D&D: Five Ways To Think About Creating Your Next Character

Creating a character is one of the most intricate parts of D&D. Here are five ways to think about where your next character comes from.

In D&D, character creation is half the battle. Honestly, it’s half the game. And I mean that in a complementary way. Because a big part of D&D is the “lonely fun” of it all, that is, the stuff you can do when your friends aren’t around. If you’ve played D&D, I can almost guarantee that if you give yourself a long enough break, you’ll get the itch – that feeling of “oh man, I need to make a new character.”

It is so much fun to think up the kind of weirdo you are going to play for the next, however long. Or that you might one day play. Or that you never, in fact, do play, but just the idea is comforting. Either of these outcomes is great – and it’s why we keep making characters just for the fun of it. With that in mind, here are five ways you can think about creating your next character.

How Do You Want To Do This – The Rules Approach

This might sound a little controversial, but D&D is a game. Sure, it’s a game of the imagination, it’s a game where you’re encouraged to tell the story of fantasy heroes who go on marvelous adventures and unearth all sorts of ancient treasures and face world-threatening dangers. But it’s also a game where you roll a d20 and get excited whenever it’s a big number.

And it is a perfectly cromulent way to put together a character while thinking, “Hey, how would I like to play this game?” It’s the opposite of method acting. You approach the character almost from the outside, from the mechanics first. You use that to determine what they can do – maybe there’s a rule you want to play with, like the Warlock’s refresh all powers on Short Rest, or the Fighter’s ability to use multiple weapon masteries, or, more likely, some kind of magic-using swordfighter who fights with swords and magic and only focuses on Charisma.

But once you figure out what your character can do, and how they do it, then you start to figure out who they are. It’s still a holistic approach that describes a narrative around a character, but it comes from the outside in.

Difference Engine – The Anti-Self-Insert

On the opposite end of things is the “how can I be different from who I am” principle. You focus on what’s different between you and your character. Because RPGs are a great way to explore ourselves. People have long used D&D to explore their identities across multiple spectra.

Play someone of the opposite gender. Play a nonbinary character. Maybe you’re someone who always follows the rules, so you play a Rogue who decidedly doesn’t. RPGs are a great way to try on different ideas of what you might be like, or to explore the things that you aren’t.

That said, it is a roleplaying game, and we are all still people at the end of the day. So you might want to stick to picking one or two – certainly no more than a handful – of big differences to explore. But, hey, you might learn something about yourself.

The Funhouse Mirror – Heightened Reality

Or you could explore parts of who you are. Performers frequently land on a character choice by just heigtening some part of their personality. And this works for D&D characters too. Maybe you play up your love of history and be some kind of sage who loves to collect obscure facts about the world and won’t shut up about them. Maybe you play as someone who can crack the perfect joke, the way you can usually crack up your friends. You just pick a thing and heighten it.

Imagine how you might live if you were larger than life. And then play that way at the table. Just for the fun of it. Again, less is definitely more when it comes to picking out how many things to heighten.

Always Wanted To Try One – The Archetype

Sometimes you just see a cool character and you think “I wanna know what it would be like if I did that.” This is one of my favorites – you look at an existing character or archetype and try to emulate that. For instance, you might do your own take on Conan the Barbarian, by playing as a Barbarian wanderer who’s given to great mirths and great melancholies. Or maybe you play as a hapless Wizard in the style of Rincewind.

Or you take a classic archetype, like “jock” or “nerd” or “mysterious stranger who drifted into town in a poncho with a gun/sword at her hip” and you figure out what that means in D&D. It gives you something to work for, and I can guarantee you that just in the act of trying to do a thing, you’ll play a character that is unique – because you’re unique. You can’t help it.

Do It For The Vine – A Funny Joke You Have To Keep Playing

And then of course, you can always start with a joke. Maybe you realized that you could play a Gnome named Chompsky. And it makes you chuckle enough that you roll up to your next session with your new little weirdo in mind.

One word of warning. Any time you make a joke character, do try and make sure that it’s something that you will enjoy playing. Because I guarantee you, that campaign will be the one that goes for 5 years and runs through epic levels. And it’ll end with a tearful farewell as Gnome Chompsky takes an epic last stand, side by side with someone’s version of Goku from Fortnite.

It sounds dumb. It is dumb. But also it’s the kind of thing that will genuinely make you tear up. I can’t explain it, you just have to endure/live it.

Happy adventuring!

Bell of Lost Souls Staff Writer and DM, J.R. covers RPGs of all stripes and on occasion eats sandwiches. You can ask him about either at [email protected]

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