In The Days Of Knights (TCG)

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This chapter is dedicated to the film Excalibur, which is required viewing for anyone wishing to bring "real" knights into a fantasy campaign. Herein, everything about both historical knights and their fantasy equivalents is laid out in an effort to add new layers of depth to your feudal campaign.
Hopefully, you'll find this material fascinating enough to make the knights in your campaign more than just a few two dimensional paladin types. Entire countries have been conquered by just a few of these noble warriors, for better or for worse.
The classic knight is the holy warrior in search of glory for his god, king, and family. He repels hordes of invaders, drives the heathens back across the waters, and recovers stolen holy artifacts from the minions of evil.
However, history is filled with variations on the theme, and fantasy takes things much further than that. History tells us of the great germanic king Charlemagne who was known as much for hist great height (as tall as a modern man) as he was for his skill in battle. Fantasy tells us of warriors like Perseus, Beowulf, Lancelot, Sigfried, and El Cid. These mythical men fought dragons with their bare hands and wore the horns as trophies. Since we are dealing with a fantasy game, these are the knights and heroes which best suit our mold.
Knights are dedicated, almost always to extremes. Lancelot would not give way to a king's army simply on principle, while Don Quixote stepped over the edge and beat up helpless windmills. The dark knights of fiction-Mordred and the legendary Black Knight-also were driven to single-minded goals, and despite their evil cores. often followed the same principles as their good counterparts.
However, in a game where team. work is more important than solo gallivanting, the single heroic figure can sometimes be lost. This doesn't have to happen.
An air of mystery around a knighted character helps keep the campaign tense. Maybe the pala. din is hunting for his missing father, or the dragon that burned his village. The campaign should not revolve around this lone quest, as almost all knights look for a "sign from above" for guidance. This plot point can be brought up occasionally, in between adventures focused on other characters. This enhances the sense of destiny around the knight and adds immensely to the atmosphere of the campaign. In short, knights are supposed to be a special, elite group of warriors. They should be as quirky as your wizard, as devout as your priest, and as cunning as your rogue-but in different ways and for uniquely chivalric reasons.
==Knights of Glory==
As mentioned before, knights are the elite of warriors. They are always considered to be noble. even if they were not born so, as knighthood is one of the few ways for a person of common roots to enter the nobility.
For this and other reasons. knights are accorded the highest measure of respect in the king. dom. If a knight is travelling within his realm or the realm of a major ally, he can stay at any inn he wants for free. In the friendlier of inns, his entourage can stay as well.
His crest and standard command respect and trust (unless the family is an infamous one). His word is usually taken as law, for knights are renowned for their honesty, integrity, and honor. In fact, truth and honor are the meat and drink of true knights.
Their armor is clean, their mount proud and strong. A knight's sword is always sharp, and even the thieves give way when a knight comes down the road.
Simply put, knights receive all the public respect accorded any noble, and all of the private respect as well. Knights are strong defenders of the people, and are seen as the real power behind the throne. Tales of lone warriors defeating barbarian hordes are always popular at Market Day festivals. And any great battle, no matter how it was fought, or by whom, is always attributed to a great knight, whether he deserves the credit or not.
Knights even get to have their own castles and marry beautiful princesses, usually of their own choosing! Ah, to be big and strong and wear expensive armor.
==Nothing is Free==
Well, why isn't everyone a knight? The answer to that is fairly simple: Not everyone has, as they say, the right stuff.
For one thing, knights die a lot. You see, it seems that charging into danger isn't the safest occupation in the world. Thus, knights have very short life expectancies (usually in the neighborhood of one or two battles). The honor thing also seems to get in the way a lot, since a knight won't back down from a fight no matter what the odds are. In such cases, a knight either flees (and disgraces himself) or dies. Because they are known to be stubborn people, they often choose the latter option. When this happens, their armor is brought home, fixed up, and passed on to the oldest son.
Knights must be ready to leave for battle at a moment's notice. whether for god, king, or family honor, and this also tends to make that marriage to the beautiful princess a short-lived affair.
Taking orders without question and following a rigid code of warrior ethics tends to make a knight's job a bit of a roller-coaster ride. One minute, you're riding a white palomino to glory, lance in hand, and the next minute your brave warhorse has left you surrounded by the great khan and his three hundred angry sons.
It's a dirty job, but someone's got to do it...
==Warhorses==
While we're discussing some of the good and bad points of knighthood, it's time someone mentioned the knight's faithful sidekick, his warhorse.
Any knight worth his silver spurs has spent a lot of time choosing, raising, training, and pampering his mount. Whether this is the silver dragon given to you by the elven king, or a real good deal you found at a farm, a mount is often a knight's only method of travel.
Knights are very close to their mounts. A well-trained warhorse can be counted on to drag a fallen knight to safety, defend his master's body after a staggering blow, or even return a slumped rider to his manor. A good mount is not only an aid to a knight, but a necessity.
From the campaign point of view, a knight's mount can be a source of drama and personality. Remember that such an animal is known for his unusual intelligence and his loyalty to his master. By giving the war horse a few interesting traits, the DM can add a great deal of color to the knight's life. Pity the poor thief who is caught going through the master's pack by his mount...
==In Search of High Adventure==
High adventure. This is not the crude wench-mongering of such salty warriors as barbarians. No. these are noble quests in search of great treasures and the downfall of vast evil powers-where dragons' hordes are stripped from their evil clutches in conflicts steeped in blood, fire, and steel.
Alright, you probably get the idea. The AD&D game lets you leave the boredom of real life and jump right into the very myths of our past. Note that the classic epic hero has always been a warrior, since wizards never existed, priests don't cast spells in reality, and thieves only adventure when they have to.
Unfortunately, that leaves some of the other character classes out in the cold, but that's okay, they have their own ways of achieving glory, wealth, power, and (best of all) knighthood.