How to give your D&D character a personality

My dnd friends: Your character is so cool and unique
Me: gluing foghorn leghorn and doc brown together, haphazardly yes i worked very hard on this

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When Im stuck on my characters personality I like to think of different people ive come across, typically when i choose a personality i try to make it one that i personally am ok with seeing, i dont wanna be playing a karen in dnd, though that could be interesting to say the least. One of my more recent builds I decided i didnt want a young adventurer build, so instead i made an old lady, a 70-ish y/o healer. For her personality i thought, why would an old lady go on an adventure. So i made her an overprotective grandma, she would mainly heal her party and stay out of the fray, but could hold her own if needed. Her philosophy was, dont mess with my grandkids or you wont be able to have any, and she saw her party as her grandkids. if i were to play her character at a session i feel like it would be an interesting experience for everyone.

Idk why, but when I heard the name Corwin, my mind instantly jumped to one of my brothers, but my brother isn't in the military unlike that Corwin

I usually play a foresty & kind-hearted character, like an elven druid, but the other day I was invited to a one-shot that took place in space!
This was already out of my comfort zone & because it was just gonna be a one-shot, I decided to to the same for my character.
I decided to make a bit more of a rough-and-tumbled kinda character and so Osaba the Half-Orcen Warlock was born 😉

In the process I realised that what I was creating was basically VI from Arcane, but then with some magic & space thrown in there for good D&D measure ;)

I just realised that I made a shonen protaganist for my charecter, what do I do i dont wanna be a web

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i write more then i play so i just whatch shows and se someone like gojo from jjk and think o i whana make an overpoer charakter and then i just aks why abunch

Not gonna lie, I once made a Guts from Berserk ripoff in dnd as an earth genasi fighter, but I took the defense fighting style with sword and board instead of greatsword. I stole part of his origin backstory, and his early personality before becoming part of the Band of the Falcon. That character died btw doing something way stupid they couldn't survive, but in my defense, I was being pretty lazy. I mostly stick with original characters that are inspired by other characters or songs and lyrics I particularly like rather than just stealing backstories lol

High intelligence character, you mran pun master

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I work from my stats backwards. I think my character's stats are likely to reveal a lot about how they navigate the world, and as a result, shape the way they express themselves to the world, and how they interpret the world - and that ultimately, is what personality is. It's the sum total of your experiences, and your natural inclinations. I also look at my character class, or background, for hints about their personality.

Random example here, with randomly generated stats:
Ranger, STR 13, DEX 15, CON 10, INT 15, WIS 18, CHA 13.

With Wisdom being the high score, then Intelligence and Dexterity being the next highest, but Constitution being the lowest score, there's a lot in here to chew on. This character may have experienced a life changing event as a child or young person that resulted in that low CON score, but that made them grow up fast mentally (high WIS score). Given that they became a Ranger, it seems likely that had a connection with nature in some way. Let's assume it does.

This Ranger experienced an event that made them more keenly aware of the necessity of protecting or managing the natural world, which makes them a passionate environmentalist, maybe not even because of a love of nature, but because of a love of people - perhaps a big forest fire damaged their lungs, and as a result, they have a fear of fire? The damage hasn't heavily affected their strength or dexterity, so it may just be a case of heat inhalation damaging their lungs. That lung damage also means they speak raspily, making them hard to understand, and their intense passion for properly managing the forest to prevent the kind of devastating wildfires that harmed them as a child can put them at odds with other wilderness classes who dislike their opinion that a managed forest is better than a completely wild and untouched one, as well as with local authorities who think they never shut up, explaining their only slightly above average CHA score. Their high dexterity score but low strength score, coupled with their background, mean their approach to problem solving is in going around the problem, rather than through it - in the woods they'll walk around a fallen tree or a steep ravine, rather than climbing over or through it, and this carries through into their approach at solving intellectual problems - why struggle with developing a fire and smoke proof home when you could instead create proper firebreaks, and clear deadfall from the forest floor instead?

I loved the ad in the video. Such a throwback :D

2+ years later i keep coming back to this video from time to time. it has so many helpful details, there's always something new to use !

I just keep making me!!

My favourite character to play was created by me taking a random background from the player's handbook and adding what I saw to be a negative trait of mine which flipped the background on its head and then thinking "how do I make this funny" and he turned out hilariously annoying and still likable

A death metal bard named Dirge.

Hey, Ginny. I'm stealing YOUR personality for a D&D character. And no, you can't have it back.

I made my first character based on myself and my second on what I aspire to be. My next one will be completely different. I really like the idea of mashing two fictional characters together - right now my mind is racing as to which two ???

Yessss! I grew up with Jim Henson's Labyrinth and this an absolutely lovely tribute to it and David Bowie! And it is the first time I loved any sponsor segment soooo much! Thank you!

Personalities of some of my characters:
- Chaotic piece of shit that is more noble than the "good aligned" characters.
- The tomboy of the group
- Character with good moral values that is pushed to wanting to strangle the character that likes to throw metaphorical shit.
- Mom/Dad of the group

See, the problem is real humans are boring because, unless a person is extremely one-sided, it's a full spectrum. I'm romantic and seek subtle emotions yet I get scared of showing them and I act rude. I'm a thinker, an introvert, but I make so many dumb decision in my life. I know exactly what I'm talking about so you must listen to me! Right now! I'm not kidding! But I'm shy, I speak last, if at all. I'm afraid of so many things but I'm capable of bravely jumping into the fray. I doubt myself all the time yet I know my worth. I care for innocent creatures but I know sometimes a sacrifice is needed. I'm so weak but I endure so much and that's a story of a strong man. That's me, real. And I'm boring. Because you want to see only half of these. Only A or B.

So every time I ask myself "could this character do X?" I get the only possible answer: "absolutely!" To avoid that I'd have to go way beyond sane spread and lock traits at extreme positions. Ultimate coward. Would never risk his life or possessions. Grump. Always mad about every tiny little thing going on. A romantic b!tch. Never shutting up about finding a perfect BF. A wise-ass. An old man constantly mentoring others and acting aloof. Is that it? A fun personality is 1 pure color taken to absolute? Because a complex combo is boring. Because a real person would act very differently, not one predictable way. Because whether I jump into a fight with a dragon or chicken out depends on my current mood way more than my "personality". I had a good breakfast, life seems good, I... don't wanna die right now. I better go around the beast. Or maybe I just had a talk with someone who reminded me about the losses people go through. Life is cruel and unfair. And rage is boiling in me and I wanna grab my sword and kill someone terrorizing the local village for 100 years. Yes! That's not my personality, that's my decision! And I actually enjoy deep characters who don't act 1 simple way. It's actually boring that Ron is always scared and Hermione is always a nerd and Harry is always an "insert face" photo cardboard. Sometimes I'm glad Harry does something insolent like attacking Malfoy first. Sometimes it's great that Hermione breaks rules and gets lazy. It's wonderful that Ron can stand up for his friends, being a knight, not a shaky rabbit.

So... Having a few "scars" probably makes a fun character. Someone lost his hand, someone is fat, someone is germophobic... But the rest is a full deck of open decisions. You don't have to make a 1-color character. Being blind or having 6 legs affects these decisions way way more.

See, basic pirate npcs yeah? they all have that.... pirate voice. Their lines usually start with "Oi Oi Oi-"

Have you heard about your journey in life and how When you're getting where you're going. It changes what you do each day and what you have to attend to in each year because of your success. Then think about how people say you've changed. That's because you have, and that basically is all personality is.

First method
Making your own clothes
Second is buying something
Third is buying something and editing it or buying two things and combining them somehow or making your own clothes out of fabric stolen from store bought clothes

Thank you for giving stealing validation, I get self conscious of it haha

I scroll through dnd forums picking up little details from many players characters that I like and add things to my characters where I like when I'm feeling stumped, heck I sometimes browse just to look for good names when I'm not satisfied with what I came up with (for example, I named my character's mom Elliwyn when I learned about your medic NPC, I thought it was so pretty!)

I'm not streaming or selling any of my characters so I tend to remind myself it really doesn't matter what they're based off lol

That's it, my half elf cleric it's now Luke Skywalker!

I always use mbti for my characters. I always make lawful evil TJs... I guess they are the easiest.

I've never herd you sing before you have a amazing voice

The labyrinth reference was wow brilliant 😮 🌟

I feel the "stealing light" thing. I have a fairy artificer that I tried hard to not make just a carbon copy of Mei Hatsume, but there was definitely a lot of her in there.

How would you make a personality for a character that can't talk?

No trademark Bowie Bulge? 😂😂😂

Give them a personality?! I don't have one, so i dont see why my made up character should!

Me personally, I start with option 3 then let them develop over the campaign.

My first character:
A dragonborn paladin that wants to ascend to a higher being/a god to protect the people from evil
My latest character:
A singing pear that came to life in a random forest

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06/07/23
Omg, okay lend me a minute, I'm late to the party, (catches breath) if my friend Dave were still alive, I would have sent this to him, and because of that number, you have earned my subscription, milady!!! And always a thumbs up!! My daughters and I are just starting out on a DnD adventure, and this Saturday we are making our characters. I had always wanted to play, but just never did growing up, one reason or another; parents wouldnt buy it, or didn't know anyone who wanted to play it. Always loved the idea of being a high fantasy story teller, which is why I write and have published high fantasy novels, never mind all that, thank you for all the advice, and I have been catching up. Definitely rewatching that very clever and very well done Advert in the theme of Dance Magic Dance. 👏 Bravo 👏 !!! I've not seen it used like that before, or to that very good extent. That really made my day!!! Thank you So SO Much!!!!

I thought there was a reason I got David Bowie vibes😂😂😭

Epic song! Thank you for this.

I usually skip the sponser portion of videos but your David Bowie/Labyrinth bit was awesome ❤😂

stardew and whiteclaw? sounds like an amazing evening!

Generally i like to start with building a character sheet. From there i flesh them out

The original idea for my barbarian was just “barbarian, but not the big dumb.” So he has high wisdom. From there, I thought “ya know, i kinda want him to be a blacksmith.” So i gave him
Smithing tool proficiency. Then, i thought about his life in his home. He’s well liked and respected, always helping out. So, he’s a folk hero. That just lead to one more question. Why is this big lovable himbo a barbarian? In short, his husband was murdered and his son was kidnapped. He spent a week in his forge creating his axe, alwhile a blizzard raged outside. He never made weapons before, so the axe looks a bit off, more jagged. Even his axe is angry. He won’t be at peace until he rescues his son.

As an added bit of info, his husband was killed by a religious order who didn’t like two men raising a kid, so, husband was in the way as they tried to take the kid. Was burned alive.

Your videos have been recommended to me for well over a year now, and I never did watch them... which was foolish of me. I've been binging your stuff all day today! I love exploring characters from deep angles, getting really into their heads, and your channel is full of fun and interesting ways to do exactly that. My point being, great work! Thanks for sharing your content!

💗 Wow again. All of this. Especially your love of Labyrinth as big as mine.

Thank you for this video, I’m a new player. Never played dnd . So I don’t have any idea how to roll play my wood elf Druid. Now I think I have an idea of how to play her.

My one big thing about my character: my cleric is a kleptomaniac...