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I am looking to create a character that is a member of a monastic order of Templar Knights. The game setting is a historical one set around the 1200s. Thus, I am looking at source material for "Paladin," "Templar", or/and "Warrior Monk".

More than a historical account (although I am happy to be pointed at one), I am looking at the day to day live, arms and armours, and general information useful to portray a knight of the cross. Clearly, this question would be more at home on history.stackexchange.com but that site is not in beta yet.

If you had some "mystical" accounts, that would constitute a good answer as well. Things like "Holy Grail, Holy Blood" are after all, works of fiction but could serve well as background noise/conspiracies/hidden supernatural truths.

The main question is How to play a historically accurate Templar Knight? What personal experience do you have in playing a Templar? What helped? What hindered?

I care very little about systems and thus I am not looking for rules. However, if a rulebook contains useful background information, that would be a suitable answer.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ Have you allready gone through the books mentioned in google? historymedren.about.com/od/templars/tp/templar_books.htm Is there a reason you don't like these books, are you looking for something else? amazon.com/Knight-Templar-1120-1312-Warrior-Nicholson/dp/… \$\endgroup\$
    – GMNoob
    Sep 9, 2011 at 12:23
  • \$\begingroup\$ Looked at Google, Amazon, and Wikipedia. I am hoping someone here is both a historian of the period and a role player. If nobody knows, that's fine and I will use other recommendations. \$\endgroup\$
    – Sardathrion - against SE abuse
    Sep 9, 2011 at 13:04
  • \$\begingroup\$ So you are looking for a full answer and not a reference to a book? \$\endgroup\$
    – GMNoob
    Sep 9, 2011 at 13:25
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    \$\begingroup\$ Convince the rest of your adventuring party to invade another country to reclaim it for your church \$\endgroup\$
    – briddums
    Sep 10, 2011 at 19:34
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    \$\begingroup\$ This question appears to be off-topic because it is about historical information on Templar Knights. You even said yourself that it would be more at home on history.stackexchange. \$\endgroup\$
    – Miniman
    Jan 4, 2015 at 0:37

2 Answers 2

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There's a French RPG where characters are crusading Templar knights, called Miles Christi (French). It's not been translated into English nor have I used the system, but I've heard good things about how the game succeeds in giving players a feel for the environment. There's a really nice and enthusiastic write up of a small Miles Christi game held at SGA 2003.

Also, there was going to be a Crusades supplement for Pendragon put together by Tim Ferguson but nothing ever got published. There's some links on Peter Corless' Pendragon page that are relevant: look for the ones labelled TF. These resources here fall short of what you want, but might be interesting, nontheless.

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I wouldn't go as far as to call myself a medieval scholar but it's a period of history that I know reasonably well. If I was going to be playing a Templar in this period my first step would be to get the relevant Osprey book, in this case Knight Templar 1120 - 1312. This should give you a solid grounding in what the Templars were, their history and their equipment.

One of the issues with the Templars is that there is a lot of mythology that surrounds them and you probably want to decide how much you want to play that - if you're going to play a more historically accurate character then I would suggest that you have a look and try and find some of the primary sources, I don't know of any that are Templar specific but there are an increasing number of medieval texts available on-line. If you want to play up the mythological side then I'm sure there are no shortage of modern books available that explore this side of the order.

Whilst doing this reading you should get an idea of what you want to play, you might even pick up on a specific person you can base your character around. Once you are playing you can then bring in details of things you remember to sessions, even things like adding small incidental details about your equipment that have no game mechanic effect will allow you to shape the character in a way that you feel is representative of your vision of a Templar Kight.

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    \$\begingroup\$ +1 good idea about the historical character as model and good recommendation for the book/author. Thanks. \$\endgroup\$
    – Sardathrion - against SE abuse
    Sep 13, 2011 at 10:18

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