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D&D presents a unique creative space. In theory, it serves as a blank canvas where the imagination of Dungeon Masters and players can paint any kind of picture. Yet, D&D also carries a 50-year legacy of campaign settings, monsters, magic systems, established non-player characters, and general lore. Even the best imaginative thinkers find it difficult to entirely detach themselves from this extensive universe of existing content, so that a lot of “new” material for Dungeons & Dragons is a reworking of familiar ideas. At times you encounter things that sound as good as “a classic hit,” on other occasions you cringe as if hearing “a derivative tune.”

The show Critical Role has been highly inventive in the past thanks to the unique worlds of its first setting (created by the DM Matt Mercer) and now Aramán (the setting created by DM Brennan Lee Mulligan for Campaign 4). Although devoted followers of Brennan and his other series Dimension 20 work may identify some of his common themes (He really hates the gods!), the second episode stood out to me because of a highly innovative interpretation on a classic D&D creature type: celestials.

The Historical Background of Heavenly Beings in D&D

Demons and devils (often called fiends) have been included in Dungeons & Dragons since the mid-70s, but it took a while longer for their heavenly counterparts to appear. A handful of distinct “divine messengers” with specific names appeared in Dragon magazine editions 12 (February 1978) and 17 (Aug. 1978). These were essentially riffs on the celestial figures from biblical religious lore; for more original versions, we had to wait until 1982 and the creator Gary Gygax’s “Monster Spotlight” article in Dragon magazine, where he presented new monsters that would be included in 1983’s Monster Manual 2. That’s where the deva angel, the planetar angel, and the solar made their debut, initiating a tradition of beings known as celestials that is still present in the latest edition of the role-playing game.

In Dungeons & Dragons, celestial beings are the servants of good-aligned deities, created by their masters to act as warriors, commanders, messengers, intermediaries for humans, and overall to inhabit their domains in the Heavenly Realms. They are champions of good who battle the forces of chaos and evil from the Infernal Realms and help uphold the faith of their deity on the mortal world. Despite their close connection with the divine beings, celestials are unique individuals with individual traits. Famous examples encompass the angel Lumalia and Zariel from the Forgotten Realms world, the Lady of the Lake from the Greyhawk setting, and even the iconic Dame Aylin from Baldur’s Gate 3.

The mythology of celestials is notably underdeveloped in contrast to fiends. The chaotic Abyss has ninety-nine levels of ever-growing disorder and lords of demons warring amongst themselves. The Nine Hells are a interpretation of the series Game of Thrones with greater violence and more interesting side stories. And that’s not even mentioning the mysterious Yugoloth. In the meantime, all the essential information about celestial beings can be gleaned in an short time of wiki reading.

It’s not surprising that creatures who look like angels from the Bible received less attention. Rumor has it that Gary Gygax was uncomfortable about giving players game statistics for divine beings they could kill in their games, and although celestials were subsequently developed with a broader spectrum of looks and purposes, that controversial beginning stunted their development. There is also a limit to what you can do with creatures that are created to be divine minions. Sure, they have free will, but their narrative potential is restricted. In that sense, the bad guys have far greater liberty: They have defined superiors (Demon Lords, Infernal Dukes, and so on) but they’re in the end unpredictable and disorderly creatures that can evolve in a lot of directions without losing 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 smite evil in every manifestation can be cool, but they also get cheesy very fast. That widespread disinterest means we still don’t know a great deal about celestials. For example, we have yet to learn what occurs after the deity who created them dies. There is no canonical answer, and every DM is able to devise their own interpretation. Brennan Lee Mulligan decided to center this issue at the heart of the setting of Aramán, one where the deities have all been killed by mortals in a great conflict that concluded 70 years before the beginning of the story. So what became of the servants of these gods?

Brennan’s answer is simple, terrifying, and highly intriguing: They became insane and turned into a blight that devastated entire countries. A lot about the past of Aramán, the war against the gods, and its aftermath in the current era has still to be revealed, but it seems that after the deities were slain, the celestials went “feral”. They transformed into creatures that could destroy entire regions if not contained. The audience got a glimpse of how frightening one of these creatures can be at the end of episode 2, as Wicander (player Sam Riegel) got to meet his “ancestor,” a fearsome celestial held bound in a enormous casket.

It’s not a coincidence that the most compelling celestial beings in D&D, narratively, are those who have lost their divinity. The angel Zariel, for example, was a mighty Solar angel whose fixation with ending the eternal Blood War resulted in her being corrupted by Asmodeus and turned into an Archdevil. The planetar Fazrian is a little-known Planetar who was summoned by a priest inside the dungeon Undermountain and developed a fixation on “purging” the evil in the Terminus level of the massive dungeon, slowly succumbing to the insanity infusing the location.

The taint seen in Campaign 4 of Critical Role takes a different shape. These celestials didn’t fall from grace. They weren’t tricked, nor misled by their own pride or fixations. They are victims; one more dreadful result of the Shapers’ War. As Campaign 4 continues, I hope the DM concentrates on the notion that, regardless of how “righteous” that war was, the humans who won it may nonetheless lament the consequences. Their realm has been wounded, their link to the hereafter has been cut off, and the beings that were formerly their guardians, shepherding their souls to safety after death, are currently terrifying calamities.

Sure, this may just be a convenient way to address the original creator’s original dilemma. It’s easy to rationalize slaying an angel when it’s a screaming, mad entity with multiple fangs, but I also feel highly fascinated by this new declination of the celestial mythos in Dungeons & Dragons. I am not entirely in accord with Brennan’s aversion for gods in his stories, but I nonetheless favor these horrific heavenly beings to the one-dimensional {