Build me a D&D character backstory that's actually useful at the table — hooks the DM can use, NPCs to riff off, and a personality that survives a 4-hour session.
CLASS + SUBCLASS: {class_subclass}
RACE / ANCESTRY: {race}
LEVEL STARTING AT: {1-5}
ALIGNMENT or VIBE: {LG / CN / 'morally complicated' / etc.}
WHAT YOU WANT TO ROLEPLAY: {gruff / sarcastic / earnest / weird / quiet}
THE PARTY: {classes_of_other_PCs if known}
CAMPAIGN SETTING: {homebrew / Forgotten_Realms / specific_module / unknown}
WHAT YOU DON'T WANT in this backstory: {tragic_orphan / generic_revenge / 'mysterious_past'}
ONE THING YOU'RE NERVOUS ABOUT roleplaying: {romance / strong_emotion / improvising_voices}
DESIGN:
1. **3-paragraph backstory** — concrete, specific, no 'taken from her village at age 12'. Includes names of places, people, and one weird detail.
2. **2 personality traits** + **1 ideal** + **1 bond** + **1 flaw** — the Player's Handbook format but actually interesting.
3. **3 DM hooks** — NPCs, places, or unresolved conflicts the DM can pull into the story whenever they want.
4. **2 NPC connections** — a mentor and a rival, each in 3 sentences, with one specific quirk.
5. **A signature item** — not magic, not heirloom. Something weird that says who you are. (A pewter spoon. A library card. A finger bone that may or may not be your dad's.)
6. **One opening line** I can use the first time my character speaks in session 1.
7. **A 'session 5 reveal'** — something about my character that comes out later, NOT in the first session.0 copies·0 saves·1 views
255 words·1,531 chars
Sample output
Class: rogue (arcane trickster) · Race: half-elf · Level 3 · Alignment vibe: morally complicated, charming · RP style: sarcastic, deflecting · Party: paladin, druid, sorcerer · Setting: homebrew low-magic city campaign · Don't want: tragic orphan or generic revenge · Nervous about: voicing strong emotion.
1. Backstory (3 short paragraphs):
Mila Vex grew up in the Brookside neighborhood of Carthen, a port city built into the side of a limestone cliff. Her mother, Imelda, ran the family laundry — a legitimate business that also, until Mila was nine, served as a quiet drop-point for the Goosefoot Network, a smuggling ring that mostly trafficked banned books and the occasional minor noble fleeing arranged marriage. Mila grew up sorting other people's sheets and learning, through osmosis, how to look at a folded handkerchief and tell whether the message inside had been read.
When Mila was twelve, the Goosefoot Network was dismantled by the Carthen Guard. Imelda was not arrested — Mila's mother had been smart enough to step back two years earlier, and the laundry was, by then, just a laundry. But two of Mila's favorite people in the world were arrested. One of them was Old Tarsh, who had taught Mila her first card tricks. The other was Sophie, an apprentice mage and Mila's first crush, who had taught her the first three signs of the silent hand-cant the network used.
Mila has been a thief, freelance, since she was sixteen. She is not romantic about it. The magic she practices came late — she discovered she could cast Mage Hand in the alley behind the laundry at nineteen, and it scared her. She has not told her mother. She is now twenty-four, in Carthen still, drifting up and down the coast on jobs that pay enough to eat well, and she is starting to suspect that some of the people she's been doing 'freelance jobs' for might be reconstituting Goosefoot under a new name.
2. Player's Handbook traits:
Parameters
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FAQ
Print your character sheet's flaws + bonds at the top of your page. Look at them every time you make a decision in-game. Players who actually play their flaws have the most fun and the best stories. The prompt targets Claude Sonnet and lives in the Writing & Content category on mycopyprompt.
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3. DM hooks (handed to your DM):
4. NPC connections:
Mentor: Old Tarsh. Released from prison three years ago, now runs a small card-and-cane shop in the Lower Market. Walks with a limp from a bad mage in prison. Insists Mila call him 'sir' and then immediately calls her 'kid'. He taught her the only trick she still does for fun: cutting a deck one-handed under the table during a tense conversation. He has not asked her, even once, whether she's a thief now. He doesn't have to.
Rival: Tessen Mirel. Another half-elf, two years younger, who entered the freelance scene three years ago and is making a name for himself by undercutting Mila's prices and being more theatrical about the work. They have had two near-collisions on jobs. They have shared a drink exactly once and it was tense. He is not evil. He is just trying to be the new Mila.
5. Signature item: A pewter spoon, slightly bent. Was Sophie's. Mila uses it to eat soup like a normal person at inns. She does not explain it.
6. Opening line (session 1): 'Right, so before anybody asks — yes, I noticed the second exit, yes, I noticed who the guard is sleeping with, and yes, I'm probably picking up the bar tab. Where are we going?'
7. Session 5 reveal: Mila has been carrying Sophie's unopened letter for ten years. The session she finally opens it should be earned — a moment when the party has helped her grow into someone who can read it. The letter (DM's call) probably contains something that recontextualizes who Sophie was, and possibly a hint about the new Goosefoot.