D&D 5E Brainstorming Wizard Subclasses

[Minigiant]

One thing I would have loved and am doing with wizards is the idea of Arcane Quirks. There would be positive and negative quirks and major and minor quirks.

Different Wizard subclasses would have the wizard choose positive and negative, minor or major quirks.

A Magic Academy Wizard would only have minor positive quirks as the school would drill out bad habits and won't pass you if you learn the material.

A Magic School Dropout would still have a bunch of minor negative quirks and a major positive quirks due to not maintaining the program.

A Sidhe Mage would learn the slow methodical process to the elven arcane legacy. The mage would be of elven age range or have their age magically lengthen. They would focus on the elven and fey quirks: Divination Focus, Enchantment Focus, Illusion Focus, Teleportation Focus, Psychic Damage, Speed, Low Power, Low Toughness, Overconfidence,

A Wizard of Legacy would gain the quirks of the master they apprenticed under. Leaning heavily on Major positive and negative quirks.

The Bloodline Wizard would be rather sorcerous but come with all the negative quirks of being bred for magic or being in a position of power over your trainer.

 

[ECMO3]

So the recent thread about the wizard class got me thinking. I think that most of the schools of magic are thematically pretty weak and muddled, so I am trying to condense the wizard subclasses to give them more district identity.


These are my ideas thus far:

The School of Forces. Also known as battle mages due the destructive power of their spells. This is the school that concentrates on manipulating the matter and energy. It is most obviously "wizardly" and has flashiest magic. Mostly an evocator with some stuff from transmutation and abjuration tacked on. The classic blaster wizard.

The School of Gates. Also known as summoners. This is the wizard who studies the planes and gateways between them. They summon extraplanar entities and commune with them. Basically a combination of conjurer and diviner. Probably should have some mechanics to allow a permanent pet, a boosted planar familiar at the least.

The School of Mirrors. Also known as the dream weavers. Thematically enchantment and illusionism are very similar, so this just basically combines these two. Probably leaning more on the illusion side, as enchantment is already pretty decently covered by the bards.

The School of Shadows. Also known as necromancers and death mages. Necromancy is the thematically the strongest of the existing schools and the subclass has pretty decent mechanics too. Perhaps add some other shadow and creepy stuff.


What do you think? Are these thematically clear enough? If these were the only four wizard subclasses in a game you were playing, would you feel satisfied? Do you think there are some some significant themes these are missing? What sort of mechanics would you want to see for such subclasses?

I think those work fine as additional subclasses, but I don't think they should replace the other subclasses.

Also I don't think all of the current subclasses are weak, some are but others aren't. I think Enchantment, Necromancy, Bladesong, War Magic and Abjuration are all stronger thematically than these proposed subclasses are.