D&D 5E Strixhaven Table of Contents

Strixhaven's table of contents has appeared on Reddit. The book contains 7 chapters, plus an appendix, including four adventures.

1. Basic setting information, about 20 pages
2. Character options, about 22 pages
3. 4 adventures organized in a unified campaign, about 32 pages per adventure (plus general campaign organizational tools which take up about 20 pages)
4. NPCs & monsters, about 42 pages

D&D 5E - Strixhaven Previews Start to Appear

It's that time in the D&D pre-release publicity phase where previews of the upcoming book start to appear across the web on various sites. It looks like each site is getting a different college to preview -- Screenrant has Prismari, and Polygon has Silverquill, for example. There are 5 colleges...

www.enworld.org

D&D 5E - Strixhaven's Monsters: Groffs, Mage Hunters, & Oriq Recruiters

Gizmodo has a preview of Strixhaven: Curriculum of Chaos, showing off some of the new monsters in the book. The Oriq Recruiter is an agent of a dark mage cult; a Groff is a canine swamp creature; and a Mage Hunter is a spider-legged drone. The article also talks about trudges, daemogoths, the...

www.enworld.org

D&D 5E - Strixhaven Has Exams, Jobs, & Extracurricular Activities

It's IGN's turn to preview part of Strixhaven: Curriculum of Chaos, taking a look at exams, extracurricular guilds, and jobs. An example of an exam includes the Magical Physiologies exam, and a success gives them an advantage when fighting those creatures. The exams have a studying and a...

www.enworld.org

 

[Parmandur]

To be honest, I felt the same about Ravnica and Theros to a degree; there is scant enough world info beyond the Gods/Guilds to tell more than one solid story. This is not the feeling I got from the equally small amount of info in Eberron, Wildmount or Ravenloft, where even using just the 5e guides I feel I couldn't run through all the settings/villains/adventures I'd want to in one campaign.

I think the inherent issue with the MTG settings is they tend to be small in scope; We've been to Ravnica three times and each of them mostly fixated on the ten guilds vs. the actual city of Ravnica. (Only War of the Spark, which showed the Guilds and all the Planeswalkers united against an invasion, felt like a worthy story to adventure through). Theros has been about the plots of the gods, Strixhaven about the colleges, etc. What works for a CCG (a bunch of well-defined rival groups) doesn't translate well to a TTRPG (where PCs make characters out of the well-defined rival groups and... do... stuff...).

Honestly, the only set so far that felt like it could have been a good setting for multiple types of adventures is Innistrad, where in three sets they delt with the Return of the Angels, the Corruption of the Moon, and now the Endless Night all being separate but equally epic horror adventures. Of course, Innistrad is basically Ravenloft with a tighter focus anyway, so I can see why they didn't bother with a second Gothic Horror setting...

That's a rather anemic read on what Ravnica and Theros have on offer. Both books involve dozens of pages of adventure generation tables grounded in the Settings. There isn't anything to the world city outside of the Guilds, sure, but the Guilds are the entire point and material is given for innumerable campaigns based around them. Indeed, the point of the Setting is that there is nothing in the city outside of the Guilds, at all. They dominate every aspect of everyone's lives. Same with the Therosian deities.

This is definitely more limited, it feels like more Adventure generation material at least would be handy, though the campaign looks great as is.

 

[MockingBird]

I was under the impression this was an adventure first and foremost. Seems to be set up close to past adventures. Bulk of the book is adventure with dedicated section about the area the adventure takes place in. It's an interesting concept for an adventure. I feel like my kids would like this. Gonna need to flip through it in person though.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Both books involve dozens of pages of adventure generation tables grounded in the Settings.

I'm not a fan of random adventure tables, I can do that myself. What I am looking for in a setting book is lots of background detail to flesh out the experience.

 

[Azzy]

Yeah, I had no idea how much of this book was going to be take up by the adventure. It seems neat, but I'm not sure about getting it right away.

 

[darjr]

I think a lot of this book will have areas and places I can nab for magic schools my players happen across.

 

[Parmandur]

I'm not a fan of random adventure tables, I can do that myself. What I am looking for in a setting book is lots of background detail to flesh out the experience.

The thing about the random tables in Ravnica and Theros, is that they also provide those details. Even without rolling, the tables give solid ideas for how to play in the Setting.

 

[Parmandur]

I was under the impression this was an adventure first and foremost. Seems to be set up close to past adventures. Bulk of the book is adventure with dedicated section about the area the adventure takes place in. It's an interesting concept for an adventure. I feel like my kids would like this. Gonna need to flip through it in person though.

Yeah, they made it clear there would be a significant Campaign component, with four modules, but this is a larger percentage than I think a lot of us were expecting.

 

[lud]

I figured this would be a hybrid of setting and adventure, based on what was said, but this feels more like an adventure, as others have stated. We only get about 27 pages (27!) describing the setting. Here’s the breakdown:

setting details: 27 pages
Player material: 12 pages
NPCs and monsters: 42 pages
Adventure material: 142 pages

This feels like a disappointment for those who might want to use the setting and develop their own adventures. What makes Eberron so great is that you feel you could spend countless campaigns there. This feels like you get just enough info for a single campaign.

I guess I’m fine with it as it sounds like a lot of fun, but I think they should have advertised it as an adventure rather than a setting. It makes me question what is going to be meant by future “settings” books. For example, if we get a Spelljammer book, is it going to be a couple hundred pages detailing D&D in space and space travel, or is it going to be a little bit of that along with a big space adventure?

They are following the same pattern as the Paizo adventure path model.

Adventure material : 57-63 pages : 63-69%
Setting: 6 -12 pages : 7-13%
Options: 6 pages : 7%
NPCs and Monsters: 16 pages : 18%

Adventure material: 142 pages : 64%
setting details: 27 pages : 12%
Player material: 12 pages : 5%
NPCs and monsters: 42 pages : 19%

 

[lud]

Also, isn't is funny D&D releases a magic school oriented adventure path after Paizo published Strength of Thousands this year?

For those who don't follow Pathfinder : adventure paths #169 to #174, Strength of Thousands, place the players in the role of students at the Magaambya magic academy. Including material for interactions with other students, graduating, becoming teachers...

 

[Twiggly the Gnome]

I can see people wanting more background material on the world of Arcavios being disappointed. My intention is to mine the content to flesh out the town beneath the towers of Arcanix in Eberron, so it works for me. Also interested in the unique dragons for ideas on stating out the crown chimeras in my homebrew world.