Snake's Venom: Gorgon Archer - Dungeons and Dragons 5e

Tuesday, October 31, 2017

Gorgon Archer - Dungeons and Dragons 5e - Character Creation Analysis

Character Creation and the Gorgon Archer

For the purposes of examining character creation I'm going to do two versions here. One is going to only use official rules from printed books to approximate the content and the other will use my homebrew gorgon race (bottom of the linked page below the sorcerer heritage and spells).

Contrary to more normal approach of going for a little bit higher stats than the typical game, I'm going to use the default array of 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8 as it represents a more pure analysis of the game. I will be using Feats when I look at advancement but as this post deals with 1st Level only, they won't be appearing here.

Dungeons and Dragons character creation is very simple and direct. It is a prime example of template based character creation. You choose a race, a class, and a background and through them create a unique character. Races sometimes have subraces and other ways to customize. Classes more often have options to tweak one way or another to fit your specific concept. Backgrounds are the most flexible consisting of 2 skills, and a combination of 2 tools or languages along with some flavorful gear and a mechanic-light feature connected to their background.

The downside is that there isn't an easy way to create a concept that's outside the ones in the established classes and races. You can approximate an outside concept by finding the combination that's closest to what you want, but you'll likely always be short one or two features for the total concept. You'll also likely have a few features you don't want or don't care about as well because you can't drop parts of the templates in favor of picking something up that fits with what you want, even if what you want to drop is considered more powerful than what you want to pick up.

Pure Wizards of the Coast Content Only

1st Level Yuan-ti Pureblood Fighter

Str: 8

Dex: 15

Con: 14

Int: 14

Wis: 12

Cha: 12

HP: 12

AC: 13

Initiative: +2

Speed: 30ft

Darkvision 60ft

Poison Immunity

Innate Spellcasting: Poison Spray, Speak with Snakes

Magic Resistance

Armor Proficiencies: Light Armor, Medium Armor, Heavy Armor, Shields

Weapon Proficiencies: Simple Weapons, Martial Weapons

Tools: Flute

Saving Throws: Strength, Constitution

Languages: Common, Abyssal, Draconic, Sylvan

Proficient Skills

Acrobatics (Fighter) +4

Athletics (Outlander) +1

Perception (Fighter) +3

Survival (Outlander) +4

Background: Outlander

Fighting Style: Archery

Second Wind

Equipment

Leather Armor

Longbow

20 Arrows

Spear

Shield

Homebrew Version

1st Level Gorgon Fighter