D&D General 5e Character Generator: What would an actually good one look like?

[purgatory101]

I've been interested in what it would take to make a good character generator since I first played 3rd edition and the CD that came with the book had an app to make level 1 characters easily. It got me excited about the possibilities, before I realized that the app was never going to make it any further.

Ironically, while we do have a full character generator for 5e, it requires quite a bit of work on the player's part to assemble it and understand the choices and pieces that matter. (It still doesn't even assign sensible stats based on your class).

If you could have a character generator that did all the work you didn't want to do...what would you still spend time customizing? I'm assuming everyone likes to pick their own class and species, but beyond that what do people care about?

To me if the generator did all the work with intelligent defaults at any level, I'd already be happier than with any other tool I've used, but I also know I like to tinker and would likely want to still be able to customize what it came up with (spells, background, definitely subclass, feats). Curious if different sorts of players care about different levels of customization...or have most of us hit the point where we don't want to build we just want a good start and some minor customization to make it your own. Just wondering how many folks care about this and have strong opinions.

 

[Clint_L]

I’m not sure what you mean by the quickbuilder “doesn’t even assign sensible stats based on your class.” It did when I tested it - it seems to work great for level 1 characters. After level 1 you get diminishing returns with it, though a level 3 option would be nice.

I don’t really understand your criticism of the current builder. I had a newbie use it for D&D Club and they had a character within a couple minutes, plus a basic understanding of what their character was about. 5/5 stars.

 

[Li Shenron]

Higher level defaults would be useful.

I am not usually interested in character generators because IMO the designers focus too much on the fancy look (good for selling, useless and distracting in practice).

As a player I don't need defaults, I build my PCs a la carte.

As a DM, I have often made pregens PCs. For 1st level ones I don't really need an aid, but after a few levels it's already time consuming to go through the options, so having a few default sets to start from per class would speed up the process.

 

[aco175]

If it is to make a character to play as a player I would like something that I can click a button and something pops up on a screen that looks like a character sheet. Drop downs on things like class and race that I can click on and the sheet updates to reflect. Then if I want to click on more like stats or backgrounds I can to modify these things. If I want to modify level, maybe the other stuff that updates is in another color like feats and ASIs until I choose to print.

On the DMs side, I would like this to also be able to convert to a monster statblock if needed to make as a NPC or bad guy. I'm not sure if I want it to change race to all the monster races or just keep the PHB stuff. Seems like it would be getting too close to the monster generator I want.

 

[Morrus]

I’m not sure what you mean by the quickbuilder “doesn’t even assign sensible stats based on your class.”

We noticed it has a habit of assigning odd numbered stats, which isn't a great use of point-buy.

 

[bedir than]

We noticed it has a habit of assigning odd numbered stats, which isn't a great use of point-buy.

It uses the Standard Array. The odd numbers are for when a Background assigns the +2/+1 in a non-optimal way.

Which merely means that some people will decide to play story-first rather than optimize their math problems

 

[AlViking]

We noticed it has a habit of assigning odd numbered stats, which isn't a great use of point-buy.

I sometimes assign odd numbers here and there either because I have plans for a higher level either a feat or because I left two odd numbers. The first 3 levels usually go by pretty quick quickly so it can make sense. With point buy you can only buy up to a 15 so if you add your +2 from background and want to max out your score (and get a feat) you end up with an odd number.

It's all preference of course.

 

[AlViking]

Back to the OP, I think there are only minor issues I have with the character builder, most of which don't really bother me personally much but I have a better understanding of the systems than a lot of my players.

As far as the character builder, I'd add more of a tutorial at the decision points. When you get to 3rd level, compare and contrast the different subclasses and why you would take them. When you get to the ASI levels, suggest optional feats or increasing an ability score. Suggestions on spells could be particularly useful. So if your playing a wizard it would be things like "Play an evoker if you like a more offensive approach, and at this level you should add spells X, Y and Z." But that's a lot of extra overhead that is only useful to some people. Those are things that are probably better discussed in a blog or podcast because there is no one size fits all.
As far as the interface itself, I think it's okay even if I wish there were a bit more flexibility. A couple of examples

• I don't really need to know what my standard actions are on the first page of my character sheet - I always redo the "Proficiencies and Training" and "Actions" sections with my own notes in the PDF. But it would be nice if I could just type those notes in once instead of having to redo them every time I level up.
• For Weapon Attacks section
  • automatically show show my normal and rage damage in the PDF.
  • For rogues, give me a "sneak attack" entry so I don't have to look it up or add it manually.
  • In the online character sheet let me click on sneak attack damage if I'm using the online dice instead of doing it manually.
  • Give me better weapon customization so I can add that flame tongue battle axe and show the extra 1d6 fire damage, and let me click on it if I'm rolling online.

There's more little things I'd do of course but overall I think it works okay even if nothing is ever perfect.

 

[Blue]

I'm torn, because the first, most important thing that popped into mind when I read the title doesn't seem to be what the post is about.

I remember old PCGen ways. If I have a character builder, I want one that I can easily add homebrew, including things that are new, modify existing, or even remove things. Everything from lightly ruled ("here's my custom pantheon for this setting") to give out to players, to whole classes with multiple subclasess.

This asked about quickbuild. I really can't see wanting this feature as a player or a GM. I enjoy the character building minigame. If I'm playing a character it's most likely in a 1+ year campaign and I don't get why I'd want generic choices instead of what I pick. As a DM I'm not running any older editions so talking abotu 5e I'd never build an NPC with the player-facing character rules, I'll use a statblock like every single instance WotC has done across every adventure and monster book. They are built differently, especially in ratio of survivability to (nova) damage.

But, to try to be helpful, if I was looking for quickbuild I'd want a couple of basic indicators of what I'm looking for (this fighter is an archer, not a front liner) so it can weight it's options, and I'd love if it color coded the things I haven't picked, and another color for the effects of those picks. For instance, it might pick a feat that affects my ability scores and I'd want the feat highlighted to know it's something I can customize, and I'd want the ability score highlighted and when I moused over/touch and held it would show where the bonuses were coming from so I could realize the impact without knowing that it's coming from a specific feat.

BTW, when I say basic indicators, that's part of it, but it should also be weighting on the rest of the choices. If I have a paladin with a bunch of CHR based subclass features and took a CHR-based feat, it should be pushing STR>CHR>CON, and if I don't it might be pushing STR>CON>CHR.

I take it back, one place that could be useful for a quickbuild is spell lists based on level and intent. Smart ones so there's no too much overlap in functionality. "We'll swap out shatter when we get fireball" sort of thing. Even better if it's making suggestions for categories like "Offensive AoE" with some options, and not taking that will affect suggestions at other levels.

Oh, that gives me a great idea for functionality. Any choice points can show the top 3 (?) options as per the weighting, so new players can select among a curated list of things that fit and don't need to know all of the options.