Unearthed Arcana Unearthed Arcana: Mages of Strixhaven

An Unearthed Arcana playtest document for the upcoming Strixhaven: Curriculum of Chaos hardcover has been released by WotC!

"Become a student of magic in this installment of Unearthed Arcana! This playtest document presents five subclasses for Dungeons & Dragons. Each of these subclasses allows you to play a mage associated with one of the five colleges of Strixhaven, a university of magic. These subclasses are special, with each one being available to more than one class."

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It's 9 pages, and contains five subclasses, one for each the Strixhaven colleges:

• Lorehold College, dedicated to the pursuit of history by conversing with ancient spirits and understanding the whims of time itself
• Prismari College, dedicated to the visual and performing arts and bolstered with the power of the elements
• Quandrix College, dedicated to the study and manipulation of nature’s core mathematic principles
• Silverquill College, dedicated to the magic of words, whether encouraging speeches that uplift allies or piercing wit that derides foes
• Witherbloom College, dedicated to the alchemy of life and death and harnessing the devastating energies of both

 

[Yaarel]

That isn’t really accurate. The Tashas options are options, not changes.

I am taking for granted there is plenty of time for more stuff between now and 2024.

 

[Minigiant]

The PHB and Xanathar's both point towards flavor options to minimize and essentially eliminate the Patron as an active entity
A Warlock is a short-rest recharging full caster, the flavor can be negotiated.

A Warlock Patron doesn't have to be active. They are just the source that unlocks a warlock's access to power.

In MTG, warlocks still make pacts and deals with patrons. It's just that demons, devils, and other dark powers are much weaker in MTG and cannot revoke power. They are D&D warlocks will weaker but more numerous patrons.

Warlocks aren't just short rest wizards. WoTC would have to rewrite spell lists to make them color based and not class based for that. Something I doubt they will.

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

I can see this multi class subclass support working to tackle some Dark Sun dilemmas.

Gladiator could be used with Barbarian, Fighter, and Rogue
Templar could be used with Paladin, Sorcerer, and Warlock

Fantastic game design innovation here.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I am taking for granted there is plenty of time for more stuff between now and 2024.

And you think that what comes in those years will be changes, rather than additions?

 

[AliasBot]

Oh, well if you want it to be a bargain with dark powers it should definitely be a student loan rather than a scholarship

Well that's just canon.

 

[Yaarel]

And you think that what comes in those years will be changes, rather than additions?

I expect the future options will continue to be daring and innovative.

The overall impact will be significant.

I consider the revamp of races to be significant, albeit publically necessary. (And I like the customization.)

Setting feats at first level is awesome and welcome.

The fixes for the Players Handbook like for the Ranger, are significant, even if necessary.

The Strixhaven shared subclasses are less impacting, but if they tweak the classes to make shared subclasses work better, that will be significant.

One can call these options if one wants to, but if all in one book and easily accessible, the feel will differ from 2014.

I expect more to come before 2024.

 

[Hussar]

MTG typically don't have specific patrons but they still some sort of black mana creature to start the process and draw power from.

What makes you a warlock is that power from another being unlocks or fuels your spells. A caster who uses black mana but never draws power from a black creature would advance as a wizard, sorcerer, cleric, or bard, not a warlock.

Umm, ok, I'm not a MtG player and I don't know the setting specific lore.

But, isn't this setting a series of really big, old, magic schools? Like sort of Hogwarts/Unseen University/Candlekeep kind of thing? As in a massive repository of lore, magic and books and books of knowledge wot man was not meant for? That sort of thing?

And you seriously can't envisage a warlock at this school? Really? Everything from Rincewind reading a magic book and having this world altering sentient spell take up residence in his cranium to the standard "You read books of very bad stuff and the very bad stuff took notice of you". Good grief, a warlock is perfectly in keeping with the genre.

 

[PsyzhranV2]

Just so everybody knows, there are Warlocks both attending Strixhaven and as part of their faculty. Albeit from a reading of the wiki, I don't see an explanation of what makes them Warlocks in MtG terms as opposed to other types of spellcasters, or where they got their powers from. Just that they typically work with Black Mana.

Silverquill Warlocks: Breena, Embrose, Fain, Killian
Witherbloom Warlocks: Gyome, Tivash, Valentin

 

[Minigiant]

Umm, ok, I'm not a MtG player and I don't know the setting specific lore.

But, isn't this setting a series of really big, old, magic schools? Like sort of Hogwarts/Unseen University/Candlekeep kind of thing? As in a massive repository of lore, magic and books and books of knowledge wot man was not meant for? That sort of thing?

And you seriously can't envisage a warlock at this school? Really? Everything from Rincewind reading a magic book and having this world altering sentient spell take up residence in his cranium to the standard "You read books of very bad stuff and the very bad stuff took notice of you". Good grief, a warlock is perfectly in keeping with the genre.

I have no problems with Warlocks being enrolled in a school.
I just don't like a warlock's patron being the school or college within the school.

 

[THEMNGMNT]

Remember "modularity"?

This is what it looks like.

New setting that doesn't quite fit the traditional approach to classes = new class/subclass mechanics.

This isn't a preview of 6E. It's just the designers doing what they said they were going to do in 5E.