Creating Sonic the Hedgehog in 'Dungeons & Dragons'

With a movie on the way, Sonic the Hedgehog is back in the public's imagination, and that means a [...]

With a movie on the way, Sonic the Hedgehog is back in the public's imagination, and that means a chance to incorporate the fuzzy blue hedgehog into Dungeons & Dragons. Sonic the Hedgehog is the anthropomorphic star of Sega's biggest franchise and challenged Nintendo's Mario at the peak of its popularity. While Sega and Sonic have seen their popularity drop in recent years, the hedgehog is now set to star in a live-action movie starring Jim Carrey as the hedgehog's nemesis Dr. Eggman and Ben Schwartz as the voice of the fast-moving hedgehog.

Watching Sonic run around in a world that's clearly not his own got me to wondering if the character would work in a D&D setting. After all, Dungeons & Dragons is a game filled where the only limitations are your own imagination, so a blue hedgehog that can move at supersonic speeds would hypothetically be right at home in a world where trees come to life and where players can progress from being barely competent warriors to potential god-slayers over the course of one lengthy adventure.

While designing a Sonic the Hedgehog course like Green Hills into a dungeon might be tricky, it wouldn't be too hard to add the character itself into your D&D campaign. Maybe Sonic is a fuzzy fey spirit with abilities like a quickling who hunts for gold rings and magically imbued crystals. Or maybe Sonic is similar to a tabaxi or tortle - a character of an anthropomorphic hedgehog race. His motivations could be tied to greed if he's an antagonist - Sonic is a ring hoarder or desires the Chaos Emeralds for some nefarious purpose. Or, he may recruit the characters to help him fight Dr. Eggman and his army of innocent animal-powered robotic horrors.

Designing a playable character around Sonic would be a bit trickier, but still doable under Fifth Edition rules. Sonic would probably best fit as a monk as he's fast, mobile, and doesn't use weapons. Personally, I would allow Sonic to use ki points to use homebrew abilities that incorporate his various spin attacks, such a Spin Dash attack that does extra damage and allows a player to sprint across the battlefield but requires a turn to charge, or a homing attack that grants advantage on attacks. I might even be inclined to give Sonic access to thunder damage (the equivalent of sonic damage in 5e) or maybe some natural armor that causes opponents to take damage whenever Sonic is hit with a melee attack due to his spikes. There's a lot of interesting possibilities here, but a DM would probably need to playtest a bit to see what exactly works within their campaign.

How would you build Sonic the Hedgehog in Dungeons & Dragons? Let us know in the comment section or find me on Twitter at @CHofferCbus to talk all things D&D!

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