Characters / Assassin's Creed: Connor Kenway

Main Character Index

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May contain unmarked and/or Late Arrival Spoilers.

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Ratonhnhaké:ton / Connor Kenway

"It is better to have faith in something than none at all."

Main Game Appearances: Assassin's Creed III | Assassin's Creed III: Liberation

Other Appearances: Assassin's Creed : Forsaken | Assassin's Creed: Memories | Assassin's Creed: Reflections | Assassin's Creed Nexus VR

Voiced By: Noah Watts (English)^note Other Languages: Mikhail Tikhonov (Russian), Daisuke Namikawa (Japanese)

"All people should be equal and not in turns."

An ancestor of William and Desmond Miles, Ratonhnhaké:ton (who adopted the name "Connor" to ease communication) is a Kanien'keha:ka (Mohawk) born from a Native American mother, Kaniehti:io, and an English father, Haytham Kenway. He had a turbulent childhood that saw his tribe destroyed by colonial forces, and his hatred of tyranny led to his recruitment by the Assassin Brotherhood in 1770 and his subsequent involvement in the American Revolutionary War.

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A-E

• All-Loving Hero: Well, not exactly, as he is technically a Professional Killer, but he's about the closest the series has gotten otherwise. Wherever he goes Connor is helping those in need and trying to settle things with as few deaths as possible on all sides.
• Almighty Janitor: In the grand scheme of things, Connor is not officially the leader of the Colonial American Assassin Order, but he is considered the main driving force of why the Templars never managed to reclaim a foothold in America after he destroyed their order. It's implied that this is the true reason Abstergo went out of their way to downplay Connor's historical influence.
• Ambiguously Brown: In-Universe, it's used so Connor can pass as a Spaniard or an Italian. Though this is more of an Informed Ability than anything, it doesn't seem to take a role in the gameplay.
• Ancestral Weapon: In The Tyranny of King Washington, Connor uses Haytham's Hidden Blade, which Haytham gave to Ziio to pass down to him.
• Antiquated Linguistics: Does not use contractions.
• Ask a Stupid Question...: At one point during their truce Connor inquires to Haytham about the Templars' lack of knowledge about the military plans of the British. Haytham irritably points out that they did have an intelligence network until Connor came along. Connor - the person asking this - has spent the entire game dismantling the Templar Order piece by piece!
• Aura Vision: Has Eagle Vision inherited from his father, which made him pretty good at playing hide and seek as a child.
• Authority Equals Asskicking: You can invoke this as The Captain of the Aquila. What better way to inspire your crew by leading the Boarding Party by being first one over with Tomahawk in hand. In the Battle of the Chesapeake Bay, Connor manages to keep the Aquila afloat long enough to ram a Royal Navy man o' war, board and take out its crew and captain, set its powder magazine aflame, and escape back to his own ship entirely by himself, leaving Robert Faulkner appropriately speechless.
• Back-to-Back Badasses: With Aveline in this pic.◊ and later Haytham during their Awkward Father-Son Bonding Activity.
• Badass Longcoat: Wears a longcoat that gives him the appearance of an infantryman.
• Badass Native: As a half-Mohawk.
• The Beastmaster: He is capable of using ghostly wolves to attack people in The Tyranny Of King Washington DLC.
• Been There, Shaped History: Helped form the United States of America through his actions. He played an active role in the Boston Tea Party as well as the engagements at Lexington and Concord, Bunker Hill, Monmouth, Chesapeake Bay. He also played a role in securing America as a Republic in The Tyranny of King Washington where after a shared vision with the Apple of Eden, both Commander and Assassin agree that No Man Should Have This Power and Washington became firm in his convictions to reject all offers and plots of making America anything other than a Republic.
• Berserk Button: While he's soft-spoken and caring at the best of times, he also has a short temper caused by his character flaw of naiveté. Doubting his opinions seems to set him off the most often. Connor gets angry and agitated at any sign of hypocrisy, or moral weakness and injustice in society, which makes his interaction with Colonial society extremely tense.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Connor is fair, sympathetic, generous and kind to his friends and to ordinary people, and applies what he believes about the value of life and human dignity consistently—meaning, yes, to his enemies as well. At first, he tends to seek (relatively) peaceful resolutions with his enemies—most notably in how he tries to work together with Haytham and the Templars, in his decision to leave William Johnson alive after destroying his funds, believing that this would be enough to stop him from buying his people's land, and also his initial plan to imprison Thomas Hickey to stop his assassination schemes, as Hickey can't hurt Washington if he's behind bars. Every single time, they spit on his mercy. And every single time, he doesn't offer a second chance. The Templars also assume that he's a nuisance. The entire American rite gets slaughtered as a result.
• Black-and-White Morality: Connor is described as having a very firm idea of right and wrong. Early on, he shows a somewhat naive belief that people should simply be straightforward and honest about their actions and points out the hypocrisy of colonists protesting about their freedoms while also practicing slavery.
• Blade Below the Shoulder: The hidden blade is a Type 1. Like Altaïr & Ezio, he can wield two at once. It's also foldable so that he can hold it like a knife. Mostly he likes to use that Tomahawk with the Assassin sigil on its blade.
• Big Good: Could be informally considered the Mentor of the Colonial Assassins by the end of the game. He leads the Assassins in the region (especially after Achilles' death) and symbolizes everything the Assassins fight for. By the end of Assassin's Creed III he's the most senior Assassin in the area despite some of his recruits being older than him.
• Big Guy: The largest playable assassin at the time the game debuted, and still one of the largest to date. He's tall, broad and powerfully muscled, and uses more brute force in his fighting style than Ezio or Altair had. Best seen in his unarmed aninations, where he can easily knock foes on their asses with a single blow or toss them like a ragdoll with one hand.
• Bow and Sword in Accord: And axe and pistol too... or whatever else he's carrying. Bow is a given, regardless.
• Braids, Beads and Buckskins: In his early days. After obtaining the Assassin robes, he loses the buckskins completely while the braids and beads get downplayed.
• Break the Cutie: While his life wasn't exactly sunshine and rainbows prior, the final quarter of the game is one sledgehammer blow after another to the poor guy. Desmond Miles, his descendant, whose own life wasn't all that happy, admits that Connor's life was "painful".
• Breaking Speech: Connor pulls out one against Achilles targeting his failures and reticence to help the colonists. Though he regrets it immediately. He receives more than a few from his father and Juno later on.
• Broken Pedestal:
  • He considered George Washington a decent enough man and a worthy leader in the fight for freedom of the colonists. Then he learned that not only was he only fighting for the freedom of the colonists alone, but it was him who ordered the burning of Connor's village, resulting in the death of his mother. Needless to say, their relationship was never the same again, even post-Tyranny of King Washington.
    • Subverted somewhat after the main story. Even though he threatened to kill Washington before the Battle of Monmouth, and was thoroughly pissed off when Washington asked for his help dealing with Benedict Arnold (basically telling the commander that he deserved it), his anger had subsided enough by the end of the war that he was willing to play games with the future president, though not without apprehension. In The Tyranny of King Washington, he’s even surprised that George would become such a ruthless and bloodthirsty king. And even outside of the Apple’s simulation, he was quick to try and help a clearly terrified Washington rather than show any hostility towards him.
  • His own father Haytham, who he hoped he could reunite and form a bond with. The revelation that he was in the end just another fanatic manipulative Templar greatly upset him. Though it later became a case of Rebuilt Pedestal after reading Haytham's journal and learning about his father's own struggles through life.
• Bully Hunter: Being a Child of Two Worlds character who is fortunately raised with love & tolerance, Ratonhnhaké:ton grows up to believe he should pay this kindness forward and show kindness and acceptance to all people regardless of their race, political beliefs or religion. Unsurprisingly, this also means equally punishing tyrants, corrupt politicians politicians and those who terrorize innocents on both sides of the American Revolution. And once the Tomahawks and Hidden Blades are sheathed, he leads by example and rebuilds the Davenport homestead as a diverse community where oppressed and helpless people of all races and religions can come to find a home and shelter, and a family of humanity built on tolerance and kindness.
• But Not Too Foreign: A rare Western example: His father was European ^note  half British, half Welsh. and his mother was Mohawk, but he was raised entirely by and identifies as a Mohawk. Becomes an Enforced Trope when Achilles gives him the name Connor so that he may pass as as someone of Spanish or Italian ancestry to prevent being rejected as a Native by colonists.
• Calling the Old Man Out: He does this to two different parental figures.
  • When Connor realizes that Haytham lied to him about not knowing about Ziio's death he disgustedly calls his father out for trying to emotionally manipulate him. He also lambasts Haytham for continuing to defend Charles Lee despite the latter doing everything in Haytham's name before declaring their short-lived alliance over.
  • Connor's impatience with Achilles finally erupts in a harsh but accurate assessment that the Colonial Assassin rite died under Achilles' watch. Though he later apologizes Achilles tells Connor that he was right.
• The Cameo:
  • Aveline's DLC in Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag begins with a voiceover by Connor narrating a letter that he wrote to her. He also appears in a mission of Assassin's Creed III: Liberation.
• The Captain: Of The Dreaded Cool Boat Aquila, a.k.a. "The Ghost of the North Seas."
• Captain Ethnic: Since he is a Mohawk tribesman, Connor uses a tomahawk for melee combat and a bow with arrows for long-range combat to represent his indigenous roots. Near the end of the game, he even has the typical Mohawk haircut and red facepaint.
• Captain Patriotic: Connor is a humble, all-loving Native American warrior who fights with the Patriots to achieve American independence from Britain and is deeply loyal to his country despite its shortcomings. Additionally, his Assassin robe incorporates the national colors of the United States and the bald eagle on the top of his beaked hood.
• Catchphrase: "Where is Charles Lee?" and "What would you have me do?"
• Celibate Hero: So far, Connor is the only main protagonist without any sort of love interest, and in one homestead mission where he tries to help Norris court Myriam with a gift, he awkwardly asks Prudence advice on what "you women" like. A deliberate contrast to the womanizing Ezio.
  • A temporary case, however; as Desmond's ancestor, Connor will father the next ancestor leading to Desmond. According to one of the tablets you can pick up at Abstergo in Rogue, apparently Connor even got married.
• Character Tics: He has a tendency to clasp his hands together during conversations.
• Child of Two Worlds: His father is an English Templar, and his mother is a Kanien'kehá:ka Native.
• Combat Pragmatist: Much like Altaïr and Ezio before him, Connor fights very dirty, with his arsenal including the use of human shields to block musket fire.
• The Corruptible: The Tyranny of King Washington DLC alludes to him being this—he repeatedly takes "Sky Journeys" to gain new powers, but each time, visions of his mother warn him that he is becoming deluded and turned aside from his original path. How or why is left ambiguous, as Connor's behavior is only subtly changed. The ending implies that he has been gaining a lust for power that leads to him planning to claim the Apple for himself, right before the vision the entire DLC takes place in abruptly ends. While the nature of his corruption remains ambiguous, following the vision, once Washington gives him the Apple, Connor is able to force himself to weigh it down and drop it in the ocean.
  • Connor confesses how amazing the Spirit Journeys are and becomes increasingly covetous of its special powers as the DLC goes along. It's possible that the story as a whole represents The Final Temptation for both Connor and George, with the former tempted to use Pieces of Eden for correcting wrongs.
• Custom Uniform: Connor's Assassin outfit is described as being an Assassin outfit that he personally modified into its current incarnation. His Kanienka;haka outfit already has the thigh-high breeches while inside he wears a longcoat with a plain shirt and trousers. When captaining the Aquila, he wears a formal Privateer Uniform that makes him look Mildly Military.
• Dead Guy Junior: Achilles gave him the name Connor, which was the name of his own (long since deceased) son.
• Deadpan Snarker: Not anywhere on the level of an Ezio or his grandfather, but even straight-laced Connor has a few moments of sarcasm, leaning more heavily toward "deadpan" than "snarker".
  Connor: (after being given the plan to swap keys with a prison guard) I will admit, you seem to have given this plan to risk my life a lot of thought.
• Deflector Shields: The Shard of Eden, Captain Kidd's ring, has a chance of deflecting bullets.
• Dented Iron: Subverted. After he's impaled in the stomach when chasing Charles Lee through a burning ship, he’s barely able to stay conscious and his walking is reduced to a very slow crawl. In the epilogue cutscenes, set six months later, he’s still walking with a limp and clutching his wound in pain. He's back to normal during regular gameplay post-story. Based on tie-in comics, he fully healed from his wounds by 1796.
• Determinator: Essentially becomes Connor's defining trait by the end of the game. Even in the face of inevitability, he will not stop fighting.
  Charles Lee: Why do you persist...? You put us down. We rise again. You end one plot – we forge another. You try so hard... But it always ends the same. Those who know you think you mad and this is why... Even those men you sought to save have turned their backs on you. Yet you fight. You resist. Why?
  Connor: Because no one else will!
  • In the audio files in Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag his descendant Desmond cites this as the most inspiring quality about his life, the fact that even if Connor's story was in Desmond's words, painful, he never lost hope or faith.
  • What makes him even more of The Determinator than even Altaïr and Ezio is that neither of them were in danger of losing their culture and way of life like Connor was, to persevere and retain hope even in the face of that oppression is an altogether different kind of Heroic Willpower.
• Detachable Blades: Connor's left Hidden Blade is capable of detaching in order to be used as a knife.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Not so obvious since Haytham gets it too, but after Haytham reveals Washington's order for Continentals to assault Connor's village and his past attack on Kanatahséton resulting in Ziio's death, Connor interrupts them both to declare that it's more important to stop the attack than to attribute blame for the past before rejecting Haytham for his all-too-obvious ploy of trying to manipulate him. However, since Washington does admit to and rationalize the context of the orders^note confirming Haytham's allegations, Connor YELLS upon his departure: "A warning to you both: choose to follow me or oppose me and I will kill you!"
• Doomed Hometown: Connor's village is destroyed during his early years, helping to drive him to the Assassins in a search for justice.
  • Subverted: While the burning of his village has a huge impact on him... the survivors rebuild it and you can visit it and talk to people there whenever you like when Connor is an adult. That is until the post-game, where the townspeople have been evicted by the colonists and the whole place is deserted.
• Don't Call Me "Sir": On the homestead. He often has to remind the residents that he doesn't consider himself the lord or the master of the property, though legally and practically he is. He even tells wandering hunters they don't need to ask permission to hunt on the land, as the wilderness should provide for all.
• Downer Ending: Subverted. Like his father and grandfather, Connor supposedly meets this at some point, according to Melanie Lemay, in some Noodle Incident. The Abstergo Handbook says that he ends up Dying Alone, with his wife abandoning him and taking their children away, but Assassin's Creed: Reflections reveals that this was just one big discrediting lie on their part.
• Dual Wielding: Connor never wields just a single weapon, save for when he's using a musket, and always has a dagger or hidden blade ready in his off-hand.
• Dude, Where's My Respect?: A problem for him. On the one hand it's justified on the parts of some of the disrespectful American commanders: The Assassins have essentially no presence in the colonies so when Connor initially approaches them during battles, they don't see a highly trained and very strong man but rather just another early-twenties ostensible patriot and probable dumb farm boy. On the other hand Connor himself handles these situations... somewhat less than gracefully, which probably doesn't help matters.
  • On a more dramatic and tragic note, this is how Connor feels at the end of the game. For all his sacrifice and hardship and genuine belief in the American nation, the fact that it will come at the price of the sacred land of his people he had hoped to protect and that the new nation would continue to indulge in slavery makes him feel betrayed and humiliated. The look on his face when he sees slaves sold on a block in New York right when the English leave America for good says it all.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: After everything that he went through, seeing Assassin's Creed: Reflections #4 be centered around teaching his youngest daughter Io:nihòthe how to hunt, showing that Connor eventually did start a family, and that he's capable of showing a lot of love and patience towards his youngest daughter, is quite heartwarming. Even Otso Berg finds it touching in his attempts to understanding the Assassins in Reflections.
• Eloquent in My Native Tongue: Downplayed, and later averted altogether. English is very clearly his second language, and early in the game he's very hesitant to speak because of it. However, this turns in on itself later in the game, since he doesn't use colloquialisms or contractions when speaking. As a result of this and his preference for strong, clear, and concise language, his delivery comes off as somewhat sophisticated, even towards Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness sometimes.
• Empowered Badass Normal: After drinking the Tea of the Red Willow in The Tyranny of King Washington DLC, Connor gains supernatural powers. See Super Power Lottery for the details.

F-L

• Famed In-Story: Connor is a Living Legend among French Assassins for rebuilding the Colonial/American Brotherhood out of scratch, entirely on his own. Charles Dorian rubs it in to Shay Cormac in Rogue in his last words. Pierre Bellec in a bit of Misaimed Fandominvoked sees Connor's Back from the Brink approach as the Assassin tradition and decides to invoke it by murdering his mentor and rebuilding the French Assassins via The Purge.
• A Father to His Men: Combined with Papa Wolf. Connor would never shy away from helping out those who live with him in his homestead, even going so far as to risk his own life for simple tasks if it makes theirs a happier one. Which leads to a funny moment when he winds up chasing pigs into a pen, shouting "The things I do for this place!"
  • Most notably, he gives away Myriam during her wedding to Norris, taking the role of father of the bride and community.
  • He seems a bit aloof from his naval crew, however. Though that is justified in that unlike his pirate grandfather who sailed with his crew regularly and even personally helmed the ship normally, Connor works as a Privateer and works on contracts which means that his work with the crew is few and far between and not on a regular basis. That said, his crew love him and whenever the Aquila sails into a storm, they keep telling Connor that as long as he's at the helm, they are safe.
  • Played straight with his Assassin recruits... even though, amusingly, most of them are older.
• Forest Ranger: What with his bow carrying, tree-running, tracking and all. Especially with how he defends the early, heavily-forested Homestead.
• Friend to All Living Things: Connor is very affectionate with domesticated animals and tries to make his hunting kills as clean as possible, sometimes thanking the animal in Mohawk while skinning it. In fact, if you start killing animals for sport — without skinning them — the Animus will desynchronize.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: From the perspective of the Templars and especially Charles Lee. Connor began the story as a small boy underestimated in particular for being a "savage." He eventually rebuilds the Colonial Assassin Brotherhood from the brink of extinction to the point where it controls the entire newly-formed United States and almost single-handedly decimates the well-established Templar Order in the region. Haytham irritably lampshades how effective Connor has been when they cooperate.
  Haytham: Our problem is that we're completely in the dark.
  Connor: I thought the Templars had eyes and ears everywhere?
  Haytham: They did, until you started cutting them off!
• Game-Breaking Injury: During his final battle with Charles Lee, he gets impaled through the stomach by a piece of broken wood, which disables him from even running for the rest of the game.
• Gentle Giant: He's not incredibly tall, and he's a skinny kid, but as an adult Connor is very heavily and solidly built—look at his thighs, or his shoulders and back!—and is fittingly extremely powerful. Personality-wise, he's also possibly the nicest and kindest and sincerely sweetest Assassin we've yet played as. Compare and contrast with his grandfather...
• Generation Xerox:
  • Much like his grandfather, Connor becomes The Captain of the Cool Ship, hunts for buried treasure and joins the Brotherhood despite not being raised within the Assassin Brotherhood. Later, Eseosa, Adewale's grandson and Mentor of the Haitian Assassins, meets up with Connor at the Davenport Homestead.
  • Like his descendant Desmond, he serves as an Unwitting Pawn for Juno, has a very cold and distant relationship with his father, gets treated like a Butt-Monkey by people around him and ends up with little to show for his troubles.
  • The Expanded Universe also revealed that years after the game, Connor would become close friends and allies with a Haitian Assassin named Eseosa, the grandson of Adéwalé.
• Good Is Not Soft: Is a nice, soft spoken person. He still ended up decimating the American rite of the Templar order and screwing the Templars so badly they temporarily lost power on a global scale if Shay is to be believed.
• Good Parents: Reflections shows him being a good and patient parent to his youngest daughter and child, Io:nihòthe, and presumably he was one to his other children.
• Guns Akimbo: Connor can wield dual pistols. However, he uses them in a relatively realistic fashion, using one at a time and switching hands when one pistol goes dry; and reloading them individually after use.
• Half-Breed Discrimination: Once Connor starts getting infamous amongst the enemy, variants of it become a common taunt.
• Handicapped Badass: Low-key, but he is clearly suffering from chronic pain long after being impaled on a piece of wood while chasing Lee. This doesn't impact him outside of cutscenes though.
• Hates Being Touched: And whenever someone does (particularly when he's only just met them), he has a dictionary of subtle but hilarious reactions. Likely due to his culture and upbringing, as it is considered rude to touch someone you don't know in Mohawk Culture. That said, he does allow a handshake to Samuel Adams when he helps him escape notoriety after the Boston Massacre.
  • He loosens up a lot with friends and relations, but even then it's probably best if you don't sneak up on him.
• Hero with Bad Publicity: He gets this from Abstergo who paint him as an Assassin fanatic zealous enough to commit Patricide on his Templar father, while intentionally glossing over the fact that Connor repeatedly tried to make peace with him, only to be constantly betrayed, and the fact that Haytham was the one who was strangling him. Later, Pierre Bellec of the French Assassins sees Connor in a similar ruthless light, only he thinks it's a heroic quality and uses it as an example to justify killing his mentor, Mirabeau.
• Heroic Bastard: Ziio and Haytham were hardly married when he was conceived. This is subverted however in that Connor never had the stigma among the Kanienka;haka since Mohawk tribes fully supported single mothers and Connor, despite being half-British, was treated as one of them. The word itself is never used in the series, and Haytham is quite emphatic when he calls Connor his son, several times in public.
• Hidden Weapons: As long as his left hand is free, he'll use a Hidden Blade in combination with any weapon you wield; he can also swap out his tomahawk for a variety of daggers.
• Highly-Visible Ninja: He's noticeably more out in the open than Altaïr or Ezio ever were. His longcoat ensemble is also rather standard, other than the coloring and keeping the hood up at all times, and he seems to be wearing street clothes under it. Ezio and Altaïr's robes, however, were rather distinctive uniforms.
• Historical Villain Upgrade: In-universe: Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag features a commissioned portrait series in 2013 of Templar VIPs throughout history, with Haytham's caption dismissing Connor as "the ungrateful son who could not appreciate the wisdom of [Haytham's] pragmatic, race-blind approach to politics and personal life". In Rogue, he's described as a remorseless killer who refused to show his father an ounce of mercy and Abstergo in internal emails enjoy gloating about the Downer Ending he faces in some Noodle Incident.
• History Repeats: Connor only trains his youngest daughter Io:nhiòte to become an Assassin because she inherits his gifts, much like how his grandfather only trained his father but not his aunt. It's unknown how her elder siblings feel about the arrangement.
• Humble Hero: For the most part Connor is a fairly humble guy who isn't much of a glory seeker.
• Iconic Item: The Tomahawk with the blade shaped like the Assassins crest. A real-one was made for Men At Arms: Reforged.

• Ideal Hero: Connor fights for freedom and equality, first and foremost, more so than for justice. Because of this, he is able to give the Templar ideology serious thought without being tempted by it. His interactions with the Homestead residents seems to imply that, in a better world, he'd rather fight For Happiness.
• Important Haircut: Cuts his hair into a mohawk before the last sequence when he goes after Charles Lee.
• Improbable Age: Connor's martial skills are extremely strong for a 13-year old, as even before he acquires Assassin training, he appears to have a full repertoire of fighting abilities with the tomahawk and he kills multiple musket/bayonet-armed men on the Davenport manor grounds before being knocked down. It is implied that he is adapting the techniques he uses for hunting wolves and the like to hunting humans.
• Improbable Weapon User: Connor can use his hunting snare during a counter to strangle his enemies.
• In the Hood: Although he puts it down when he goes after Charles Lee, and it stays down in the Homestead afterwards.
• It's Personal: The main reason Connor hates Charles Lee is the latter calling him and his people "savages" and then believing that he was responsible for the attack on his village; even after he learns that Lee was apparently not responsible, he persists in opposing him solely out of this vendetta... and the times that Lee tried to have him hanged and being responsible for him being forced to kill Kanento:koh in self-defense.
• Known Only by Their Nickname: Achilles gave him the name "Connor" due to pronunciation difficulties, and nobody outside of his tribe refers to him by his birth name. And that Connor is a Replacement Goldfish for his own son.
  • Though it appears at least a few of his friends know that Connor isn't his birth name; as Norris (who also goes under an assumed name) puts it, "Names change, but the person stays the same. Isn't that right, Connor?"
  • Duncan doesn't believe him for a second when he says his name is "Connor", saying it is a fine name "for a boy from Wales."
  • Further played with in The Tyranny Of King Washington, where due having to never met Achilles in the Alternate History and thus not receiving the name "Connor", everyone instead refers to him by either his birth name or simply, "The Man wearing a Wolf".
• Lamarck Was Right: As well as picking up his fighting style from his father's side, Connor also picked up his grandfather's talent as a naval captain despite the fact that Edward died long before Connor was born.
• Large and in Charge: Tall and heavily-built, as well as the leader in his homestead.
• Lightning Bruiser: Connor is faster and more agile than Ezio and Altaïr. As a result, he can flit from enemy to enemy and dispatch them with his tomahawk and hidden blade quicker, and he is more versatile in combat than his predecessors. Though he typically avoided the impressive brute-force shows of strength that Ezio was famous for in favor of quick clean kills.
• Like Father, Like Son: Like Haytham and Edward, Connor has a very low tolerance for taking crap from others. They also have issues with shaking hands when meeting new people. A deleted audio file however has Achilles noting that while Connor has similarities to his father, he is not as cruel a person and that his compassionate nature comes from his mother, since she actually raised him.
  • Overlapping with Generation Xerox, the DLC has Connor briefly discussing his grandfather Edward Kenway (who he never knew) who seems to have passed to Connor his sailing skills. While more cynical and amoral than Connor, Edward is an Assassin who comes from humble roots and shows similar solidarity to outsiders and castaways.

M-Y

• Mama's Boy: In the semi-alternate universe of The Tyranny of King Washington, Connor is still living alone with his mother as an adult. Since Connor is transported into that "universe" with his true memories including those of his mother's death, he is more or less stunned into doing whatever his miraculously-still-alive mother asks.
• Man of the City: He single-handedly turns the Davenport homestead from a nearly abandoned, rickety manor to a thriving, flourishing community. Connor never shies away from helping homestead residents in need and in turn the community looks up to him as a respected leader despite his insistence otherwise.
• Meaningful Name: Connor means wolf kin, lover of wolves, and his birth name Ratohnhaké:ton means "a life that is scratched", i.e. a life of struggle. The former becomes all the more meaningful in The Tyranny of King Washington DLC.
• The Mentor: Takes on the role following the events of III, including towards Adéwale's grandson Eseosa. It's safe to assume by the time Connor meets Eseosa that he has formally gained the rank of Mentor.
• Motive Decay: Connor joins the Assassins and The American Revolution, nominally, to protect his village and to oppose the Templars and gain revenge on Charles Lee. Yet upon joining, his friend accuses him in one of the interactive conversations of not being involved in the matters of the village and giving vague advice that doesn't apply to their situation. Even when Haytham reveals the truth that Washington was responsible for the attack on his village, Connor rebukes him for attempting to manipulate Connor with it, and while Connor abandoned Washington's service he maintained enough ties with the Revolutionaries to participate at Monmouth, West Point, and the Chesapeake, and he never lets go of his vendetta against Charles Lee.
  • Though it must be noted that Juno lied to him about his true purpose. She was the one who led him to believe that, joining the Assassins and opposing the Templars is key to preventing the halt of spreading the frontier. Her real purpose for Connor was for him to safeguard the MacGuffin of the game, which makes him justifiably outraged at the end.
• The Musketeer: Aside from being a skilled melee combatant he has no problems using firearms like muskets and pistols.
• Multi-Melee Master: Like Ezio before him, Connor is lethal with a few classes of weaponry. The categories are Small^note hatchets, tomahawks and daggers., Swords^note sabres, cutlasses and rapiers., Heavy^note two-handed axes. and Blunt^note Native war clubs.. He has to wield a small weapon at all times, and can only carry one other of one primary weapon type at a time, though he can snatch any of his enemies' weapons temporarily, all of which fall under one of the aforementioned classifications. He can also use his bare hands to devastating effect. and the rope dart, while intended to be a noose or lasso from above or a distamce, can pull nearby enemies to the ground or drag them into close quarters. Finally, though he can't keep them in his inventory, he can appropriate muskets in melee combat, using the butt as a bludgeon and the bayonet like a spear.
• Nice Guy: In his day-to-day life, Connor is pretty meek. He is also passionate about making sure his friends are happy and well-cared for, and is very respectful to anyone he considers a friend for, regardless of station or their societal relationship to him.
  • His descendant Desmond notes that Connor's ability to remain nice and hopeful despite whatever life threw at him was inspiring.
• Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: Connor is the son of a Templar British man and a Kanienkaha:ka woman and is raised in a Mohawk tribe learning their fighting, hunting and tree-running and rock climbing techniques. He becomes an Assassin and later pilots the Cool Ship as The Captain and becomes a Privateer off the East Coast. He's perhaps the most multicultural figure in the franchise.
  • And of course in Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag, his own grandfather was a Pirate Captain himself.
• Not in This for Your Revolution: Initially, Connor is extremely sympathetic to the Colonies or at least their speeches about freedom, independence and equality which he likes a lot. However, he is bothered by their hypocritical desire to be free despite owning slaves and forcing people off their land. Played straight after he finds out that Washington has been attacking Native villages, including his own, and was the one behind his mother's death. After that, he only helps the Colonies when it suits him, and he is verbally harsh to Washington thereafter.
  Connor: I hear much talk of freedom and equality, but it seems one must be a landed white man to benefit.
• "No More Holding Back" Speech: Connor gives a deeply moving one at the end of the tie-in novel Forsaken which was originally part of the game itself and exists in deleted audio:
  ''"Compromise. That is what everyone has insisted upon. And so I have learned it. But differently than most, I think…I realize now that it will take time; that the road ahead is long, and shrouded in darkness. It is a road that will not always take me where I wish to go, and I doubt I will live to see its end. But I will travel down it nonetheless. For at my side walks hope. In the face of all that insists I turn back, I carry on. This…This is my compromise."''
• Not So Stoic: He's very quick to anger, with Charles Lee's mere presence making him irrational, and he's visibly upset when he kills Kanen'tó:kon in self-defense due to a misunderstanding.
• One-Man Army: A literal example, mixed with Hope Bringer. When he enters a conflict and starts mowing down opponents as they try to reload muskets, the side he's fighting for has a high morale boost.
• Only One Name: In both English and in Kanien'kéha, as Word of God is that he didn't adopt his father's surname. Early game concepts and databases in later games however refer to him as Connor Kenway.
• The Paragon: Connor is about the closest of all the Assassin's Creed protagonists of falling playing this trope straight. While Connor's main motivation was protecting his tribe, he takes an increased interest in fighting against all Injustice in his way. It was his reason for ultimately getting involved in the Colonials' Revolution efforts.
• Parental Favoritism: He chooses to train his youngest daughter Io:nhiòte how to hunt and track, implied to be Assassin training, despite the rules of his wife's village, because she's the only one who inherited his Eagle Vision.
• Patricide: A very rare, dark and semi-heroic example. He is forced to finally kill his own father Haytham when the latter tries to strangle him for his continuing to target Charles Lee. As an Assassin he's aware that Haytham is an eventual target and Achilles informs him of his purpose, but Connor is very reluctant to go ahead and was actually excited at the possibility that he and his father could bond and join the Templars and Assassins together. This action haunts him especially after he reads his father's journal, ''Assassins's Creed: Forsaken where he comes to regret their Poor Communication Kills relationship.
  • A cut line during their final encounter has Connor begging Haytham to break the cycle of violence, and Haytham definitively slams the door shut, declaring them mortal enemies.
• Poisoned Weapons: The Poison Darts.
• Privateer: Operates as one during the Revolution, he specifically attacks English ships and serves nominally on the side of the Continental Navy and its French allies. Since the American navy wasn't formed yet, privateers played a major role during the Revolution.
• Professional Killer: Like most Assassins.
• A Protagonist Shall Lead Them: He quickly assumes leadership of the Colonial Assassin Brotherhood and puts the teachings of Achilles to good use.
• Proud Warrior Race Guy: A very complex example. He's given a mandate to study and live outside his tribe by the village elder, and under Achilles he gets a thorough education in Western culture, reconciling his Mohawk culture with his new worldviews, somehow becomes a multicultural American just when the nation is formed.
• Rebellious Rebel: Connor supports the American Revolution because he believes that the colonists are defending their liberty. However, his stake in the matter is mostly that he happens to be good friends with the Founding Fathers and is fiercely loyal to them in a personal sense. He doesn't particularly care for the war itself and mostly just treats it as scenery.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: Connor is Blue to the Patriots' Red (despite them being Bluecoats!) but is himself Red to Achilles' Blue and in his brief collaboration with his father who is a cold Blue with Connor being Red, though when Haytham increasingly becomes The Brute, the positions switch again.
• Refuge in Audacity: A lot of his plans and actions amount to this. "Yes, I am going to march straight into an open battlefield (and as per Synchronization Objectives) without getting shot and then sneak in and murder the opposing captain by landing a Tomahawk to his face while jumping off a flagpole... Oh, and I will take out a Man O'War entirely by myself and then ask the skeptical commander to bomb a side of a fort. I also think putting my hood down, cutting my hair into a Mohawk and putting on warpaint is a perfect way to confront my Arch-Enemy at the funeral of his best friend who is also my father, who I killed."
• Renaissance Man: Canonically, he's a hunter, Assassin, naval captain, explorer, entrepreneur, merchant, and manager of the multiple businesses in his homestead, all of which are in professional capacity and for which individually he could have made a living out of. Connor doesn't fit the mold of the Renaissance men of the time, who focused on scholarship, but the wide variety of Connor's trade skills are similarly impressive (and hold to the philosophy of the polymath).
• Shipper on Deck: For Myriam and Norris.
• Silly Rabbit, Idealism Is for Kids!: Is on the receiving end of this from everyone from Achilles to his father Haytham and all his targets. Even Juno, who manipulated him on his quest, tells him that his quest for Justice is something inherently impossible and beyond reach. In the end, despite all this he still retains a belief that it is possible even if it will take years to achieve.
• Small Steps Hero: A more prominent example than his predecessors: Connor takes every task given to him with the same degree of attention and skill as the big ones. The homestead means as much to him as the Revolution.
• So What Do We Do Now?:
  • The end of the game, with Connor all alone at the Homestead has shades of this. It's also apparent in the DLC, where the framing story The Tyranny of King Washington with Connor sitting in the forest in a contemplative mood when Washington comes along. At the end of the DLC campaign, after dropping the Apple in the Ocean, he looks lost before telling his crew to take the Aquila back home.
  • He seems to have settled on rebuilding the Assassins and recruiting new initiates, he sends Aveline to find Patience Gibbs in the Black Flag PS3 DLC and as per Initiates, he and the Homestead are active till 1804 where he invites Adewale's grandson Eseosa, a hero of Haiti's Revolution to meet him.
• Spanner in the Works: As per Rogue and Unity, Connor totally upended the order of the Templars on a global scale and pretty much forced them to kick off The French Revolution in response just to maintain the balance of power.
• The Stoic: Played with: Connor has the bearing of The Stoic and a belief in standing firm against everything life throws at you, but he is also very emotive and highly sensitive depending on the context. Among the Patriots, the Assassins and his crew on the Aquila he is The Stoic, but amidst Achilles and the Homestead he drops his guard.
  • In a meta-example, this is part of why Abstergo Entertainment passed on doing a Connor game^note though one could also interpret the video itself as acknowledging real-life players who didn't like Connor's stoic image.
• Strong Family Resemblance: His mother noted that his face retained traits similar to Haytham's own. Otherwise, his skin tone is very much that of a Native. Even Charles Lee says that Connor look familiar when first meeting him despite the latter still being a boy. Haytham later sees the similarity when Connor is in prison and it's enough to confirm that Connor is his son with Ziio.
• Super Power Lottery:
  • Over the course of the The Tyranny of King Washington DLC, he gains three powers from his "Sky Journeys" after drinking Red Willow tea.
    • The Wolf Cloak, the first power learned drains his health constantly to turn him completely invisible and undetectable. He can also summon wolves to take out multiple enemies (though that loses usefulness when Bear Might is introduced). Dogs can see through it.
    • Eagle Flight, the second power learned, shapeshifts him into a an illusory eagle temporarily to let him fly up or between high points. Spamming it will get you what is probably the fastest land-traveling speed in the series.
    • Bear Might, the last power learned, summons the form of a giant bear around Connor as he slams his hands into the ground, causing an explosion around him that will instantly kill most nearby foes and knock down foes in a wider range. It's also used to destroy large structural objects.
• Thank Your Prey: Does this in his native tongue before skinning his hunting catches.
• That Makes Me Feel Angry: Tends to express his feelings this way on occasion; particularly noticeable in the Homestead Missions.
• These Hands Have Killed: He tells Achilles that he feels regret after killing William Johnson, his first Templar target, rather than the accomplishment he expected. When he says that Johnson left him no choice, it sounds like he’s trying to convince himself this rather than simply debriefing his mentor. Achilles comforts him by saying that it was natural to feel this way.
• This Means Warpaint: Connor puts on warpaint and gives himself a mohawk shortly before his final confrontation with Charles Lee.
• Took a Level in Cynic: His beliefs in the revolution starts to sink halfway through the game when he's being confronted by its leaders' hypocrisy and cut-throat pragmatism. After the revelation that it was George Washington, not Charles Lee who burned down his childhood village, Connor finally loses all faith in the revolution and treats his further partnership with its leaders as only a mere Enemy Mine alliance.
• Tragic Dream: Connor believes that the world should be true and just and not "as it is." Achilles tells him that this is irreconcilable, Haytham does the same but Juno, who manipulated him to begin with disabuses him thoroughly,
  "You strive for that which does not exist."
  • More specifically, he hoped to stop the encroachment of settlers on the lands of the Mohawk land which as any observer notes is inherently, regretfully, impossible.
• Trauma Conga Line: Connor's life is kind of crap. Desmond, reliving it, admits that it was "painful". He was always somewhat an outsider due to his father, then his mother died in front of him, the result of the village being burned by colonials. Then he's kicked out and sent to live with an irascible old man in the hopes of saving his people from the colonists, during which he ends up having to kill his best friend. And after all the hard work he does... his people are cast out by the new US government anyway, and he gets called foolish and naive by Juno for his troubles. According to a tablet in Rogue, something unpleasant happened to him later in life as well, and his wife died. Dude never caught a break.
• Underestimating Badassery: On account of his youth and his Naïve Newcomer earnestness, his collaborators and enemies underestimate him. James Barrett, Israel Putnam and Admiral de Grasse, Four-Star Badass of their respective military engagements think he's not much to look at and he proves them all wrong and earns their respect for his sheer Refuge in Audacity, especially de Grasse after he sees Connor take out a Man O'War entirely on his own. As for the Templars, he singlehandedly upsets decades of planning in mere minutes, safeguarding the revolution from their venomous influence.
• Unexpected Virgin: Word of God says that Connor was a virgin for the duration of the game. This is not at all a surprise; the game makes it pretty clear that Connor couldn't find a place in his life for companionship like that, not while he was still so focused on Lee and the Revolution. In Rogue, Melanie Lemay states that Connor got hitched to a woman with a colourful personality and she later left him and took their children with him, leaving him Dying Alone, staring longingly at a lock of her blonde hair, but Reflections reveals that this was a lie on their part and Connor was a good Assassin and father to the end of his days.
• Universally Beloved Leader: As the unofficial leader of the Davenport homestead, he's deeply respected and well-liked by all of its inhabitants.
• Unwitting Pawn: Ultimately, Altaïr, Ezio, and the whole of history is this to Juno, but she takes a direct role in Connor life's, giving him a Mushroom Samba that tells him that opposing the Templars is important and that it will save his people, all so she could keep the MacGuffin of the key to the Grand Temple safe for Desmond to find. Connor realizes this at the end, and Juno merely tells him that his quest for justice was impossible to begin with. Ouch.
• Used to Be a Sweet Kid: The young Connor we briefly see is thoroughly adorable, and while he remains sweet all through his life, the contrast between his happy childhood and Trauma Conga Line makes his story highly poignant.
• The Unpronounceable: The main reason why Achilles gives him the name Connor. There is a secondary reason in allowing him to pass for a Spaniard or Italian^note "Better a Spaniard than a native, and far better than me.", but it's mainly because of the pronunciation difficulties.
  Connor: My name is Ratonhnhaké:ton.
  Achilles: Right... well, I am not even going to try to pronounce that.
• Warrior Poet: True to his lineage, Connor will often ponder on his goals and the life choices of his enemies, sometimes making harsh-but-fair assessments of those around him. It’s clear that philosophizing is his own way of coping with the tragedies that surround him.
• Weapon Twirling: Connor can twirl his tomahawk when the player uses the "Attack" command without anything to attack in front of him.
• Wearing a Flag on Your Head: It's subtle but Connor's Assassin costume is red, white and blue just like the American flag.
• "Well Done, Son" Guy: Played with. Though he's hostile to Haytham for abandoning him and by proxy ordering the burning of his village^note though it's later revealed that he didn't — it was actually George Washington, he's still willing to work with Haytham and holds out hope that they can come to an understanding and form a connection. Ultimately though he chooses his allegiance with the Assassins over his father's approval, just like his father chose his allegiance with the Templars over reconciliation with his son.
  • He also feels this towards Achilles at times, constantly angry at his Sink or Swim Mentor tactics and his overall pessimism and generally underrating his victories, behaving like an angry teenager — which early on he actually is — to his Stern Teacher Dad.
• When He Smiles: Played straight during a few Homestead missions especially at Myriam's wedding where he receives the Davenport Homestead flag.
  • Throws Charles Lee a rather apathetic one when confronting him at Haytham's funeral.
• White-and-Grey Morality: Surprisingly for an Assassin, and especially such a prominent one, Connor internalizes the Templar's ideals in order to understand his true duty as an Assassin. (It helps that the Templars in this game as represented by Haytham are far less rabid and more logical and well-intentioned, even if they are all major Jerkasses.) Connor never buys into the Templar propaganda, since his strong moral compass centers on his belief in freedom (which the Templars explicitly hate), but he never disregards them either. Typically, he acknowledges the wisdom in the Templars' dying words, but refuses to apologize for the deed on the grounds of the Templar in question being an irredeemable asshat.
  • Notably unlike Altaïr and Ezio, Connor seriously believes in a rational collaboration between Templars and Assassins on common goals, even briefly convincing Achilles of the soundness of the idea. Though it makes more sense as to why when in Rogue it is revealed he got his entire Brotherhood wiped out for not considering it at the time. This takes on greater resonance at the end of the game when Minerva said that it was her hope that humanity could put aside their differences and collaborate to avert the catastrophe. Juno fomented this conflict for her own ends, which means had Connor succeeded he could have been the Spanner in the Works.
• Wide-Eyed Idealist: With bits of Naïve Newcomer in his early years.
  • Also due to his belief that Assassins and Templars could work together. Though a bit of a subversion as it actually almost appears to be possible, right up until he catches Haytham trying to manipulate him.
• Wrestler in All of Us: Some of his moves involve wrestling moves, including drop kicks, DDTs, suplexes, and clotheslines. It's evidently genetic since both Haytham and Edward also make use of said moves.
• Young and in Charge: Widely viewed as the leader of the Davenport homestead and informally leads the reborn Colonial Assassin Order despite not formally attaining the title of Mentor - all while being younger than thirty. Some of the people he recruits are at least a decade older than him. This also extends to his captaincy of the Aquilla where Faulkner insists on being the ship's first mate due to personal reasons.
• Younger Than He Looks: The game spans his journey from ages 18-28, during which time he could pass for a man in his mid to late 30s. He looks younger if his hair is cropped or in a mohawk, though.

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