To play Dungeons & Dragons, you need a character. For some people, this comes easily. I’m one of life’s people who has many D&D character ideas written down in a Google Doc (five pages, to be precise).

It doesn’t come as easily to everyone. Some people don’t spend as much time thinking about D&D as I do (or writing about it, come to think of that). Others go through a lot of D&D 5e campaigns and one-shots and eventually run out of inspiration. Some don’t know very much about the game and struggle to think of a good character.

You don’t just need to stare at a blank character sheet and wait for D&D character inspiration. There are plenty of things players can do to kick things into gear and come up with a D&D character idea.

Updated September 12th by Artificial Twenty: Even as editions change, some character-building tips are timeless. I’ve updated this list to include another valuable source of D&D character ideas. I also performed some boring technical tweaks, don’t worry about it.

Think About Specific Abilities for Your D&D Character

Among many other things, D&D is a game of wish fulfilment and power fantasy. Any D&D character can do some incredible things well beyond what people in real life can pull off.

Start with something specific you want to be able to do and work backwards from there. This is a better source of D&D character ideas for experienced players, but you can get more general as a newcomer.

To start simply, an idea might be “a D&D 5e character who can make the most attacks.” A player might have a D&D character idea for a top-tier combatant who can take on an entire horde.

You’d start with something like a Fighter, Path of the Berserker Barbarian, a Monk, or a Gloom Stalker Ranger. Something that specifically deals as many strikes as possible.

From there, you might look at D&D 5e races and look at those with extra attack potential, such as the Shifter or the Centaur. You can then consider other build choices like subclasses, feats and Fighting Styles.

One of the best ways about this D&D character inspiration method is you can hop from mechanical thinking to roleplay. If your character fights like that, are they a precise, razor-focused combatant? Are they a frothing warrior who lashes out? Are they suave and cocky, or quiet and lethal? What sort of vibes does the ability give?

Making these attacks is only one example of a D&D 5e character idea. You might want to change your appearance, or fly, or raise the dead, or charge people from horseback.

Just take one thing you want to pull off and start a build to make that happen. The rest of your D&D character inspiration will come from there.

Roll Your D&D Character’s Stats Down the Line

Back in the hoary days of the late 20th century, when Dungeons & Dragons was a relatively new thing, character creation was significantly more streamlined, with far less choice.

There was much less having a specific character idea and working to make it happen, and a lot more creating a character on the whims of luck and probability.

The prevalence of rolling stats straight down the line for old-school D&D character creation is overstated (as is the use of 3d6). Nonetheless, some players might find it an excellent way to inspire and build their own D&D character.

Pretty much any statblock can be usable for a D&D 5e character, even if it isn’t optimal. Roll down the line, see which class your ability scores suit, and then build your character from there.

If you roll high Charisma and Dexterity, you might naturally think of a fast-talking, nimble-fingered Rogue or Bard. If you get high Wisdom and low Constitution, you might naturally tend toward a Moon Druid to avoid an overly fragile character.

This can open up statblocks and D&D character creation ideas that you wouldn’t naturally consider.

Even if your D&D group doesn’t roll 4d6 for stats like the default (such as using Point Buy or the Standard Array), you can still use this method. Simply roll a die for each stat to decide which will be the highest, second-highest, and so on.

Randomly Generate Your D&D Race and/or Class

There are other ways to introduce randomness into your D&D character inspiration. Your ability scores are so foundational that you might not want to gamble with them. Instead, you can let the dice decide other elements.

You can roll a d20 and (rerolling results higher than a 13) go with whichever class (in alphabetical order) the dice come up with. Alternatively, you could roll a d100 (rerolling high results) and pick your race the same way.

This doesn’t have to be an all-or-nothing way to inspire a D&D character build idea. If there are classes or races you’re really not a fan of, exclude them and adjust the dice parameters to match.

You can do this for your D&D character’s race, class, or (if you’re feeling very daring) both.

Few players would naturally come up with a character idea for D&D like a Sea Elf Artificer. If that’s what the dice spell out, however, you have the ideal opportunity to flesh out a unique character idea.

I would recommend the honour system for this sort of D&D character inspiration, but a campaign can last years. If you’re really not a fan of whatever combination you roll, nobody will judge you for trying again.

Take Inspiration from Other Media

I say this time and time again on Artificial Twenty. All creatives beg, borrow, and steal ideas from one another. With a creative pastime like D&D, there’s no reason players should do any different.

In general, most D&D players want to avoid ripping things off wholly. Instead, use other media and fiction as a source of character inspiration.

You might really like a character from a film, TV show, novel, religious scripture, anime, game, or any other form of media. Find something that draws you to them, isolate that trait, and build a brand-new character out of it.

This character might be an arrogant spellcaster. Start there. They might be a talkative fighter who dual-wields longswords. Maybe they’re an occultist detective, a beleaguered watchman, or a monster-slayer.

This is a particularly good source of D&D character ideas for beginners. You might not know much about the D&D 5e character rules, but you likely know plenty of pop culture. Some DMs will roll their eyes if you want to make a one-to-one of an existing character, but most will be happy to help you piece together something that resembles the fiction you like.

Many different figures across fiction can make for stellar D&D character ideas if you get creative with them. However, I would recommend reading Artificial Twenty’s article on avoiding the pitfalls of this exact D&D 5e character creation method.

Go Fiction-First with a Backstory Concept

This method of D&D 5e character inspiration is similar to the prior example, just lacking media to take direct inspiration from.

With much of the Player’s Handbook detailing the mechanics behind character creation, it’s easy to get bogged down in picking race, class, ability scores, feats, and spells before anything else. You build a skeleton and then flesh it out with a story.

If you’re struggling for D&D character ideas, you might want to invert that. Start with the core story concept you want to explore and then build the mechanics around that.

Maybe you want to explore the story of a defecting or former spy in D&D 5e. When you have that idea, you could start with a Bard, Rogue, or even Monk for obvious classes (and plenty of other choices besides) and then choose your race.

Alternatively, your D&D character idea might have the simple idea of ‘bodyguard’. This could apply to any number of classes depending on your exact mental idea and even involve collaborating with other players on synergistic character builds.

If no one D&D 5e class or race leaps out at you as a must-play, go the other way. Start with the story you want to explore and then see which races and/or classes best suit it.

Stand On the Shoulders of Giants

It isn’t just fiction you can take D&D inspiration from for character-building. One of the best things about D&D 5e‘s enthusiastic online community is how passionately people discuss every aspect of the game. One of the most discussed, however, is character creation.

Any space devoted to D&D or even Baldur’s Gate 3 character creation will be perfect for new ideas. Whether you focus on the mechanics or the storytelling, the collected brilliance of the internet will have come at the problem from angles you’ve never considered.

Perhaps people will be discussing a mechanical quirk of the rules you weren’t aware of that will capture your imagination. Maybe they’ll be discussing D&D character backstories that linger in your mind.

There are almost infinite amounts of D&D character creation discussion on the internet. Even if only a small fraction speaks to you, that’s several hundred ideas right there.

This is another good character creation method for D&D beginners. There are plenty of new player-friendly or casual spaces online where people will discuss things in fairly uncomplicated terms. And there are, of course, more in-depth spaces where diehard fans will be getting deep into rules minutiae for experienced players who want something new in D&D.

You can find excellent ideas on D&DBeyond and especially on Reddit communities like /r/dndnext and /r/3d6. Other Baldur’s Gate 3 and D&D character-building forums and communities are also a godsend.

Much like borrowing from fiction, try not to do a one-to-one lifting of an idea. However, this applies more to backstories or concepts other people have created. If someone’s sharing a mechanical quirk of the D&D 5e rules, they probably want other people to use it.

These have been six ways to generate D&D 5e character ideas, even if you’re struggling for inspiration. There are many other ways, and I’d love to hear about yours. Please do like, comment, share this with others, and read more Artificial Twenty content. Thank you!

If you’re a DM on the other side of a very similar issue, ‘Five Ways to Make D&D 5e Quests When Low on Ideas‘ might suit you perfectly.

Maybe you want to hear my own thoughts on D&D character creation. If so a) thank you kindly, and b) check out ‘Unusual D&D 5e Build Ideas‘.