Terminal character sheets for D&D 5e sessions, written in Rust (ratatui), inspired by pythops' work.
Scope: D&D 5e, 2014 rules, official content only (Player's Handbook and the other Wizards of the Coast books; no Unearthed Arcana, no homebrew). The 2024 rules are not covered.
| Casting Fireball | Character creation |
|---|---|
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To try it without installing anything, open the web version at https://odd-git.github.io/dnd-TUI/: the same rules in a page that works on phones too. Sheets stay in that browser; Export saves a copy you can import elsewhere.
Download the archive for your system from the latest release, unpack it and run dnd-tui from a terminal:
| System | File |
|---|---|
| Linux (any distribution) | dnd-tui-linux-x86_64.tar.gz, or -aarch64 for ARM |
| macOS | dnd-tui-macos-aarch64.tar.gz (Apple silicon) or -x86_64 (Intel) |
| Windows | dnd-tui-windows-x86_64.zip, best in Windows Terminal |
tar xzf dnd-tui-linux-x86_64.tar.gz
./dnd-tui-linux-x86_64/dnd-tui
To keep it: install -Dm755 dnd-tui-*/dnd-tui ~/.local/bin/dnd-tui. SHA256SUMS in the release lists the checksums.
The binaries are not signed: on macOS, if the system refuses to open it, run xattr -d com.apple.quarantine dnd-tui once; on Windows, SmartScreen asks for "More info", then "Run anyway".
To build it yourself you need a recent stable Rust toolchain:
cargo build --release
install -Dm755 target/release/dnd-tui ~/.local/bin/dnd-tui
Pick a sheet at start, or press N to create a character.
Each character is one JSON file in ~/.local/share/dnd-tui/ ($XDG_DATA_HOME/dnd-tui/; on Windows %LOCALAPPDATA%\dnd-tui\), sheet and live state together, saved after every action. The bundled sheets in data/characters/ are copied there on first run (the .seeded file marks it): delete a sheet to remove it; to get a bundled sheet back, delete it and .seeded (the other sheets are kept); drop a .json there to add a character. If the program crashes it writes the error, a backtrace and the last 40 inputs to crash.log in the same folder: please attach it to the issue.
Keys are shown in the footer, and every footer button, list row, check and tab is clickable. Tab or F1-F4 switch tabs, / searches lists, Z undoes, Q goes back to the sheets.
| Where | Key | Does |
|---|---|---|
| Sheets | N / D |
new character (wizard: race, class, background, scores, skills, spells, gear) / delete |
| Sheets, Character | P |
export the sheet as a printable PDF (A4) in the folder you started the program from: to play on paper |
| Combat | Enter, 1-9 |
run an action: attack and damage rolls, healing, resources spent |
D / H / G |
damage / heal / temporary HP (the higher value stays; damage takes them first) | |
I / T / V |
initiative / ability check, skill or save / next roll with advantage or disadvantage | |
C / F / X |
conditions / exhaustion level / death saves | |
N |
Heroic Inspiration: grant it, press again to spend it for advantage | |
M / P |
Battle Master maneuvers / counted items (ammunition, potions) | |
S / L |
short rest (spend hit dice) / long rest | |
U |
level up, in any class whose multiclass requirements you meet | |
E |
sheet editor: identity, scores, gear, feats, resources, notes, spells, inventory and coins | |
O |
end concentration | |
| Spells | Enter, C |
cast: slot level, attack or save DC, damage; rituals without a slot |
P / E |
prepare / add or remove spells | |
| Journal | A / Del |
add / delete a note |
- All 13 classes (the twelve of the Player's Handbook and the Artificer) from level 1 to 20 with multiclassing: features, resources, pooled spell slots and pact slots, hit dice per class.
- Every Player's Handbook subclass has its mechanics (Channel Divinity options, Arcane Ward, Portent, Wild Magic surges, the Beast Master's companion, Wild Shape with the SRD beasts...). Subclasses from other books are text only: their features are listed with a summary and a link, without automation.
- Spellcasting: known, prepared and spellbook casters, upcasting, cantrip scaling, concentration with automatic CON saves, ritual casting.
- Exhaustion, conditions, temporary HP, death saves, Heroic Inspiration.
- Inventory: items with count and weight, attunement up to three, coins that make change when spent.
cargo test and cargo clippy --all-targets -- -D warnings must pass. The lists in data/lists/ are generated, do not edit them by hand: change the scripts in tools/ and run them with python3 -I, in this order: fetch_lists.py, fetch_classes.py, fetch_classes.py fighter-ek barbarian, fetch_spells.py, fetch_options.py (fetch_beasts.py on its own). Pages are cached in /tmp/dnd-wikidot-cache. Entries without a summary go to /tmp/dnd-summaries-todo.json: write one in your own words in data/lists/summaries.json. Then run tools/check_copy.py (it must find 0 copied strings) and tools/audit_spells.py (it must find 0 new differences with Open5e).
The code is licensed under the GNU General Public License v3.0 or later (see LICENSE).
The lists in data/lists/ keep the licenses of their sources: the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License for the data derived from dnd5e.wikidot.com and the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License for the SRD 5.1 data (beasts.json), as detailed in Credits below.
This is an unofficial fan project, not affiliated with or endorsed by Wizards of the Coast. Dungeons & Dragons is a trademark of Wizards of the Coast LLC.
Races, classes, subclasses, backgrounds, feats, weapons, armor, spells and class options (data/lists/, built by the scripts in tools/) are derived from the pages of the D&D 5th Edition wiki at https://dnd5e.wikidot.com, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/); these derived lists are shared under the same license. Each entry keeps the name of the official sourcebook it comes from. Descriptions are not copied from the books: spells in the SRD 5.1 carry their SRD text (from the Open5e API, marked "srd": true), every other entry carries a short mechanical summary written for this project (data/lists/summaries.json, merged in by the generators) and a link to its wiki page, shown as More: in the sheet. tools/check_copy.py checks that no description shares 8 or more consecutive words with the cached wiki pages.
Beast and elemental statistics (data/lists/beasts.json, built by tools/fetch_beasts.py from the Open5e API) come from the System Reference Document 5.1 by Wizards of the Coast LLC, available at https://dnd.wizards.com/resources/systems-reference-document and licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode).