Re: [HOE] Templar Role-Call

["David L. Hoff" <dlhoff1@charter.net>]

David R Goecke wrote:

>A Librarian in my posse recently asked Biletinkoff for a list of all
>known Templar. I'd like to give him one. I'd appriciate it if everyone
>out there could send me the name and basic descriptions of any Templar
>characters they have played, have had in their posse, or just have in
>their head that hasn't been played. 
>
I have had two in my posse, and one I play myself. This may be a little 
long, and it does contain some spoilers from the adventure in the 
Templar book, as well as another spoiler about the Wasted West in 
general. You Have Been Warned. Here are the Templars my players have had:

Russell "Rusty" Goldman -- Rusty was the first Templar anyone in my 
group played. Physically, he was pretty average. He wasn't really 
strong, wasn't really fast, etc. but he was was quite strong in mind and 
spirit. His most noticeable feature was he had pox scars all over his 
body, caused by an encounter with an Anti-Templar who used the powers of 
Pestilence against him. He had the Blessing of Saint Wayne, which was 
the result of that same encounter. He used a Katana as his sword, it 
being a rather special one (he had spent points to have it be a relic). 
It had two special abilities. The first one was that any raises on his 
fighting roll could be used to modify the hit location by 2 points 
instead of the usual one. The second ability was that if he was fighting 
a human or humanoid opponent and could raise the die roll to 20 and have 
at least one raise left over, the sword would hit the opponents neck, 
and would do an additional 3 dice of damage instead of the normal 2 
dice. Unfortunately, he was slain during an encounter with Brad Modeen, 
the Destroyer. One of the other party members succeeded in killing 
Modeen, and then his friends took his body and sword back to Boise. The 
tale they told in Boise was that Rusty was the one who killed Modeen, 
before succumbing to his wounds.

Jonathan "Glows-in-dark" Kinnichuck -- "Glows", as he is known to his 
friends, is a Native American who fought on the Northern side during the 
last war. After the bombs fell his unit stuck together, but he 
eventually left them to go explore the Wasted West. During his travels, 
he learned that he had special talents... as a Junker. He owned a pick 
up truck  that he had named "Ol' Molotov" because of the small spook 
juice refinery he had built in the back. He started calling himself 
Glows-in-dark after an encounter with radiation left him with a mutation 
that caused his skin to give off a faint green glow that was only 
visible at night. He eventually teamed up with several other 
adventurers, including a Templar known only as Rusty. (Yep, same Rusty 
as listed above) During the climactic battle with Modeen, it was 
Glows-in-dark who managed to finish off Modeen after Rusty had fallen. 
After that fateful adventure, Glows-in-dark realized that he now had 
some sort of "link" to the Reckoners, and could feel them offering some 
of their powers to him (Brad Modeen's coup). He utterly refused to use 
these powers, and he immediately began searching for a way to remove 
this link. He decided to try and travel back home, to his tribe, who 
have been living according to the "Old Ways" ever since the war. While 
there, he discovered that not only did he have the Reckoners taint upon 
his soul, but it was also revealed to him that spook juice has a harmful 
effect on the spirit world, in the form of "supernatural smog" that 
flows into the Hunting Grounds from engines that run off of spook juice. 
It was at that point that Glows-in-dark decided that not only was he 
going to try and remove the taint of the reckoners, but he was also 
going to turn his back on his Junker background, and instead try and 
start over as a Squire of the Templar. He spent many days in a sweat 
lodge, with shamans chanting around the clock trying to remove the link 
between him and the Reckoners. While in the sweat lodge, he had visions 
of himself as a servant of the Reckoners, and then had to defeat his 
"evil twin" in combat. At that point, the link with the Reckoners was 
broken. Since that time, he has dedicated his life to the Templars, and 
has become a full-fledged Templar. He now carries the same Katana that 
used to belong to Rusty, and believes that Rusty is watching over him 
and has given him aid from time to time in dire situations.

Now, for the one that I have made (and have only played a couple times):

John Smith (at least, that's the name he tells anyone who asks) -- John 
was a hit man during the time before the bombs fell. He was best known 
for using twin 9 mm pistols for doing hits that were up-close and 
involved no less than 6 bullets in each target, usually with the number 
being closer to 12. He wasn't bloodthirsty, he just wanted to be sure to 
get the job done right. He actually was someone who you would think of 
as a nice guy, if you didn't know what he did for a living. And that was 
what was odd about him... he thought of his being a hit man as just a 
job. He basically felt that he wasn't really responsible for the targets 
deaths, it was the client who hired him that was responsible, and in 
most cases, the target was partially responsible as well. After all, if 
he was hired to kill a person, that person obviously had done something 
bad enough that someone was willing to pay to have them killed. He had 
been brought up Catholic, but had turned his back on religion during his 
teen years. However, he did remember a lot of what he had been taught. 
When the bombs fell, he had been on the road traveling through Kansas. 
It wasn't too long after the bombs fell that he encountered people who 
were fleeing from War and his minions, and heard tales of the other 
Horsemen.. John couldn't believe what these people were saying. If the 
Four Horsemen were real, then that meant that the Bible was telling the 
truth... and after getting a glimpse of War as he attacked a nearby 
settlement, John fled in terror of this knowledge. He eventually came to 
his senses, and then had to think over what he had done during his life. 
He decided that since the Horsemen were real, that meant that there was 
truth to what he had been taught in church, and that all those murders 
he had committed were going to damn his soul to hell. He decided that 
even though he didn't have a chance of actually redeeming himself, he 
needed to try and use his skills to help protect those people who were 
in need, because it was the right thing to do. He began traveling the 
Wasted West, helping out towns that were suffering from bandit attacks, 
critter attacks, etc. He eventually learned of the Templar, and although 
he didn't think of himself as worthy, he decided to try and become one 
of their order. To his surprise, he managed to make his way through the 
training, passed the tests given him by Jo and the other Templar, and 
eventually worked his way from being a Squire to being a full fledged 
Templar. Although he is well trained in using his sword (a roman style 
short sword), he is much better with guns, and still uses his twin 9 mm 
pistols as his first combat option. He also has an animal companion, a 
dog that is a cross between a german shepherd and a wolf. The dog's name 
is Wolfgang, and has been trained by John to be a guard and attack dog. 
John has a beat up motorcycle with a sidecar, and Wolfgang loves to 
travel in the sidecar as John is going from town to town. Through the 
powers granted him by being a Templar, John has the ability to take 
shots with his pistols at ranges that would be more appropriate for a 
rifle. A few bikers have discovered this the hard way.

Well, that's it. Sorry for the length, but I hope you found the details 
interesting.

--David L. Hoff
dlhoff1@charter.net