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D&D presents a distinctive imaginative arena. In theory, it serves as a empty slate where the imagination of Dungeon Masters and participants can craft countless scenarios. Yet, D&D also bears a five-decade history of worlds, monsters, spellcasting rules, well-known NPCs, and general lore. Even the most talented imaginative thinkers find it difficult to completely free themselves from this extensive landscape of references, meaning that a great deal of “fresh” material for D&D is a reworking of sampled tracks. Sometimes you encounter elements that sound as good as “Gangsta’s Paradise,” other times you cringe like when listening to “All Summer Long.”

The show Critical Role has gotten plenty creative in the past thanks to the unique worlds of its first setting (created 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 Dimension 20 work may identify some of his recurring motifs (Brennan strongly dislikes the gods!), the second episode impressed me because of a truly original interpretation on a classic Dungeons & Dragons monster category: celestials.

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 required more time for their heavenly counterparts to show up. A handful of distinct “divine messengers” with specific names appeared in the publication Dragon issues #12 (February 1978) and #17 (Aug. 1978). These were essentially variations of the celestial figures from Hebrew and Christian sacred texts; for more original versions, we had to hold out for the early 80s and the creator Gary Gygax’s “Monster Spotlight” article in Dragon, where he introduced fresh creatures that would be included in the 1983 Monster Manual 2. That’s where the deva, the planetar angel, and the solar first appeared, initiating a tradition of beings called celestial entities that is continues to exist in the most recent version of the game.

In Dungeons & Dragons, celestial beings are the servants of benevolent gods, created by their masters to act as warriors, commanders, emissaries, liaisons with mortals, and in general to inhabit 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 faith of their deity on the Material Plane. In spite of their close connection with the divine beings, celestials are unique individuals with specific personalities. Famous examples include Lumalia and the fallen Zariel from the Forgotten Realms world, the mysterious 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 fiends. The chaotic Abyss has 99 layers of expanding chaos and demon lords warring amongst themselves. The Nine Hells are a version of Game of Thrones with greater violence and more engaging subplots. And don’t get me started the mysterious Yugoloth. In the meantime, all the essential information about celestials can be gleaned in an hour of online research.

It’s understandable that beings who look like angels from the Bible received less attention. There are stories that Gygax was uncomfortable about giving players game statistics for divine beings they could kill in their sessions, and although celestials were later expanded with a bigger range of appearances and roles, that controversial beginning hindered their growth. There is also a limit to what you can create for beings that are created to be servants of a god. Sure, they have independent thought, but their narrative potential is restricted. In that sense, the antagonists have much more freedom: They have established masters (Lords of Demons, Archdevils, and so on) but they’re in the end unpredictable and disorderly entities that can evolve in a lot of directions without losing their unique nature.

How Critical Role Campaign 4 Reimagines Heavenly Beings

To be frank, I get it: Celestials are simply not very compelling. Holy warriors of virtue that smite evil in all its forms can be impressive, but they also get cheesy quickly. That widespread disinterest means we remain unaware of a great deal about celestials. For example, we still don’t know what happens after the deity who created them dies. There is no official explanation, and every DM is free to come up with their own spin. Brennan Lee Mulligan chose to center this issue at the heart of the setting of Aramán, a place where the deities have all been slain by humans in a great conflict that ended seven decades prior to the beginning of the story. So what happened to the servants of these gods?

Mulligan’s answer is straightforward, horrifying, and highly intriguing: They became insane and turned into a plague that devastated entire countries. A lot about the history of this world, the war against the gods, and its aftermath in the present has yet to be disclosed, but it appears that when the deities died, the celestial beings went “feral”. They transformed into creatures that could destroy entire regions if left unchecked. The audience caught a sight of how scary one of these creatures can be at the conclusion of the second episode, as Wicander (Sam Riegel) encountered his “ancestor,” a terrifying celestial kept chained in a massive coffin.

It’s not a coincidence that the most compelling celestials in D&D, narratively, are those who have fallen from grace. The angel Zariel, for example, was a powerful Solar whose fixation with ending the eternal Blood War led to her being tainted by Asmodeus and turned into an Archdevil. The planetar Fazrian is a little-known Planetar angel who was called forth by a priest inside Undermountain and became obsessed with “purging” the evil in the Terminus level of the huge labyrinth, slowly succumbing to the insanity infusing the place.

The taint observed in Campaign 4 of Critical Role assumes a distinct form. These celestials did not lose their virtue. They were not deceived, nor led astray by their own arrogance or obsessions. They are victims; one more terrible consequence of the Shapers’ War. As Campaign 4 progresses, I hope the DM concentrates on the notion that, no matter how “just” that conflict was, the humans who won it may nonetheless lament the consequences. Their world has been wounded, their connection to the afterlife has been severed, and the beings that were once their protectors, guiding their spirits to safety after death, are now frightening disasters.

Sure, this may just be a convenient way to address Gygax’s original dilemma. It is simple to justify killing an divine being when it’s a screaming, mad entity with multiple fangs, but I am also highly fascinated 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 campaigns, but I still prefer these horrific heavenly beings to the one-dimensional {