It’s time to go back to school with Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos, the new adventure setting for D&D 5e!
Many schools promise their students a magical college experience, but Strixhaven literally means it!
Mysteries and intriguing adventures abound in the hallowed halls of this magical university. Combined with campus hijinks, new friendships, and keeping your grades up, this is one of the most unique releases for 5e to date!
So today we’ll be reviewing Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos to see if this prestigious university is right for you!
Overview – What is Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos?
Attend the most highly respected school of magic in the world and embark on thrilling adventures with your classmates!
As a group of the newest students at the prestigious Strixhaven University, you’ll be doing more than just learning about the many wonders of arcane magic!
With Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos, you’ll get to explore every nook and cranny of the campus while taking on challenging quests. Make new friends (and enemies) as you navigate your way through classes, exams, and after-school activities.
Who knows what secrets await you at Strixhaven Academy?
Just make sure to keep up with your studies as you work towards graduation! Having Strixhaven University as your alma mater is one of the most prestigious accomplishments one can have!
What Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos Is Not
All of the hype before the release of Strixhaven seemed to indicate that this was a campaign setting book. I initially expected something similar to Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft or the Guildmaster’s Guide to Ravnica.
The real “meat and potatoes” here are the four adventures.
There’s enough lore about Strixhaven University to establish a baseline for the adventure’s setting, but it’s about 20% of the total book. DMs are definitely encouraged to add their own elements to tailor the school setting to their group’s tastes.
If you’re looking for a book with a collection of new character options, magic items, and lore, this isn’t for you.
Psst! But you can also check out my review of Fizban’s Treasury of Dragons!
Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos thrives by being a contained environment. The majority of this book’s contents rely heavily on this setting and can’t be easily incorporated into most other non-Strixhaven campaigns.
In other words, this book is for Strixhaven students only.
Who is Strixhaven For?
If the idea of “Harry Potter meets D&D” gets you excited, Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos is for you!
College life introduces new mechanics that are unlikely to appear in other types of campaigns. This means things like exams, extracurricular activities, and student jobs in addition to adventuring!
Of course, you’ll also be expected to socialize with fellow students around Strixhaven University…
Who knows, you might even find yourself becoming more than friends with some! The relationship mechanics are one of the more interesting additions in this book.
All of this combines to create a truly unique experience that is perfectly suited to Strixhaven’s target audience. The magical school setting allows for a type of storytelling that’s different from most campaigns while still being unmistakably D&D 5e.
If you’ve ever wanted to experience life and adventure in a magical school setting, there’s plenty for your group to sink their teeth into at Strixhaven.
Just note that the mysteries are the big draw of the adventures within Strixhaven. Unless you’re planning on being the DM for a Strixhaven campaign, there’s nothing in this book for you but spoilers.
Full Review of Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos
Now that we’ve got an overview of what Strixhaven is and isn’t, let’s get into the details!
The book itself is 224 pages with 7 chapters and an appendix with a map of the campus. Additionally, the book includes a full double-sided poster with campus maps to make navigating Strixhaven easier for your group.
The Setting of Strixhaven
Chapter 1 brings you up to speed on the setting of Strixhaven University.
Strixhaven University is made up of five colleges: Lorehold, Prismari, Quandrix, Silverquill, and Witherbloom. Each of these colleges was founded by five ancient dragons is dedicated to a specialization of study.
| School | Field | Description |
| Lorehold | Archaeomancy | History, Archaeology |
| Prismari | Elemental Arts | Magic Art using the Elements |
| Quandrix | Numeromancy | Mathematics |
| Silverquill | Eloquence | Writing, Rhetoric, Poetry, Oration |
| Witherbloom | Essence Studies | Life and Death |
The central campus of Strixhaven connects the five colleges as a large common area. Here students will find the Biblioplex (library), Strixhaven Stadium, the school’s café, and more.
This chapter also includes information about student life at Strixhaven and the general “how things work” of the university.
It also makes for a great briefing about what is expected from the player characters.
Remember: you’re playing students and therefore need to also keep your instructors happy in addition to your adventures. Nobody wants to find themselves in detention or getting expelled!
Additionally, socializing around campus is expected just as much as getting good grades. First-year students will be spending a lot of time on the central campus mingling with other students and learning what Strixhaven has to offer.
Character Options
As I mentioned, there are not many character options in Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos. A large chunk of what is included doesn’t work so well outside of an adventure taking place at Strixhaven University.
While some may complain about that, I think it’s actually not a bad thing.
It may make it seem incredibly niche, but I think some degree of specialization in the character options is necessary for a setting like this to function.
New Race Option: Owlkin
Owlkin are the newest race option to D&D 5e. As the name implies, they resemble humanoid owls with wide wings and other owl features on a humanoid body.
Players who choose to play an Owlkin can choose whether they would prefer to be a Small or Medium creature.
As expected, Owlkin have excellent darkvision and are able to fly as long as they aren’t wearing medium or heavy armor. Thanks to their silent feathers, Owlkin also start with proficiency in the Stealth skill.
Few things are as associated with arcane study as owls, so the Owlkin are right at home in Strixhaven! Unlike the other character options, they are more than capable of working in non-Strixhaven campaigns as well.
Colleges and Backgrounds
There are five new backgrounds available for you to choose from. Each of these backgrounds corresponds to one of the five colleges at Strixhaven.
While you aren’t officially in your chosen college until your second year at Strixhaven University, you still start with the background of that college.
The assumption is that you already have some affinity for that college’s area of expertise due to previous study before coming to Strixhaven or just a general knack for the subject.
Each background gives you appropriate starting skill and tool proficiencies in addition to equipment. It also gives you access to bonus spells appropriate to the theme of the college.
The college you choose is also important as it relates to the free Strixhaven Initiate feat you gain from these backgrounds. You’ll gain two cantrips and a first-level spell based on your college’s spell list.
You’ll also find extra guidance with suggestions for how to play a student from your chosen college if you need a starting off point.
Spells and Magic Items
Five new spells are included in Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos. They are decent and interesting options, but there’s not necessarily a standout “must-pick” option.
As spells created at Strixhaven, these are available to any character who has taken a Strixhaven background and meets the class/level requirements of the spell.
The magic items in Chapter 2 comprise the essentials for any student: textbooks, stuffed animal mascot, and caffeine.
I got a good chuckle out of the Bottle of Endless Coffee in this section.
As far as usefulness goes, though, the textbooks are fittingly the most important. You get a primer based on your college that gives you extra abilities and bonuses that make sense for the school.
The Adventures
Chapters 3 through 6 include the four adventures within Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos. Each of these adventures represents a year a Strixhaven University.
Because Chapter 3 is your first year, it also includes the rules/mechanics related to other essential aspects of student life. This includes your extracurricular activities (and the bonuses they provide), jobs, relationships, and how to run exams.
This is also the chapter in which you are introduced to several important NPC students that the players will encounter in their time at Strixhaven. There are 18 in total with included bios, activities, personalities, and general locations.
From there, these chapters are all about the adventures you can have at Strixhaven. If you run all four adventures as written, you’ll graduate at level 10!
| Adventure | Starting Level | School Year |
| Campus Kerfuffle | 1 | 1 |
| Hunt for Mage Tower | 4 | 2 |
| The Magister’s Masquerade | 6 | 3 |
| A Reckoning in Ruins | 8 | 4 |
Each of these adventures offers plenty of mystery, adventure, and excitement. There’s a lot going on in them that captures the imagination in ways that are strongly reminiscent of a certain famous “boy who lived.”
Bestiary
Last but not least, Chapter 7 is the bestiary. Here you can find the stat blocks for the various friends and foes you’re likely to encounter that are unique to Strixhaven.
Statblocks include members of each college based on their position, each of the Draconic founders, and threats/enemies unique to this adventure.
All in all, it’s a decent chapter. Personally, I would have liked to see more unique enemies for this release, but it’s not like there aren’t tons of monsters already published for 5e.
The inclusions in this section do a lot to capture the magical wonder (and danger!) that one would expect from this kind of setting.
Is Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos Worth Buying?
Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos is fully aware of who it’s for, the type of stories it’s telling, and what it’s about.
This is a release that I largely see people falling into one of two camps with: “love it” or “forget it.”
For those who have always wanted to experience the magic of worlds like Harry Potter at their game table, Strixhaven is simply excellent. It’s a self-contained story with enough structure to keep it intact but without feeling like the campaign is just on rails.
A major focus with Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos is roleplaying, investigation, and problem-solving. Not only do you have to brave challenges on your adventures, but you need to also juggle your responsibilities as a student.
I will say that this isn’t an adventure for every type of character though. That’s something to bear in mind.
Look… there’s plenty of reminders that anyone can enroll at Strixhaven even if they aren’t typically a spellcaster class.
But it’s a magical university… With some shoehorning, you can probably make just about anything fit in this story. However, there’s a specific type of character (i.e. spellcasters) that this adventure just works best with.
Beyond that, there might be some useful resources here for DMs who are looking for more stat blocks to add to their arsenal in other campaigns. That said, I wouldn’t bother if that’s the only thing here of interest to you.
Conclusion – Review of Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos
Between Strixhaven, Theros, and Ravnica, we’re seeing a trend of settings from Magic: The Gathering being incorporated into D&D 5e.
All in all, I think it’s actually pretty interesting. The settings are exciting and give even more options for what types of campaigns your group can have.
I think it’s safe to say that Wizards of the Coast is going to continue releasing books from MTG settings. In that case, I’ll be holding my breath for Mirrodin and/or Kamigawa 5e sourcebooks.
But I’m rambling, so I’ll get back to the point…
Reading through this book several times, Strixhaven scratched an itch that I didn’t realize I had.
I’ve always thought it would be fun to do a magical university adventure and Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos provides exactly that while also setting a blueprint for how homebrew adventures in such a setting can work.
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I have mixed opinion about Strixhaven.
It is a very interesting setting, light-hearted mainly and touching the teams of teaching, that are dear to me. The book gives lots of very good NPCs (as from MtG and created for the book), and it is extremely fun to roleplay.
The Colleges themselves are also quite interesting and appealing, and a very good campaign can be built.
That said… The book is severely lacking in many aspects. It gives very little amount of lore, which seems to be current WotC trend. Yes, MtG team did not flesh out Arcavios in general – but a new race was introduced and we got nothing about Owlin culture and ways of life.
(So my wife and I had to built it from scratch. Having a wife who is a player and zoological enthusiast helps immensely, I say)
The assumed campaign seems like it was written for school and much junior age of characters if not the players, and quite often it seems to be very loosely connected. And also we have the trope of “Adults/Teachers are useless” in play, which is really annoying. To clarify: I am a university teacher myself, so it’s personal.)
From the mechanical point of view lots ot NPC stats are… questionable at the very least.
However it can be made really good and I hope that I manage that. As I like making characters and building the world… well, I’ve already rewritten lots of things and got backstories, conflicts and inspirations to fellow students.
Hi V-Z!
I understand what you mean and agree with many of the points that you’re making.
This was a unique review for me to write since I was initially indifferent to the theme. But when I realized that I’m not necessarily the target audience for it, it helped me open my mind and look at things from the perspective of the younger crowd that this book seems primarily meant for.
By the end of it, I did end up enjoying it but in a very different way than I approach pretty much any other D&D book.
I would love to know what you and your wife came up with for the Owlin!
As a university teacher, were there any other things that you added to your Strixhaven game based on your experience?
Oh, that will be a long post, I warn you…)
On the Owlin. We’re still fleshing them out, but…
First of all, we added a few racial traits, as, frankly, Owlin are lacking that. The Loxodons, Minotaurs and Dhampir are present in the book, but they have a whole list of features. Then…
Real owls are a symbol of wisdom, but they are quite harsh birds. They usually don’t build their nests, but throw other birds out and invade their homes. And they are really different within their species by size and ferocity. And they are territorial: if a person takes a horned owl in the house, and said owl dislikes any family member.. well, it’s somehow worse than being disliked by a Siamese cat.
So, we transferred these qualities to sapient species and got the following:
-Owlin distinguish their society according to their species. Eagle owls are usually warlords and warriors, long-eared owls – mystics and scholars, and so on.
-Owlin had quite a lot of wars and enslavement in their past, and the majority of their cities are built not by themselves. The exception is one kind of them (I honestly forgot the name) who are respected as builders and crafters.
-So, in the Age of Blood Owlin could be quite fierce. And some of them are arrogant too, as they conquered the sky, being a winged species.
It is not a pleasant image, but after that we added a layer of progress – Owlin society is changing. Some influential family are progressivists, and the family of my wife’s character is among them. That is why she is a student of Strixhaven and a wizard, despite being an eagle owl. And the society in general is shifting towards much better future (having ties with all-welcoming Strixhaven helps).
Now, on the university.
The problem was, that I could not restructure the system without depriving Strixhaven of its peculiar features – duality of deans, magic factors, clubs and so on. So, I did certain changes beginning from the 2nd year.
First of all, I made the year more clear. It is divided into trimesters, with exams at the end of each trimester.
Second, I made a certain specializing progress through years. A first-year student stuides and chooses a College. During the second year a student (under two counsellors’ guidance) chooses a side of a College philosophy. During the third year a student chooses and masters a specialty among given in the book (and yes, I took time to bind certain bonuses, abiliies and spells to each specialty). And during the fourth year the student masters advanced applications of the specialty under a special tutelage.
Third, at the beginning of the second year a student should begin preparing a project, special for each College (work of art for Prismari, historical research for Lorehold and so on). It will be evaluated at the middle of the third year, but it helps to dive into College philosophy.
(I am proud of a Silverquill type of course. You should make a speech, passionate and convincing enough to touch the hearts of the audience. The catch? The audience is chosen just before the test, so you’ll never know who you’ll need to impress. And the circumstances will be always different – try practicing rhetorics in complete darkness, among the storm or raging battle. A Silverquill speaker should be eloquent in any situation!)
Fourth, the professors are not useless. Mavinda, for example, actively helps the characters, and they can get a consultation with any professor, if they haven’t ruined the relationship with this very teacher.
(I am putting aside Professor Onyx here. She is not in Strixhaven mainly for teaching, after all).
Fifth, I reworked the named NPCs, as their statblocks caused a huge amount of WTF in me. So, I took professors and students, assigned a class and subclass for everyone and fleshed them out. So, they are really developing and may share quite interesting things with the characters… or use them against the characters, depending on relationships.
But yes, the work is still in progress.
This is seriously some absolutely impressive and inspired stuff, V-Z.
From the worldbuilding to the structure of the school and everything. I totally love and agree with your design decisions. If I end up running a Strixhaven adventure (which now I REALLY want to), I’ll definitely be following your example on this!
I think that the concept of duality is a lot of what makes the adventure pop. Just as there is a duality within each area of study, there is pressure to do the adventure while also keeping up with grades and the university experience.
However, your ideas really add that extra pressure to the university experience in a good way that also brings in extra considerations and a sense of achievement for students/characters belonging to each school.
This is some seriously awesome stuff and I really appreciate you taking the time to share it!
Thank you for the kind words. As I said, it is still work in progress, and much of the material is unstructured, but I’ll deal with it, and may combine the changes into a single document. Funny enough, I usually write down any RP stuff in English; that’s easier.
And yes, the duality was the fact that attracted me, especially after I read about MtG colour system a bit more. My current players seem to prefer Order, Radiance, Growth and Expression, but who knows what may change.
I also try to highlight at least one lesson from each of the subjects, that helps both to immerse the characters and present various NPCs. Well, I admit, I have a professional love for such things.)
Currently I am fleshing out Arcavios. By the way, you have helped me! Due to your review I read the Radiant Citadel and now I am thinking how to put these cities and countries on Arcavios map.
It seems that my replies to Strixhaven are being eaten by Mage Hunters.) Anyway, to be short: I hope to make a document of all my work on the university in future. And I thank you for the Radiant Citadel review, as it inspired me to read the book – and use it to flesh out the map of Arcavios.
Hi V-Z!
Yes, for some reason the Mage Hunters caught your comments again, haha.
If you make that document, please let me know. It sounds great and I’d love to read more! 🙂
Also glad to know that you found my review of Radiant Citadel helpful. I had so much fun with that one!
Not a problem, Just state where to send, when I’ll finish with the document.
Sorry, just for clarity: was my answer not approved, or some error wiped it? Not a problem in the first case, but just to know.
I was wondering what happened. It ended up getting caught by my spam filter for some reason even though your other comments haven’t been.
Got it restored and approved though! 🙂
Thank you, sorry for bothering. I hope, the post was informative.)
Not a bother at all, friend. Just responded to it!
I haven’t seen my spam filter catch a genuine comment before, but I’m glad you pointed it out so I could restore it! 🙂