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D&D offers a unique imaginative arena. In theory, it acts as a blank canvas where the creativity of DMs and players can paint any kind of picture. However, D&D also carries a five-decade history of worlds, creatures, spellcasting rules, well-known NPCs, and rich mythology. Even the most talented imaginative thinkers find it difficult to completely free themselves from this vast universe of existing content, so that a lot of “new” material for Dungeons & Dragons is a reworking of familiar ideas. Sometimes you encounter elements that sound as good as “a classic hit,” on other occasions you wince as if hearing “a derivative tune.”

Critical Role has been highly inventive in the past thanks to the original settings of Exandria (created by the DM Matt Mercer) and now Aramán (the world created by Brennan Lee Mulligan for Campaign 4). While devoted followers of Brennan and his Dimension 20 work may identify some of his common themes (He strongly dislikes the deities!), the second episode stood out to me because of a highly innovative interpretation on a classic D&D creature type: angelic beings.

A Brief History of Heavenly Beings in D&D

Fiendish creatures (often called fiends) have been included in Dungeons & Dragons since the mid-70s, but it required more time for their heavenly counterparts to show up. A few unique “divine messengers” with individual titles appeared in Dragon magazine editions 12 (Feb. 1978) and #17 (August 1978). These were little more than variations of the celestial figures from Hebrew and Christian religious lore; for truly unique interpretations, we had to wait until the early 80s and the creator Gary Gygax’s “Monster Spotlight” article in Dragon magazine, where he introduced fresh creatures that would appear in the 1983 Monster Manual 2. That’s when the deva angel, the planetar angel, and the solar made their debut, initiating a tradition of beings known as celestial entities that is still present in the most recent version of the game.

In Dungeons & Dragons, celestial beings are the agents of benevolent gods, made by their creators to act as warriors, leaders, messengers, intermediaries for humans, and in general to inhabit their domains in the Heavenly Realms. They are champions of good who fight against the forces of chaos and evil from the Lower Planes and help uphold the belief of their god on the mortal world. In spite of their direct relationship with the divine beings, celestials are unique individuals with specific personalities. Well-known instances encompass Lumalia and Zariel from the Forgotten Realms world, the mysterious Lady of the Lake from the Greyhawk setting, and even the iconic Dame Aylin from the game Baldur’s Gate 3.

The mythology of celestials is notably underdeveloped compared 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 interesting side stories. And that’s not even mentioning the mysterious Yugoloth. Meanwhile, all the essential information about celestials can be gleaned in an short time of online research.

It’s not surprising that creatures who look like biblical angels received less attention. Rumor has it that Gary Gygax was uncomfortable about providing gamers game statistics for angels they could kill in their games, and although celestials were later expanded with a broader spectrum of looks and purposes, that problematic origin hindered their growth. There is also a limit to what you can do with creatures that are created to be servants of a god. Sure, they have independent thought, but their narrative potential is limited. In that sense, the bad guys have much more freedom: They have established masters (Lords of Demons, Infernal Dukes, and etc.) but they’re ultimately unpredictable and disorderly entities that can spin in a lot of directions without sacrificing their distinct identity.

How Critical Role Campaign 4 Redefines Heavenly Beings

To be frank, I get it: Celestials are simply not very compelling. Holy warriors of virtue that strike down wickedness in every manifestation can be impressive, but they also get cheesy quickly. That widespread disinterest means we remain unaware of a great deal about celestials. As an illustration, we still don’t know what occurs after the deity who made them perishes. There is no canonical answer, and every DM is free to devise their own interpretation. Brennan Lee Mulligan chose to center this issue central to the setting of Aramán, one where the deities have all been killed by mortals in a massive war that ended seven decades prior to the start of the campaign. So what became of the servants of these gods?

Mulligan’s solution is straightforward, horrifying, and highly intriguing: They went crazy and became a blight that destroyed whole nations. A great deal about the past of this world, the divine conflict, and its consequences in the present has yet to be disclosed, but it seems that after the gods died, the celestial beings went “feral”. They transformed into monsters that could destroy large areas if left unchecked. Viewers caught a sight of how scary such a being can be at the conclusion of the second episode, as the character Wicander (Sam Riegel) got to meet 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, narratively, are those who have fallen from grace. Zariel, as an instance, was a powerful Solar whose fixation with concluding the eternal Blood War led to her being tainted by the devil Asmodeus and transformed into an Archdevil of Hell. The planetar Fazrian is a obscure Planetar who was called forth by a cleric inside Undermountain and developed a fixation on “purging” the evil in the Terminus area of the massive dungeon, slowly succumbing to the insanity permeating the place.

The taint seen in Campaign 4 of Critical Role takes a different shape. These celestials did not lose their virtue. They weren’t tricked, or led astray by their own pride or obsessions. They are casualties; one more terrible consequence of the War of the Shapers. As Campaign 4 continues, it is hoped Mulligan concentrates on the notion that, regardless of how “just” that conflict was, the mortals who won it may nonetheless lament the consequences. Their realm has been wounded, their link to the hereafter has been cut off, and the creatures that were formerly their guardians, shepherding their souls to security after death, are currently frightening disasters.

Certainly, this may just be a convenient way to solve the original creator’s initial quandary. It’s easy to justify killing an divine being when it’s a screaming, insane creature with rows of teeth, but I also feel highly fascinated by this new declination of the celestial mythology in Dungeons & Dragons. I am not entirely in accord with the DM’s aversion for gods in his campaigns, but I nonetheless favor these monstrous celestials to the one-dimensional {