Is Strixhaven Good? Bad? Or Somewhere in Between? - D&D 5e Review

Here is my brutally honest review for the newest Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition adventure book, Strixhaven: Curriculum of Chaos. If you are looking for your groups next D&D 5e adventure, you may LOVE this book, or... you might just HATE it. Let's take a look at the Harry Potter Hogwarts of D&D adventures.

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[Glitch_Online]

There are those that will like it for what it is, and thats good. Then there will be the fanatics, who will complain about this review simply because "how dare you". Thanks for the honesty.

[aboundedsumo]

The moment i heard that there was going to be an "adventure" book about attending school, managing relationships, and attending a ball, I knew exactly that this book wasn't for me or my group. I hope whichever group this book was for enjoyed it. But i will be saving my money.

[LandonTheDM]

I was familiar with the setting. So I picked up the book expecting magical whimsical school and got magical whimsical school. You're right it's about the expectation you have. It's just not the same tone of D&D adventure that previously has been the norm. And it's okay for whimsy to be a focal tone and let the danger, risk, heroics be the counterpoints.

[gregoryfloriolli]

I’m glad I’m not the only one who noticed the decline in quality over the past year.

[ruthb]

You have confirmed what I was already feeling about Strixhaven, it really isn't for me. My DM was planning on running it this year for the group I'm in, and I straight up said I wasn't interested in playing in such a setting, my days of playing school kids are long since over. Fortunately he has now decided to run it for another group and run something else for the one i'm in, but I'm still waiting to see what he comes up with. I guess one thing we have to remember is that D&D has to appeal to people my age (over 50 and not ashamed to admit it) and to people in their teens, so I don't expect every book to appeal to every player, you just have to work out which ones are right for your group.

[omnipedia-tech]

Sometimes at the college where I work, we play games with the students just to keep the place fun and interesting so they come back often to study. Usually we'd just play MTG, but this semester we're going to start a campaign. I tossed a lot of options at them, but Strixhaven was the one they immediately latched onto. They had no idea what Forgotten Realms was, or really anything D&D - none had seen even a single hobbit movie. They know every little detail about Harry Potter though. This book's for them, and I think it's interesting too playing it in an educational setting to use really as a story platform where we can embed interesting puzzles and dilemmas from their actual classes IRL.

[therocketboost]

WOTC is catering too much to the "our all tiefling party runs a quirky bakery instead of doing any adventures" crowd

[WellManNerd]

Glad you are back and made it through! Difficult holiday season for my family as well. Thanks for this video, honesty and transparency is important.

[josephvoytus]

Not a chance I'd even pick it up & look thru it. Good video. I agree tho about not automatically running down something.

[jjmeyer]

I'm planning to run a combination of Stirxhaven with sidequests from Candlekeep. The two settings compliment each other, just substitute the Biblioplex for Candlekeep and most of it falls into place. One of my players absolutely loves games with social and romance options, the other is a more straightforward min/max style rpg player.

I think blending these two settings where magical books keep pulling them into bigger adventures while attending school will work well.

[Merlewhitefire]

The problem is

-The D&D set is derived from a Magic the Gathering set
-The Magic set is derived from Harry Potter (I strongly suspect it was meant to be a licensed set and the deal fell through)
-Harry Potter's Hogwarts is itself strongly derived from Roke Island in the works of Ursula LeGuin

So with each iteration, the essence gets distilled a little further from its origins and creates a product that has none of the joy of the original but still doesn't feel like D&D at all.

[OldPaw]

This video is the moment you realize you are no longer in the target market.

[sketchasaurrex]

THANK YOU!


I don't think you were harsh enough but I get trying to be respectful to the "creators." MtG Strixhaven is still mocked at my lgs.

[joesgarden]

This is why i play "Basic Fantasy" now.

[randydethlefs]

I fully agree with your assessment, but they won’t be getting my money for this product.
Glad to see another video from you, I enjoy your channel and have been missing your regular content.
Hope all is well with you and your family.

[TheOtherMrEd]

The last several releases have all been pretty weak. I completely agree with your thoughts on whimsy. The last few books (Strixhaven, Feywild, and Fisban) have been whimsical to the point of being silly and childish. This is clearly a design choice, so I've told my group that I'm not buying any more Wizard books until conditions improve. If my players want a new subclass or something, they can buy it a la carte on dndbeyond. I work too hard for my money to just throw it away.

[obscuredbythecloud]

I absolutely love your honesty in this review. If I hadn't already subscribed last night after finding your channel and thinking it's one of the 2 best DND channels I've seen on YouTube, this review would've made me subscribe.

I'm new to DND in general and also as a DM, and I find your content extremely helpful. Thank you!

[anthonyrenli]

I was completely looking forward to this book BEFORE I saw the outline.
I was looking for a lot of magic, spells, and something to make it kind of sort of like a sourcebook...not something completely useless UNLESS you are running a Strixhaven specific campaign.
I'm glad I waited to pick it up and didn't do my reflexive pre-order it. I might buy it if I can find it cheap at my FLGS, but I won't pay full retail price.
Edit - BUT I hope people who buy it enjoy the heck out of it. Seriously. I could see running this as a game for some kids, or with some groups of friends who are Harry Potter Obsessed... But it wouldn't be a long running campaign for me.

[isaaclong]

I feel like Wizards' target demographic changed some time around the release of Tasha's Cauldron. I'd say even that book is a bit too far off the D&D feel for my liking.

[fokusnik]

Fizban's Treasury of Dragons is amazing!!! I'll check to see if you have a video that goes into more of your perspective, but from my perspective as someone who is newer to the hobby, it is an idea generator for working on my dragon centric campaign. I love this book.