Building Fantasy AU Kiribaku in DnD 5e
In Season 2 of My Hero Academia, the characters were reimagined in a fantasy style end credit sequence that mostly focused on Midoriya, Todoroki, Bakugou, Uraraka, and Iida. Some aspects of their fantasy counterparts have been confirmed, such as Bakugou being a barbarian king, while other things like Kirishima’s exact rpg class have been left ambiguous. So while Bakugou will be pretty straightforward, Kirishima will require a little more work.
For his race, Bakugou is a Human. Normally for anime characters, I tend to make them Variant Humans for the free feat. Bakugou can add the Great Weapon Master to make better use of All-Might’s fractured greatsword. However, Bakugou also makes use of a scimitar in the season 2 end credits, and a scimitar is not a great weapon. So, Bakugou could also take Prodigy or Resilient to give himself more skills or better saving throws, or even Fighting Initiate to allow Bakugou to acquire the Dueling or Great Weapon Fighting fighting styles.
For his background, Bakugou is a king, making him a Noble.
BAKUGOU’S CLASS
BARBARIAN
BERSERKER
The Berserker subclass is the Barbarian subclass that notices your raging and suggests putting more rage into your rage. A lot of people give this subclass flack for the level of exhaustion it can give you when you rage, but fail to read the actual print that says that you can choose to trigger a frenzy while you’re raging, but you don’t have to. Going into a frenzy gives Bakugou the ability to make an attack as a bonus action, but he doesn’t enter a frenzy every time he rages. Later, he can enter a rage to break the effects of charms or fear, instill fear with the menacing presence of his own rage, and eventually retaliate against anyone with the nerve to attack him.
Kirishima’s race would depend on how you want to do him. Kiri’s appearance would be more accurate as a Variant Human with the Tough feat. However, he is also a dragon shifter, and therefore, he could be a red dragonborn with the added protection of his dragon scales.
Kirishima loyally stays with Bakugou because he lost a battle with him, but his actual backstory is something I know less about. My best guess would be an Outlander, living outside of society, witnessing the migration of herds, and suffering through the most extreme weather. Since he is in the service of a king, you could call him a Knight, or even a Courtier. His general vibe also has some rogue-like elements where you could make a case for Urchin or Criminal backgrounds. If Kirishima has a clearer backstory in the light novel, I apologize for not having read it.
KIRISHIMA’S CLASS
MONK
ASCENDANT DRAGON
This is hands down the best way to build Dragon!Kirishima. Although the idea of making Kirishima wise might seem a bit silly, this is the only melee class that lets the user take on Draconian traits. The only other option would be to make him a Draconic Bloodline Sorcerer, which doesn’t seem to fit his armored and weapon-bearing human form. As a Monk of the Ascendant Dragon, Kirishima can charge his unarmed attacks with elemental magic, create a breath attack regardless of his character race, grow wings, and protect his allies from harm. While it’s true that this form doesn’t permit Kirishima to fully change into a dragon as he would with a polymorph spell, it’s still the most in-character with what Kirishima’s human side is capable of.
The third build option is all about making Bakugou a Dragon Rider, which focuses on making the two of them an inseparable tag team. With this build, Bakugou is the main playable character, and is built the same way as he was as his own independant character since nothing really changes here. The main difference is his class.
DRAGON RIDER BAKUGOU
RANGER
CONCLAVE OF THE DRAKEWARDEN
With this subclass, Bakugou starts his adventure with a connection to draconic magic and the ability to summon a drake to be his companion. The dragon is a quadruped that only speaks Draconic and his would be a Red Drake. As their bond grows, the fully drake Kirishima gains wings at level 7, a breath attack at 11th level, and grow to a Large size fit for riding at 15th level. While this build does rob Kirishima of his autonomy and traps him in his dragon form, he is better able to be the dragon we see in the end credits: large, winged, and breathing fire. You could also always talk to your DM about ways to play around with this to build Kiribaku as a Drakewarden while still making Kirishima his own character.
In the end, I’m still pretty much making the best with what I have. Frankly, Kirishima is difficult to translate, and if I had to remove the Dragon entirely from his fantasy alter ego, I’d probably make Fantasy!Kirishima a Fighter or a Paladin, as Kirishima is one of the few characters with a very clearly established code of conduct that would make him work very well as an Oath of Glory Paladin determined to make a legacy for himself and prove himself a worthy hero. However, the ability to polymorph into a gigantic dragon and breathe fire complicates aspects of this. Still, the draconic-inspired UA subclasses we got after the publication of Tasha’s really gave us much better methods of translating Fantasy!Kirishima to the world of Dungeons and Dragons.