The Order of Lead: Antithesis of Strixhaven

Another project I’ve been working on I’m calling The Order of Lead. So the concept in a nutshell is that society has become weak, soft, decadent, and corrupt because of its reliance on magic, and The Order of Lead aims to purge the world of this arcane blight. In other words, it is the antithesis of Strixhaven: Curriculum of Chaos.

How else are you going to go back to those halcyon days of low magic?

The seed for the idea came from a D&D character my wife played back in early 2000: Diamanda Bloodstorm, epic level barbarian, forsaker, destroyer of magic, wielder of a greatsword forged in the heart of a dead magic zone that disjoined all magic on a critical hit.

Coincidentally, I found out a few days ago that there is a manga / anime called Black Clover with a protagonist, who was born without magical powers in a magical society, and who possesses anti-magic and anti-magic swords. Cool.

This seed idea began to germinate and grow after I ran a Discworld-ish high magic 5e campaign with a party composed exclusively of novice arcane spellcasters—wizards, sorcerers, warlocks, etc. The campaign world had a secret society that sought to purge the world of magic. But in a sandboxed world, as sometimes happens, the PCs and the secret society never crossed paths.

This idea has begun to flower with the advent of Strixhaven: Curriculum of Chaos, the D&D / MtG crossover supplement by Wizards of the Coast, which has been aptly dubbed by Venger Satanis as “Sparkle Prom”. Yeah, yeah, Wizards, I get it. Lifestyle brand. I’m not the target demographic, blah blah blah.

So all of this is a work in progress. Hopefully it bears fruit in the future!

Backgrounds

  • Arcane School Outcast: You were a promising student in an arcane school, until for some reason, you were expelled.
  • Dead Magic Zone Dweller: You were born and grew up in a dead magic zone.
  • Magical Catastrophe Survivor: You were in a major magical catastrophe as a child and somehow you survived.

Class Options

  • Barbarian: Path of the Forsaker
  • Fighter: Anti-Magic Warrior
  • Monk: Way of the Lead Fist
  • Paladin: Oath of Lead
  • Ranger: Witch Hunter
  • Rogue: Sorcerer Saboteur
  • Rogue: Anti-Magic Assassin
  • Purified: A former spell-casting class who has undergone a purification rite, voluntarily or involuntarily, gaining anti-magic abilities in their place.

Feats

  • Existing feats: Mage Slayer

Hazards

  • Dead Magic Zones: Dead magic zones are environments where, for some reason or other, magic is negatively affected. Causes include magical accidents, strange meteors crashing down, blasphemous acts against the gods of magic, magic that defiles the land, etc.Dead magic zones have tiers of debilitation:
    • Tier 1: Disadvantage on spell-related rolls.
    • Tier 2: Spells and magic item do not function.
    • Tier 3: Cumulative chance of magic items disenchanted.
    • Tier 4: Cumulative chance of permanent loss of spell-casting abilities; magic items disenchanted.
    • Tier 5: Permanent loss of spell-casting.

Spells

There are factions within the Order of Lead that practice magic, particularly abjuration magic, solely for the sake of hindering and destroying magic. These spells are particular to their repertoires.

  • Existing spells: anti-magic field, counterspell, dispel magic
  • Spell Lock: Like counterspell, but prevents the countered caster from using a particular school of magic for a short time.
  • Disenchant: Removes the magical properties from a magic item.
  • Spell Drain: Target caster loses spells slots.
  • Deattunement: Target becomes deattuned to his attuned magic items.
  • Mage’s Disjunction: Powerful abjuration that disjoins all magical effects and magic items in an area.
  • Spell Turning: Interrupts spell and reflects it back on its caster.

Equipment

  • Banishing Dust: Banishes summoned monsters
  • Dead Magic Seed: When planted in the ground, it creates a dead magic zone that grows
  • Shield of Magic Deflection: Reflects spells back on caster
  • Weapon of Disjunction: Disjoins magic on a critical hit
  • Anti-Magical Pulse (A.M.P.) Bomb: Disjoins magic in an area. Comes in tiny, small, large, cluster, and The Big One.
  • Arcane Lodestone: Draws in spells and magic items towards it.
  • Exploding Lodestone: Draws in spells and magic items towards it. Explodes after absorbing a certain amount of magic.
  • Armor, Spell Resistant
  • Potion of Lead: Grants limited magic resistance or immunity but lowers intelligence

Monsters

I’ve seen homebrew versions of monsters like this, but they need to be adjusted (mutated?) to suit the Order of Lead.

  • Lead dragon: breathes poison cloud or anti-magic cone.
  • Disenchanter: like the rust monster, except for magic items.

More to come

This is just the basic outline of what I have in mind so far. I’d like to put together something like a sourcebook, plus anti-magical adventures.