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D&D offers a unique creative space. Theoretically, it acts as a empty slate where the creativity of DMs and players can paint countless scenarios. Yet, D&D also carries a 50-year legacy of campaign settings, monsters, magic systems, established non-player characters, and rich mythology. Even the best imaginative thinkers find it difficult to entirely detach themselves from this extensive universe of existing content, so that a great deal of “new” content for Dungeons & Dragons is a reiteration of sampled tracks. At times you get things that are as brilliant as “Gangsta’s Paradise,” on other occasions you cringe like when listening to “a derivative tune.”

The show Critical Role has been highly inventive in the past due to the original settings of its first setting (created by the DM Matt Mercer) and now Aramán (the setting crafted by Brennan Lee Mulligan for Campaign 4). While devoted followers of Brennan and his other series Dimension 20 work may recognize some of his recurring motifs (Brennan strongly dislikes the deities!), episode 2 impressed me because of a truly original take on a traditional Dungeons & Dragons monster category: angelic beings.

A Brief History of Heavenly Beings in Dungeons & Dragons

Demons and devils (collectively known as fiends) have been part of D&D since 1976, but it took a while longer for their angelic equivalents to show up. A few unique “divine messengers” with specific names appeared in the publication Dragon issues #12 (Feb. 1978) and #17 (Aug. 1978). These were little more than variations of the angels from biblical religious lore; for truly unique interpretations, we had to hold out for the early 80s and the creator Gary Gygax’s “Featured Creatures” article in Dragon magazine, where he introduced fresh creatures that would be included in the 1983 Monster Manual 2. That’s where the deva angel, the planetar, and the solar first appeared, initiating a lineage of creatures called celestials that is still present in the latest edition of the game.

In D&D, celestial beings are the servants of good-aligned deities, made by their masters to act as warriors, leaders, emissaries, 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 mortal world. Despite their direct relationship with the divine beings, celestials are distinct persons with specific personalities. Well-known instances include the angel Lumalia and the fallen Zariel from the Forgotten Realms setting, the mysterious Lady of the Lake from Greyhawk, and even Dame Aylin from Baldur’s Gate 3.

Celestial lore is notably less fleshed out in contrast to demonic entities. The Abyss has ninety-nine levels of expanding chaos and lords of demons warring amongst themselves. The Nine Hells are a interpretation of Game of Thrones with more bloodshed and more interesting side stories. And that’s not even mentioning the mysterious Yugoloth. Meanwhile, everything you need to know about celestial beings can be gleaned in an short time of wiki reading.

It’s not surprising that beings who resemble angels from the Bible went underdeveloped. There are stories that Gygax was uncomfortable about giving players stat blocks for angels they could kill in their sessions, and although celestials were subsequently developed with a bigger range of looks and roles, that controversial beginning stunted their development. There’s also only so much what you can create for beings that are designed to be divine minions. Certainly, they have free will, but their storytelling range is restricted. From that perspective, the antagonists have much more freedom: They have defined superiors (Lords of Demons, Infernal Dukes, and etc.) but they’re ultimately unpredictable and disorderly entities that can spin in a lot of directions without sacrificing their unique nature.

The Way Campaign 4 of Critical Role Redefines Heavenly Beings

Honestly, I get it: Celestial beings are just not that interesting. Holy warriors of virtue that smite evil in all its forms can be impressive, but they also get cheesy quickly. That widespread disinterest implies we still don’t know a great deal about celestials. For example, we have yet to learn what occurs after the deity who created them dies. There is no official explanation, and each Dungeon Master is free to devise their own spin. The DM Brennan Lee Mulligan decided to make this question at the heart of the world of Aramán, one where the gods have all been killed by mortals in a great conflict that concluded 70 years before the beginning of the story. So what happened to the servants of these gods?

Brennan’s solution is simple, terrifying, and highly intriguing: They became insane and became a plague that destroyed entire countries. A lot about the history of this world, the divine conflict, and its consequences in the present has still to be revealed, but it appears that when the deities were slain, the celestials went “feral”. They transformed into monsters that could destroy entire regions if left unchecked. Viewers caught a sight of how frightening one of these creatures can be at the conclusion of the second episode, as Wicander (player Sam Riegel) got to meet his “grandfather,” a terrifying celestial entity kept chained in a enormous casket.

It’s not a coincidence that the most compelling celestial beings in D&D, narratively, are those who have fallen from grace. The angel Zariel, for example, was a mighty Solar angel whose obsession with ending the Blood War led to her being corrupted by Asmodeus and transformed into an Archdevil of Hell. Fazrian is a obscure Planetar angel who was summoned by a priest inside Undermountain and became obsessed with “purging” the wickedness in the Terminus level of the massive dungeon, slowly succumbing to the insanity infusing the location.

The corruption seen in Campaign 4 of Critical Role takes a different shape. These celestials didn’t fall from grace. They were not deceived, nor misled by their own arrogance or fixations. They are victims; another dreadful result of the War of the Shapers. As Campaign 4 continues, it is hoped the DM concentrates on the idea that, no matter how “righteous” that war was, the mortals who won it may still regret the consequences. Their world has been harmed, their link to the hereafter has been cut off, and the creatures that were formerly their guardians, guiding their spirits to safety after death, are now frightening disasters.

Certainly, this might simply be a convenient way to address Gygax’s original dilemma. It is simple to rationalize slaying an angel when it’s a screaming, mad creature with rows of teeth, but I am also highly fascinated by this fresh variation of the celestial mythology in Dungeons & Dragons. I don’t necessarily agree with the DM’s aversion for gods in his stories, but I nonetheless favor these horrific heavenly beings to the one-dimensional {