Hey, guys. I brought the aasimar as a PC race into my game as an option during character creation. Let me know if you think the rules make sense. I modeled it after the tiefling.
The resistances seem a but much. From what I remember, the tiefling only got fire.
They did get fire, but it seems to me like fire comes up a lot more often than other resistances so maybe it's better to have than something like lightning or radiant? Maybe I should cut it down to two rather than three?
The aasimar should be in the second PH.
My suggestion is resistance to necrotic damage, and a daily "inspiration dice" as is it was a special adventage. .
A little catrip like daylight, and darkvision, and adeventage for listen and spot cheks
Ability Score Increase. Your Wisdom score increases by 2, and your Charisma score increases by 1.
A note on the deva / aasimar thing - who says you can't have both by having celestial blooded humans constantly reincarnating naturally (actually, this is how Forgotten Realms seems to have balanced the aasimar/deva question for their setting)? You could even work that into the abilities.
That's actually something that happened with the tiefling, though few people give it credit for it. The 2e version of the tiefling favored charisma, but also gave elemental resistance, darkvision, and the darkness spell; this was the default tiefling before any charts. The 3e version inverted the charisma bonus to a penalty, but kept the dark stuff and resistances. The 4e version went with a fire theme. 5e went with both the darkness theme AND the fire theme together.
So, instead of just giving some light spells... why not add something in that references both the 4e deva AND the 2/3e aasimar?
It would also have interesting story repercussions, with the aasimar assuming royal lineages and constantly being reborn and ruling over their people for generations. It also really works the divine right angle.
I kind of also always liked getting some kind of "halo" mechanic for the aasimar - reference Pathfinder or 13th Age SRDs for more info
Although I posted this on the Google+ thread for this... the Aasimar has some issues that make it sort of a pointless race.
1) Heroes ought to need to become heroes. If one is a Tiefling, you start at a deficit. You are expected to be unheroic. People might well not give you a chance to be heroic-- they might be distrustful of you, slap your hand away if you offer helping expecting a trick that will cost them their soul and might be so nasty and dismissive of you that becoming evil will seem more and more tempting.
But an Aasimar... well, assuming that one can even identify you as well (more on this later)... how are they going to react? Look! It's a child of the gods who provide us peace and protection. The ones we spend our lives worshipping. The son/daughter of god is here!! All worship his/her holiness!! They are going to treat you ridiculously kindly, give you all sorts of unearned favors and advantages-- naturally so as they would figure any good done for the child of a god is certainly going do be more productive than trying to do it in the name of the god for a stranger or trying to somehow do the favor for the intangible deity. There is no challenge here, no internal struggle, no dynamic worth spinning a tale around... nothing.
2) If a Tiefling goes around abusing their demonic powers, it might well allow demons to have more and more influence in the world. A Tiefling can do their life doing good by using their powers and all of it ultimately resulting in ripping open a rift to the netherrealms that cannot be closed and allows a massive demonic invasion that destroys the whole world. That's ought to be a major concern for an adventurer who, if made aware of it, might start becoming understandably hesistant to use their powers.
But what's the very worst that could possibly come from abusing the powers of a god to do good? What's the major consequence of weakening the veil between Earth and the heavens? Oh... what is going to cause an angelic invasion? Allow more powerful angels to manifest themselves in the world? Seriously... what's the story hook here?
3) Tieflings have an interesting and distinct appearance. You can spot a Tiefling from a hundred yards away no issue. Horns on the head, fiery eyes, hoofed feet, long whip-like tails... maybe clawed hands, forked tongues... you know... demon traits!
But Aasimar? Oh... they look like perfect humans? That... it. So basically they look like every adventurer, particularly Paladins and Elves. You cannot describe them as being "the most beautiful" or "the most charismatic" or "perfect" because anyone can have equal or higher charisma scores as them. So you are left with... nada.
Oh, they might have a funny skin color like bronze or gold hair...? Except... you know... that's already within the realm of human potential anyhow, particularly in a fantasy world.
And, yes-- I could say that my angel-blooded humans have glowing white eyes, blue skin with odd natural markings that could be describes as "tattoos" with wings on their backs that are too small to carry them, but still there easily marking them as a non-human and feathers instead of hair on the top of their head and sparsely elsewhere on their body where a human would have hair... and they have an underdeveloped third eye in the middle of their forehead, thus in one concept paying tribute to the European, Hindu, Bhuddist and Native American concepts of "angels" or "sky people" or "the children of gods". And they would be clearly not-quite-human just like the Tiefling and could be spotted from 100 yards away. But you aren't going to have any artwork of such a concept, you are just going to have the boring Arayan Nation version of the "Perfect Human" that Aasimar were depicted as in every piece of artwork in the first three editions that are, generally speaking, entirely similar to every other Paladin.
You can't just have a "reverse Tiefling" you see, because much of what it means to be a Tiefling ADDS to the challenge of the adventure and creates more story hook, more adventure and ultimately greater triumph. You reverse those concepts and you end up with less challenge to the adventure, fewer story hooks, less adventure and ultimately a less fulfilling victory.
So the real issue isn't even #3, although issue #3 is the most obvious one to everyone who is going to take a look at the artwork. #1 and #2 are the real issues that are in serious need of being addressed. There might be ways to do it, but I haven't any suggestions for it at the moment that would be universal in all settings-- or would even be applicable to anything but a new, original setting.
Hebitsuikaza wrote:
Hebitsuikaza wrote:
Hebitsuikaza wrote:
Hebitsuikaza wrote:
As a counterargument to the idea that heroes ought to have to become heroes...
I haven't written a place for aasimar (or tieflings) in my homebrew world yet, but if I did, I'd be inclined to alter them slightly from beings of celestial heritage to beings of any divine heritage, including the evil gods. The divine scion is a popular fantasy trope that deserves some solid support. Kinda like how the Dragonborn provided support to everyone who got excited about playing a "dragon-man", but were denied because half-dragons were too powerful.
My aasimar would probably get +2 Charisma as a race and +1 to another score based on their subrace. They'd also get Darkvision*, the Thaumaturgy cantrip, and the Celestial language. The aasimar subraces would be based on the various cleric domains, the implication being that an aasimar would be the scion of a deity with that domain. For example, the Life Aasimar (better name desired) would probably get +1 Wisdom, limited access to Life Domain spells, and the ability to make healing spells cast by them or on them more effective (by 2+spell's level in HP). Aasimar Clerics with the actual Life domain would get an extra benefit of some kind that I haven't figured out yet, but I do recognize the need for it.
* - or, instead of darkvision, a halo that emits light that only the aasimar and their allies can see.
I love fantasy art, and I have seen lots of pictures of gothic fantasy art. The aasimar race could be a interesting hook for fans of supernatural romance.
DLfan wrote:
Hebitsuikaza wrote: