Crafting a Lady D&D Character: Wonder Woman Edition

Welcome to Create a Lady Character Friday, where we take one of our favorite women and try to D&D them. 

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​For our first post, we’re going to be transforming Princess Diana of Themyscira herself, aka Diana Prince, which isn’t as easy as it sounds. Wonder Woman is basically a divine being with super human strength and healing. But unless you’re playing a Level 20 character, that doesn’t work terribly well in game. 

In our game, players use the Standard Array (15, 14, 13, 12, 10, and 8), so that’s what I’m going to be using to build this version of Wonder Woman—meaning she’s going to be more like a starter Wonder Woman.

So if you want to play a Wonder Woman inspired character, here is our Wonder Woman character sheet and a breakdown of how we did it. 

The Build
For the race, you want either Human or Aasimar. I went with Aasimar (a Celestial race detailed in Volo’s Guide) because the gods granted Wonder Woman her power, and that seemed like a pretty compelling argument for a celestial race. In particular, Protector Aasimars have a feature that allows them to fly, which Wonder Woman can do depending on which iteration of Wonder Woman you reference.
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Aasimar also has the advantage of giving Diana a +2 to Charisma. Wonder Woman is a fantastic orator, who inspires people to follow her example. But since I used the Standard Array, a bad stat had to go somewhere, and I decided to put it in Charisma since Wonder Woman’s only Charisma skill tends to be in Persuasion. She's not known for intimidating foes and she actively never deceives them, so a high stat score in those skills would be wasted. Plus the Aasimar +2 bump means that Wonder Woman isn’t bad at any skill.

But if you don’t have access to Volo’s Guide, a Human build would also work.

Then for the class, I chose a Strength build Barbarian. Barbarian is a good fit because the Barbarian tribes are set apart from the rest of society, reminiscent of Diana’s home of Themyscira. Now Barbarians are generally defined by their Rage, which Wonder Woman admittedly has very little of. But Wonder Woman is known for her love and sense of justice, which can just as easily fuel a rage like passion.
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Now, just to give you a better idea of the character build, I’ve started her at Level 3. At Level 3, Barbarians get their Path, and in this case, I chose Path of the Totem Warrior: Eagle. Eagle is a natural fit thanks to Wonder Woman’s Breastplate, and the eagle powers makes her slightly more nimble during combat.

For her Background, I created a Diplomat Background, which draws on her longstanding experience working with other groups and nations. A custom Background is very easy to create under the rules detailed in the PHB. Generally, a Background gives a player proficiency in 2 skills, an additional language, some starting equipment, and maybe a tool proficiency.

Thus, a Diplomat Background allowed Diana to have proficiency in Persuasion and Perception, rounding out some of her skills that were left lacking by the Standard Array. You may also be able to use the official Noble Background to achieve a similar result.

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The Equipment
Wonder Woman has some pretty dope equipment—not all of which she’ll be able to take into a D&D game. Her Lasso of Truth and Bracelets of Submission (worst. name. ever.) are basically game-breaking, so I’ve adapted them for D&D. The Lasso will allow her to use her proficiency bonus on Insight checks (to help discern if others are lying), and the Bracelets give her a +1 to AC. But if you wanted to make the Lasso of Truth ever more powerful and true to character, you could also give it some charges of the Zone of Truth spell.

While Wonder Woman in the movies has a sword, in the comic books she's usually depicted with an axe. For this build, we leaned into axes, which is consistent with a Barbarian's starting equipment. They also start with four javelins, which I subbed out for a shortbow and 10 arrows. The javelin is presumably meant to offer a Barbarian a ranged attack option (in addition to throwing the handaxes), and I decided a shortbow is more in theme with Wonder Woman.
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Another iconic Wonder Woman item is her tiara, which is said to be so sharp it has cut Superman. I think she traditionally uses it as a boomerang type item, so for D&D purposes, we stat-ed as a dagger. A dagger in D&D can be either thrown or used in melee combat, so it's a close approximation to the tiara's function, without being overpowered. And speaking of turning her items into D&D weapons, you could ever stat her Lasso as a whip for combat purposes.

Like in the movie, our Diana Prince character also has a shield, which Barbarians are proficient in but do not get as part of their starting gear. For purposes of her build, I decided to start her with 10 less gold pieces than I thought her Diplomat background would grant her, in order to represent her purchasing a shield.

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Playing Wonder Woman
While our lady characters are merely meant to inspire you, this character is a playable character consistent with most D&D rules. Even though she does have a couple magic items, she shouldn’t be game-breaking. In fact, in an effort to keep the character true to Wonder Woman, the character isn’t overly “optimized.”

What does that mean? It means that she has pretty low attack bonuses compared to other characters that can be created under the rules. But as Diana levels up and finds magic items, her Stats can also increase, making her more powerful. 

If you decide to use our character as is, remember to talk to your DM first about whether or not it will fit in their campaign. You'll need to discuss:

• Custom Diplomat Background (remember that you can probably substitute with the official Noble Background) 
• Playing as an Aasimar 
• Using a shortbow
• Dagger (tiara)
• Her shield 
• Custom magic items ​(if the DM doesn’t want you to start with these items, ask if they can be inserted into the game later as treasure your character picks up) 
• Starting level (this sheet is for a 3rd level character)

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It's about what you believe. And I believe in love. Only love will truly save the world. - Wonder Woman

Written by Rachel Paxton. She cried during the first fight scene in Wonder Woman and didn't stop until the movie ended. Finder her on Twitter @rachpax.