A Guide for Beginning Players

The advice here on Over the DM's Shoulder is mostly oriented toward GMs, but sometimes a good GM could use some help teaching beginning players how to adapt to TRPGs. This guide contains everything a player will need to know to succeed in a game of Dungeons & Dragons. The same rules will generally apply to all TRPGs, but for the consideration of statistical details, I will be focusing on D&D. If you are playing a different TRPG, ask your GM for help understanding the rules--they will help you to work through all the numbers and give you an understanding of how to play. But building a game-ready character is more than understanding rules; let's address what you need to be ready as a player. 

The first piece of information you will need is what the focus of your game is going to be. Ask your fellow players and your GM what you'll be trying to accomplish with the game--will it be a combat-focused journey, a creative story, a roleplaying exposition? The character you create should be made according to this information. Once you have determined this information, it's time to create your character. I'll handle each possible focus, beginning with roleplaying. 

I've written elsewhere about how to roleplay, and the basics are simple. You'll need a backstory--check out the linked article for full tips on creating a backstory, but the core idea is that you're providing enough details to give yourself inspiration for how to behave in small moments. You want to know without doubt how your character would behave in any given scenario, and that takes an understanding of who they are, where they came from, and what they want. A good roleplayer is someone who contributes to the overall story through individual actions, and you will find that simply trying to honestly portray your character will do so. 

If your GM wants to focus more on storytelling than roleplaying for the sake of roleplaying, it's a good idea to tailor your character to the campaign. Let's say your GM has designed a story about falling stars which explode in fiery bursts when they strike land. They want the party to discover what's going on and do something about it. To contribute to the storytelling, it's a good idea to pick a character design that would be interesting or helpful in this scenario. You could decide to be a stargazer or astronomer and have a background in the campaign's focus area. You could also decide to be an explosives expert who is interested in the detonation upon impact, or a nature preservationist who is alarmed at the destruction of land, or a humanitarian bent on helping those whose lives were impacted by the falling stars. The important thing is that your character be able to contribute to the story with their own unique perspective. 

A roleplaying or storytelling approach also means that you as the player are going to be expected to generate content in concert with your fellow players. That means that in either case, you'll need a healthy improvisational spirit. You can read about how to use improv rules to work together on a story, but the basics are that you accept whatever detail is added by another player or the GM and you add to it. If the GM says that stars are falling near you, you can respond in many different ways as long as you add something to it. "I run away from the falling stars, trying to warn nearby townspeople," or "I stand still, too frightened to move," or "I cast a spell on the star to determine whether it is magical" are all great options, but the important thing is that you added your character's action to the mix. 

If you're playing a combat game, you'll want to be ready with appropriate rules and strategies, and you'll especially want to be familiar with your character sheet. Here are the basics:

The most vital information is how the stats generally work. As I've written before, the key is in understanding the attribute scores. The basis is simple: each score for an attribute like Strength or Charisma has a corresponding scaled modifier. This modifier reflects the bonus you get to rolls for skills and attacks, as well as your difficulty to be hit (your armor class) and your overall hit points. A +3 to Strength means that you get +3 to your "to hit" (plus your proficiency modifier as well); it also means you get +3 damage on top of what your damage dice roll. If you understand this basic formula, you can grasp 90% of the numerical values in D&D. Check out the linked article for more detail on how this is applied. 

But just knowing how your numbers relate to one another won't be enough--you'll also need to know how to find specific information on your character sheet. And among that information, there's specific details that you will want to memorize. First though, let's break down the character sheet, using the official template from D&D Beyond. Here's the character sheet for Asa, who I introduced here.  

Highlighted: the attributes and their bonuses. 

As mentioned above, the attributes are the core of the statistical framework of D&D. Take a look at the attribute bonuses and compare them to the skill check scores in the middle column. Skills which rely on Intelligence have a +1 bonus, which is because Asa's Intelligence has a +1 bonus. The only differences are when a character is proficient in a skill--Asa gets an additional +3 to these skills because of his proficiency bonus (located right next to the attributes). This will clear up much of the confusion about stats in the game. 

Highlighted: your actions. 

It's very important to be familiar with your actions. Many first time players freeze on their turns, unsure of what to do in combat, but this actions box covers basically everything you can do. It includes attacks, spells, and special actions. Anything you want to do related to these will be found here. If you're using the online character sheet, you can click on the top menus in the box to move between attacks, spells, equipment, and more. 

Highlighted: vital statistics. 

The final area of interest on our character sheet is this bundle of numbers in the upper right corner. It includes your hit points, your speed, your initiative, and your armor class, amongst other details. If you are in the midst of playing and you need information about your characters ability to remain unharmed in combat, it will be found here. This information is so important in general that it would be helpful to memorize it. In fact, you should memorize the following numbers so that you can keep combat rolling on your turn:

• Armor Class
• Total Hit Points
• Initiative
• Attack and Damage for your most common weapon(s)
• Checks for your most common skills (dependent on the game, but perception is often used in most games)

The first four items on this list are information which can change, but generally stays the same for long periods of time. Thus, if you memorize the information, you can save yourself having to reference your character sheet when these common rolls come up. The checks, as mentioned, depend on the game, but you will quickly learn which skills your GM wants you to use most often. Once you have this information ready, you'll be able to play like a pro. 

But there are other ideas about combat you should be aware of. Since the creation of D&D in the 1970s, players and GMs have theorized that the perfect party has a definite breakdown of components. The common wisdom holds that a four-person party follows a certain pattern: a healer, a tank, an expert, and a striker. Generally this would mean, respectively, a cleric, a fighter/barbarian, a rogue/bard, and a spellcaster. It's not that every adventure demands this balance, and a good GM won't require a party to have this makeup in order to succeed. But the wisdom holds that the party should be prepared for anything, and having one party member who is well-versed in each eventuality is a good way to ensure you've got what it takes. You can collaborate with the other players to build a balanced party, but you can also just as easily assign roles to the player characters who are best suited for the job. A fighter might take up the striker position if they're a ranged weapons specialist, and a sufficiently skilled sorcerer could be the party's expert. It's all about what works for you, but try to figure out your role in the party and lean into it. 

There are also specific strategies you can adopt in the game to make the most of your attacks. In D&D, there are a variety of special attacks that allow you to target an enemy in a specific way. You can view a hypertext list of them here. You have access to a range of special attacks; you could strike your foe's weapons or shield (Sunder), knock them prone (Trip), push them back (Bull Rush), or knock the weapon from their hands (Disarm). And that's just a bit of your options. These special attacks are among the most commonly overlooked abilities in the game, and if you can begin familiarizing yourself with them as a beginning player, you'll get the most out of combat in no time. 

"This is all great and fine," you might say, "but I'm still hung up trying to design my character." Inspiration for a good character can be a challenge, but there are a variety of routes I find helpful. You might first be inspired by the physical look of the character. You could design a character or stumble upon inspiration, and looking at figurines for combat can be a great option. If you're looking to browse options and be inspired, check out a mini seller like Miniature Market. If you want to have control over the appearance of your character-to-be, try Hero Forge with its many options for appearances. In either case, you'll get a clear picture of who your character is on the surface, and that will help fill in details later. 

You could also start with the core of the character's personality. A good place to start here is with the works of fiction or nonfiction you enjoy. Really enjoy a specific character out there? Tweak some details and fashion them into your character. Wish that a specific character were different in some way? Make them as you wish they were. Enjoy a figure from history and find them inspiring? Create them in the game world. It doesn't matter where your inspiration comes from--you just want to make a complex, realistic character who you can inhabit in game. 

The final method for coming up with a character idea I'll recommend is in working closely with another player. So often are player characters lone wolfs with no real past--and how sad that we deprive ourselves of the opportunities to fill in those details with something interesting. You could sit down with another player and discuss how they know each other and what their relationship is like. This method allows you to get right to the heart of your character's connections with the real world and present a more realistic group dynamic in the game. It's rare that people use this option, but I highly recommend it if you're looking for a storytelling or roleplaying campaign. 

And for players who are very new to TRPGs, the dice themselves can be a challenge. Use this guide to dice for D&D for beginning players, which will teach all the basics of recognizing and using the dice, including what each is commonly used for. Don't underestimate the difficulty of starting out in D&D--there's a lot to learn, and dice can be just the beginning of player issues. 

This guide has covered a variety of concerns for players, and I hope that it allows a few beginning players out there to get a leg up on the intensive process of becoming a seasoned D&D player. As always, if you as a player or GM need guidance on some part of the TRPG process, let me know! I'd be happy to write about your concerns. Look out soon for guides to dice for beginners, describing magic, and what accessories you need to play. Until next time, happy gaming!

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