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D&D presents a unique imaginative arena. Theoretically, it serves as a empty slate where the imagination of Dungeon Masters and players can craft any kind of picture. Yet, Dungeons & Dragons also carries a five-decade history of campaign settings, monsters, spellcasting rules, established non-player characters, and general lore. Even the most talented imaginative thinkers struggle to completely free themselves from this vast landscape of references, meaning that a lot of “fresh” material for D&D is a reworking of familiar ideas. Sometimes you get elements that are as brilliant as “Gangsta’s Paradise,” other times you cringe as if hearing “a derivative tune.”

Critical Role has been highly inventive in the past thanks to the original settings of its first setting (designed by the DM Matt Mercer) and now Aramán (the setting crafted by Brennan Lee Mulligan for Campaign 4). Although longtime fans of Brennan and his Dimension 20 work may recognize some of his common themes (He really hates the gods!), the second episode stood out to me because of a truly original interpretation on a classic D&D creature type: angelic beings.

A Brief History of Celestials in Dungeons & Dragons

Demons and devils (often called evil outsiders) have been part of Dungeons & Dragons since the mid-70s, but it required more time for their angelic equivalents to appear. A handful of distinct “angels” with specific names were featured in the publication Dragon issues #12 (February 1978) and #17 (August 1978). These were essentially variations of the angels from Hebrew and Christian religious lore; for truly unique interpretations, we had to wait until the early 80s and the creator Gary Gygax’s “Featured Creatures” column in Dragon, 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 angel made their debut, initiating a lineage of beings called celestial entities 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 creators to serve as warriors, leaders, emissaries, intermediaries for humans, and in general to inhabit their domains in the Upper Planes. They are paragons of virtue who battle the agents of disorder and wickedness from the Lower Planes and help uphold the belief of their deity on the Material Plane. In spite of their close connection with the gods, celestials are unique individuals with specific personalities. Well-known instances include Lumalia and Zariel from the Forgotten Realms world, 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 chaotic Abyss has ninety-nine levels of expanding chaos and demon lords warring amongst themselves. The infernal Nine Hells are a version of Game of Thrones with greater violence 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 understandable that beings who look like biblical angels went underdeveloped. There are stories that Gary Gygax felt uneasy about providing gamers game statistics for angels they could murder in their games, and even if celestials were later expanded with a broader spectrum of looks and roles, that problematic origin stunted their development. There is also a limit to what you can create for beings that are designed to be servants of a god. Sure, they have free will, but their storytelling range is restricted. In that sense, the antagonists have far greater liberty: They have established masters (Demon Lords, Infernal Dukes, and so on) but they’re ultimately fickle and chaotic entities that can spin in a many ways without losing their unique nature.

The Way Campaign 4 of Critical Role Redefines Celestials

To be frank, I understand: Celestial beings are simply not very compelling. Holy warriors of good that strike down wickedness in all its forms can be impressive, but they also become clichéd quickly. That widespread disinterest implies we still don’t know a great deal about celestials. For example, we still don’t know what happens after the deity who created them perishes. There is no canonical answer, and each Dungeon Master is able to devise their own spin. Brennan Lee Mulligan decided to center this issue central to the setting of Aramán, one where the deities have all been slain by humans in a great conflict that ended seven decades prior to the start of the story. So what happened to the servants of these divine beings?

Brennan’s solution is straightforward, horrifying, and highly intriguing: They went crazy and turned into a blight that destroyed whole nations. A lot about the history of this world, the war against the gods, and its consequences in the current era has still to be revealed, but it appears that when the gods died, the celestials went “feral”. They transformed into monsters that could annihilate large areas if not contained. Viewers got a glimpse of how frightening one of these creatures can be at the end of episode 2, as the character Wicander (player Sam Riegel) encountered his “ancestor,” a fearsome celestial entity held bound in a enormous casket.

It is no accident that the most interesting celestials in D&D, narratively, are those who have lost their divinity. Zariel, for example, was a mighty Solar angel whose obsession with concluding the eternal Blood War resulted in her being corrupted by Asmodeus and transformed into an Archdevil of Hell. The planetar Fazrian is a little-known Planetar who was called forth by a priest inside the dungeon Undermountain and became obsessed with “purging” the wickedness in the Terminus area of the huge labyrinth, gradually yielding to the insanity permeating the place.

The corruption seen in Campaign 4 of Critical Role takes a different shape. These celestial beings didn’t fall from grace. They weren’t tricked, nor misled by their own arrogance or fixations. They are casualties; another terrible consequence of the War of the Shapers. As Campaign 4 progresses, it is hoped Mulligan focuses on the idea that, no matter how “just” that war was, the humans who won it may still regret the outcome. Their realm has been wounded, their link to the hereafter has been severed, and the creatures that were formerly their protectors, shepherding their souls to security following death, are currently frightening disasters.

Certainly, this may just be a practical method to address the original creator’s initial quandary. It is simple to justify killing an divine being when it’s a shrieking, mad creature with rows of teeth, but I am also very intrigued by this new declination of the celestial mythos in D&D. I don’t necessarily agree with the DM’s loathing for gods in his stories, but I still prefer these monstrous celestials to the flat {