No, the eight schools of magic are part of the core rules of D&D and as such you can't homebrew in new ones. What you can do is follow what Matt Mercer did and give them a description that groups them as a special subset of magic, which still using the traditional schools
Just curious but what would this alternative school do? Because like Dave said, there's the 8 schools and honestly they cover pretty much anything you could want to do. But some Arcane Traditions make a mixture of them along a particular theme like the Chronoturgist and Graviturgist. They specialize in time and gravity magic specifically but their spells vary based on the effect which traditional school of magic they draw from.
You can definitely do it, just not here on D&D Beyond. D&D Beyond is not 'the law'.
Even when D&D added Time and Gravity spells, they put them in the standard Transmutation, Necromancy, etc. schools.
Note, part of the issue is that most people have weird ideas about magic - including Wizards Inc.
They should have done something along the lines of sciences, more like this:
Energy Control (Evocation, Force, light, darkness, fire, cold)
Body Manipulation (Healing, necromancy and shape shifting)
Mind affecting (Illusions, enchantments, etc.)
Matter Manipulation (non-living transmutations, acid, stone to mud, Telekinesis, flight)
Time/Space (Conjurations, Divinations, Teleportation, speed, slow, far viewing)
That way every spell would fit in some where. Instead they went with historical names for kinds of magic and made some silly choices (such as non-detection being an 'abjuration' spell rather than an illusion, despite the fact that it deceives you about the truth rather than protecting anything from harm.)
I created a homebrew school of magic for my campaign setting, but found i couldn't do it on dnd beyond. I ended up just writing it down.
The schools of magic that already exist pretty much cover all magic related needs, i just felt like making mine for fun and just to try it out. so go ahead and give it a try if you really want to, but schools of magic exist to help people with their spells and so they dont have to go and make their own schools of magic.
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One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them
Abjuration spells are not about protecting others or yourself from har, but shielding yourself and overcoming the magic of others. Counterspell doesnt protect you from harm aswell and it still makes 100% sense as an abjuration spell. Just like non-detection
You can definitely do it, just not here on D&D Beyond. D&D Beyond is not 'the law'.
Even when D&D added Time and Gravity spells, they put them in the standard Transmutation, Necromancy, etc. schools.
Note, part of the issue is that most people have weird ideas about magic - including Wizards Inc.
They should have done something along the lines of sciences, more like this:
Energy Control (Evocation, Force, light, darkness, fire, cold)
Body Manipulation (Healing, necromancy and shape shifting)
Mind affecting (Illusions, enchantments, etc.)
Matter Manipulation (non-living transmutations, acid, stone to mud, Telekinesis, flight)
Time/Space (Conjurations, Divinations, Teleportation, speed, slow, far viewing)
That way every spell would fit in some where. Instead they went with historical names for kinds of magic and made some silly choices (such as non-detection being an 'abjuration' spell rather than an illusion, despite the fact that it deceives you about the truth rather than protecting anything from harm.)
I mean your system works too but its really not all that different from the actual schools and its dramatically less flavourful in the titles of each, not to mention the schools are intended to have a little leeway in their terminology to allow a wider variety of options for each school of magic (and therefore better usage of the discounted spell scribing from arcane tradition).
I think Abjuration fits better in that instance than Illusion, there is no illusion being cast as their presence isn't being made to look like its not there or like anything else they are just literally being shielded from divination magic and similar spells. The person trying to find them isn't so much being deceived as much as they just straight up can't find them using whatever spells or abilities they are trying to use.
In older editions there were other schools of Magic beyond the 8 that are present in 5e. There was the five Schools of Effect (Dimensionalism, Elementalism, Force, Incantation, and Shadow), there was also unique cultural schools of magic (The Mazteca had two: Hishna and Pluma), there were setting-specific ones (not even talking like "Chronomancy and Graviturgy" where they're specializations that exist alongside the others; I'm talking Dark Sun style "these are literally the only two options you have" kinda setting-specific schools), and there was even an additional "ninth school" along with the traditional 5e 8 called Universalism for wizards who didn't want to have to specialize and miss out on any of the other schools' goodness (because in older editions then specialization into a school restricted one's spell list options).
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Want to create new spells but they don't fall into the traditional schools of magic. Is there any way to do this currently in DnD Beyond?
No, the eight schools of magic are part of the core rules of D&D and as such you can't homebrew in new ones. What you can do is follow what Matt Mercer did and give them a description that groups them as a special subset of magic, which still using the traditional schools
Find my D&D Beyond articles here
Just curious but what would this alternative school do? Because like Dave said, there's the 8 schools and honestly they cover pretty much anything you could want to do. But some Arcane Traditions make a mixture of them along a particular theme like the Chronoturgist and Graviturgist. They specialize in time and gravity magic specifically but their spells vary based on the effect which traditional school of magic they draw from.
You can definitely do it, just not here on D&D Beyond. D&D Beyond is not 'the law'.
Even when D&D added Time and Gravity spells, they put them in the standard Transmutation, Necromancy, etc. schools.
Note, part of the issue is that most people have weird ideas about magic - including Wizards Inc.
They should have done something along the lines of sciences, more like this:
That way every spell would fit in some where. Instead they went with historical names for kinds of magic and made some silly choices (such as non-detection being an 'abjuration' spell rather than an illusion, despite the fact that it deceives you about the truth rather than protecting anything from harm.)
I created a homebrew school of magic for my campaign setting, but found i couldn't do it on dnd beyond. I ended up just writing it down.
The schools of magic that already exist pretty much cover all magic related needs, i just felt like making mine for fun and just to try it out.
so go ahead and give it a try if you really want to, but schools of magic exist to help people with their spells and so they dont have to go and make their own schools of magic.
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them
Abjuration spells are not about protecting others or yourself from har, but shielding yourself and overcoming the magic of others. Counterspell doesnt protect you from harm aswell and it still makes 100% sense as an abjuration spell. Just like non-detection
I mean your system works too but its really not all that different from the actual schools and its dramatically less flavourful in the titles of each, not to mention the schools are intended to have a little leeway in their terminology to allow a wider variety of options for each school of magic (and therefore better usage of the discounted spell scribing from arcane tradition).
I think Abjuration fits better in that instance than Illusion, there is no illusion being cast as their presence isn't being made to look like its not there or like anything else they are just literally being shielded from divination magic and similar spells. The person trying to find them isn't so much being deceived as much as they just straight up can't find them using whatever spells or abilities they are trying to use.
In older editions there were other schools of Magic beyond the 8 that are present in 5e. There was the five Schools of Effect (Dimensionalism, Elementalism, Force, Incantation, and Shadow), there was also unique cultural schools of magic (The Mazteca had two: Hishna and Pluma), there were setting-specific ones (not even talking like "Chronomancy and Graviturgy" where they're specializations that exist alongside the others; I'm talking Dark Sun style "these are literally the only two options you have" kinda setting-specific schools), and there was even an additional "ninth school" along with the traditional 5e 8 called Universalism for wizards who didn't want to have to specialize and miss out on any of the other schools' goodness (because in older editions then specialization into a school restricted one's spell list options).