School of Invention (5A)

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This is a Wizard subclass for 5A.

Many wizard apprentices have a period of experimentation in their youth, but for most this is just a phase they go through. But some keep experimenting throughout their career. The School of Invention claims credit for inventing the other schools of magic – a claim other wizards find absurd. Wizards of this school push magic to its limits. They stretch the known laws of arcane power and strive to reveal important truths about the nature of the multiverse.

Adherents of this school believe that innovation is best served through experimentation. They have a reputation for acting first, thinking second. Most wizards are scholars who have mastered their craft through careful study, rigorous practice, and endless hours of repetition. Inventors would rather throw spells together and see what happens.

Many wizards of this tradition are gnomes, young, or both, and they take pride in the magic-infused armor they don. The armor not only provides protection, but it is also designed to help the wizard channel magic in unpredictable ways.

Wizards of this tradition are regarded as savants to their faces, but wizards of other traditions often think of them as lunatics.

Greyhawk: The image of the mad wizard that uses unstable magic is a classic. Such wizards used to operate in high towers far from habitation. These days, magical experimentation happens in the street, tough magic guilds and town guards try to keep inventors away from fragile civilians and flammable buildings.

Sources: Unearthed Arcana 47 - Three Subclasses

Subclass Features

Tools of the Inventor

At 2nd level, you gain proficiency with light armor and two tools of your choice.

Vicissitude Armor

Innovation is a dangerous practice, at least as far as members of this school practice it. As a shield against this risk, you have developed a suit of arcane armor.

Starting at 2nd level, you gain proficiency with light armor and gain a suit of vicissitude armor. Despite the name, this is not actual armor. —a magic item that only you can attune to. While you are attuned to it While you are and wearing it, it grants you resistance to force damage.

The armor is light armor and provides an AC of 12 + your Dexterity modifier. It weighs 8 pounds.

You can create a new suit of it at the end of a long rest. by touching a nonmagical suit of studded leather armor, which magically transforms it. Doing so removes the magic from your previous vicissitude armor. turning it into nonmagical studded leather.

Reckless Casting

Starting at 2nd level, you can attempt to cast a spell you don’t have prepared. When you use this ability, you use your action and choose one of the following options:

• Roll on the Reckless Casting table for cantrips and cast the resulting spell as part of this action.

• Expend a spell slot and roll twice on the Reckless Casting table for its level, or the 5th-level table if the slot is 6th level or higher. Pick which of the two results you want to use and cast the resulting spell as part of this action.

If the spell you cast isn’t a wizard spell, it is nonetheless a wizard spell for you when you cast it with this feature.

Reckless Cantrip Casting (1d10)

1. Acid Splash
2. Chill Touch
3. Fire Bolt
4. Light
5. Poison Spray
6. Ray of Frost
7. Shocking Grasp
8. Sacred Flame
9. Thorn Whip
10. Roll twice and cast each cantrip, but if you roll another 10, roll again. if you roll another 10 on either die, you cast nothing, wasting your action.

Reckless 1st Level Casting (1d10)

1. Burning Hands
2. Chromatic Orb
3. Color Spray
4. Faerie Fire
5. False Life
6. Fog Cloud
7. Jump
8. Magic Missile
9. Thunderwave
10. Roll twice and cast each spell, but if you roll another 10, roll again. if you roll another 10 on either die, you cast nothing, wasting your action.

Reckless 2nd Level Casting (1d10)

1. Blur
2. Darkness
3. Enlarge/Reduce
4. Gust of Wind
5. Invisibility
6. Levitate
7. Melf's Acid Arrow
8. Scorching Ray
9. Shatter
10. Roll twice and cast each spell, but if you roll another 10, roll again. if you roll another 10 on either die, you cast nothing, wasting your action.

Reckless 3rd Level Casting (1d10)

1. Blink
2. Fear
3. Feign Death
4. Fireball
5. Fly
6. Gaseous Form
7. Lightning Bolt
8. Sleet Storm
9. Stinking Cloud
10. Roll twice and cast each spell, but if you roll another 10, roll again. if you roll another 10 on either die, you cast nothing, wasting your action.

Reckless 4th Level Casting (1d10)

1. Blight
2. Confusion
3. Evard's Black Tentacles
4. Fire Shield
5. Greater Invisibility
6. Ice Storm
7. Phantasmal Killer
8. Stoneskin
9. Wall of Fire
10. Roll twice and cast each spell, but if you roll another 10, roll again. if you roll another 10 on either die, you cast nothing, wasting your action.

Reckless 5th Level Casting (1d10)

1. Cloudkill
2. Cone of Cold
3. Destructive Wave
4. Flame Strike
5. Hold Monster
6. Insect Plague
7. Mass Cure Wounds
8. Wall of Force
9. Wall of Stone
10. Roll twice and cast each spell, but if you roll another 10, roll again. if you roll another 10 on either die, you cast nothing, wasting your action.

Prodigious Inspiration

At 6th level, you have attained a greater mastery of spell preparation. As a bonus action, you can replace one spell you have prepared with another spell from your spellbook. You can’t use this ability again until you finish a short or long rest.

Vicissitude Casting

At 10th level, you learn to channel magic through your vicissitude armor to augment spells in a variety of ways. When you cast a spell while wearing that armor and attuned to it, you can expend one additional spell slot of 1st to 5th level to alter the spell. The effect depends on the spell slot you expend.

• A 1st-level slot allows you to manipulate the spell’s energy. When you cast a spell that deals acid, cold, fire, lightning, or thunder damage, you can substitute that damage type for another one from that list.

• A 2nd-level slot increases the spell’s raw force. If you roll damage for the spell when you cast it, increase that damage by 2d10 force damage against one of the spell’s targets (your choice) this turn.

• A 3rd-level slot increases the spell’s range. The spell must have a range measured in feet to be manipulated in this way. Triple the given number of feet.

• A 4th-level slot increases the spell’s area. The spell must have an area measured in feet to be manipulated in this way. Double the given number of feet.

• A 5th-level slot increases the number of targets. The spell must target one or more creatures to be manipulated in this way. Double the number of targets.

Controlled Chaos

At 14th level, your ability to improvise magic grows stronger. Whenever you roll on a Reckless Casting table for a spell other than a cantrip, you can roll on the table that is one level higher than the expended spell slot. You can roll on the 1st level table without expending a spell slot.

Editor's Notes

Quite a number of changes, but they follow the established pattern.