There are a few Irish beasties in D&D, but mostly in AD&D, not so much in Classic D&D. Being half-Irish descended, I feel like I should stat up a few more of them.
Well, I don't have time to do it tonight, but maybe in the near future. In the meantime, here are a couple of links to some Irish/Celtic legends that hopefully might inspire one or two of you to DIY something for your games.
Good old Encyclopedia Mythica, a great website for brief rundowns on lots of mytholgies. Here's their page of Celtic Mythology articles.
Here's another site that looks nice that I found with a quick Google search. (link goes to their monsters page, there's more than just monsters on the site)
Happy St. Patrick's Day!
*I was thinking of doing a post complaining about the idiots on Facebook/Twitter who think the earthquake/tsunami were God and/or Fate's revenge on Japan for Pearl Harbor. But really, I only need to respond to those idiots with two words: Hiroshima, Nagasaki. Plus, that's got nothing to do with gaming.
It's interesting how we all equal irish myths with celtic myths.
ReplyDeleteOf course, they are part of the celtic mythology, but a relatively small part of the celtic traditions on the european mainland survived the roman empire and the germanic mix and mangle that was the fall of the western empire (or at least the last nail in it's coffin). The differences were probably quite great, given the relatively fractured celtic cultures and the influence of the original inhabitants of the british isles on the gaelic mythology. To quote the linked page:
The Continental Brythonic, that is, Brittany. Though racially akin to the Welsh and Cornish, the Bretons have had a very differently history and enjoy a distinct culture.
Now, how different (and how equal) were the cultures of celts at the black sea or elsewhere? We'll never know for sure, probably...
I know there's a distinction, but I think EM just lumps all the Celtic stuff together. So if you want to find Irish myths on their site, you need to do it in the Celtic Myths section.
ReplyDeleteThe other link is pure Irish.