As Critical Role Campaign 4 picks up steam, preparing for the final episode of its “overture” and to split the players into three distinct parties, we’re still learning more about the mysterious world of Aramán, created by Dungeon Master Brennan Lee Mulligan. Exandria (the setting of Critical Role’s three previous campaigns) relied heavily on established Dungeons & Dragons lore. Instead, one of the most exciting parts about Campaign 4 is how Mulligan plays with those common references to build something truly original.
Viewers have already been introduced to Aramán’s sad and twisted version of the Celestials, but episode 3, “The Snipping of Shears,” also delivers some lore about their fiendish counterpart, the demons. This term has been used quite generically in Campaign 4, but what’s most interesting is that it also refers to individuals that would be classified as “tieflings” in other D&D settings, including the demon warlock Tyranny, played by Whitney Moore.
Traditionally, tieflings are mortals with Fiend ancestry, but it appears that in Aramán, they’re true demons whose souls have come to inhabit a mortal body as the result of a deal. In episode 3, we learned that demons reside in a place called the Pit, ruled by an ominous being called High Prince Ksha’aravi, the Shadow of Suffering. Ksha’aravi struck a deal with House Halovar, in which he would provide them with demons to use as agents and as paragons of redemption for the Candescent Creed. In exchange, he would get mortal souls and some of the Filament, a substance with divine properties produced by the Halovars.
If you find all this puzzling, you’re not alone (but you can always check our useful guide to the lore of Campaign 4). Mulligan is a master of teasing, and he’s being meticulous about how much he reveals in each episode. Still, we can assume from what we know that Aramán’s tieflings are demon souls who inhabit a mortal body. This is a nice spin on one popular D&D character species, and one with the potential to make it more interesting.
The origin of tieflings dates back to 1994 and the iconic Planescape Campaign Setting for second edition AD&D. They were vaguely described as humans with otherworldly heritage, implying it came from devils, demons, or other evil planar beings. Planescape author Zeb Cook revealed in a later interview that he left the tieflings’ origins vague on purpose because he simply wanted to create an archetype for a reformed devil/antihero character, partially to appeal to the gothic and emo mindsets. Third and fourth edition D&D, however, further defined and narrowed down those origins (a choice that Cook criticized), leading to the current consensus that tieflings all have ancestry that leads to the Lower Planes.
While the specifics about that ancestry differ a lot, the common point is that tieflings are humans with the blood of Fiends running through their veins. In D&D, Fiends are the inhabitants of the Lower Planes of evil alignment, including the Abyss, the Nine Hells, Carceri, Gehenna, Pandemonium, and probably a few more that I’m forgetting. This cosmology is shared among almost all D&D settings, including the world of Exandria, which has had its fair share of Fiend appearances. While these evil creatures are native to the Lower Planes, they can be summoned to the Material Plane or access it through portals. They come through with their physical bodies, but they can only be truly slain on their native planes.
The description of the Pit and its inhabitants made in episode 3 of Campaign 4 steers away from these common elements. Ksha’aravi feels a lot like Asmodeus, the ruler of the Nine Hells, with all that scheming and soul bargaining, but my impression is that the demons of Aram
