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Dungeons & Dragons presents a distinctive imaginative arena. In theory, it serves as a empty slate where the imagination of Dungeon Masters and players can paint any kind of picture. However, D&D also carries a five-decade history of campaign settings, creatures, spellcasting rules, well-known NPCs, and rich mythology. Even the most talented creative minds find it difficult to entirely detach themselves from this extensive universe of existing content, so that a lot of “fresh” content for D&D is a reworking of familiar ideas. 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 original settings of its first setting (created by the DM Matt Mercer) and now the new world Aramán (the setting created by DM Brennan Lee Mulligan for Campaign 4). Although devoted followers of Mulligan and his other series Dimension 20 work may recognize some of his recurring motifs (Brennan strongly dislikes the gods!), the second episode stood out to me because of a highly innovative interpretation on a traditional Dungeons & Dragons monster category: celestials.

The Historical Background of Celestials in Dungeons & Dragons

Demons and devils (often called fiends) have been included in Dungeons & Dragons since 1976, but it required more time for their heavenly counterparts to show up. A handful of distinct “angels” with specific names appeared in the publication Dragon issues 12 (February 1978) and 17 (August 1978). These were little more than variations of the angels from biblical religious lore; for truly unique interpretations, we had to wait until 1982 and Gary Gygax’s “Featured Creatures” article in Dragon magazine, where he introduced new monsters that would be included in 1983’s Monster Manual 2. That’s when the deva, the planetar angel, and the solar angel made their debut, initiating a lineage of beings called celestial entities that is still present in the most recent version of the role-playing game.

In D&D, celestial beings are the agents of good-aligned deities, made by their masters to act as warriors, leaders, messengers, intermediaries for humans, and overall to inhabit their domains in the Upper Planes. They are paragons of virtue who fight against the forces of chaos and evil from the Infernal Realms and support the belief of their deity on the Material Plane. Despite 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 Dame Aylin from the game Baldur’s Gate 3.

Celestial lore is markedly underdeveloped compared to demonic entities. 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 more bloodshed and more interesting subplots. And that’s not even mentioning the mysterious Yugoloth. Meanwhile, all the essential information about celestial beings can be gleaned in an short time of online research.

It’s understandable that creatures who look like biblical angels went underdeveloped. Rumor has it that Gygax felt uneasy about giving players stat blocks for divine beings they could kill in their sessions, and although celestials were subsequently developed 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 created to be servants of a god. Certainly, they have independent thought, but their narrative potential is limited. From that perspective, the antagonists have much more freedom: They have defined superiors (Demon Lords, Infernal Dukes, and so on) but they’re in the end unpredictable and disorderly entities that can evolve in a many ways without losing their unique nature.

The Way Campaign 4 of Critical Role Reimagines Celestials

Honestly, I understand: Celestial beings are simply not very compelling. Holy warriors of virtue that smite evil in every manifestation can be cool, but they also get cheesy very fast. That general lack of interest implies we remain unaware of a great deal about celestials. As an illustration, we have yet to learn what occurs after the god who made them dies. There is no canonical answer, and each Dungeon Master is able to devise their own spin. Brennan Lee Mulligan chose to center this issue at the heart of the world of Aramán, a place where the deities have all been killed by mortals in a massive war that ended seven decades before the start of the story. So what happened to the followers of these gods?

Mulligan’s solution is simple, horrifying, and highly intriguing: They became insane and became a plague that devastated whole nations. A lot about the history of this world, the divine conflict, and its aftermath in the present has still to be revealed, but it seems that when the gods died, the celestials went “feral”. They transformed into monsters that could destroy entire regions if not contained. Viewers got a glimpse of how frightening such a being can be at the conclusion of the second episode, as Wicander (player Sam Riegel) got to meet his “grandfather,” a terrifying celestial kept chained in a massive coffin.

It is no accident that the most interesting celestial beings in Dungeons & Dragons, narratively, are those who have lost their divinity. Zariel, for example, was a mighty Solar angel whose fixation with concluding the eternal Blood War resulted in her being tainted by the devil Asmodeus and turned into an Archdevil. The planetar Fazrian is a little-known Planetar angel who was summoned by a cleric inside the dungeon Undermountain and developed a fixation on “cleaning” the wickedness in the Terminus level of the huge labyrinth, gradually yielding to the insanity permeating the place.

The taint seen in the fourth campaign of Critical Role assumes a distinct form. These celestials did not lose their virtue. They weren’t tricked, nor led astray by their own pride or fixations. They are casualties; another terrible result of the War of the Shapers. As the new campaign continues, it is hoped the DM focuses on the notion that, regardless of how “righteous” that conflict was, the humans who won it may nonetheless lament the outcome. Their realm has been harmed, their link to the hereafter has been cut off, and the beings that were once their protectors, guiding their spirits to security following death, are now terrifying calamities.

Certainly, this might simply be a convenient way to solve Gygax’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 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 nonetheless favor these horrific heavenly beings to the flat {