⚙️5e - Character Creation⚙️

The world of Ena Lucoria offers an infinite combination of possibilities and circumstances that shape the lives of the characters who live within it. Your first step is deciding what type of character you want to create. Their personality, appearance, aspirations, desires, and fears are all up to you. It’s through their eyes that you’ll experience the world, and all the details you give them shape how you — and by extension they— interact with the world and respond to what takes place during the course of gameplay. Before diving into the mechanics of the character creation process try to imagine what you’re looking for in a character and what interests you as a player.

Are you fascinated by the dynamics between gods and mortals? Are you intrigued by combat in all its myriad forms? Or do you prefer to be the source of knowledge for the party, surprising them with just the right tidbit of information to save the day or ruin it for someone else?

Origins

Who is your character? Where do they come from? What drives them forward?

Creating your character generally begins by asking yourself a series of questions about not just the type of adventurer you want to play but also what type of person they are and how they came to be who they are.

Origins are detailed later but consist of four main aspects: heritage, culture, background, and destiny. As you go through the character creation process, each of these aspects will help you flesh out more details about your character or prompt you to determine traits you otherwise may not have considered.

Heritage

See 👥Heritage for more information.

Characters in the world belong to a heritage which includes certain biological characteristics and defines some aspects of their physical appearance. Other things, such as a character’s speed and size, are also derived from their heritage. While a heritage may be a factor in your character’s story, that’s just the beginning. Who they are is defined by the experiences and the actions that lead them to where they are now.

Choosing a heritage grants your character access to additional traits and a heritage gift, which helps you make your character stand out from the crowd. For example, a Drakari’s trait allows them to do what Dragons do best and exhale a breath based on that ancestry that can burn, electrify, and even freeze their enemies. Meanwhile some Drakari have scales like iron while others have developed aquatic adaptations.

In addition, as your character levels up, they choose a paragon heritage gift that is unique to their heritage.

Culture

See 🎎Culture for more information.

Your character’s culture details the society and circumstances that helped shape who they are. This provides a number of traits including proficiencies, languages, and other benefits related to the culture that influenced their development.

One of the key things to keep in mind during character creation is that culture options are universal and aren’t limited to specific heritages. This opens up a number of fun and interesting options and opportunities for your creativity to color outside of the lines!

Background

See ⛏️Background for more information.

If a culture tells how a character started, their background helps outline where their journey led. There are a number of backgrounds to choose from each of which provides bonuses to your ability scores, additional proficiencies, and features your character can use while adventuring.

That’s just mechanics though, and thinking about the details of how a background influences your character’s thoughts and actions is a great way to add depth to a concept. Deciding on your character’s memento (an object of personal importance) and connection (a person who matters to them) helps you create stakes in the world.

Destiny

See 🔮Destiny for more information.

All characters in the world have a destiny that they move towards, though whether or not they will reach it is a mystery. When creating a character you are able to place a mark of destiny upon them to not just help you better understand who they are and where you want them to go, but also help the Game Master get an idea of what you’re looking for as a player. It is a summation of their motivations, goals and outlook.

It also provides your character an edge at key moments that would help them move toward that destiny.

Class

See 🧙Classes for more information.

Adventurers come from all walks of life and approach the world in different ways. Class is the term used to broadly describe the set of skills and abilities they use while confronting the challenges of the world. While your origin describes your character’s past, your class represents what they are doing now.

Choosing a class for your character provides them with class features, the unique talents and expertise inherent to their class that set them apart from other classes. In addition, you also gain certain proficiencies which represent your character’s skills and what they are best at resisting (their saving throws), as well as their ability to use certain tools, armor, weapons and more. Proficiencies essentially outline the things your character can do well, such as performing for a packed room or holding on to their sanity after a particularly powerful psychic spell.

Depending on which class you choose, at 3rd level you select a subclass for your class. Every class has its own set of disciplines that each specialize in one particular aspect of the adventuring tradition. Some Rogues are very sneaky, others utilize magic in their thievery, and there are those who become master assassins — all Rogues that made different choices with their subclasses.

Level

Most characters start at 1st level and advance by adventuring and gaining experience points (XP). A good way to picture a character at this level is to see them as a newcomer to some of the more difficult challenges you’ll face.

Record your level on the character sheet as 1st level and indicate that your starting experience is zero.

Depending on the campaign your Game Master is making for the group, your game’s stakes may be high enough that your character starts at a higher level. In those cases think about what dangerous and fascinating events may have brought you to that point as you begin creating your character. A higher level character would typically begin with the minimum experience points necessary for that level. In the case of higher level characters, be sure you understand the various features and traits that come with each additional level in the class.

Hit Points and Hit Dice

See ❤️Hit Points for more information.

Your character’s Hit Points (HP) provide a rough idea of how much damage they can withstand. Your HP are determined by your Hit Dice which are in turn tied to your class. At 1st level, your character begins with 1 Hit Die and hit points equal to the maximum number of that Hit Die. You also gain additional HP based on your Constitution which will be covered later in the character creation process. Another use for Hit Dice is the ability to roll them in order to recover hit points during a short rest.

The total number of HP you have available is called your Hit Point Maximum.

Be sure to record your character’s Hit Dice and Hit Points on the character sheet.

Proficiency Bonus

See ⚙️Proficiency for more information.

Your Proficiency Bonus (PB) can be found in the table that describes the features you gain at each level of your class. Characters starting out at 1st level begin with a +2 to proficiency and that bonus applies to a number of important character elements:

• Attacks you make with weapons you are proficient with.
• Spell Attacks cast against your adversaries.
• Ability Checks made using proficiency-based skills or tools.
• Saving Throw DCs for features, spells, and traits you use.
• Saving Throws you have proficiency in.

Proficiencies come from a number of sources, including Backgrounds, Classes, Feats, and more. Be sure to keep a look out for when your character gains a proficiency and note it on the character sheet.

Your proficiency bonus can only be added to a die roll or any other circumstance once. The only exceptions are cases where the bonus is modified before being applied to a roll. If circumstances arise that indicate your bonus should be halved, doubled, or multiplied more than once, the golden rule is to only halve, double, or multiply it once.

Determine Ability Scores

See ⚙️Ability Scores for more information.

There are six key ability scores that factor into everything that your character does in the game: Strength (STR), Dexterity (DEX), Constitution (CON), Intelligence (INT), Wisdom (WIS), and Charisma (CHA). These abilities and their uses are described in detail later.

Ability scores are generated randomly by rolling 2d4 and substracting 4 from the total. You continue to do this until you have a total of six numbers.

Choose where you’d like to assign these numbers by recording each next to an ability score.

After that’s done, modify your ability scores to account for any additional bonuses your character gained from their background.

Strength

How hard can I hit with this weapon?
Represents the physical power your character can exert upon the world.

Important for: Adepts, Barbarians, Fighters, Paladins

Dexterity

Can I avoid getting hit by their weapon
Represents your character’s physical agility and reflexes.

Important for: Adepts, Fighters, Rangers, Rogues

Constitution

How many strikes from their weapon can I take?
Represents your character’s health, stamina, and endurance.

Improtant for: everyone

Intelligence

Theoretically, I can calculate how many strikes I can take before I pass out.
Represents your character’s mental power, including information recall and general knowledge.

Important for: Warlocks, Wizards

Wisdom

It would be best not to test that theory myself in combat.
Represents your character’s ability to apply logic and reasoning to situations, as well as overall awareness of surroundings and intuition.

Important for: Adepts, Clerics, Druids, Rangers, Warlocks

Charisma

I’ve convinced them to just not hit me…or possibly hit someone else.
Represents your character’s overall impression on others and their ability to convince, deceive, and lead.

Important for: Bards, Paladins, Sorcerers, Warlocks

Ability Score Point Cost

Gear up for Adventure

See 🛠️Equipment for more information.

Your character begins the game with starting equipment determined by their background and class. Starting equipment includes everything from weapons and armor to general tools and items. Be sure to record your starting equipment on the character sheet.

If your character is going on a journey, they will also need to carry food and water with them (or whatever it is they eat and drink). You can carry a number of days’ Supply equal to your Strength score, in addition to your equipment, weapons, and armor.

Defense

Your Armor Class (AC) represents your character’s ability to avoid sustaining damage in battle. Numerous things affect your AC in various ways, such as armor, traits, features, Dexterity and more.

Unarmored, your character’s AC is 10 + their DEX. While wearing armor, utilizing shields, or taking advantage of traits and features, the AC calculation will differ based on the circumstances. For equipment the details of AC calculation are available as part of an item’s description, and the criteria and effects of other options are listed in your character’s class, heritage, or culture.

When your character is subject to more than one way to calculate their AC, you can choose which one to apply.

One of the key things to remember when making your character is that not everyone can use armor and shields. Your character must be proficient with armor and shields in order to use them with any efficiency, and there are certain drawbacks from struggling to use either without knowing how to properly do so.

Save Difficulty Classes

Some of your attacks and spells may force your target to make a saving throw to resist it. You have two saving throw difficulty classes (DCs), one used for combat explits, and the other for spellcasting.

Maneuver save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Strength or Dexterity.
Spell save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus + your spellcasting ability.

Offense

Weapons are the bread and butter of any savvy adventurer, even those who use them as only a last resort.

Weapon attacks are made by rolling a d20 and adding your proficiency bonus (as long as your character is actually proficient with the weapon) and the appropriate ability. Weapon damage is calculated by rolling the weapon’s damage die and adding any applicable ability.

Melee weapons use your character’s Strengt or Dexterity for attack and damage rolls.

Meanwhile, ranged weapons use Dexterity for attack and damage rolls. Some weapons with the thrown property, such as javelins, allow you to use your character’s Strength instead.

All attacks also indicate the type of damage they deal. A sickle deals slashing damage while a heavy maul deals bludgeoning damage. Damage types, besides being cool aspects of your character, also come into play as some situations may call for one type of damage type over the other.

Some special attacks (basic combat maneuvers that you use to grapple or shove a creature) instead do an amount of damage called basic melee damage.

This is equal to 1 + your Strength.

Bring your Character to Life

Now that the mechanics are worked out here comes the fun: what does your character look like? How do they act? What brought them to where they are? Be sure to take into account how their culture, background, destiny, and ability scores may come into play in their approaches, attitudes, and appearance.

An orc wizard trained in an elite city academy will approach magic differently than a dragonborn wizard who taught himself using a spellbook he won in a rigged game.

Also don’t be afraid to get creative on how an ability score is represented for your character! Not every character with high Strength is built like a mountain and not every character with low Charisma is a quiet mouse.

Why fight alone?

The world is full of dangers and perils mundane and mystic. Most characters don’t try to brave it alone, especially adventurers heading directly towards those types of situations. Instead most of them form a party, a group of people working towards a shared goal. When starting a game be sure to work with other players and the Game Master to figure out not just how everyone came to know each other, but also how your similarities and differences work together so that the group can achieve the impossible and improbable.

The World and You

The challenges your characters face and the adventures they take can be classified into five main tiers of play. Tiers of play help give you an idea of what to expect involving the scale of the challenges you face and how the world generally reacts to you.

At tier 1 (levels 1-4) your characters are entirely new to adventuring, just beginning to learn how dangerous the world around them can really be.
At tier 2 (levels 5-8) your characters are local heroes. They are coming into their own as adventurers and learning the basic elements of their classes. Threats are small in scale and scope.
At tier 3 (levels 9-12) your characters are regional heroes. They are accessing new levels of martial or magical power and can use skills, features, and magic that attract attention and acclaim.
At tier 4 (levels 13-16) your characters are masters of their craft, well beyond the abilities of other people and even other adventurers. Spells can bend the definition of what’s possible while martial characters taking to the battlefield can and have turned the tides of massive battles.
At tier 5 (levels 17–20) your characters have reached a point where the challenges they face are of world-changing size and proportion. At this tier, your character’s actions have the potential to fundamentally alter the lives and wellbeing of those that rely on (or fear) them.

Origins

What makes your character who they are? What have they experienced? When building your character, their upbringing — and by extension the culture they were raised in — can have as much of an impact as their heritage. By splitting your adventurer’s origin into four parts — Heritage, Culture, Background, and Destiny — there is ample opportunity to create wildly diverse characters with skill sets that reflect their lives in the most accurate way possible.

Building your origin story

The prevalence of each heritage and culture can vary between various settings and different campaigns.

Only you know what story you are trying to tell with your character, and only you know the best way to build that character’s origin. Anything is possible in a magical world and all of the heritages, cultures, and backgrounds presented in this chapter — as well as those you might build yourself — are viable options for an adventurer of any class. However, to ensure your character fits your specific game and setting, you should always have a discussion with your Game Master about the character options available to you prior to character creation.

Your heritage solely influences your character’s physical appearance and traits, while your culture influences those traits that would be learned or developed over time. Your background reflects the path you have chosen to take, or a path you have been pulled into, independent of your heritage or culture. This grants you things like proficiencies with skills, languages, and tools, and bonuses to certain ability scores to represent the areas of your life that have seen intentional improvement. Finally, your destiny describes your character’s goals and motivations. The following sections are designed to walk you through the four-part origin story, and to help you build your ideal adventurer.

Heritage

The first step in the origin creation process is deciding on a heritage such as a dwarf, elf, or halfling. Each of the eight heritages listed in this chapter include unique, biologically inherited traits as well as details about their physical appearances.

While this may seem like the most important step, keep in mind that nurture plays as much of a role in development as nature; while you may be used to seeing fantasy media portraying pastoral, friendly halflings, the culture and background you choose can provide the stepping stones needed to create a competitive and secretive halfling wizard.

While it may affect how the world perceives them, an adventurer should never be limited by their heritage.

When building your character’s origin, you can choose only one heritage to gain traits from. The Mixed Heritages sidebar should be consulted for characters with multiple heritages.

The following sections appear in the descriptions for most heritages.

Age

This section details the average age at which a character of this heritage is considered to have reached adulthood, as well as their typical life span. Your character can be of any age, which could also be an opportunity to explain away significantly low or high ability scores.

Size

All creatures are assigned a size, ranging from Tiny to Gargantuan. Medium and Small are the most common sizes for adventurers.

Speed

While other factors may influence how fast you are, each heritage has a base Speed. This determines how far you can move on your turn during combat and while traveling.

Heritage Gift

In addition to the traits granted to all characters of the same heritage, some include multiple gifts for you to choose from to further diversify your character. When multiple options are presented, you may choose only one heritage gift.

Paragon Gift

Later in their adventuring career, each heritage grants a paragon feature. This could be a completely new feature, or something that improves or offers a new way to use a trait already granted by the heritage.

Culture

The second step in the origin creation process is choosing your character’s culture. This is the culture they were raised in, or that of their parents, and does not need to be related to their heritage; a character’s culture can be used to represent their past as a refugee, adoption into a new family, or being raised outside of their heritage for any other reason. The culture you choose provides your character with a number of proficiencies and traits that they would have learned through living amongst that culture, or that members of that culture are often trained in.

For each heritage option presented, there are a handful of suggested cultural options. When building your character’s origin, you can choose only one culture to gain traits from. Each culture listed in this chapter includes a description of what sort of life a character from that culture would experience — this description can range from the morals and traditions instilled in them to how they found themself a part of that culture to begin with. The following sections appear in the description for most cultures.

Cultural Traits

Each culture contains a range of traits. You gain all of the traits associated with your chosen culture, unless the text says otherwise.

Languages

This section details the languages that a character can read, speak, write, and sign, provided there is no disability or condition that prevents them from doing so. When given a choice of language, consider choosing one from the Languages sidebar that further brings your character to life—this decision could be impacted by their family, previous occupations, or even a special interest.

Signing: You must have at least one hand free to communicate by sign, and the creature you are communicating with must be able to see you. When attempting to make subtle signs, to remain unnoticed you must succeed on a Sleight of Hand check against the passive Perception scores of observers.

Background

The next step in creating your character’s origin story is choosing their background. A character’s background tells a story about the life they have chosen to lead, separate from the culture they were raised in. This step can be used to tell nearly any story; how your character became an adventurer, why they claim a culture other than the one associated with their heritage, or how they began their journey towards finding their place in the world.

While picking a background does not have to complete your character’s story, it provides a sturdy base for developing that story. A character’s background typically reflects the individual training they have sought out or been given, rather than the common heritage and culture which they shared with their first community. One of the most important questions you can ask when choosing your background is how does this relate to your character’s current adventuring status? Did they leave a job they loved to adventure out of a sense of duty, or were they forced out of their home? Did they spend their inheritance on adventuring gear in search of excitement, or did they save their meager wages until they could embark on a journey bigger than any they’ve taken yet? After being dealt their cards in life, how did they make the most of it — or did they set off in search of a new hand?

The backgrounds in this chapter provide mechanical benefits, such as ability score increases and proficiencies, as well as more roleplay-oriented benefits.

As with the other origin sections, you gain the benefits of only one background. The following sections appear in the descriptions for most backgrounds.

Ability Score Increase

Each background increases one of a character’s ability scores by 1 and allows you to increase a second ability score of your choice. This reflects the abilities utilized or valued the most by that background.

Proficiencies

Most backgrounds grant proficiency with two skills, which are explained more in the Ability Scores section.

Additionally, many backgrounds grant proficiency with an appropriate tool set (or multiple sets). These tools and proficiencies are explained in the equipment section.

If your character would gain the same proficiency from multiple areas, such as a heritage or cultural trait or class feature, they may instead choose a new proficiency of the same type (skill or tool).

Languages

Like cultures, your background can also allow you to learn additional languages. Provided there is no disability or condition that prevents them from doing so, characters are considered to be able to speak, read, write, and sign the languages granted by their background.

Connections

Each background provides examples of one acquaintance, ally, or enemy that has had an effect on your character’s life. This could be a childhood friend, a sparring partner, or even a business competitor. Make sure to include your Game Master when choosing your connection; you never know when they’ll show back up.

Equipment

Suggested equipment sets are included with each background, along with an associated cost.

Memento

Each background includes options for a memento. This is a sentimental item reflective of your background and the occurrences that have built you into who you are, typically worth less than 30 silver.

Background Feature

Every background comes with a feature that helps determine how your character interacts with the world and people around them. While they rarely provide a set mechanical benefit, they can provide you with a reliable way to find information, shelter, or even financial support.

Background Feat

Every background gives a list of recommended first level feats. Your character can take one to aid them on their journey. No character must pick from the list of feats provided by their background. Instead they can choose any first level feat they and the Game Master deem appropriate.

Destiny

The final part of your character’s origin is their destiny. Your destiny represents your character’s overall personal story arc. It provides your character with motivation, roleplaying hooks, and special features, including a bonus feature when your character eventually fulfills their destiny.

Source of Inspiration

Your source of inspiration describes certain acts which grant you bonuses in play.

Inspiration Feature

When you gain a bonus from your source of inspiration, you can use it to fuel a special feature.

Fulfillment

Each destiny tells you what you must do to fulfill that destiny, and what special feature you gain as a consequence of doing so.

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Art: Andrea Piparo, The heroes Mercion, Molliver, Strongheart, and Ringlerun protect a portal to another plane from diabolical invaders, PHB2024