giving you advantage on all attacks, but nobody with darkvision can see you, giving them disadvantage while attacking you.
According to Sage Advice magical darkness only blocks darkvision if the description specifically says so. Then as Gloom Stalker level 9 you can Summon Fey (Tricksy) and order her/him/it to use it‘s fey step: darkness repeatedly at you and attack all enemies that come close to you. Because of Umbral Sight your darkvision works looking out, giving you advantage on all attacks, but nobody with darkvision can see you, giving them disadvantage while attacking you.
You now have Gloom Stalker‘s Shadow of Moil
While being in darkness you can see through is helpful having the enemy be charmed is better, so I would say this is flat weaker than a mirthful Fey.
Also it is a 5 foot cube, so this would only work for Gnomes, Goblins, Halflings or other Rangers that are less than 5 feet tall.
According to Sage Advice magical darkness only blocks darkvision if the description specifically says so. Then as Gloom Stalker level 9 you can Summon Fey (Tricksy) and order her/him/it to use it‘s fey step: darkness repeatedly at you and attack all enemies that come close to you. Because of Umbral Sight your darkvision works looking out, giving you advantage on all attacks, but nobody with darkvision can see you, giving them disadvantage while attacking you.
You now have Gloom Stalker‘s Shadow of Moil
While being in darkness you can see through is helpful having the enemy be charmed is better, so I would say this is flat weaker than a mirthful Fey.
Also it is a 5 foot cube, so this would only work for Gnomes, Goblins, Halflings or other Rangers that are less than 5 feet tall.
Charm is good, of course, but they would get a saving roll. And regarding the cube: There are a couple of tweets by Jeremy Crawford in which he pointed out that there are many ways to place a cube, nowhere in the rules is written that it must be placed flat on the ground (or your battlemap grid). The diagonal of a 5‘ cube is ~8.6‘. With an average height of 6‘ there‘s still plenty of darkness all around you. But of course this is debatable by your DM, in our group it has been long ruled in favor of creativity (mostly with Minor Illusion).
According to Sage Advice magical darkness only blocks darkvision if the description specifically says so. Then as Gloom Stalker level 9 you can Summon Fey (Tricksy) and order her/him/it to use it‘s fey step: darkness repeatedly at you and attack all enemies that come close to you. Because of Umbral Sight your darkvision works looking out, giving you advantage on all attacks, but nobody with darkvision can see you, giving them disadvantage while attacking you.
You now have Gloom Stalker‘s Shadow of Moil
While being in darkness you can see through is helpful having the enemy be charmed is better, so I would say this is flat weaker than a mirthful Fey.
Also it is a 5 foot cube, so this would only work for Gnomes, Goblins, Halflings or other Rangers that are less than 5 feet tall.
Charm is good, of course, but they would get a saving roll. And regarding the cube: There are a couple of tweets by Jeremy Crawford in which he pointed out that there are many ways to place a cube, nowhere in the rules is written that it must be placed flat on the ground (or your battlemap grid). The diagonal of a 5‘ cube is ~8.6‘. With an average height of 6‘ there‘s still plenty of darkness all around you. But of course this is debatable by your DM, in our group it has been long ruled in favor of creativity (mostly with Minor Illusion).
There is plenty of darkness around you, but there is plenty not around you too. if you turn it on its end like that you have your feet and probably part of the crown of your head, not to mention your arms. That makes for partial cover perhaps but they can still see you (or more accurately parts of you) without darkvision.
Sure there is a save against charm, but look at it this way if he fails his save he can't harm you at all. Not being able to attack is more debilitating than attacking with disadvantage from being invisible even if you get that ruling. With Tricsky he can also use breath weapons or AOEs with no degradation at all since he knows exactly where you are. On top of that if you charm him he can't attack the Fey either. If your Fey Fey steps and puts darkness on you, the bad guy can still cut down the Fey and end this game until you cast the spell again.
I agree that a 5ft darkness cube probably doesn't fully cover a number of races unless they squeeze or at least duck (though interestingly enough, Bugbear probably could fit without penalty in this case thanks to Sneaky).
However, I've rarely seen the combat value in single target charmed conditions by themselves, to be honest -- at least on the players' side. Yes, it prevents the target from attacking you, but it also prevents everyone from attacking that target (lest they do damage to it) while still allowing the target to attack everyone else in the party. My most common result from charming things in the past has been that it breaks quick from someone needing to hit it. Ranger Spell DCs are also probably not the highest in the first place.
However, I've rarely seen the combat value in single target charmed conditions by themselves, to be honest -- at least on the players' side. Yes, it prevents the target from attacking you, but it also prevents everyone from attacking that target (lest they do damage to it) while still allowing the target to attack everyone else in the party. My most common result from charming things in the past has been that it breaks quick from someone needing to hit it. Ranger Spell DCs are also probably not the highest in the first place.
I think you are discounting the value that goes with positioning and action economy. Ideally you make it so that enemy can't get to anyone else to attack them -. block his path, have the Fey try to grapple him or make him move around you so he does not have enough movement to get to someone else. If you can't do that you position yourself so you get two opportunity attacks on him when he moves (one from you and one from the Fey) or alternatively he has to use a disengage and waste an action. Yes that cancels the charm if the AOOs hit, but the value of 2 off-turn attacks is higher than disadvantage on an enemy attacks I think.
Also, we are comparing the value of attacking the Ranger with disadvantage to the value of not being able to attack either the Ranger or the Fey at all. If the bad guy can just ignore the Ranger and go attack someone else while he is charmed then he can just ignore the Ranger and go attack someone else if the Ranger is covered in darkness too!
The rest of the party does have to concentrate on other enemies while he is charmed, but they can usually do that rather easily.
According to Sage Advice magical darkness only blocks darkvision if the description specifically says so. Then as Gloom Stalker level 9 you can Summon Fey (Tricksy) and order her/him/it to use it‘s fey step: darkness repeatedly at you and attack all enemies that come close to you. Because of Umbral Sight your darkvision works looking out, giving you advantage on all attacks, but nobody with darkvision can see you, giving them disadvantage while attacking you.
You now have Gloom Stalker‘s Shadow of Moil
While being in darkness you can see through is helpful having the enemy be charmed is better, so I would say this is flat weaker than a mirthful Fey.
Also it is a 5 foot cube, so this would only work for Gnomes, Goblins, Halflings or other Rangers that are less than 5 feet tall.
Charm is good, of course, but they would get a saving roll. And regarding the cube: There are a couple of tweets by Jeremy Crawford in which he pointed out that there are many ways to place a cube, nowhere in the rules is written that it must be placed flat on the ground (or your battlemap grid). The diagonal of a 5‘ cube is ~8.6‘. With an average height of 6‘ there‘s still plenty of darkness all around you. But of course this is debatable by your DM, in our group it has been long ruled in favor of creativity (mostly with Minor Illusion).
There is plenty of darkness around you, but there is plenty not around you too. if you turn it on its end like that you have your feet and probably part of the crown of your head, not to mention your arms. That makes for partial cover perhaps but they can still see you (or more accurately parts of you) without darkvision.
Sure there is a save against charm, but look at it this way if he fails his save he can't harm you at all. Not being able to attack is more debilitating than attacking with disadvantage from being invisible even if you get that ruling. With Tricsky he can also use breath weapons or AOEs with no degradation at all since he knows exactly where you are. On top of that if you charm him he can't attack the Fey either. If your Fey Fey steps and puts darkness on you, the bad guy can still cut down the Fey and end this game until you cast the spell again.
I agree that a 5ft darkness cube probably doesn't fully cover a number of races unless they squeeze or at least duck (though interestingly enough, Bugbear probably could fit without penalty in this case thanks to Sneaky).
However, I've rarely seen the combat value in single target charmed conditions by themselves, to be honest -- at least on the players' side. Yes, it prevents the target from attacking you, but it also prevents everyone from attacking that target (lest they do damage to it) while still allowing the target to attack everyone else in the party. My most common result from charming things in the past has been that it breaks quick from someone needing to hit it. Ranger Spell DCs are also probably not the highest in the first place.
I think you are discounting the value that goes with positioning and action economy. Ideally you make it so that enemy can't get to anyone else to attack them -. block his path, have the Fey try to grapple him or make him move around you so he does not have enough movement to get to someone else. If you can't do that you position yourself so you get two opportunity attacks on him when he moves (one from you and one from the Fey) or alternatively he has to use a disengage and waste an action. Yes that cancels the charm if the AOOs hit, but the value of 2 off-turn attacks is higher than disadvantage on an enemy attacks I think.
Also, we are comparing the value of attacking the Ranger with disadvantage to the value of not being able to attack either the Ranger or the Fey at all. If the bad guy can just ignore the Ranger and go attack someone else while he is charmed then he can just ignore the Ranger and go attack someone else if the Ranger is covered in darkness too!
The rest of the party does have to concentrate on other enemies while he is charmed, but they can usually do that rather easily.