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Dungeons & Dragons Magic: The Gathering Strixhaven Campaign Will Feature Mechanics of 'What a Hot Mess College Life Can Be'


Dungeons & Dragons is getting another campaign based on a world of Magic: The Gathering, and the upcoming crossover book is called Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos, which is based on the recently-released set, Strixhaven: School of Mages. The designers at Wizards of the Coast have to come up with ways to make existing mechanics and characters from the collectible card game fit into D&D's set of established rules, and the team behind the new campaign book are also challenged to bring the colllege experience to the new campaign.

Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos
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Credit: Wizards of the Coast

Here's what principal designer Jeremy Crawford said during Monday's press conference:

"As we reflected on our own experience as university students, we looked at not only how much excitement there can be, but what a hot mess college life can be. The relationships you can build can become really dear and affectionate, but they can also go the other direction, and you can end up with a frenemy who might end up causing you trouble."

Strixhaven is an elite university for wizards, and it's located in the plane of Arcavios. Just like Hogwarts from the Harry Potter franchise, the students and teachers are divided among different groups. In Strixhaven, there are five colleges each associated with a dual-color combination of Magic. Silverquills (Black/White) use words as weapons through battle poetry and ink magic; Prismari draws the power of the elements to showcase creativity and theatrical performance; Witherbloom is focused on natural sciences; Lorehold is all about history, and Quandrix mages are ingenous math magicians. All players will get a free campaign feat that will grant them some magical abilities based on one of the colleges, so you don't have to use a magic-using class in a Strixhaven game.

"It's not so much a university to learn how to be a caster as it is a university to learn about magic and the application of magic and the existence of magic in the world," said Amanda Hamon, senior designer at Wizards of the Coast.

Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos
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Credit: Wizards of the Coast

The new campaign also has rules to simulate college life including working on campus and taking tests.

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"Depending on how well you do on your exams, which mostly consist of skill checks and a lot of flavor, you'll get bonuses going forward in the story," Hamon added.

The new campaign also has rules for building up relationships with other students. The book features personality profiles for 18 NPCs spread across the five Strixhaven colleges, and players can interact with them during relationship encounters. Decisions players make during these encounters could earn them new allies, or rivals who can ruin their plans.

Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos is scheduled to release on Nov. 16, and it's now available for preorder at Amazon. You can exclusively get a version of the book with an alternate cover art at local game stores.

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