Tuatha De Danann PCs?

[Celedhrían]

Just curious, but are there any fantasy settings out there (including D&D) that offer Tuatha De Danann (a family of Celtic gods) as PCs? I'm not talking about the known gods themselves, but a Tuatha, similar in scope as to the AD&D Eladrin or what have you.

This query was prompted by my finding the Scion RPG (published by White Wolf) which featured characters who were demigods. The list of pantheons included the Tuatha De Danann, and so I naturally became intensely interested in the possibility of me creating and playing as a Tuath or a Tuatha De Danann inspired being.

 

[Nagol]

There's a couple at least in that direction.

GURPS has the supplement Celtic Myth.

There is a d20 supplement Eyru. I believe this one takes the approach that human is the base stock and the named Tuatha Du Danaan are what they are through class levels, but it's been a long time since I looked at it.

If you want to focus on a more deific feel, I'd suggest the Hero System, reskinned In Nonmine, or reskinned Exalted.

 

[Desdichado]

To be a bit pedantic--it's inferred that the Tuatha Dé Danaan were the gods of pagan mythology in Ireland. However, there's no direct evidence of that other than proposed linguistic correlations between the Irish names of characters and Brythonic pagan deities.

They're probably best seen as the mythic predecessors of the aes sidhe who are a people in decline, forced to live in the fairy mounds. In that sense, the Tuatha Dé Danaan are very similar to the glory days of the elves, from the First Age in Middle-earth. The elves of the Third Age; as seen in the Lord of the Rings movies or the upcoming Hobbit movies are essentially the same people, just in retreat.

I guess I'm not sure exactly what your question is. As you point out, the notion of elves as they've evolved in fantasy literature in general and D&D in particular are already pretty heavily based on the stories of the Tuatha Dé Danaan. Are you asking if there are any settings where the elves are specifically given a more Irish flavor? Because otherwise, the flippant answer is, yeah--pretty much every D&D setting has them already.

 

[Crothian]

You might find what you want in the Slaine campaign setting by Mongoose.

 

[gamerprinter]

While the Tuatha De Danann are the ancient gods of Ireland, if you actually follow the exploits of the Tuatha De Danann, you'd realize that typical D&D adventurers are more heroic with more assets to succeed as standard D&D human spellcasters and warriors without any need to up their power level.

The Tuatha De Danann weren't uber powerful gods, in fact to some they are simply the first wave of iron age Celts that landed in Ireland from Spain, defeated the Firbolgs and their leader Balor the One-Eye, who were the previous inhabitants of Ireland. The Tuatha De Danann were a race of Celtic humans who eventually succumbed to a plague and were pretty much wiped out. The subsequent waves of Celtic settlers remembered the stories of the Tuatha De Danann, and immortalized them into "gods".

Just roll up some characters and name them Lugh the Longhanded, Brigit, Mannanon Mac Lir and now you're playing Tuatha De Danann... it doesn't need to get any more complicated than that.

 

[Celedhrían]

Okay, whether you believe the Tuatha De Dannan were gods or not (there's too much evidence to prove that they are), the whole point in this thread is to know of playable races similar to them.

On a side note: One should ignore the whole "Book of Invasions" as it was a series of stories designed to make the Celtic people have a sort of Christian flavour to them and demoting their gods to sound like people. There were never any "Milesians" or other people. The Tuatha, Fir Bholgs, etc, were, but these other people were not.

 

[Tharian]

If you're able to find it, you might consider Armageddon. I'd heard rumors of a 2nd edition, but was never able to find it. It let you play as demigods along with a whole bunch of other types of character "races," but you could just choose to focus on specific elements for your own game.

 

[Celedhrían]

Hm, that sounds interesting. How would I go about searching for it? Something like "Armageddon RPG"?

 

[Gothikaiju]

D&D 4E's Heroes of the Feywild has a character theme (sort of a second class-or-race-or-background you get at level 1) called Tuathan. They are described as an ancient race of human-like conquerors native to the faerie realm.

Possible features and powers of this theme include heightened endurance, assumption of animal form, ability to come back from the brink of death, substituting one die roll for another, or forcing an enemy to target someone else with an attack.

 

[gamerprinter]

Okay, whether you believe the Tuatha De Dannan were gods or not (there's too much evidence to prove that they are), the whole point in this thread is to know of playable races similar to them.

Oh, I certainly believe they were gods, as there is plenty of evidence. At the same time, I believe that many primal pagan religions have life stories and sagas of real people, kings and clanheads that over time become personified and deified into gods. I think this is true of the Nordic beliefs as well as the Celtic faith and others too. I don't think that lessens those ancient beliefs in any way, and creates strong themes to build PC adventurers around. You don't have to have creation or wold sundering powers to be depicted as primal gods.

I don't give the Book of Invasions much credence over a touching of basic themes of possible ancient history. It is well known that the Celts had a strong oral tradition and had never written down their histories and origin stories. The first time it was written down were by Christian monks, which make the information highly suspect and definitely biased into attempting to Christianize these ancient beliefs. Unfortunately, we have no other written sources describing what it truly meant to pagan believers, but it's all we got.