Using Detect Magic to reveal Lycanthropes

[The Library DM]

According to the 5e PH, the detect magic spell will cause an aura to appear around “objects or creatures that bear magic,” and “identify the school of that magic, if it applies.” (Those are not verbatim, but they are the exact meaning of the statements.)
Since lycanthropy is a curse (MM), curable only by remove curse or wish, but not by any method associated with otherwise curing diseases, my assumption would be that it is a magical curse in nature. Thus, a lycanthrope is a creature that “bears magic” as it bears this same curse. So I would think that detect magic would reveal that a lycanthrope at least “bears magic.” I’m unsure on the school; it could be enchantment (as a hex), but it might be transmutation, like polymorph. Or, since not caused by a cast spell, lycanthropy might not fit any school.

Note that in this concept, the nature of the magic will remain unclear; that the creature is a lycanthrope would be one of many possible guesses for the cause of the aura.

Thoughts? Counter arguments? Or has anyone used this idea?

[DMThac0]

I don't think that Detect Magic would work mostly because of my research into mythology and such.

D&D mechanics don't feel like they support the idea. Bestow Curse, as the spell, doesn't allow you to create lycanthropes. The transference of lycanthropy is done via a physical nature. When reading the MM on lycanthropes there's nothing that says it's inherently magical. Little things like that make it feel like Detect Magic wouldn't work the way you're suggesting.

However, if you want to interpret it that the curse is magical in nature, go for it, it makes sense. You could say that the magic school would be similiar to Transmutation, but feels a bit different, like it's not pure magic from the weave.

[MagneticKitty]

I would say...
Their true form is human. The shapechange ability reads they magically change shape. So either: a) only the act of changing registers as magic
Or b) only the form they magically turn into registers as magic
since their human form is not innately magic.

But I could see your argument for the curse being magic.
As a side note Identify can scope out if a creature is effected by "spells", so I'd say no on identify detecting it since it's not a spell.

[Maelynn]

My reasoning would be, just because something is created by means of magic doesn't necessarily make it magic in itself.

Yes, you could argue that the lycanthropy curse is magical. However, the effects of the curse are a natural ability - more in the range of a chameleon's camouflage or a puffer fish inflation. Or, to stick with D&D, the effects of Control Flame on a non-magical fire.

[PhoenixPhyre]

"Magic", when used in the rules (e.g. detect magic), does not refer to all those supernatural things. Everything in a D&D world is suffused with background magic. If detect magic detected those things, it would ping on everything.

Instead, detect magic works on ordered, patterned magic. Active spells. Magic items. Effects that explicitly mimic spells by name. If you can't dispel magic it, you can't detect magic it (by RAW). Now I'm more permissive about things, but I'm intentionally working outside the RAW.