Your first step in playing an adventure in the Dungeons & Dragons game is to imagine and create a character of your own. Your character is a combination of game statistics, roleplaying hooks, and your imagination.

You choose a race (such as human or halfling) and a class (such as fighter or wizard). You also invent the personality, appearance, and backstory of your character. Once completed, your character serves as your representative in the game, your avatar in the Dungeons & Dragons world.

Before you dive into the character builder, think about the kind of adventurer you want to play. You might be a courageous fighter, a skulking rogue, a fervent cleric, or a flamboyant wizard. Or you might be more interested in an unconventional character, such as a brawny rogue who likes hand-to-hand combat, or a sharpshooter who picks off enemies from afar. Do you like fantasy fiction featuring dwarves or elves? Try building a character of one of those races. Do you want your character to be the toughest adventurer at the table? Consider a class like barbarian or paladin. Once you have a character in mind, follow the steps in this builder in order, making decisions that reflect the character you want. Your conception of your character might evolve with each choice you make. What's important is that you come to the table with a character you're excited to play.

Typically, your character begins play at 1st level. In the next step, adjust your level if you’re playing in a higher-powered campaign.

As your character goes on adventures and overcomes challenges, he or she gains experience, represented by Experience Points (XP). Once you reach a specified XP total, you gain a new level. Adjusting your character level will change your XP total and vice versa.

The next step also includes various preferences for your character. You can proceed with the default options or make changes if desired.

Choose a race in the next step. Your choice of race affects many different aspects of your character. It establishes fundamental qualities that exist throughout your character's adventuring career. When making this decision, keep in mind the kind of character you want to play.

For example, a halfling could be a good choice for a sneaky rogue, a dwarf makes a tough warrior, and an elf can be a master of arcane magic.

Your character race not only affects your ability scores and traits but also provides the cues for building your character's story. Each race's description includes information to help you roleplay a character of That race, including personality, physical appearance, features of society, and racial alignment tendencies.

These details are suggestions to help you think about your character; adventurers can deviate widely from the norm for their race. It's worthwhile to consider why your character is different, as a helpful way to think about your character's background and personality.

The description of each race includes racial traits that are common to members of that race. The following entries appear among the traits of most races.

ABILITY SCORE INCREASE

Every race increases one or more of a character's ability scores.

AGE

The age entry notes the age when a member of the race is considered an adult, as well as the race's expected lifespan. This information can help you decide how old your character is at the start of the game. You can choose any age for your character, which could provide an explanation for some of your ability scores.

For example, if you play a young or very old character, your age could explain a particularly low Strength or Constitution score, while advanced age could account for a high Intelligence or Wisdom.

ALIGNMENT

Most races have tendencies toward certain alignments, described in this entry. These are not binding for player characters, but considering why your dwarf is chaotic, for example, in defiance of lawful dwarf society can help you better define your character.

SIZE

Characters of most races are Medium, a size category including creatures that are roughly 4 to 8 feet tall. Members of a few races are Small (between 2 and 4 feet tall),which means that certain rules of the game affect them differently. The most important of these rules is that Small characters have trouble wielding heavy weapons, as explained in the Equipment rules.

SPEED

Your speed determines how far you can move when traveling and fighting.

LANGUAGES

By virtue of your race, your character can speak, read, and write certain languages.

SUBRACES

Some races have subraces. Members of a subrace have the traits of the parent race in addition to the traits specified for their subrace. Relationships among subraces vary significantly from race to race and world to world. In the Dragonlance campaign setting, for example, mountain dwarves and hill dwarves live together as different clans of the same people, but in the Forgotten Realms, they live far apart in separate kingdoms and call themselves shield dwarves and gold dwarves, respectively.

In the next step, choose a class for your character. Every adventurer is a member of a class. Class broadly describes a character's vocation, what special talents he or she possesses, and the tactics he or she is most likely to employ when exploring a dungeon, fighting monsters, or engaging in a tense negotiation.

Your character receives a number of benefits from your choice of class. Many of these benefits are class features - capabilities (including spellcasting) that set your character apart from members of other classes. You also gain a number of proficiencies: armor, weapons, skills, saving throws, and sometimes tools. Your proficiencies define many of the things your character can do particularly well, from using certain weapons to telling a convincing lie.

Adventurers sometimes advance in more than one class. A rogue might switch direction in life and swear the oath of a paladin, A barbarian might discover latent magical ability and dabble in the sorcerer class while continuing to advance as a barbarian. Elves are known to combine martial mastery with magical training and advance as fighters and wizards simultaneously.

The optional rules for combining classes in this way is called Multi-classing.

Much of what your character does in the game depends on his or her six abilities: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma. Each ability has a score, which is a number you record for use during play.

Generation Method

You can determine ability scores in one of three ways, chosen in the next step:

Standard Array

If you want to save time or don’t like the idea of randomly determining ability scores, you can choose from a fixed list (15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8).

Point Buy

Customize your ability scores by spending points. If you are playing an Adventurers League character, choose this option.

Manual

Manually enter your ability scores. If you roll to randomly determine scores, choose this option to record your results.

In this step, you will flesh your character out as a person. Your character needs a name.

You’ll need to decide your character’s appearance and personality. Choose your character’s alignment (the moral compass that guides his or her decisions) and ideals. Identify the things your character holds most dear, called bonds, and the flaws that could one day undermine him or her.

You will also choose a background in this step.

Your character’s background describes where he or she came from, his or her original occupation, and the character’s place in the D&D world.

A background gives your character a background feature (a general benefit) and proficiency in two skills, and it might also give you additional languages or proficiency with certain kinds of tools

In this step, you will select weapons, armor, and other adventuring gear for your character. Race and class descriptions include equipment to include here first.

Starting Equipment

Your starting equipment options will be displayed on the next screen. Your class and background determine your character’s starting equipment. Review the options and add the appropriate items using Manage Equipment.

Starting Gold

Instead of taking the gear given to you by your class and background, you can purchase starting equipment. You have a number of gold pieces (gp) to spend based on your class, as shown on the next screen if you choose this option.

Your Strength score limits the amount of gear you can carry. Try not to purchase equipment with a total weight (in pounds) exceeding your Strength score times 15.