The burden of the expectations placed upon them.

>>98723916
What >>98724027 says, but I think that not letting this whole divine heritage thing to to your head should be something aasimar frequently struggle with.

>>98723916
They're the chads, the people meant for success. You know a lot of manga have the protagonists resenting those better than them? Well, aasimar are better than you. In a Korean manwha they would be chaebol heirs, or people born beautiful.
It's best if you play it straight, so your players can feel the seething envy.
Imagine if a guy is like, 1.9 meters tall. Women just look at him and go: "Fuckable."

>>98723916
imagine you have literal heaven in your veins, everyone has asian dad expectations for your and since childbirth you have been expected to be the nexe nobel prize winner, the next olympic gold medal winner and the next Hercules.

and then you fuck it up and dont live up to all that.

Or maybe you do, but its just kinda mid.

Or maybe you actually dont want what people assume is predestined for your life, but do your own thing, because you´re still an individual with your own head

and all the local gangs and cults and shady wizards may or may not want to get you go cut you open stem to stern, because perhaps your blood is special

>>98723916
Imagine you never had a choice in your life but religion and expectations set your path out for you and any deviation is met with suffocating worry and catering.

>>98723916
Aasimar work well as a "chosen one" race, a race some holy individuals can ascend to, the blood line of heroes or even heavenly beings incarnated into mortal form.

A peasant boy born with a heroic destiny

High ranking Priests of good aligned churches might "reincarnate" in to a more divine being when they reach a certain rank or position

The royal descendants of a legendary Paladin King

Gandalf the White

All of these could be represented by the Aasimar race.

>>98723916
>Aasimar have to face, what?
Struggling with his humanity and divine nature. Being a paragon of morality among imperfect fickle humans who sometimes do good and sometimes do unimaginable horrors to each other. Aasimar has to face humanity itself and not lose their faith in it.

>>98724154
>>98723916
My favorite idea is a figure like Disney's Maui, someone in a destitute or unfortunate situation who the gods save and now he does the hero thing. I had an idea for a PC who was mechanically a Paladin with an unarmed focus who wore 'armor' that only covered his arms and part of his chest and legs like a gladiator. He was an urchin the gods turned into a beautiful and powerful famous hero and monster slayer. The twist is he's a total coward and has neither martial ability nor spellcasting. All his 'spells' and Smites are the gods granting him power in the moment, granting him short-lasting superhuman strength to deal with the opposition. In greek myth there's a concept called 'thumos', an independent flaming passion that can influence or even control a person. There's scenes in the Illiad where a hero says "Athena grabbed me by the hair, put the spear in my hand and turned my feet to face the enemy". As though they were come upon by an outside force encouraging or coercing them into heroics. That's what I picture here, Ciaphas Cain who would really rather not be here going into a tard-rage and throwing a young red dragon through a wall because the gods are using him as a conduit for 'kill all the things we gods don't like".

whatever their divine nature, aasimar are also still part human, and would have internal struggles between their divine half and their base mortal desires. temptation would be hypercharged.

Honestly all the answers need to keep in mind aasimar can be descended from or empowered by any celestial not just angels and archons. I usually run them like godblooded in Exalted or other 'lesser demigods' or spirit-descended persons from eastern mythology. Often enough morality as such isn't even a factor in how I write them. They're usually benevolent to some degree, but they're just celestial-blooded in the same way genasi are elemental blooded and the not-shitty version of tieflings is just infernal blooded.

>>98723916
They add a sense of symmetry with Tieflings. If there ar devil people, there ought to be angel people too.

>>98724193
People don't forget it's just uncomfortable to think about the fact your grandma boinked a Unicorn.

Lots of good answers here.
>>98723916
>Aasimar have to face, what? Every LG/NG king, priest, paladin and faithful peasant within a 40-mile radius treating them as the literal Second Coming and trying to form a cult around them?
You're on 4chan and you can't see how constantly having to graciously socialize might be beyond agonizing?
Do you think being the center of a cult just means being captain of the highschool swim team?

>>98723916
You can play both Aasimar and Tieflings as the Nephilim race.

>>98723916
Aasimar are supposed to be barely distinguishable from regular humies, so these problems shouldn't come up too often

>>98723916
why would you choose aasimar if you want pathos? are you retarded? well i guess that's your pathos, your own retardation

you're welcome

A character that has built-in evil tendencies nees to work hard to resist the urges to do deliciously evil things to others even when they know those same evil acts will make them miserable because they also have things like empathy and morality.

The equivalent for a character that has built-in good tendencies is feeling like an arachophobe stumbling on a nest of spiders whenever they encounter genuine evil and other related things like suffering they can't help with. Try imagining walking through a slave market with that trait.

>>98723916
This is really only an issue when you assume godhood or divinity to be absolutely good by definition. Something kinda inherent to abrahamic faiths but absolutely not so for many other religions. The hellenistic gods are widely known to have not just personalities, but actual moods, schemes, desires etc. The literal daddy sky boss god is a serial rapist who murdered his own parents.

Demigods aren't distillations of goodness in a human meatsock, they are basically as humans in a body of divine power made flesh. It's not the mind that is divine, its the body. And divinity and goodness are not interchangeable.

Btw if you use dnd alignment systems for anything other than statblock shorthand reminders of rough disposition you're doing it wrong.

>>98724827
it doesn't matter if you like alignments or not, aasimar are by definition descended of creatures that are part of the metaphysically objectively good planes of reality (such as angels and others), and even their name is derived from the aasimon which are the objectively good angels, this isn't about religion in general, and in fact the non-good and evil religion servants certainly don't create aasimar

you're trying to solve the issue by entirely changing the foundational concepts of aasimar and alignment, so instead of solving the issue you're creating an entirely separate conversation

>>98723916
so being born good and facing the realisation that humanity isnt good and nor are societies and people still continue being evil and you just dont get it and the world irks you at best or drives you mad at worst and you have to live with that disposition and all prejudice that you will face by either the common people or the elites
aasiamr are obviously creatures of pathos anon. it is just one the fewer and fewer people are willing to play compared to the edgy, they are not understanding me you get out of tieflings

>>98723916
Could go a few ways. Maybe everyone has utterly impossible expectations of you, driving you from childhood to a destiny you may or may not want. Your 'cult' will certainly be more interested in whatever they think you should be doing than what you want, often to your detriment. Imagine growing up and everyone around you talks about the mantle you must bear while you just wanted to be a kid, and it never stops.

>The Nephilim were in the earth in those days, and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bore children to them; the same were the mighty men that were of old, the men of renown.

Imagine living up to that being your life, whether you want it or not.

Or, you can go with Pathfinder having a campaign that starts when an aasimar girl, sexually abused and whored out her entire life so those with coin can get a piece of heaven, finally snaps and goes evil, murdering not just her abusers but aiming for the whole town that failed to ever protect her.

>>98723916
One time I worked with this girl that was absolutely perfect. Her name was Taylor, and she was a really smart, incredibly beautiful blonde. She had *EVERYTHING*. She was literally a walking Barbie doll, and ontop of all the good looks, perfect body, and pristine presentation, she was a good worker. She came in every day and decided that she was going to do just as much work as any of the guys and that she wasn't going to be a prissy piece of shit like some of the other women that worked with us, (Who sat and acted like they didn't have to do physical labor or the hard parts.)

Well, I observed something really interesting. People were really mean and judgemental to Taylor. They immediately made assumptions about her because they thought she was a dumb blonde college girl. Men would come in and say, "Are one of the guys around to help? I need someone that knows what he's doin'..." Despite the fact that she knew our workplace better than many of the men that worked there. Also guys would constantly ogle her and make really disgusting comments, (I don't mean, "God, she's hot" or making advances on her. I mean we'd have guys try to cop a feel despite her literally being in the middle of performing a task that required focus for safety. We had to call cops a couple times for creeps that would wait in the parking lot to see which car was hers.) And women were even worse! Female coworkers would talk shit about her for absolutely NO reason, ("Can you believe she stayed over every day this week? She's probably sleeping with the boss!" No, she stayed late to clean up after hours and help lock up.) One time a woman came in and was mad that her expired coupon didn't work, and when Taylor tried to at least help her by giving her a 10% discount, the lady spit on her...

While people hate ugliness... They absolutely loath beauty. I don't know where Taylor is now, but she's the closest thing I've ever met to an Aasimar in real life.

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>>98723916
DnD gags are rife with histrionic main character syndrome. It’s hardly surprising that they took so quickly and strongly to being given a main character race to pick from. Surprised there isn’t also a “hero” class that does stealth and magic and martial stuff all at once, that would please them too. What’s even funnier is that furfags also did this as well, not satisfied with various beastfolk races or lizard men especially, they needed Dragonborn, their own main character race.
It’s a part of the problem with theatre kids taking the hobby over and wanting to define their character entirely with le epic backstory rather than what they actually fucking do in the game.

>>98725150
>Surprised there isn’t also a “hero” class that does stealth and magic and martial stuff all at once
there is, it's called a wizard

>>98725559
you misquoted, that was clearly meant for the op who needed his hand held

>>98725150
>Surprised there isn’t also a “hero” class that does stealth and magic and martial stuff all at once
sounds like the bladesinger? might be blade warlock too and that was the class everyone was multiclassing in 5e

>>98725591
Wipe the drool off your chin and the keyboard and re-type this

>>98725948
i see you're still experiencing your pathos just like you wanted, op, i'm happy for you

>>98725961
>I'm a two-legged goycattle so spiritually raped I literally cannot think for myself, and do not even know what pathos is, and this is my post

>>98725979
you sure are using that insult a lot for someone who couldn't figure out for himself that maybe not everyone wants to play a whiner

>>98724953
OP asked how to make it work and I gave him an option.

Crying about forgotten realms lore isn't gonna help him in any way shape or form. Holding exactly to that lore is the source of his problem as he himself got extremely close to diagnosing. Rewriting lore or at least tweaking it is a core part of the game. Not to mention that a great many people play 5e content in an entirely different setting.

Also, you can't first say rigid alignment is not a part of it and immediately point to how rigid alignment is literally the core issue. Because the whole concept of "objectively good" is exactly what rigid alignment means.

But hey, lets just restate my earlier point that Aasimar are not entirely divine and thus not entirely beholden to their place of origin. So even within the lore there is space for the exact interpretation that I gave OP. Aasimar relate to divinity as Americans relate to their supposed italian and irish ancestry. Some of them are halfbreeds but most have no clue in the slightest and are functionally mutts.

Stop being a retard.

>>98726013
you gave him an option that involves heavy changes to the setting, including multiple specific features of that setting which were mentioned in the op itself, so while it technically is an option, it's clearly not one that respects the bounds of his question

>>98726002
>>I'm a two-legged goycattle so spiritually raped I still struggle to comprehend what "pathos" is

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>>98723916
As others have stated before, they are burdened with huge expectations and responsibilities — a chosen one, but for what? Only time will tell, yet as you grow up, you will have a cult of nutters constantly telling you that you must do this and that or come to beg at your feet for help, and you are expected to help regardless of whether you want to or not

And the worst thing is, you are not allowed to flinch at the first sight of trouble, not allowed to show doubt when facing a problem, or even run away when the forces of evil come your way, or else you aren't worthy to be the "chosen one" of the gods, as your followers who were praising you non-stop are now calling you out with anger and disdain because you didn't feel like fighting anymore and go home as you don't wish to be the chosen one anymore

>>98723916
It's the biggest problem with fantasy worlds really. The only solution is that there are too many of them for it to matter that much.

Because realistically even a lvl 1 DnD warrior would grown up to be the next Gengis Khan in the real world.

>>98726045
I just pointed out how you can do it with no/minimal changes to the setting. Maybe take a reading class before commenting again.

This thread and it's dissertation length posts are why I don't allow plane touch characters in my game.

>>98727783
you did the opposite of that

with an Aasimar PC there's a good chance the party are the first genuine friends they have in life

sure they had tons of attendants, followers, generally people orbiting them but all they were interested was the ideal, the greater than life figure, be it to mentor them, to support them or to profit of them

but they never had a single person to share a beer with

>>98728138
Aasimar aren't automatically nobility, they're just as likely to be a random farm boy

>>98728476
As soon as their celestial origin becomes apparent, they are likely to be shipped off to the local temple to be brought up as the next best saint of the community. They are at least considered a good omen and treated with awe and envy.

I ran my aaisamar that he was once a human who killed a couatl, which in it's dying moments bound its spirit to him, suddenly hes got these horrible pink wings and his scins erupting in green scales so now he's searching for a cure. A bit of a ripoff from dungeon meshi but whatever

aasimar, I get the concept, 'oh the chosen one will save us' and the pressure that brings, but that doesn't stop it from being a very boring concept that very few people could relate to

>>98723916
make it a cunning character that uses the godlike reputation of the aasimar to con NPCs

>>98728657
>boring concept that very few people could relate to
As opposed to "Cursed hellspawn out of my sight!" Tieflings bring to the table. Underdog worship is a thing.

>>98727992
Jesus christ I'll spoonfeed it to you.

Mordekainens:
Aasimar are MORTAL humanoids with *some spark of the upper planes in them through blood or infusion*. They are not literal celestials.

Volos guide:
Aasimar are HUMANS with a TOUCH of Celestia in their heritage. While it goes on to say they're hailed as champions of the gods at birth, it also goes on to say the literal line "An Aasimar, except for one who has turned to evil, has a link to an angelic being."
>Except one who has turned to evil
There ya go. Aasimar are rules as written free to explore their own personal morality.
Volos even specifically got an errata removing the Good alignment and explicitly stating "
Alignment. Imbued with celestial power, most aasimar are good. Outcast aasimar are most often neutral or even evil."

If you read the 2024 rules you are pushed even further to be free in your own decisions as a mortal. Not to mention choosing the wording "upper planes" as it stands in both mordekainens and 2024 gives free reign to choose something other than mt Celestia.

The bottom line is clear as day. They're not straight up celestials. They're mortals. They're in fact more mortal than celestial. They are RAW explicitly NOT bound to a definite morality, or even to be either good or evil. They can be neutral.

Their appearance can also RAW be anywhere from obviously angelic to subtly majestic, graceful etc. And even then we are talking about a world that has a thousand ways to stumble into magic that might achieve any range of outward appearances.

The entire assumption of Aasimar being a pigeonholed race of absolutely good messianic chosen ones is evidently untrue. The entire solution is to read beyond the first sentence in the actual source material. The whole issue doesn't stem from the lore, it stems from an unwillingness or inability to write a character that is not wholly defined by the most stereotypical narrowly read conception of its race.

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>>98723916
So play an ultra-narcissist who views it as his inborn right to be a beloved hero and save the world.

>>98723916
>Aasimar have to face, what?
The ever present demand of having to be an example of good because of 'divine' blood and most of humanity being american HOA to your livelihood WITH asian parent expectations.

>Aasimar have to face, what?
Hopefully the challenges the GM throws at them.
This board usually shits on any and all rpg content that isn't dungeon delving so I'm a bit surprised that there are so many opinions on the moral dilemmas certain PCs should face.
>then why not play a regular human?
Maybe because they just angels are cool?

>>98723916
>trying to do good or at least live their lives unmolested.
Boring. Give me an evil tiefling any day

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I always wondered, what differentiates an aasimar from a Good-aligned demigod?
Like, if a big shot archon fancies some big-titted, pious female cleric and nuts inside her, the baby that pops out is an aasimar, but if a high statted LE deity does it, it's a demigod?

>>98729388
anon i'm not trying to disrespect your effort of making a long and relatively high effort post like this or anything, but i feel like you completely changed the goalposts back to "i will describe normal aasimar and pretend this was what i was talking about all along" now instead of the "just make homebrew about absolute goodness and religions or whatever" that you were going with before

>>98729583
that child would be a half-celestial, an aasimar is more like a 2% or lower celestial

>>98723916
>With tieflings, at least, you can create a sense of pathos; what with them being scions of pure evil trying to do good or at least live their lives unmolested.
Why can't this work for an Aasimar? Like, heroes who refuse to be heroes are a thing, there's an entire genre of media where the hero (or the devil king too) decides to forsake the thing and just go to a corner of the world and be a farmer. And while korean manwah is not high quality storytelling, it's at least good enough for a character concept.

>>98729583
>>98729798

Arguably the Aasimar and Tiefling would be the pc races for things like demigods and holy/unholy bloodlines. One of the big issues multiple editions of D&D has had is that race has always been a level one choice that becomes mostly meaningless as characters grow in level.

>>98723916
I never really liked them when they're played in the same way as a Tiefling, being an obviously good aligned planetouched creature. The only time I was happy with them was when the Aasimar in a game I ran were ordinary people 99% of the time but could manifest their heritage in dire circumstances--at the long term cost of their sense of self. Sure, the bonuses were great and it was easier to manifest them/lasted longer the more you used them, but continual use would turn you in to nothing more than an unthinking automaton for a particular deity. It's like a reverse paladin fall, the allure of following your god's strict code of behavior without thought or question eventually turns you into an NPC with no personal agency.

>>98723916
Consider Constantine where most of the half-breeds tend to be egotistical assholes who are either totally up their own ass or are entirely preoccupied with their great holy war bullshit.

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>puckee2! slop spam thread
Urgh

>>98723916
Aasimar are incredibly boring as an option. You'd think something that had innate divinity would at least be cool but no, aasimar have boring fucking designs and boring fucking mechanics and boring fucking lore.

Aasimar should be more overtly divine in appearance, similar to the huge range of Tiefling variants there should be divine origins for aasimar that drastically alter their appearance based on which god their divinity comes from, giving them unique spells or other traits.

Basically, aasimar got shafted because people whined about them being remade into furries or whatever during the OneD&D playtests, so now instead of having an actual identity as a character option in any way, shape, or form, they're forgettable garbage whose only redeeming quality is having two resistances.

>>98740006
Aasimar were probably an afterthought they only put in because Tieflings needed an alignment balance, then they added Genasi to fulfill the rule of threes.

>>98729794
Thanks for speaking in good faith.

What I'm mostly trying to say is that Aasimar absolutely do not have to be played as one-dimensional pseudo-christs, which is in my view the main cause of what OP is bothered by. While I absolutely recommend doing homebrew surrounding the topic of alignment, that post about RAW is simply to show that it's not even necessary to homebrew yourself into freely creating your Aasimar character. Once you get over that hurdle of not being tied to playing straight goody 2 shoes, being inspired by how demigods or even 1/64th gods work in Greek myths and legends is on the table. And I guess I focus on that because I think that it's a very rich tradition to draw from with good perspectives on what it could mean for people around you if you are more powerful than others but not more morally pure.