Ravenclaw: Clan Ollivander

 Ollivander

"the wand chooses the wizard"

Sigil: a wand and three stars, gold on grey

Skills: Wand-Lore (expert) | Creatures (advanced) | Herbology (advanced)

Close-mouthed and secretive, the Ollivanders are an ancient family. Never numerous or conventionally powerful, their status as the best wandmakers in Britain has assured the clan a certain prominence for centuries. While known for their hermit-like dedication to their craft, the grey-cloaked Ollivanders roam the backwaters and bylanes of the country seeking obscure woods and magical oddments.

Inspired Action – Wandmaker’s Eye

You have an intuitive understanding for the deep, magical relationships that govern wands’ behavior, and can use them to your advantage. You may spend Inspiration to automatically succeed in disarming or counter-cursing an opponent whose wand you have observed, or avoid penalties when using another wizard’s wand. When you do this, invent some kind of symbolic justification for it involving some hitherto unrevealed magical property of the wands’ wood, core, etc.

Flaw – Lure of Secrets

The Ollivanders are an eerie folk, drawn to see great magic, regardless of whether that magic is fair or foul. When you could act to prevent some dangerous magic and instead choose to simply observe it, you gain Inspiration.

Starting Equipment –pick two–

1. Rowan sprig – Ward 1 (ud6)

2. Tame bowtruckle

3. Silver tape measure – obeys spoken commands, can extend out to 100 feet

4. Vial of dragon blood – rare potion ingredient (ud3)

5. Sachet of phoenix ash – causes any fire to burn furiously (ud3)

6. Harp strung with unicorn hair – magically soothing

Names

1. Alder

2. Geraint

3. Huon

4. Elowen

5. Ingrid

6. Ophelia

Design Notes: wand-lore was very difficult to write because it's both a big evocative Harry Potter setting element and also completely slapdash, ad-hoc, and unexplored. In addition to that, Mr. Ollivander in the books is a very mystical and eerie figure despite not really doing anything. His mysticism and his eerieness are just vibes. Put them together and you have a strong impression of what the character type should feel like without much of anything solid to actually deliver on it.

My solutions (such as they are) were to make wand-lore and the Ollivander's mastery of it a mini-game of competitive bullshitting, and to give them a flaw that encourages you to play like Isildur in the Peter Jackson LotR movies or the gloomy anti-hero from a shonen manga. D&D is a game of cheap melodrama anyway.

Names: as good as "Garrick Ollivander" is, mythological tree names seemed more appropriate than repeated Gs.