D&D 5E D&D Beyond Releases 2023 Character Creation Data

D&D Beyond released the 2023 Unrolled with data on the most popular character choices for D&D. The full article includes a wide variety of statistics for the beta test of Maps, charity donations, mobile app usage, and more. However, I’m just going to recap the big numbers.

The most common species chosen by players are Human, Elf, Dragonborn, Tiefling, and Half-Elf. This contrasts with the stats from Baldur’s Gate 3 released back in August 2023 where Half-Elves were the most popular with the rest of the top five also shuffling around.

Also, keep an eye on the scale of these charts as they’re not exactly even. It starts with just over 700,000 for Humans and 500,000 for Elf, but the next line down is 200,000 with the other three species taking up space in that range. This means the difference separating the highest line on the graph and the second highest is 200,000, then 300,000 between the next two, 100,000 between the next, and finally 10,000 separating all the others.

Top classes start off with the Fighter then move onto the Rogue, Barbarian, Wizard, and Paladin. The scale on this chart is just as uneven as the last, but the numbers are much closer with what appears to be about 350,000 Fighters at the top to just over 100,000 Monks in next-to-last with under 80,000 Artificers. This contrasts far more from the Baldur’s Gate 3 first weekend data as the top five classes for the game were Paladin, Sorcerer, Warlock, Rogue, and Bard.

And the most important choices for new characters, the names. Bob is still the top choice for names with Link, Saraphina, and Lyra seeing the most growth and Bruno, Eddie, and Rando seeing the biggest declines from last year.

Putting that together, it means the most commonly created character on D&D Beyond is Bob the Human Fighter. A joke going as far back as I can remember in RPGs is, in fact, reality proven by hard statistics.

 

[Hussar]

I have never, not once, seen the "hit 2nd level at the end of session one, hit 3rd level at the end of session two/three, get another level every 2-3 sessions thereafter" pattern in 5e. Levels are always a marathon, never a sprint, in my experience. It's why I tried (several times) to convince a DM to maybe consider starting higher than first level. I stopped bothering after the fourth attempt.

Again, though, like myself, we do have to recognize that our experiences are somewhat idiosyncratic. I mean, either as a DM or a player, I've never run into that. Most DM's, IME, want to get through levels 1 and 2 as fast as possible just to make the group more survivable. You have to play with kid gloves so much at levels 1 and 2. The game doesn't generally get really fun until level 3.

But, you do realize that for me, when you talk about six different campaigns, I've actually run/played more than six multi-year campaigns since the release of 5e. Mostly because for a long time we were switching out DMing duties and running a couple of campaigns concurrently on alternating weeks. Heck, in the past three (four? Man, I have to go check) years, I've run/played the entire Horde of the Dragon Queen, Candlekeep Mysteries, my homebrew Spelljammer campaign, we're several sessions into Avernus and I'm about to start a shortish Phandelver campaign to give myself something of a stress break from running homebrew.

IOW, I've put in a metric assload of time on both sides of the screen in 5e. Which is why I get rather shirty when I get told that the issues I'm having are either self-inflicted, or flat out me lying about what's happened in my own games, as if anything I've pointed to, any of the problems I've brought up, are so bizarrely implausible that it's impossible to think that they could be happening.

 

[Oofta]

We were a level 2 party, not level one, but we destroyed a CR3 creature (a manticore). I know level 1 to 2 is a power jump, but I too feel a CR3 creature for level 1 is not that bad.

Besides, violence is just one of many solutions. And if you are being clever, diplomatic, your level isn't that important anymore.

A level 2 party against a CR 3 solo is an easy fight according to the CR calculator, at level 1 it's hard but not deadly. But the claim was that a CR 5 troll would be a cakewalk for a level 1 party. I disagree.

Clever, diplomatic and smart play works sometimes, but if the leopard is only interested in eating your face then I don't know how much diplomacy is going to help. At a certain point if a powerful enough monster wants to kill you and you can't escape you're going to die. How much more powerful depends on the group in my experience.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I really don't think that magic in general is too potent in combat. There might be some exceptions but still. And I definitely would put my money on the troll against those first level casters!

But what @Hussar said about magic bypassing all sort of exploration and other content that would be an interesting challenge otherwise is true. It less of an issue in 5e than it was in 3e, but it still happens. When I started my campaign I went through the spell list and just banned the most obvious offenders. I definitely recommend doing this to any GM who has issues with this.

 

[Oofta]

I know right? Totally unbelievable that you would have that kind of starting set up. A "wide open field" that's ten paces across. There's a reasonable chance that the room you are in right now is about 30 feet across. Massive space right? Totally unbelievable. WOW. Be still my beating heart. Holy crap, seriously? THIS is what you're going to harp on? An encounter that starts a movement away. :shock: What next? Stairs?? Maybe... maybe there are leaves on the ground. Oh NOES!! The party is doomed.

Again, MISSING THE POINT!


Yuppers. I know you have very little experience with caster groups. You've repeatedly stated that. So, maybe.... just maybe.... instead of jumping up and down about examples... maybe... oh... I dunno.... accept people's experience? I know that's such a completely unreasonable thing to ask. After all, that would mean that ... people don't play the way you play. Unbelievable, I know. But it's apparently true that not everyone plays the same way you do.

I've run many different groups over the years including mostly caster groups. I don't usually usually use solos, but I wouldn't throw a CR 5 troll against the level 1 PCs because the odds of a TPK are incredibly high if I play the troll as anything but a mindless automaton. You're making an extraordinary claim, it requires extraordinary proof. You've given none.

Again: what's the party makeup? How many? What classes?

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I've run many different groups over the years including mostly caster groups. I don't usually usually use solos, but I wouldn't throw a CR 5 troll against the level 1 PCs because the odds of a TPK are incredibly high if I play the troll as anything but a mindless automaton. You're making an extraordinary claim, it requires extraordinary proof. You've given none.

Again: what's the party makeup? How many? What classes?

Right. It is not completely impossible for the characters to win, random is random after all, but the odds are heavily against them. Unless you're running some sort of super old school fantasy Vietnam game where TPKs are expected and frequent, this just doesn't seem like a good idea as a first level encounter. It of course is different if there are mitigating factors such as allies and environmental effects that can help you against the troll.

 

[Oofta]

When it has happened to six different campaigns (not counting the ones that TPK'd before the end of session 2) that contained zero common players beyond myself, yes, I do feel qualified to say that. And no, I am not a risk-taking player. Rather the antithesis. I am congenitally risk-averse.

Every single DM has insisted that we start at level 1 (no matter what) and ensured that the first level takes 3-4 sessions minimum. I've specifically described this problem in numerous threads at this point. The only time I've ever gotten higher than 3rd level was when I joined a game starting at 5th. It didn't last past 6th. (Can't call it specific sessions because it was a PbP game, but it only lasted about a month.)

I have never, not once, seen the "hit 2nd level at the end of session one, hit 3rd level at the end of session two/three, get another level every 2-3 sessions thereafter" pattern in 5e. Levels are always a marathon, never a sprint, in my experience. It's why I tried (several times) to convince a DM to maybe consider starting higher than first level. I stopped bothering after the fourth attempt.

If you follow the general guidelines, levels 1 and 2 are just to get familiar with the group and your character. Typically a session each. Your experience is extremely unusual. I have only experienced a game that did not at least get to 8th level once and that was because the guy running it had an idea that just didn't work out.

 

[Oofta]

Again, missing the point.

It's not that the party MUST HAVE Tasha's after all. There's a shopping list of spells here that can cause the Troll to lose actions. Dissonant Whispers is a good one. Command (presuming the cleric speaks Giant) also shuts to Troll down for a round. Entangle slows the Troll down, potentially, although not a great option. Animal Friendship to have a pet to bolster the party isn't unreasonable. Never minding that caster classes sometimes come with pets. Color Spray and Sleep become options in later rounds after the troll's been softened up a bit. Thunderwave to push the troll back a bit and get everyone out of reach. The list is extensive and we're only talking about FIRST LEVEL CASTERS. This is the absolute weakest this party can be.

But, notice how suggesting that the encounter starts a single movement away get's brushed away with "let's start the troll in a pit". Every example just gets twisted. Is starting an encounter 50-60 feet away really that implausible? Seriously?

Let's see.

• Hideous Laughter is decent, but every time the target takes damage it gets a save with advantage and of course gets a save at the end of their turn.
• Dissonant Whispers does on average 10.5 damage and they move away. Okay. The troll has 84 HP, it's barely a scratch. If it's hurt bad enough, it just keeps going and comes back in a minute or two when it's fully healed.
• Command assumes the caster knows the language of the target which, in my campaign is not giant but that's another issue. Does stop the troll for 1 round if they fail.
• Animal Friendship? Have you read the spell? It just convinces an animal you aren't going to attack and charms them. Charm just means it's not going to attack the caster and you have advantage of social skills. It doesn't make a grizzly bear into a pet. It's useful to get past a guard dog, it doesn't make the dog your pet. I don't know of any class that gets a pet at first level.
• Color Spray is pretty weak in 5E, it just blinds a creature if you roll 6d10 and get a number above their HP. I've never seen any one actually take it.
• Thunderwave only pushes back 10 feet and it's a con save. Trolls have a +5 to con save, so most of the time they aren't pushed back.

But of course these are all super powerful in your game and you won't discuss details.

So my challenge is simple. Give us number of PCs and classes. I'll set them up in DndBeyond and run a scenario or three when I have time (running a couple of games this weekend) and run a sample combat how I would do it.

 

[Oofta]

I really don't think that magic in general is too potent in combat. There might be some exceptions but still. And I definitely would put my money on the troll against those first level casters!

But what @Hussar said about magic bypassing all sort of exploration and other content that would be an interesting challenge otherwise is true. It less of an issue in 5e than it was in 3e, but it still happens. When I started my campaign I went through the spell list and just banned the most obvious offenders. I definitely recommend doing this to any GM who has issues with this.

Maybe I just keep running for people who aren't good at this, or I just don't do exploration the way some DMs do. I've also not seen it in games I've played, other than the occasional "let the familiar scout ahead" which generally leads to dead familiar if it's abused. It's not that it's all that powerful, it's more just that it's boring. So I've just never really seen much of an issue running or playing. On the other hand I run more urban campaigns and mysteries, not exploring the wilderness.

What spells do you find problematic?

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Maybe I just keep running for people who aren't good at this, or I just don't do exploration the way some DMs do. I've also not seen it in games I've played, other than the occasional "let the familiar scout ahead" which generally leads to dead familiar if it's abused. It's not that it's all that powerful, it's more just that it's boring. So I've just never really seen much of an issue running or playing. On the other hand I run more urban campaigns and mysteries, not exploring the wilderness.

What spells do you find problematic?

Teleportation type spells are an obvious offender. Being able to teleport past obstacles or just skip travel altogether is something I don't want.

Another is spells that break the rest dynamic such as Catnap, Rope, Trick, Leomund's Invincible Bunker etc.

Third is various resurrection spells that trivialise death.

There are some others, but I'd say these are my three main categories to scrutinise.

 

[Oofta]

Teleportation type spells are an obvious offender. Being able to teleport past obstacles or just skip travel altogether is something I don't want.

I tend to be liberal with the anti-teleportation spells such as inner sanctum and forbiddance. They can be made permanent and, compared to the cost of building a castle are affordable. I do ban long distance teleport because I think it's boring, but even if I didn't you still aren't guaranteed to arrive safely.

Another is spells that break the rest dynamic such as Catnap, Rope, Trick, Leomund's Invincible Bunker etc.

I eventually house ruled that you can't attack anything outside the tiny hut.

Third is various resurrection spells that trivialise death.

Raise dead has been difficult in my games for several editions. I don't mind revivify, but that's based on how lethal a campaign the players want.

There are some others, but I'd say these are my three main categories to scrutinise.

Thx. I think we just take different approaches to these.