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Dungeons & Dragons presents a unique imaginative arena. In theory, it acts as a empty slate where the creativity of DMs and players can paint any kind of picture. However, D&D also carries a 50-year legacy of worlds, creatures, spellcasting rules, established non-player characters, and rich mythology. Even the best imaginative thinkers find it difficult to completely free themselves from this extensive landscape of references, meaning that a great deal of “new” content for D&D is a reiteration of sampled tracks. Sometimes you get things that are as brilliant as “a classic hit,” on other occasions you wince as if hearing “a derivative tune.”

The show Critical Role has gotten plenty creative in the past due to the unique worlds of Exandria (created by Matt Mercer) and now the new world Aramán (the world crafted by DM Brennan Lee Mulligan for Campaign 4). Although longtime fans of Brennan and his other series Dimension 20 work may recognize some of his recurring motifs (Brennan really hates the gods!), the second episode stood out to me because of a truly original interpretation on a traditional D&D creature type: celestials.

The Historical Background of Heavenly Beings in D&D

Fiendish creatures (collectively known as fiends) have been included in D&D since the mid-70s, but it required more time for their angelic equivalents to show up. A few unique “divine messengers” with specific names were featured in Dragon magazine editions #12 (February 1978) and 17 (August 1978). These were little more than riffs on the celestial figures from biblical sacred texts; for more original versions, we had to hold out for 1982 and Gary Gygax’s “Featured Creatures” column in Dragon magazine, where he presented fresh creatures that would be included in the 1983 Monster Manual II. That’s where the deva, the planetar, and the solar angel first appeared, starting a tradition of beings known as celestial entities that is continues to exist in the latest edition of the role-playing game.

In D&D, celestials are the servants of benevolent gods, made by their creators to serve as soldiers, commanders, messengers, liaisons with mortals, and overall to inhabit their domains in the Heavenly Realms. They are champions of good who fight against the forces of chaos and evil from the Infernal Realms and support the belief of their deity on the mortal world. Despite their close connection with the divine beings, celestials are unique individuals with individual traits. Famous examples include the angel Lumalia and the fallen Zariel from the Forgotten Realms world, the mysterious Lady of the Lake from the Greyhawk setting, and even Dame Aylin from Baldur’s Gate 3.

Celestial lore is markedly less fleshed out in contrast to demonic entities. The Abyss has ninety-nine levels of expanding chaos and demon lords warring amongst themselves. The Nine Hells are a interpretation of Game of Thrones with greater violence and more interesting subplots. And that’s not even mentioning the Yugoloth. Meanwhile, all the essential information about celestial beings can be gleaned in an short time of online research.

It’s not surprising that beings who look like angels from the Bible went underdeveloped. Rumor has it that Gary Gygax was uncomfortable about providing gamers stat blocks for angels they could kill in their sessions, and even if celestials were later expanded with a broader spectrum of appearances and purposes, that controversial beginning hindered their growth. There is also a limit to what you can create for beings that are designed to be divine minions. Certainly, they have free will, but their storytelling range is restricted. In that sense, the bad guys have far greater liberty: They have established masters (Lords of Demons, Archdevils, and so on) but they’re in the end fickle and chaotic entities that can spin in a many ways without sacrificing their unique nature.

How Critical Role Campaign 4 Redefines Heavenly Beings

To be frank, I understand: Celestials are just not that interesting. Holy warriors of virtue that strike down wickedness in every manifestation can be cool, but they also become clichéd quickly. That widespread disinterest means we still don’t know that much about celestials. For example, we still don’t know what occurs after the god who made them dies. There is no canonical answer, and each Dungeon Master is free to devise their own spin. The DM Brennan Lee Mulligan chose to make this question central to the world of Aramán, one where the gods have all been slain by humans in a massive war that ended seven decades before the beginning of the story. So what became of the followers of these gods?

Mulligan’s solution is straightforward, terrifying, and highly intriguing: They went crazy and turned into a blight that destroyed entire countries. A great deal about the past of Aramán, the divine conflict, and its aftermath in the current era has still to be revealed, but it appears that after the deities were slain, the celestial beings went “feral”. They transformed into monsters that could annihilate entire regions if left unchecked. The audience caught a sight of how scary such a being can be at the conclusion of the second episode, as the character Wicander (player Sam Riegel) encountered his “ancestor,” a fearsome celestial entity held bound in a enormous casket.

It’s not a coincidence that the most compelling celestial beings in D&D, story-wise, are those who have fallen from grace. The angel Zariel, as an instance, was a mighty Solar angel whose fixation with ending the eternal Blood War led to her being tainted by Asmodeus and transformed into an Archdevil of Hell. The planetar Fazrian is a obscure Planetar who was called forth by a priest inside Undermountain and developed a fixation on “purging” the wickedness in the Terminus level of the huge labyrinth, slowly succumbing to the insanity infusing the place.

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 obsessions. They are casualties; another terrible consequence of the Shapers’ War. As Campaign 4 progresses, it is hoped the DM concentrates on the idea that, regardless of how “righteous” that conflict was, the humans who emerged victorious may still regret the outcome. Their realm has been harmed, their connection to the afterlife has been severed, and the beings that were formerly their guardians, shepherding their souls to security following death, are currently frightening disasters.

Sure, this might simply be a practical method to solve the original creator’s original dilemma. It is simple to justify killing an angel when it’s a shrieking, mad creature with multiple fangs, but I am also highly fascinated by this fresh variation of the celestial mythology in Dungeons & Dragons. I am not entirely in accord with Brennan’s aversion for divine beings in his stories, but I nonetheless favor these horrific heavenly beings to the one-dimensional {