Hello! Do you have any tips on creating a good d&d character? Some friends and I might build some characters this week, and I want to create someone good. I know that I tend to play things too safe and if I don't come up with a plan, I will make THE most boring character possible. How do you create a character that will be fun?
SO if you are playing 5e, the character sheet/players guide asks you to choose personality traits, ideals, bonds, and flaws for your characters. The book even gives you some prompts for those in all the different backgrounds, which I think is actually a good place to start from. The idea is to make a balanced character, in terms of having good and bad points. I don’t think there’s anything limiting actually in just sticking to what’s in the book - you’ll develop the character over time in interesting ways based on rolls or RP with other party members.
HOWEVER if you are more into controlling your character from the start, I recommend listing out some characters you really love, and work from those tropes/traits. With Anise, my amnesiac paladin, I decided to go hard for my love of villains redeemed against their will. Then my wife made an adorable old gnome, I decided that they had to be besties, and the character fell into place from there.
SPEAKING OF, keep in mind who you are playing with and what you have fun doing. It’s fun to make a snarky character, but do you actually enjoy coming up with banter like that? Do you already know what kinds of characters your friends are playing, and have ideas for what sort of character would have great interactions with them?
If you know that your DM and friends aren’t going to be super hard on you in terms of min/maxing your skills, a great trick for making someone memorable is to pick an unexpected race/class combo or class/background combo. One of my group’s members read that tieflings make unlikely druids, so they decided to make a tiefling druid. And he’s AWESOME. My paladin was raised by the Thieves Guild and used to be a con man (among other dubious things).
I hope that at least some of this helps, and that you make a really fun character and have a great time with your friends!
