Rules edition: This guide uses the 2014 Volo’s Guide to Monsters Aasimar as its main rules reference, then compares the revised Aasimar in Mordenkainen Presents: Monsters of the Multiverse (2022) and the 2024 Player’s Handbook. These versions share a celestial theme but their traits, ability scores, and transformations are not interchangeable. Ask your DM which source your campaign uses.
Aasimar are mortals with a connection to the Upper Planes. That origin can shape a character’s appearance, history, or relationship with a celestial being, but it does not dictate their class, alignment, or choices. Mechanically, the Aasimar has useful defenses and limited healing, plus a transformation that becomes available at character level 3. The details depend on the book.
Which Aasimar rules are you using?
The 2014 version in Volo’s Guide to Monsters has three subraces: Protector, Scourge, and Fallen. Each has its own ability score increase and transformation. Monsters of the Multiverse replaces those subraces with one Aasimar option and a single Celestial Revelation choice. The 2024 Player’s Handbook uses that newer foundation, with further changes to character creation and the transformation. Choose one version with your DM instead of combining traits between them.
The older Dungeon Master’s Guide also presented a separate Aasimar variant. This guide discusses the three-subrace version from Volo’s Guide, not that variant. The 2017 official errata for Volo’s Guide removed its Alignment trait; an Aasimar is not required by the rules to be good or lawful.
2014 Aasimar traits in Volo’s Guide
All three Volo’s Aasimar share a 30-foot walking speed, 60-foot darkvision, resistance to radiant and necrotic damage, Healing Hands, and the Light Bearer trait. Light Bearer gives you the Light cantrip, using Charisma as its spellcasting ability. These traits do not grant flight at level 1, and the race does not grant general spellcasting beyond that cantrip.
Healing Hands is an action: touch a creature and restore hit points equal to your character level. You can use it once, then regain the use when you finish a long rest. It is not a spell and does not spend a spell slot. It can help when someone needs a small amount of healing, but using it in combat costs your action.
Volo’s gives every Aasimar a +2 Charisma increase. Your subrace adds +1 Wisdom for Protector, +1 Constitution for Scourge, or +1 Strength for Fallen. Those fixed increases belong to this legacy version. They do not carry over to the later Aasimar rules, and the 2024 rules place ability increases in character backgrounds rather than species.
Protector
At character level 3, a Protector can use Radiant Soul once per long rest. Activating it takes an action and the transformation lasts for 1 minute. You gain a flying speed equal to your walking speed. Once on each of your turns when you deal damage to a creature, you can add radiant damage equal to your character level to one damage roll. The feature grants flight only while the transformation lasts.
Scourge
Radiant Consumption also begins at level 3, takes an action to activate, lasts 1 minute, and recharges after a long rest. You shed bright light for 10 feet and dim light for another 10 feet. Once on each of your turns when you deal damage to a creature, you can add radiant damage equal to your character level to one damage roll. At the end of each of your turns, you and every other creature within 10 feet take radiant damage equal to half your character level, rounded up. This aura can harm allies as well as enemies, so consider where the party will be standing before you activate it.
Fallen
Necrotic Shroud has the same level, action, duration, and recharge timing. When you activate it, creatures of your choice within 10 feet that can see you make a Charisma saving throw against a DC of 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Charisma modifier. A creature that fails is frightened of you until the end of your next turn. While transformed, once on each of your turns when you deal damage to a creature, you can add necrotic damage equal to your character level to one damage roll. The feature’s skeletal wings are descriptive; they do not give you a flying speed.
The 2022 Monsters of the Multiverse version
Monsters of the Multiverse removes the Protector, Scourge, and Fallen subraces. This Aasimar can be Small or Medium, has a 30-foot speed, and keeps darkvision, resistance to radiant and necrotic damage, Healing Hands, and Light Bearer. Healing Hands now rolls a number of d4s equal to your proficiency bonus rather than restoring hit points equal to your character level. The legacy fixed ability increases are gone; use the ability score rules printed with the version your table selected.
At level 3, you choose one Celestial Revelation option: Radiant Soul, Necrotic Shroud, or Radiant Consumption. In this version, the choice is made when you gain the feature, rather than each time you transform. The transformation takes an action, lasts 1 minute, and can be used once per long rest.
- Radiant Soul: You gain a flying speed equal to your walking speed. Once on each of your turns when you deal damage to a creature, you can add radiant damage equal to your proficiency bonus to one damage roll.
- Necrotic Shroud: Creatures of your choice within 10 feet that can see you make a Charisma saving throw or become frightened until the end of your next turn. Once on each of your turns while transformed, you can add necrotic damage equal to your proficiency bonus to one damage roll against a creature.
- Radiant Consumption: You shed bright light for 10 feet and dim light for another 10 feet. Once on each of your turns, you can add proficiency-bonus radiant damage to one damage roll against a creature. At the end of each of your turns, you and every creature within 10 feet take radiant damage equal to your proficiency bonus.
The 2022 version makes the bonus damage scale with proficiency bonus, not character level. Radiant Consumption’s end-of-turn aura still damages you and nearby allies, as well as enemies. Do not import Volo’s fixed +2 Charisma and subrace increases into this version.
The 2024 Player’s Handbook version
The 2024 Aasimar is also a single species with no Protector, Scourge, or Fallen subraces. Its shared traits include 60-foot darkvision, resistance to radiant and necrotic damage, Healing Hands, and Light Bearer. Healing Hands is a Magic action: roll d4s equal to your proficiency bonus and restore that many hit points to a creature you touch. It recharges after a long rest. Your ability score increases come from your background, not from selecting Aasimar.
Celestial Revelation becomes available at character level 3. You activate it as a Bonus Action, it lasts up to 1 minute, and it recharges after a long rest. Unlike the 2022 version, you choose which revelation to use each time you transform. Its three options are Heavenly Wings (called Radiant Soul in the older books), Inner Radiance (formerly Radiant Consumption), and Necrotic Shroud. The names and some mechanics changed; in particular, the 2024 rules describe extra damage once per turn for each revelation option, while Inner Radiance also damages nearby creatures at the end of your turns. Use the 2024 text for exact details.
The action cost matters when planning a turn. A 2014 or 2022 Aasimar spends an action to begin the transformation; the 2024 Aasimar spends a Bonus Action. That difference can affect a spell, attack, or other feature you wanted to use on the same turn. Do not apply the 2024 Bonus Action timing to a legacy character unless your DM has chosen to update that character.
Choosing a class and building the character
Aasimar features do not require a particular class. Charisma is especially convenient for a Paladin, Bard, Sorcerer, or Warlock using Volo’s fixed +2, while Protector’s Wisdom increase can support a Cleric or Druid. The later versions remove the fixed race-based ability increases, so choose class and background scores using that edition’s character creation rules. A high Charisma is not mandatory for every Aasimar concept.
Think about how your limited-use traits fit the character’s normal turn. Healing Hands uses an action in the 2014 and 2022 versions, and the legacy transformations also take an action to start. The 2024 version uses a Magic action for Healing Hands and a Bonus Action for Celestial Revelation. Classes that already compete for those actions may need to choose when a racial feature is most useful rather than trying to use everything at once.
Radiant Soul or Heavenly Wings is valuable when flight helps with positioning, obstacles, or reaching a target; remember that it is temporary and does not replace your normal movement rules. Radiant Consumption or Inner Radiance can punish nearby foes, but also risks harming allies under the versions that include the surrounding aura. Necrotic Shroud adds a fear effect in the versions that include it, but creatures may resist it and frightened is not the same as being forced to flee. Select the option that supports your party’s plan and the encounter, not just the largest damage number.
Roleplaying an Aasimar
A celestial connection is a story prompt, not a command to play a saint or an obedient servant. Decide what your character believes about their origin. They might welcome a guide’s advice, distrust it, misunderstand it, or have no contact with a celestial being at all. The DM and player can agree whether a guide appears in dreams, sends occasional messages, or stays in the background.
Protector, Scourge, and Fallen remain useful character concepts for tables using Volo’s rules, but they do not dictate morality. A Fallen Aasimar can seek redemption, reject celestial expectations, or simply have a complicated history; the rules do not require evil alignment. For tables using the later unified version, you can still describe your Aasimar as radiant, shadowed, or conflicted without treating those descriptions as subraces.
Before play, agree with the DM on the sourcebook version, the character’s relationship with any celestial guide, and how strongly that heritage will affect the campaign. That keeps the story meaningful without taking choices away from the player or creating an assumed party conflict.
Official Rules Sources
- Volo’s Guide to Monsters (legacy Aasimar source)
- Official Volo’s Guide to Monsters errata (including the removed Alignment trait)
- Mordenkainen Presents: Monsters of the Multiverse (2022 Aasimar source)
- Player’s Handbook (2024) (current Aasimar source)
- D&D Beyond: The 10 Species in the 2024 Player’s Handbook (summary of changes to Aasimar)
