How to play a solo D&D-style tabletop adventure with Paige

Step by step

1. 1

   Step 1: Start an adventure

   Go to Adventures and tap “Start an adventure”. On “What is this adventure about?” type one line about the story. In a hurry for a fight? Tap “Just want fights? Kick in the door” instead.

   

2. 2

   Step 2: Choose Tabletop

   Under “How it plays”, pick “Tabletop” (“Dice, a character sheet, combat”). Then pick “Campaign” for a world with people and quests, or “Kick in the door” for room, monster, fight, loot, next door.

   

3. 3

   Step 3: Make your character

   The builder opens on “Make your character”. Choose “Quick build” (about a minute), “Step by step” (choose everything) or “Bring your character” (upload your sheet). Tap “Use this character” at the end.

4. 4

   Step 4: Set the look, sound and first fight

   Pick an art style and a “Narrator” voice. In Kick in the door, also pick how hard “Your first fight” is, or tap “Or pick the monsters yourself”.

   

5. 5

   Step 5: Check your world, then step in

   For a Campaign, Paige writes “Your world.” Read it, change anything, then tap “Save and step in”. Kick in the door skips this and takes you straight to the first room.

6. 6

   Step 6: Play and check your sheet

   Each turn gives you prose and three choices, or you type your own move. Tap “You” in the top bar to see your character sheet, inventory and the people you have met.

Campaign or Kick in the door?

Both are Tabletop, so both use dice and a character sheet. The difference is how much story surrounds the fights.

“Campaign” builds a full world first: people to meet, places, quests and where the story can go. You read and edit that world before the first scene.

“Kick in the door” has no world to build. You walk into a room, meet a monster, fight, take the loot and open the next door, for as long as you last. Each room after the first gets a little harder.

The character builder, step by step

Paige plays everyone else. You only need a species and a class to start, and every step starts on a good default. On a phone you see “Step N of M” and a thin bar; on a wider screen every step is listed at the top, one tap away. Your draft is kept in this browser, so a reload does not lose it.

Pick your rules at the top: “2024 rules” (the current D&D rules) or “2014 rules” (the older book, where species give the ability bonuses). Steps only appear when your character needs them, so a level 1 fighter sees fewer steps than a level 8 multiclass wizard.

Spells and the spellbook

If your class casts spells, the gear step includes a spellbook titled “Choose your cantrips and spells”. Search with “Search spells” or use “Filter by school”. Each spell shows if it needs “Concentration” or is a “Ritual”.

You can leave picks blank. The spellbook says “Blank is fine: Paige chooses.” Your sheet then lists your spell save DC, spell attack and spell slots.

Bring your own character sheet

Already playing someone at a real table? Choose “Bring your character” on the first builder screen. Tap “Choose your sheet” to upload a PDF, Word or text file (up to 15 MB), or paste the text under “Or paste the text of your sheet”. Sheets from D&D Beyond, the official sheet or a fan-made one all work, at any level and any mix of classes.

Tap “Read my sheet”. A long sheet can take up to a minute. Your file is only read, never kept.

Next comes “Check your character”: everything Paige read, laid out to edit. Set “Rules” to “2014 rules”, “2024 rules” or “Not sure”. Fix anything that is off. A field marked “couldn’t read this” needs your eye. You never set proficiency yourself; it comes from your total level.

Honest dice and how the rules work

The dice are rolled by the app with a true random number, not made up by the story. Paige rolls with the scores on your sheet. Rolls show in the scene, including “NATURAL 20!”, “NATURAL 1!”, “SUCCESS” and “MISS”.

The game runs on the D&D 2024 rules (the free System Reference Document, version 5.2). Where the 2024 rules are silent, it falls back to the 2014 rules (version 5.1). The free rules cover the classes, species, backgrounds, monsters, spells and items you see in the builder and the shop.

Your own rules win. If your Story Bible has an entry that changes how something works, or you added homebrew in the builder, Paige follows yours over the book.

Your character sheet during play

Tap “You” in the top bar. A panel opens: on a phone it slides up from the bottom, on a computer it sits on the right. It scrolls through these parts:

Print your sheet on paper

In the “You” panel, tap “Printable sheet”. It opens a clean page made for A4 paper (“A4, black on white, nothing else prints”). Tap “Print or save as PDF”.

The printed sheet has your scores, skills, gear, spells, features, resources, companions and story. It is handy for a real table, or to keep a record of a character you love.

Questions