Rules edition: This build uses the legacy Air Genasi from Elemental Evil Player’s Companion with the 2014 Cleric. The optional ability-score rule from Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything is labeled separately. This guide does not combine those rules with the revised Genasi or 2024 class rules.
What a legacy Air Genasi brings to a Cleric
The 2014 Genasi traits give every Genasi a +2 Constitution increase. The legacy Air Genasi adds +1 Dexterity. It does not receive a Wisdom increase, so plan your Cleric’s Wisdom through ability-score assignment and later Ability Score Improvements. If your table uses Tasha’s optional Customizing Your Origin rule, you can reassign the Genasi increases; keep that option distinct from the fixed legacy array.
Unending Breath lets you hold your breath indefinitely while you are not incapacitated. It can help you explore underwater or in an atmosphere you cannot breathe, but it does not let you share air with companions or protect you while incapacitated.
Mingle with the Wind lets you cast levitate once with the trait, without material components, and restores that use when you finish a long rest. Constitution is the spellcasting ability for this trait. The legacy feature has no character-level prerequisite. The spell requires concentration for up to 10 minutes, so it competes with other concentration spells you might want to maintain.
Set ability scores around your role
Wisdom powers your Cleric spell save DC, spell attacks, and number of prepared Cleric spells. Constitution supports hit points and concentration saves. Dexterity 14 is useful for initiative and the Armor Class cap of medium armor; Clerics already have medium armor and shield proficiency, while some domains add heavy armor.
Here is one legal 27-point-buy array before the legacy Genasi increases: Strength 12, Dexterity 13, Constitution 14, Intelligence 10, Wisdom 15, and Charisma 8. It costs 27 points. After the Genasi’s fixed increases, the scores are Strength 12, Dexterity 14, Constitution 16, Intelligence 10, Wisdom 15, and Charisma 8. This keeps Wisdom high without pretending the Air Genasi raises it. If your table uses Tasha’s optional origin rule, you may move the +1 Dexterity increase to Wisdom instead.
At Cleric level 4, consider raising Wisdom to 17, then to 19 at level 8, or choose a feat that supports your role. If you want heavy armor, check its Strength requirement: wearing armor without meeting that requirement reduces your speed by 10 feet.
Choose a Cleric domain for your campaign
Life
Life Domain emphasizes restoring hit points and keeping allies in the fight. Its healing features work with the Cleric’s prepared spell list, while Constitution helps you stay standing when enemies pressure the frontline. Air Genasi traits add exploration utility, but do not increase healing by themselves.
Tempest
Tempest Domain grants heavy armor and martial weapon proficiency, plus features built around thunder and lightning. Thunderbolt Strike can push a Large or smaller creature when you deal lightning damage to it. Levitate can give you a different way to handle vertical spaces, though it uses concentration and does not make your Tempest features stronger by itself.
Light
Light Domain supports radiant damage and area control. Warding Flare can impose disadvantage on an attack roll against you when its reaction trigger applies. Clerics already have medium armor proficiency in the 2014 rules, so the subclass does not need to compensate for an assumed lack of it.
Trickery
Trickery Domain offers deception and stealth tools. Its domain spell pass without trace can help the party approach a scene quietly, while levitate can solve a different positioning problem. Both spells require concentration, so you cannot maintain them at the same time.
Prepare spells with concentration in mind
A 2014 Cleric prepares a number of Cleric spells equal to Cleric level plus Wisdom modifier, with a minimum of one. Domain spells are always prepared and do not count against that number. You can change your prepared list after a long rest.
Bless, spirit guardians, and levitate all require concentration. You can maintain only one concentration spell at a time. In particular, you cannot hover with levitate while also maintaining spirit guardians; casting either concentration spell ends the other. Pick the effect that fits the current encounter.
Under the 2014 rules, spiritual weapon is not a concentration spell, so you can use it while concentrating on spirit guardians. Healing word can restore hit points from range as a bonus action. A racial levitate use still follows the spell’s casting and concentration rules: it does not become flight, end a grapple automatically, or guarantee safety from ranged attacks.
Use levitate when vertical repositioning or lifting a willing creature matters more than your other concentration spell. An unwilling creature gets a Constitution save. The target can move by pushing or pulling against a fixed object or surface within reach; the spell does not grant a flying speed or free horizontal movement. Plan a safe route back down before the spell ends.
Choose feats that support your plan
War Caster can help a frontline Cleric maintain concentration after taking damage. It also lets you perform somatic components with weapons or a shield in your hands and can replace an opportunity attack with a qualifying spell. It does not let you maintain two concentration spells.
Resilient (Constitution) increases Constitution by 1 and grants proficiency in Constitution saving throws. That proficiency helps with concentration checks and other Constitution saves as your proficiency bonus rises.
Telekinetic can increase Wisdom by 1. Its bonus-action shove targets a creature you can see within 30 feet; the creature makes a Strength save against your spell save DC, and on a failure you move it 5 feet toward or away from you. The shove can reposition a target, but it is not a contested ability check and does not automatically push a creature into a hazard.
Build a character who can grow through a long campaign
Let the character’s story develop alongside the Cleric’s features. An Air Genasi raised among mortals might see service to a deity as a chosen home; another might feel that organized faith limits the freedom associated with their elemental heritage. Neither outlook is required by the rules or by the character’s ancestry.
Work with the DM to connect that tension to the campaign: a temple might need help in an airless ruin, a community could ask what the character owes their ancestors, or a patron might test whether duty and independence can coexist. Set those hooks with the group so they create useful choices instead of dictating the character’s personality.
At early levels, decide what the character hopes to prove. Later, revisit that goal after the party has relied on their judgment, healing, or willingness to take risks. At higher levels, consider how contact with deities and distant planes changes the character’s commitments. Those story steps do not depend on claiming that one domain or ancestry is the best choice.
Official rules sources
- Wizards of the Coast: Elemental Evil Player’s Companion (legacy Genasi traits).
- D&D Beyond: Genasi (legacy Air Genasi).
- D&D Beyond: 2014 Basic Rules classes (Cleric and domains).
- D&D Beyond: 2014 Basic Rules spellcasting (concentration).
- D&D Beyond: 2014 Basic Rules character creation (standard array and point buy).
- D&D Beyond: Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything (optional Customizing Your Origin rule and feats).
For the wider class, see the D&D 5e Cleric Guide.
