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D&D provides a distinctive creative space. Theoretically, it acts as a empty slate where the imagination of Dungeon Masters and players can paint any kind of picture. Yet, Dungeons & Dragons also bears a five-decade history of worlds, creatures, spellcasting rules, established non-player characters, and rich mythology. Even the most talented imaginative thinkers struggle to entirely detach themselves from this vast universe of existing content, so that a great deal of “new” content for D&D is a reiteration of familiar ideas. At times you encounter things that are as brilliant as “a classic hit,” other times you cringe as if hearing “a derivative tune.”

Critical Role has been highly inventive in the past due to the original settings of its first setting (designed by Matt Mercer) and now Aramán (the setting crafted by Brennan Lee Mulligan for Campaign 4). Although devoted followers of Brennan and his Dimension 20 work may recognize some of his common themes (He really hates the deities!), the second episode impressed me because of a truly original interpretation on a traditional D&D creature type: angelic beings.

The Historical Background of Celestials in Dungeons & Dragons

Demons and devils (often called fiends) have been part of D&D since 1976, but it required more time for their heavenly counterparts to show up. A few unique “divine messengers” with individual titles appeared in the publication Dragon editions 12 (Feb. 1978) and 17 (Aug. 1978). These were essentially riffs on the celestial figures from Hebrew and Christian religious lore; for more original versions, we had to hold out for 1982 and Gary Gygax’s “Monster Spotlight” article in Dragon magazine, where he introduced new monsters that would be included in the 1983 Monster Manual II. That’s when the deva, the planetar, and the solar made their debut, starting a tradition of creatures known as celestials that is continues to exist in the latest edition of the role-playing game.

In D&D, celestials are the agents of good-aligned deities, made by their masters to act as warriors, leaders, emissaries, intermediaries for humans, and overall to populate their realms in the Heavenly Realms. They are paragons of virtue who fight against the agents of disorder and wickedness from the Lower Planes and help uphold the faith of their deity on the Material Plane. In spite of their close connection with the gods, celestials are unique individuals with specific personalities. Well-known instances include the angel Lumalia and the fallen Zariel from the Forgotten Realms setting, the Lady of the Lake from Greyhawk, and even the iconic Dame Aylin from Baldur’s Gate 3.

Celestial lore is markedly less fleshed out in contrast to fiends. The Abyss has 99 layers of ever-growing disorder and demon lords tearing each other apart. The infernal Nine Hells are a interpretation of Game of Thrones with greater violence and more engaging subplots. And that’s not even mentioning the mysterious Yugoloth. In the meantime, all the essential information about celestial beings can be gleaned in an hour of online research.

It’s not surprising that creatures who resemble biblical angels went underdeveloped. Rumor has it that Gygax felt uneasy about providing gamers game statistics for divine beings they could kill in their sessions, and even if celestials were later expanded with a broader spectrum of looks and purposes, that controversial beginning stunted their development. There’s also only so much what you can do with beings that are designed to be divine minions. Sure, they have independent thought, but their storytelling range is limited. In that sense, the antagonists have much more freedom: They have defined superiors (Demon Lords, Infernal Dukes, and etc.) but they’re in the end fickle and chaotic entities that can evolve in a many ways without losing their distinct identity.

How Critical Role Campaign 4 Redefines Heavenly Beings

Honestly, I understand: Celestials are simply not very compelling. Holy warriors of virtue that strike down wickedness in every manifestation can be impressive, but they also become clichéd very fast. That widespread disinterest implies we still don’t know that much about celestials. For example, we still don’t know what happens after the god who made them dies. There is no canonical answer, and every DM is able to come up with their own spin. Brennan Lee Mulligan decided to make this question at the heart of the world of Aramán, a place where the gods have all been killed by humans in a great conflict that concluded seven decades before the beginning of the campaign. So what became of the followers of these gods?

Brennan’s solution is straightforward, horrifying, and very interesting: They became insane and turned into a plague that destroyed entire countries. A lot about the past of this world, the divine conflict, and its aftermath in the present has still to be revealed, but it seems that after the gods died, the celestial beings became “wild”. They became monsters that could annihilate entire regions if left unchecked. Viewers caught a sight of how scary one of these creatures can be at the conclusion of the second episode, as Wicander (Sam Riegel) got to meet his “grandfather,” a terrifying celestial kept chained in a enormous casket.

It is no accident that the most interesting celestials in D&D, story-wise, are those who have fallen from grace. The angel Zariel, for example, was a mighty Solar angel whose obsession with concluding the eternal Blood War resulted in her being corrupted by Asmodeus and transformed into an Archdevil of Hell. The planetar Fazrian is a little-known Planetar angel who was summoned by a priest inside Undermountain and developed a fixation on “purging” the evil in the Terminus level of the massive dungeon, slowly succumbing to the madness permeating the location.

The corruption seen in Campaign 4 of Critical Role assumes a distinct form. These celestials did not lose their virtue. They weren’t tricked, nor misled by their own arrogance or fixations. They are casualties; another dreadful consequence of the Shapers’ War. As Campaign 4 continues, I hope the DM focuses on the idea that, regardless of how “just” that war was, the mortals who won it may still regret the outcome. Their world has been wounded, their link to the hereafter has been severed, and the creatures that were formerly their protectors, shepherding their souls to security following death, are now frightening disasters.

Sure, this might simply be a convenient way to solve the original creator’s initial quandary. It is simple to rationalize slaying an divine being when it’s a shrieking, mad creature with multiple fangs, but I am also very intrigued by this fresh variation of the celestial mythology in Dungeons & Dragons. I am not entirely in accord with the DM’s aversion for divine beings in his campaigns, but I nonetheless favor these horrific heavenly beings to the one-dimensional {