The tide-swept beaches that line the coasts of the world are home to myriad tiny crabs that nest among the sand. The Crab of the Coast is the spirit of these lands. It has a steely, sand-colored shell, and it can blast pressurized jets of water from its mouth to strike its foes from afar.

The Crab is one of the least intelligent of the primal spirits. It thinks faster than it speaks, and it thinks very slowly. Dealing with the Crab is always a test of extreme patience, even for its champions, despite the fact that the Crab is relatively easy to please and understand for a primal spirit.

Primal Spirit Avatars

The wilderness in all its many forms — tundra, forest, desert, and other biomes — is not without awareness or agency. The land itself gives birth to mighty spirits, fey and elementals that are so ancient that they are largely forgotten except by the oldest in the multiverse. These primal spirits are all connected to a form of land, taking the shape of a plant or animal from their domains.

Though they are composed of powerful magic, these mighty spirits struggle to physically leave their ancient realms in some of the oldest parts of the Feywild: the savage wilds called the Spirit World. If their domains on the Material Plane are threatened, they project a weak reflection of their true nature, an avatar, to defend the land. These avatars take little effort for a primal spirit to control, and the spirit is not harmed if the avatar is slain.

Incarnations of Ancient Titans. The primal spirits are ancient beings that traversed the Feywild and the Material Plane when the world was young and the land was still forming. The spirits are each representations of the lands themselves. The majority of these spirits keep their ancient, true names a secret, though some are known by nicknames they have adopted for the benefit of mortals, such as Coyote or Greatmother Oak. Those nicknames have been used so often that they are now applied to any coyote or any oak tree, instead of merely the primal spirit, and the original names of these animals and plants have been lost.

Druids Serve as Champions. Primal spirits often require the aid of druids and archdruids to help defend their lands against despoilers. Druids can be trusted to act more swiftly and in more places than a spirit could possibly manage from their realm in the Feywild. Arch-druids can wield powerful enough magic to summon an avatar of the spirit without effort from the spirit itself, but primal spirits trust very few with this privilege. They entreat carefully with archdruids and only select their favorite among them as a champion who can conjure their avatar to aid both their goals.

Hatred for Despoilers. The spirits of nature despise those that would despoil nature in any of its forms. Not all forms of consumption earn the spirits' ire: the spirits themselves are often predator or prey, and understand that survival often means destruction. They despise the reckless and sometimes gleeful destruction of nature that has nothing to do with survival and too much to do with mortal flaws such as greed, pride, or ambition. This is what the spirits consider to be "despoiling."

Primal Nature. A primal spirit avatar doesn't require air, food, drink, or sleep.