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D&D presents a unique imaginative arena. In theory, it serves as a blank canvas where the creativity of Dungeon Masters and players can craft countless scenarios. Yet, Dungeons & Dragons also carries a five-decade history of campaign settings, monsters, spellcasting rules, established non-player characters, and rich mythology. Even the most talented imaginative thinkers struggle to completely free themselves from this vast landscape of references, meaning that a great deal of “new” content for D&D is a reiteration of familiar ideas. At times you encounter things that are as brilliant as “a classic hit,” on other occasions you wince as if hearing “All Summer Long.”

The show Critical Role has gotten plenty creative in the past thanks to the original settings of Exandria (designed by the DM Matt Mercer) and now Aramán (the setting crafted by Brennan Lee Mulligan for Campaign 4). Although longtime fans of Mulligan and his other series Dimension 20 work may identify some of his common themes (Brennan really hates the deities!), episode 2 impressed me because of a truly original take on a classic D&D creature type: angelic beings.

The Historical Background of Celestials in D&D

Fiendish creatures (often called evil outsiders) have been part of D&D since 1976, but it required more time for their angelic equivalents to appear. A few unique “divine messengers” with individual titles were featured in the publication Dragon issues 12 (February 1978) and 17 (Aug. 1978). These were little more than variations of the angels from biblical religious lore; for more original versions, we had to wait until the early 80s and Gary Gygax’s “Monster Spotlight” column in Dragon magazine, where he presented fresh creatures that would be included in the 1983 Monster Manual II. That’s when the deva, the planetar, and the solar first appeared, initiating a lineage of beings known as celestial entities that is still present in the most recent version of the role-playing game.

In Dungeons & Dragons, celestial beings are the servants of benevolent gods, made by their masters to act as soldiers, leaders, messengers, liaisons with mortals, and in general to populate their domains in the Heavenly Realms. They are paragons of virtue who battle the agents of disorder and wickedness from the Infernal Realms and support the belief of their god on the Material Plane. Despite their close connection with the divine beings, celestials are distinct persons with specific personalities. Famous examples encompass the angel 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 markedly less fleshed out compared to fiends. The Abyss has 99 layers of ever-growing disorder and lords of demons warring amongst themselves. The Nine Hells are a interpretation of Game of Thrones with more bloodshed and more interesting subplots. And that’s not even mentioning the Yugoloth. In the meantime, all the essential information about celestials can be gathered in an short time of online research.

It’s understandable that beings who resemble angels from the Bible went underdeveloped. There are stories that Gygax felt uneasy about giving players stat blocks for divine beings they could murder in their sessions, and although celestials were later expanded with a bigger range of looks and purposes, 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. Certainly, they have independent thought, but their storytelling range is restricted. In that sense, the antagonists have much more freedom: They have defined superiors (Lords of Demons, Archdevils, and so on) but they’re ultimately fickle and chaotic creatures 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 understand: Celestials are just not that interesting. Holy warriors of virtue that strike down wickedness in all its forms 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 have yet to learn what occurs once the god who created them perishes. There is no official explanation, and each Dungeon Master is free to devise their own interpretation. The DM Brennan Lee Mulligan chose to center this issue central to the setting of Aramán, a place where the deities have all been slain by mortals in a great conflict that concluded 70 years prior to the start of the story. So what happened to the servants of these gods?

Mulligan’s answer is straightforward, terrifying, and very interesting: They became insane and turned into a blight that destroyed entire countries. A great deal about the past of this world, the war against the gods, and its aftermath in the current era has still to be revealed, but it seems that when the gods were slain, the celestials became “wild”. They transformed into creatures that could annihilate entire regions if left unchecked. Viewers caught a sight of how scary such a being can be at the end of episode 2, as the character Wicander (player Sam Riegel) encountered his “grandfather,” a fearsome celestial entity kept chained in a enormous casket.

It’s not a coincidence that the most interesting celestial beings in D&D, narratively, are those who have fallen from grace. Zariel, as an instance, was a mighty Solar angel whose obsession with concluding the Blood War led to her being tainted by the devil Asmodeus and transformed into an Archdevil. The planetar Fazrian is a little-known Planetar who was called forth by a cleric inside the dungeon Undermountain and developed a fixation on “cleaning” the evil in the Terminus area of the huge labyrinth, slowly succumbing to the madness infusing the location.

The taint seen in Campaign 4 of Critical Role takes a different shape. These celestials didn’t fall from grace. They were not deceived, or misled by their own pride or obsessions. They are victims; 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 “just” that conflict was, the mortals who emerged victorious may still regret the outcome. Their world has been harmed, their link to the hereafter has been cut off, and the beings that were once their protectors, guiding their spirits to safety after death, are currently terrifying calamities.

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