There are many approaches that can be taken when creating a new custom character for Baldur's Gate 3. While it can be a lot of fun to play with a fully optimized build, not all builds in Baldur's Gate 3 have to be about power and efficiency - in fact, some of the most fun characters to play with in Baldur's Gate 3 are those with interesting concepts.
Whether focusing on the roleplaying experience for a first campaign or kicking back after a punishing Honour Mode run, there are plenty of reasons to set aside the idea of getting the highest stats. The builds below are not all optimal or even powerful, but they all offer something a little different, and most importantly: they are fun.
Pure Bard Is More Of A Roleplaying Style
These Musical Adventurers Make Any Campaign Hilarious
Pure bards are less of a specific build and more of a roleplay style. For this character, any BG3 bard subclass can be chosen, but College of Lore works well thematically.
In-universe, bards are typically performers, so Charisma is the stat you'll want to focus on, giving you plenty of leeway when it comes to Persuasion, Deception, and, most importantly, Performance checks.
A bard is ideally a character that isn’t in the fray if they can help it, so crowd control spells like 
Tasha's hideous laughter, 
Hold person, Otto's irresistible dance, and silence can help you out a lot. It's also exceptionally fun to get serious NPCs to dance along to a tune, which can often make for a rather silly sight.
While out of combat, 
Charm Person, 
Disguise Self or 
Seeming are also good suggestions. Players can charm their enemies during dialogue, and with the help of some Bardic inspiration, this can allow you to get past some extremely difficult checks.
Bard-Barian Merges The Two Most Reactive Classes
Vigor & Voice
For those who want the roleplaying benefits of a bard, but don't want to sacrifice the combat prowess of meatier melee classes, look no further than the bard-barian. There are many ways to balance this multiclass build, but it's probably best to start as a barbarian for that early attack and HP boost, then take at least three levels in bard throughout the game.
It's best for a bard-barian to take at least a couple of healing spells, like 
healing word, so they can keep themselves alive while tanking. Support spells like Tasha's Hideous Laughter and Silence are useful for debuffing enemies. Song of Rest can also be helpful, effectively giving the entire party an extra short rest so they can keep going a little longer.
Although College of Lore is always good, if you only plan on taking three levels in the class, College of Swords might be best for the bard-barian since it's the most martial-focused out of all the bard subclasses.
Compared to the other classes, Bards and Barbarians have the most class-specific dialogue options throughout the game, so merging them together will unlock an incredible amount of interactions.
Besides the excellent unique dialogue options and Jack of All Trades bonus to skills the bard isn't proficient in, they'll also get a number of handy bonuses that can help boost their own skills and support their teammates.
Rogue-Ranger Assassins Are Sneaky Little Tricksters
Pure Damage Output & Unparalleled Sleight-Of-Hand
The rogue-ranger build is focused solely on dealing as much damage as possible in the first turn of combat.
The build doesn't work too well in story-centric battles that begin with long stretches of dialogue, since it relies almost entirely on getting the first turn and surprising enemies, which can cause first-timers to miss out on a lot of context.
However, for experienced combat optimizers who know their targets and want to dish out large amounts of damage, playing a rogue-ranger is an easy and satisfying way to cut a path through the Sword Coast.
This is mainly done using the rogue's Sneak Attack feature, which gives them a 1d6 bonus on one attack each turn as long as they're hiding (or have advantage against their target). If you don't have disadvantage, Sneak Attack also works if you have a teammate within five feet of the target.
Their abilities are boosted further by the Assassin subclass for rogue and the Dread Ambusher subclass for ranger. The former enhances the first turn in battle, especially when the rogue-ranger surprises their enemies. The latter adds to those bonuses, and helps them hide with Umbral Shroud.
The Sharpshooter and Alert feats can help bolster this build. "Alert" works particularly well with the Assassin Rogue, since the subclass is deadliest when attacking enemies who have not yet had their turn. The feat adds a huge bonus to initiative and prevents you from being surprised.
Battle Master Is The Best Fighter Build
Versatile Fighters With Extra Abilities
Fighter is one of the most versatile classes in both DnD and Baldur's Gate 3. They are able to use all varieties of weapons and armor, making them the perfect Baldur's Gate 3 class for beginners. They are also tons of fun to play as, with several of their abilities, such as Action Surge, adding to their versatility.
Fighters do miss out on a lot of roleplay aspects of BG3 since they don't get a huge amount of unique dialogue, but they're a very solid choice if you usually find yourself struggling in combat.
By far the most fun fighter build is the Battle Master with their Battle Maneuvers. This can allow the fighter to do some really fun things in combat, like disarming enemies, pushing them, or knocking them prone, all of which can be even more useful in Baldur's Gate 3 than in tabletop DnD thanks to an overall emphasis on verticality.
This build makes combat more interesting for a class that may seem boring at first glance, and it's possible to make a powerful character very early in the game. It's also a smart choice if you want to try out a wide range of armor sets in Baldur's Gate 3, since fighters won't have to worry about not being able to cast spells while heavily armored.
Tavern Brawler Monk Is Full Of Strength
Aggressive Attackers
For a fun and powerful build, it’s hard to go wrong with the Tavern Brawler monk. For this build, choose monk at character creation and level them up to level five, choosing Way of the Open Hand.
At level four, choose Tavern Brawler as your feat to add the character's Strength modifier to damage and attack rolls. This would already create a very powerful character, but by adding some levels of rogue, things can get really entertaining, as your character will get an extra bonus action.
This is perfect for using Flurry of Blows, which, with Tavern Brawler, will allow you to deal tons of damage per turn. The rogue's cunning action will also grant you some excellent freedom to move around the battlefield.
Bear-barian Is A Fun Druid-Barbarian Combo
Tanky Brawlers With A Fluffy Twist
A well-known DnD build is the Bear-barian, which combines Circle of the Moon druid with the Totem Warrior barbarian. For Baldur's Gate 3, Totem Warrior has been redesigned slightly in the form of Wildheart, but the multiclass build still works.
This is a great build for overall power and roleplaying potential, and it has a lot of extra benefits, such as the extra health pool, healing abilities, and bonus rage damage.
When starting a new character, druid should be chosen and leveled up to level two with Circle of the Moon as the subclass, so you get access to more powerful wildshape forms. After that, switch to barbarian and level up to level three, choosing Wildheart and Bear Heart for resistance to all damage types except psychic while raging.
After this, it is entirely up to personal preference, but a 50/50 split works well to balance the strengths of both classes.
You can create a similar build with Halsin as a full barbarian with the Shapeshifter hat, since he constantly has access to Bear Wildshape, no matter his class or level. He still needs a wildshape charge to use the ability, and the item grants a single wildshape charge per long rest.
Become A Ninja With Another Monk/Rogue Multiclass
Multi-Class Stealth Experts
Anyone who has played Skyrim will agree that playing as a stealth-based fantasy RPG character is ridiculously fun. Baldur's Gate 3 can take that a step further with the "Ninja" build to deal out damage from the shadows, and with a high enough Stealth skill, you won't be limited to just ranged attacks.
To begin, make a new monk character and level them up to level five, choosing Way of the Shadow as your subclass. After gaining Flurry of Blows, Stunning Strike, and an extra attack, multiclass into rogue.
Take three levels in rogue, choosing the Assassin subclass to gain auto crits on surprised enemies and advantage on attack rolls if the enemy hasn't taken their turn.
Then, return to monk as you progress through the later stages of the game to fully take advantage of the shadows and sneak attack, and savor the moments where enemies don't know what hit them until it's too late.
The Dark Urge is a good origin to apply this class build because they gain The Deathstalker Mantle, which can make you much sneakier. After killing an enemy, the cloak will cause you to turn invisible for two turns, meaning you can kill multiple enemies without detection.
Necromancer Requires No Multiclassing
Undead Connoisseurs
Whether resisting or surrendering to their murderous impulses, the Dark Urge certainly does some pretty odd things throughout the game. With that in mind, a very entertaining roleplay-focused build to lean into all the weirder aspects of a Dark Urge playthrough is the Necromancer.
This is a simple build that is more roleplay-focused with no multiclassing. Here, just make a wizard and choose School of Necromancy.
This choice works well thematically with Grim Harvest healing the Dark Urge when they kill with a spell, but is also practical in using 
Animate Dead. A Necromancy wizard creates better zombies using the animate dead spell, raising two corpses at a time with more hit points.
The Death Domain Cleric and Oathbreaker Paladin subclasses also grant more Necromancy spells, so even though the wizard class is powerful enough on its own, you can choose to dip into either of them if you're not satisfied.
Just remember to keep some spare corpses back at camp to make sure the Necromancer never runs out of new friends.
Way Of The Four Elements Monk Makes You The Tavatar
A Spell For Every Weakness
One of the easiest ways to make every battle feel fresh and fun is to give a character lots of options in combat. In that, the Way of the Four Elements monk excels.
This class takes the hand-to-hand prowess and maneuverability of a monk, then adds a handful of martial arts-flavored adaptations of wizard spells. This turns the monk into a hybrid spellcaster with a variety of options for elemental damage, making them a force to be reckoned with at both short and long range.
The real beauty of this build is its ability to hit almost any kind of enemy weakness. Players can inspect enemy weaknesses in BG3 by hovering the cursor over them and pressing T on a keyboard, or down on the D-Pad of a controller. When an enemy has a specific elemental weakness, you can act accordingly and deal some devastating attacks.
It may not be the best monk build in BG3 in terms of raw attack power, but it's a lot of fun to play. If you're unhappy with this damage output and don't mind customizing your game a little, then a mod by CreativeExcuses is available from the in-game manager. This overhauls the subclass to make it a little more capable.
Padlock Builds Provide OP Fun
The Best Of Both Worlds
Padlock is generally thought of as the archetypal overpowered Baldur's Gate 3 build. As its nickname implies, this is a combination of paladin and warlock, granting a character incredible melee strength, all armor proficiencies, and powerful spells that recharge with every short rest.
Taking the Fiend subclass and binding a two-handed sword effectively makes this a single-ability-dependent class build, allowing the padlock to put all their ability points into Charisma without seeing much of a reduction in any of their skills. A 5/7 split is ideal, with more levels going to paladin for Aura of Protection and the improved HP increases.
From a roleplaying standpoint, padlocks are also innately interesting. They combine two classes known for taking power from patrons, but each has a totally different flavor from the other.
Paladins are generally paragons of good who call on divine grace to heal the wounded, protect the weak, and punish the wicked. Warlocks are usually considered the inverse, often being harborers of dark secrets, regrets, or deriving their strength from forces of evil.
Combining the two classes creates an interesting contrast, which has some great potential for a unique character backstory. You could flavor your character as sourcing their powers from a singular deity, or you could imagine it as two forces fighting over them.