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Dungeons & Dragons provides a distinctive imaginative arena. In theory, it acts as a blank canvas where the creativity of Dungeon Masters and participants 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 entirely detach themselves from this extensive landscape of references, so that a great deal of “fresh” content for D&D is a reiteration of familiar ideas. Sometimes you encounter things that are as brilliant as “a classic hit,” on other occasions you wince like when listening to “a derivative tune.”

Critical Role has gotten plenty creative in the past due to the unique worlds of its first setting (created by Matt Mercer) and now Aramán (the setting created by DM Brennan Lee Mulligan for Campaign 4). While devoted followers of Brennan and his other series Dimension 20 work may identify some of his common themes (Brennan strongly dislikes the deities!), episode 2 stood out to me because of a highly innovative take on a classic D&D creature type: angelic beings.

The Historical Background of Celestials in D&D

Fiendish creatures (collectively known as evil outsiders) have been included in D&D 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 issues 12 (February 1978) and #17 (August 1978). These were little more than riffs on the angels from Hebrew and Christian religious lore; for more original versions, we had to hold out for 1982 and Gary Gygax’s “Monster Spotlight” column in Dragon magazine, where he presented fresh creatures that would be included in 1983’s Monster Manual II. That’s when the deva, the planetar, and the solar made their debut, initiating a lineage of beings called celestials that is still present in the most recent version of the game.

In Dungeons & Dragons, celestials are the agents of good-aligned deities, created by their creators to serve as warriors, commanders, messengers, liaisons with mortals, and in general to inhabit their realms in the Heavenly Realms. They are paragons of virtue who battle the forces of chaos and evil from the Infernal Realms and help uphold the belief of their god on the mortal world. In spite of their close connection with the divine beings, celestials are distinct persons with specific personalities. Famous examples include Lumalia and Zariel from the Forgotten Realms setting, the Lady of the Lake from Greyhawk, and even the iconic Dame Aylin from Baldur’s Gate 3.

The mythology of celestials is notably underdeveloped in contrast to demonic entities. The Abyss has 99 layers of expanding chaos and demon lords warring amongst themselves. The infernal Nine Hells are a version of Game of Thrones with more bloodshed and more interesting side stories. And that’s not even mentioning the Yugoloth. In the meantime, all the essential information about celestials can be gleaned in an short time of wiki reading.

It’s not surprising that beings who resemble biblical angels went underdeveloped. Rumor has it that Gary Gygax was uncomfortable about providing gamers game statistics for divine beings they could murder in their games, and even if celestials were later expanded with a broader spectrum of appearances and roles, that controversial beginning hindered their growth. There’s also only so much what you can create for creatures that are designed to be servants of a god. Certainly, they have independent thought, but their storytelling range is limited. From that perspective, the antagonists have much more freedom: They have established masters (Demon Lords, Archdevils, and so on) but they’re in the end unpredictable and disorderly creatures that can spin in a lot of directions without losing their distinct identity.

How Critical Role Campaign 4 Redefines Heavenly Beings

To be frank, I get it: Celestial beings are just not that interesting. Divine champions of virtue that strike down wickedness in every manifestation can be cool, but they also become clichéd very fast. That widespread disinterest means we remain unaware of that much about celestials. As an illustration, we still don’t know what happens once the god who created them perishes. There is no official explanation, and every DM is able to devise their own interpretation. The DM Brennan Lee Mulligan decided to make this question central to the setting of Aramán, one where the gods have all been slain by humans in a great conflict that concluded seven decades prior to the beginning of the campaign. So what became of the followers of these divine beings?

Brennan’s answer is simple, terrifying, and very interesting: They became insane and turned into a plague that destroyed whole nations. A great deal about the history of this world, the divine conflict, and its consequences in the present has still to be revealed, but it appears that when the gods were slain, the celestial beings went “feral”. They transformed into creatures that could annihilate large areas if left unchecked. Viewers got a glimpse of how frightening such a being can be at the end of episode 2, as the character Wicander (Sam Riegel) got to meet his “ancestor,” a terrifying celestial held bound in a massive coffin.

It is no accident that the most interesting celestials in D&D, story-wise, are those who have lost their divinity. Zariel, as an instance, was a powerful Solar whose fixation with concluding the Blood War resulted in her being corrupted by the devil Asmodeus and transformed into an Archdevil. Fazrian is a little-known Planetar angel who was called forth by a priest inside Undermountain and developed a fixation on “cleaning” the evil in the Terminus area of the huge labyrinth, gradually yielding to the insanity infusing the place.

The taint seen in Campaign 4 of Critical Role assumes a distinct form. These celestials didn’t fall from grace. They weren’t tricked, nor misled by their own pride or obsessions. They are casualties; one more dreadful result of the Shapers’ War. As the new campaign progresses, it is hoped the DM concentrates on the notion that, no matter how “righteous” that conflict was, the mortals who emerged victorious may still regret the consequences. Their realm has been wounded, their link to the hereafter has been cut off, and the creatures that were once their protectors, shepherding their souls to safety following death, are currently frightening disasters.

Sure, this might simply be a practical method to address the original creator’s original dilemma. It’s easy to justify killing an angel when it’s a shrieking, insane creature with rows of teeth, but I also feel very intrigued by this fresh variation of the celestial mythology in D&D. I don’t necessarily agree with the DM’s aversion for divine beings in his stories, but I still prefer these monstrous celestials to the flat {