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D&D provides a distinctive imaginative arena. Theoretically, it acts as a empty slate where the imagination of DMs and players can craft countless scenarios. However, D&D also bears a 50-year legacy of worlds, monsters, magic systems, well-known NPCs, and general lore. Even the most talented imaginative thinkers struggle to entirely detach themselves from this extensive universe of existing content, meaning that a lot of “new” material for Dungeons & Dragons is a reiteration of sampled tracks. At times you encounter elements that sound as good as “Gangsta’s Paradise,” on other occasions you wince as if hearing “a derivative tune.”

The show Critical Role has been highly inventive in the past thanks to the unique worlds of Exandria (designed by Matt Mercer) and now the new world Aramán (the setting crafted by Brennan Lee Mulligan for its fourth campaign). While longtime fans of Mulligan and his other series Dimension 20 work may recognize some of his recurring motifs (Brennan really hates the deities!), episode 2 impressed me because of a truly original take on a traditional D&D creature type: celestials.

The Historical Background of Heavenly Beings in D&D

Demons and devils (collectively known as fiends) have been included in D&D since the mid-70s, but it required more time for their heavenly counterparts to show up. A few unique “angels” with specific names appeared in Dragon magazine editions #12 (February 1978) and 17 (Aug. 1978). These were little more than variations of the angels from biblical sacred texts; for truly unique interpretations, we had to hold out for 1982 and the creator Gary Gygax’s “Monster Spotlight” column in Dragon, where he presented new monsters that would be included in 1983’s Monster Manual II. That’s when the deva, the planetar angel, and the solar first appeared, starting a tradition of creatures known as celestial entities that is still present in the most recent version of the game.

In Dungeons & Dragons, celestials are the servants of good-aligned deities, created by their masters to serve as warriors, leaders, emissaries, liaisons with mortals, and in general to populate their domains in the Upper Planes. 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. In spite of their close connection with the divine beings, celestials are distinct persons with specific personalities. Well-known instances include 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.

The mythology of celestials is notably underdeveloped in contrast to demonic entities. The Abyss has ninety-nine levels of ever-growing disorder and lords of demons tearing each other apart. The infernal Nine Hells are a interpretation of the series Game of Thrones with more bloodshed and more interesting subplots. And don’t get me started the Yugoloth. Meanwhile, everything you need to know about celestial beings can be gathered in an short time of wiki reading.

It’s not surprising that creatures who resemble biblical angels went underdeveloped. Rumor has it that Gary Gygax felt uneasy about providing gamers game statistics for divine beings they could kill in their games, and although celestials were later expanded with a broader spectrum of looks and purposes, that problematic origin stunted their development. There’s also only so much what you can do with beings that are designed to be servants of a god. Sure, they have independent thought, but their storytelling range is restricted. In that sense, the antagonists have much more freedom: They have established masters (Demon Lords, Infernal Dukes, and so on) but they’re ultimately unpredictable and disorderly creatures that can evolve in a many ways without sacrificing their unique nature.

How Critical Role Campaign 4 Reimagines Celestials

To be frank, I get it: Celestials are just not that interesting. Divine champions of virtue that smite evil in every manifestation can be impressive, but they also become clichéd quickly. That general lack of interest 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 perishes. There is no canonical answer, and every DM is able to come up with their own interpretation. Brennan Lee Mulligan chose to center this issue central to the world of Aramán, a place where the deities have all been killed by mortals in a massive war that concluded seven decades before the beginning of the campaign. So what happened to the servants of these gods?

Mulligan’s solution is simple, terrifying, and very interesting: They became insane and turned into a plague that destroyed entire countries. A great deal about the history of this world, the divine conflict, and its consequences in the current era has still to be revealed, but it appears that when the deities died, the celestials went “feral”. They transformed into monsters that could destroy large areas if left unchecked. The audience caught a sight of how scary 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 interesting celestial beings in D&D, story-wise, are those who have fallen from grace. Zariel, for example, was a mighty Solar angel whose obsession with concluding the Blood War led to her being corrupted by the devil Asmodeus and turned into an Archdevil of Hell. Fazrian is a little-known Planetar who was called forth by a cleric inside the dungeon Undermountain and became obsessed with “purging” the wickedness in the Terminus area of the huge labyrinth, slowly succumbing to the insanity infusing the location.

The corruption observed in Campaign 4 of Critical Role takes a different shape. These celestial beings did not lose their virtue. They were not deceived, nor led astray by their own pride or fixations. They are casualties; another dreadful consequence of the War of the Shapers. As the new campaign progresses, it is hoped the DM concentrates on the idea that, regardless of how “righteous” that war was, the humans who emerged victorious may nonetheless lament the outcome. Their world has been harmed, their connection to the afterlife has been severed, and the creatures that were formerly their protectors, shepherding their souls to safety following death, are currently frightening disasters.

Sure, this may just be a practical method to solve Gygax’s original dilemma. It’s easy to justify killing an divine being when it’s a shrieking, insane entity with rows of teeth, but I also feel very intrigued by this fresh variation of the celestial mythos in D&D. I am not entirely in accord with the DM’s aversion for gods in his stories, but I nonetheless favor these horrific heavenly beings to the flat {