Rowen Hasiba (known in Japan as Tōma Hashiba) is widely considered the brains of the Ronin Warriors—so much so that even the Dark Warlord Dais acknowledges him as the group's most dangerous member, thanks to his strategic thinking. With a reported IQ of 250, he basically functions as the group's voice of reason, constantly reining in the impulsive tendencies of hotheads like Ryo and Kento.
His background explains some of that intellect: his father Genichirou is a mad scientist too absorbed in his work to be much of a dad, while his mother (a traveling journalist) treats both her son and ex-husband more like acquaintances than family. She shows up in the YST CD drama Tenkuden. Rowen's closest friend in the group is Sage, and it makes sense—they're basically cut from the same cloth.
In the English dub, Rowen sports a thick Brooklyn accent, though this mysteriously vanishes in the OVAs. Ward Perry voiced him in English.
Armor & Combat
Rowen wears the Strata armor (called Tenku, or "Heavens," in the original YST). His virtue shifted from Chi (Wisdom) in YST to Inochi (Life) in the Ronin Warriors adaptation. He fights with a collapsible bow mounted on his back, paired with a small quiver that somehow never runs out of arrows. His signature finishing move, Arrow Shockwave (Shinku Ha in YST), fires an arrow that detonates on impact with explosive force—the first time he used it, the blast literally took out a chunk of a mountainside. By the third OVA, Message, he'd gained a new suit entirely, though its abilities remain a mystery.
Trivia
His surname likely derives from Hideyoshi Toyotomi's original clan name, Hashiba. Toyotomi unified Japan briefly after succeeding Oda Nobunaga.
Content compiled by AnimeList.moe from publicly available sources.
