The last thing that prospecting mages in Dungeons & Dragons 5E need is order. If you want to join the college in Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos, then you’re going to need to embrace some magic! While much of Strixhaven uses magic from traditional Dungeons & Dragons materials, there are a few spells that you can learn while at school. And, as may be expected from the title of the book, these spells are going to shake things up a bit! So, in our Strixhaven Spells guide, we’ll go over the five new spells from Strixhaven to see if you should pick them up for yourself!
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All New Spells From Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos
There are five brand-new magical spells that you can find in the new Strixhaven book. There is one 1st level spell and four 2nd level spells, meaning everything in this book is rather low-level. Thankfully, they are also a giant spread of utility, defense, and offense!
Silvery Barbs
The only 1st level spell in the book, Silvery Barbs is available for Bards, Sorcerers, and Wizards. As a reaction when someone within 60 feet succeeds on an attack, ability check, or saving throw, you can interrupt them. They must roll another d20 and use the lower roll. Then, you select another character within 60 feet of you. That creature gains advantage on their next attack roll, ability check, or saving throw.
This is a very interesting spell! This is not disadvantage but instead is rerolling a d20. That means it stacks with disadvantage, and doesn’t get canceled by advantage! You can really ruin an opponent’s day, especially since the wording on Legendary Resistance seems like it can get canceled by this… Talk to your DM about that one!
The rough part is making a decision on when you spend this. You can use it on your own spells to ensure that they are successful, or do that for another allied spellcaster. You can use it defensively by using it on an attack roll or when the target makes an ability check you don’t want.
Every party is going to have a character that is at least decent at attack rolls, so there will always be a good target to throw the buff to. Worst case scenario, you can buff a saving throw for a minute. Nice!
Overall, this is a really impactful 1st level spell. While it might not be quite as strong as Shield, it can be nearly as effective, and applies in a few more situations.
Borrowed Knowledge
This 2nd level Divination spell can be learned by the Bard, Cleric, Warlock, and Wizard. For an hour after you cast Borrowed Knowledge, you become proficient in a single skill that you weren’t proficient in before. You cannot have multiple instances of this spell active at a time.
Not fantastic. Parties tend to be well-trained in skills that work for them. In most cases, you’ll have someone to cover every base that you need, doing what they do best. While a Cleric might be able to use this spell to become good at Persuasion, the Bard will be able to Persuade much more effectively every time.
What this does work well with is in campaigns where the party is expected to be split. In a party, a Wizard might need Deception to avoid a bad situation. And a Warlock might want some Religion so that they can check a suspicious holy symbol. If you don’t have your party members nearby, these time-sensitive checks can – and will – run away from you.
Because of this, this spell works great for Clerics and Wizards. Bards and Warlocks don’t have enough spells known to take on such a specific spell. Bards should have more than enough skills to work with, anyways!
Kinetic Jaunt
This 2nd level spell is a transmutation effect. Kinetic Jaunt can be learned by Artificers, Bards, Sorcerers, and Wizards. For the next minute (as long as you concentrate), you gain 10 feet of movement speed and you don’t provoke opportunity attacks. In addition, you can move through creatures’ spaces without provoking and it doesn’t count as difficult terrain. If you end your turn in someone’s space, you get booted to the nearest available space and take a bit of damage.
This is a lot of lost magic for not many benefits. The only significant benefit is the ability to move through a creature’s space. Usually, you just can’t do that if you’re against an enemy. Now you can shuffle right past the Fighter to attack the Wizard behind them! Or, you can escape someone who is blocking the way.
Now, there is a small issue… Misty Step is usually much stronger than this. It gives you 30 feet of movement that doesn’t provoke, ignores other creatures, and even ignores flight restrictions. The only place where Kinetic Jaunt is better is when you need that 10 feet every turn, and you need to avoid being grabbed every turn. The benefits are fringe, minor, and other spells normally cover your escape better.
If you want this to be a core part of your build, melee Artificers and Bards can occasionally use the movement speed buff. They can quickly move through enemies to get to priority targets and can make good use of the lack of provoking by enemies. Just make sure you don’t lose your Concentration too easily! Invest in the War Magic feat if you want to dance through the battlefield effectively.
Vortex Warp
This Conjuration spell is 2nd level. Vortex Warp is only available for Artificers, Sorcerers, and Wizards. Targeting a creature within 90 ft, you force them to make a Concentration save. If they fail, or choose to fail, you can teleport them to any space within 90 feet of yourself. The placement must be somewhere that can support them. When heightening the spell, you gain +30 feet to your range.
This is a weird one. Repositioning magic is very strong for a reason. You get to choose a target and ruin their carefully-placed strategy. The range isn’t bad, either! 90 ft at base means you can usually grab a wizard and bring them in between all of your melee characters. Considering the save is Constitution-based, you’ll usually want to use this on targets who don’t want to be on the frontlines anyways.
Unfortunately, its combat power relies on your party. Teleporting an enemy is great and all, but Artificers, Sorcerers, and Wizards all have spells that can do big damage to an enemy 90 ft away. This spell doesn’t do anything specifically painful or detrimental by itself. You need to have that strong followup from your fellow party members.
What makes this spell potent is that you can also use it to help your allies. For instance, you can teleport your Mage Killer Fighter into range of a magic user. Or, you can teleport your Rogue out of jail. This utility makes it a pretty strong choice for a teleportation spell. Notably, you can’t target yourself with it. And it shares the same spell level as Misty Step. You can spend a lot of magic to teleport around!
Overall, neat! Not necessarily an option that every party is going to want. However, if you’re bored of Hold Person or summoning spells, this can really mess up an enemy who wasn’t expecting to get punched in the face today!
Wither and Bloom
The final spell is a 2nd level Necromancy spell. Wither and Bloom can be learned by Druids, Sorcerers, and Wizards. With a range of 60 feet, you can cause a 10-ft sphere to appear on a specific point. Within range of the sphere, creatures – of your choice – must make a Constitution save to halve 2d6 necrotic damage. One creature within range can spend an unspent hit dice, healing for whatever they roll on the dice and adding your spellcasting ability modifier. If you use a higher level spell slot on this, you deal 1d6 bonus damage and can roll additional hit dice to the healing effect.
Very unique! The damage is very bad. 2d6 is poor for a 1st level spell, even if it is in an area of effect. The range does make up for this weakness, but it doesn’t exactly have a gigantic burst. This’ll be hard to make deal high damage.
That’s why the heal is nice. With this spell, Wizards (and to a lesser extent, Sorcerers) have a way to heal allies without working for it. By dumping this on your Fighter in the frontline, you can hit a few enemies while also healing your melee buddy.
The healing is unfortunately not fantastic. At most, this will heal for 1d12 + your spellcasting modifier, and that’s only on a Barbarian. That being said, with better range than Cure Wounds and better healing than Healing Word, this is kinda good. Especially since it is rare that you spend all of your Hit Dice! Although, early on, everyone’s low number of hit dice will reduce this spell’s effectiveness.
Overall, Wizards should really consider learning this as an emergency heal! If your fighter goes down on the frontlines, you can use this to bring them out of consciousness while still dealing some damage. Sorcerers should consider it as a defensive option. Druids don’t really need this, as they already have some great healing and defensive options. But, this is a really cool spell for usually aggressive classes.
Wrapping Up Our Strixhaven Spells Guide
Strixhaven has some real winners here! Wizards can learn all of these, and they have some fun new tools to play with! Wither and Bloom by itself is fantastic, and none of the other spells are completely worthless. Strixhaven has brought some winners to the table!
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