In the Assassin’s Creed series, the open-world only extends as far as gameplay considering the Templars make the protagonist feel as if there’s no place to hide. These antagonists have reaches far and wide, with their intentions to control the world being relentless.

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Within this faction, though, there were personalities that were particularly evil due to them superseding the Templar ideology. We’ve considered “evil” mainly to how vile these characters personally were along with how it tied to the Templars. In this list, we haven’t included the antagonists from Odyssey and Origins as these were separate factions before the Templars were truly created.

10 Shay Cormac

Attempts were made to make Shay appear as one of the first Templars to be seen as a protagonist, but his cold-hearted killing of Arno’s father at the end of Assassin’s Creed Unity solidified that this man was too far gone and had lost his emotions.

There’s also the fact that Shay ushered in the Templar’s efforts further, meaning his overall intentions of enabling the Templars take over the world were in full flow and the free will of the people was threatened. Shay didn’t even care that he’d just made a child an orphan.

9 Daniel Cross

He could’ve landed the top spot had it not been for the fact that the Templars had brainwashed Daniel Cross into the madman that he became. However, there’s no escaping how Cross went so crazy that he went out and killed the main mentor of the assassin order.

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He would then gladly join the Templars and move over to become a Grand Master, before being the one thing that stood between Desmond’s final goals in Assassin’s Creed III. Had it not been for the bleeding effect taking over him, Cross would’ve used his Prince of Persia-style skills to kill Desmond and caused havoc on the whole world due to the solar flare.

8 Crawford Starrick

The role of the classic antagonist who has no characterization other than being evil was taken by Starrick in Assassin’s Creed Syndicate as he moved forward with his plans to steal pieces of Eden and break into Buckingham Palace.

Usually, Templars had smaller goals that had larger consequences, but this guy had huge sinister plans from the start as he planned to takeover all of the British Empire, plant the pieces of Eden, and use his influence of the empire to make himself the King of the world. He didn’t even consider the “understanding” and “peace” part of being a Templar.

7 Haytham Kenway

Although Haytham came closer to agreeing with the assassins than any other Templar might have, he was still inherently an evil person since we saw him easily take the killing option over sparing lives. Haytham became so obsessed with the Order that he forget about the peace part of it all, easily killing innocents because he didn’t think they mattered.

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Most of all, it was the fact that Haytham was prepared to kill his own son that has us convinced this man wasn’t worth of redemption. Even in his last breath, Haytham refused to feel remorse and confessed he should’ve killed his son much earlier.

6 Charles Lee

While Charles Lee never got to become the main boss of the Templars like most of the other people on this list were, we’re placing him rather high because of the disgusting manner with which he conducted himself.

After all, a man who took pleasure in choking and beating up a couple of kids is the lowest form of person there can be, and Lee found it amusing to see the child Connor suffer. Unlike Haytham, Lee had no reservations in killing assassins and harbored no desires to parlay with them.

5 Cesare Borgia

Cesare only joined the Templars to achieve his own missions as it became clear to him that using the Order’s resources would give him access to the Apple of Eden. However, we think his most evilest action has to be in conducting an affair with his sister! Now that’s a vile act none of the other villains have done.

Due to him considering the Templars’ motives as secondary, we haven’t placed him at the top, but that doesn’t hide his atrocities in killing Ezio’s uncle for sport and controlling Rome to satiate his hunger for control.

4 Lucy Stillman

Lucy’s ranked so high up because of her ability to be so duplicitous that even the Templars were unsure whose side she was on. As it happened, she became a Templar agent and manipulated the assassins to such a degree that Desmond fell in love with her.

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Had Juno not exposed her, then Lucy would’ve brought the Templars right to the doorstep of the Grand Temple and negated all of the actions of the assassins they’d been working on for centuries. Making a guy believe she was in love with him so that her group could takeover the world? That’s some cold dish Lucy was cooking.

3 Warren Vidic

Warren Vidic in Assassin's Creed

Vidic represented the maniacal style of thinking the Templars had adopted by present day, as it seemed like his overall motive was simply to win rather than being anything to do with the Father of Understanding guiding him.

He was ruthless, to the point where the idea of taking Desmond’s life brought him pleasure while being in the very presence of someone who touted the idea of free will seemed to make Vidic sick. If he’d had his way - and he did on numerous occasions - then the Templars would’ve been successful in planting the Apple of Eden in space and control all of humanity from there.

2 Al Mualim

Even though Al Mualim wasn’t officially indoctrinated in the Templar Order, the guy was so reprehensible that he finds himself near the very top. He ultimately regarded himself as an all-knowing messiah of sorts that he fooled both the Assassin Order and the Templars by agreeing with either factions.

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This led to Al Mualim being successful in wielding an Apple of Eden and outright controlling the minds of almost everyone around him. He had no cajones in that he manipulated Altair to kill the Templars while having plans to use the Apple to kill the assassins. A clear example how the Templar style of thinking could corrupt so viciously.

1 Rodrigo Borgia

Everything about this guy was sickening; from the way he spoke to others as if they were filth, to how he had no problems killing kids, and how he had plans to kill his own children. Rodrigo Borgia was a monster through and through.

Unlike the rest of the villains who had a sole purpose, Borgia’s plans were total control in that he wanted control of the Templars, the papacy, and the overall world. There were no limits to this man’s thirst for power, as he twisted the Templar ideology to unprecedented levels and shaped future Templars into thinking that peace and understanding extended only as far as what they interpreted it to mean.

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