Recently, I wrote about how Dungeons & Dragons had the best character creator across 𝓡all forms of gaming because it had a slow-burning depth that meant your earliest choices when designing them, often trivial at the time, would have pay off right down the line, sometimes not landing until years later depending on the pace of your table's play. It is loaded with backstory and perks that unlock new ways to play, unique approaches to problems, and interesting storylines to explore. However, the one part that I have always struggled with is the aesthetic. Spoiled by video game character creators, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Dungeons & Dragons always feels a little light when it comes to visuals. Hero⛎ Forge has often been the solution to that, and its latest update improves things even more.
For a long time, I have played D&D using fan art found on the internet for my characters. As a very visual DM, that means between my two ten-level adventures I have written, I am closing in on 400 characters used. I can't curate each one nor afford to pay for artists to render bespoke versions, so I rely on freely available images out there. Sometimes I take inspiration from the art itself, incorporating scars, outfits, or items, but mostly it's an exercise in looking past the art. "It's this guy but imagine he has a dagger rather than a bow and he's taller and he's wearing green", that sort of thing.
AI programs claim to erase this, letting you instantly create the character of your dreams with a few simple points, but I refuse because a) I won't feed the AI machine, b) they often look terrible, and c) despite their claims, there's still a lot of 'this guy but ignore this and this and that'. That's where Hero Forge comes into it.
Hero Forge is a company that makes physical miniatures based on your designs, where you can customise their species, limbs, clothing, gear, and colours. You can then buy them to use in real life, or download images of them as a guide. While it can't be done for all 400 characters, I've found it a very helpful resource for player characters as it lets you build them from scratch rather than rely on existing artwork. Much like the lore parts of the character creator, it forces you to think about things in depth, putting more of yourself into your characters and getting more out of it, and it's going to get even better.
Hero Forge recently revealed that facial customisation will soon be coming to the program, allowing eyes, eyebrows, cheeks, chin, nose, mouth, lips, hair, and ears to all be tweaked and pulled and twisted however players wish through sliders rather than the current base selections. Despite the depth of D&D's creator, the fact video games have gotten an increasingly detailed level of control over every inch (literally, in the case of 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Cyberpunk 2077) of our heroes' bodies means there has always been pros and cons to the whole thing. It's why Starfield, which promises in-depth aesthetic customisation with the ability to set up meaningful backstories, is so appealing to me. Hero Forge's latest update is a major step forward for Dungeons & Dragons covering its weaknesses.
Obviously there has always been a way around it. There🌱 are artists who take commissions for D&D characters, and plenty of players use video games like Dragon Age to build their character before snapping a pic for D&D reference, like others do in Hero Forge. But Hero Forge being specifically for Dungeons & Dragons (or more broadly, tabletop games using the D&D species) means this is specifically a win for the scene, especially when so many players enjoy having the physical miniatures for their most belov𓄧ed characters.
Hero Forge has always iterated on itself and has marked itself out as a key resou𝓡rce for tabletop players, and this is one of its best updates yet. Adding more depth and creativity to the character creation process can only be a good thing, and any time saved from not having to say "Like this, but only if you ignore th🍸at, and that, and that" gets my vote.