Shadow Touched 5e
Published on March 12, 2022, Last modified on April 14th, 2022
Allowing you to draw on the powers of Shadowfell to turn invisible, Shadow Touched adds amazing utility to any class that is looking for a bit of stealth.

Tomasz Jedruszek - Wizards of the Coast - Shadowmage Infiltrator
Table of Contents
What is Shadow Touched in 5e?
Opposite the bright and whimsical world of the Feywild, the plane of shadow called Shadowfell exists. As a foil to the world of the fey, this plane is known as “a bleak, desolate place full of decay and death.”.
In Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything, we were granted two similar feats: Fey Touched gives a character the grace of the Feywild, while Shadow Touched embraced the darkness of Shadowfell.
How does Shadow Touched work?
After picking up this feat, you get to increase either your Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma by 1 (still capping at 20). Additionally, you get to learn the spell invisibility and one other 1st-level spell from the Illusion or Necromancy schools. Once per long rest, you can cast one of these spells at will without spending a spell slot. However, if you do have the spell slots to cast this at a higher level, you can.
Is Shadow Touched good?
In our 5e Feats Tier List, Shadow Touched was given an A Tier rating, making it an excellent pickup for specific classes.
Invisibility is one of the best low-level spells out there, but it is available to the majority of the caster classes (bard, sorcerer, warlock, and wizard) already. With this in mind, this Shadow Touched also includes an ASI to INT, WIS, and CHA. This makes Shadow Touched an amazing feat for druids, clerics, paladins, and rangers who want to pick up invisibility, another spell from the Illusion or Necromancy schools, and still pump their spellcasting ability. An interesting concept explored in the Shadow Touched and Fey Touched feats is they don’t require a spellcasting feature in order to pick up. This means that other stealth-aligned builds, like a rogue or Way of the Shadow monk can also pick this feat for once-a-day invisibility and added utility.
As for the 1st-level Illusion or Necromancy spell to grab, here are some stellar choices:
- Cause fear: Decent single-target debuff for a 1st-level spell slot, but will need a solid spellcasting modifier because it invokes a saving throw.
- Disguise self: Another solid infiltration spell that isn’t hampered much by the once-a-day casting because of the long duration.
- False life: 1d4 + 4 temporary hitpoints aren’t necessarily exciting, but it’s an excellent way to self-heal once per day at lower levels.
- Silent image: Really good utility spell, and can certainly make an impact once per day.
Which classes make the most of Shadow Touched?
The color code below has been implemented to help you identify, at a glance, how good the Shadow Touched feat is for a specific class/subclass. It’s not a hard rule, as there are plenty of sub-optimal builds for those who don’t want to min-max and prefer to have fun experiences.
- Red isn’t going to contribute to the effectiveness of your character build at all
- Orange is an OK option
- Green is a good option
- Blue is a great option, you should strongly consider this option for your character
- Sky Blue is an amazing option. If you do not take this option your character would not be optimized
Like the Fey Touched feat, Shadow Touched gives us many options on a free spell, and giving invisibility to any class is a significant boon on its own. Most classes can use this unless they don’t want to do any surveillance or stealth on rare occasions.
Conclusion
Like its twin Fey Touched, this feat is incredible for almost all classes. The free invisibility is no joke, and a stat bump is fantastic. Picking this feat is a solid choice for virtually any class, and we recommend taking a look at it whenever you have a feat available.
What are your thoughts on Shadow Touched? Are there any great combinations we missed today? Let us know in the comments below!