Let’s Play D&D With ‘Avatar: The Last Airbender’s Uncle Iroh
This week we’re making a nice pot of tea and unpacking all of our trauma. And if that doesn’t work, we’ll breathe some fire with Uncle Iroh.
Whether we’re talking about Mako, Greg Baldwin, or Paul Sun-Hyung Lee, it’s a universal truth of Avatar that Uncle Iroh is one of the best and most beloved characters. He might just be number one in all of our hearts. It’s hard not to love Iroh. He’s already had his hero’s journey and met his full character growth. And it makes for a kind, empathetic, and slightly cheesy guy who I think we’d all like to have as an uncle. But he’s also a stone-cold badass when it’s time to get down to business. Most of us don’t play D&D characters this thoughtful and well-rounded because chaos gremlins are less work in the moment. But let’s be a little aspirational for a moment and play D&D with…
Uncle Iroh
Before I get any emails, yes, we know that there’s a better system for an Avatar character. There is the Avatar Legends system, in fact. This is also a great system that we like a lot over here, and if you’re an Avatar fan and haven’t checked it out for yourself, you should. Soon. But for my purposes, the schtick is D&D characters, so we’re adding Uncle Iron to our next D&D adventure.
And honestly, I think Uncle Iroh would do well in a D&D setting. He’s already coming from one that has a sort of a magic system in bending, weird animals and monsters. We’ve even got dragons. He’s all set.
Even if you didn’t love live-action Avatar, this was a darn near perfect casting choice.
This is to say that there are a bunch of ways to make an Iroh-like character for a D&D setting, depending on what aspects of the character you want to lean into the most. For me, I wanted to see a character who’s super powerful, but probably plays it down a bit. He’s equal parts charismatic, and friendly presence, and could definitely destroy you. And of course, there’s got to be a lot of dragon influence.
I opted for a Monk–Sorcerer duel class. Way of the Ascendant Dragon Monk has a few different origins, two of which involve learning directly from a dragon- which Iroh did with Ran and Shao. But it also gives us a few key abilities including Breath of the Dragon at 3rd level and Wings Unfurled at 6th (we’ve seen that fire benders can use fire to propel themselves, sort of like flight).
But we also want to see Iroh with some fire spells. After all, he’s a firebender; he should be bending some fire. For that, I opted for Sorcerer. And to drive home the theme a little, we opted for Draconic Bloodline Sorcerer with a red-slash-fire dragon type. I only took three levels in this for a twenty-level-total, legendary character. But that gives us Draconic Resilience and a couple of cantrip-through-second-level spells.
Every one of Iroh’s spells is either related to fire, making friends, or lightning. For example, Witch Bolt isn’t lightning per se… but the description reads a lot like lightning to me. So he should be able to do it.
Iroh also has a bunch of feats. Diplomat and Empathic because he’s an inspiring leader who can talk to and make friends with almost anyone. Actor because how many times did he blend into the Earth Kingdom, unknown? And War Caster because… Well, we all know his past. He knows his way around a battlefield.
How would you make Uncle Iroh for D&D? Which Avatar character do you think would be most helpful in D&D? Have you checked out Avatar Legends yet? What movie, show, book, comic, or game should we make sheets from next time? Let us know in the comments!
Happy adventuring!
