Saitō Yoshitatsu

Saitou Yoshitatsu is Saitou Dousan's seemingly adopted son

Appearance
Saitou Dousan describes his son as the kind of man who fits the body of a sumo wrestler, Yoshitatsu is large, taller even than Dousan himself, and sports a rugged beard upon his face. He is never seen without a suit of armour covering his body. In the Anime, he later sported a red mask while acting as an agent of the Miyoshi Three.

Later, after contracting the same fatal illness his father, Saitou Dousan, has, his physical condition slims, he shrinks, shrivels slightly, and becomes exactly as Saitou Dousan himself was in the man's youth, which proved to the both of them that Yoshitatsu, somehow, was Dousan's genuine son.

Personality
Yoshitatsu is said to hold a lot of resentment for his "father" Saitou Dousan, for banishing his real father and taking over Mino. His resentment stemmed of course to Nobuna, as it was his birthright to rule Mino and Dousan handed it over to Nobuna instead. He is spiteful, as he completely reversed many of Dousan's beneficial policies simply to spurn him and get the Mino nobles on his side.

He is also apparently something of a lolicon, which is toned down in the Anime, but either way he shows signs of it towards Hanbei.

The Anime portrays him as unflinchingly brave and cold hearted, in the Light Novels however he is at first portrayed as little short of a coward, as he fled from Inabayama castle at the mere sight of Hanbei's shikigami and went straight to the nearest town until she appologised and explaned her lack of intent to betray him, until then he was litterally just sat there cowaring in fear of them. However, in the battle against Yoshiharu's Sunomata Ichiya Castle, the idea of being defeated motivated him to fight to the point of single handedly forcing his men back into line, showing he can indeed be brave when it comes to a situation he can understand.

He is not foolish nor lacking in intelligence when it comes to it, as he easily saw through Nagamasa's attempts to use him and he also manages to successfully decieve Shingen Takeda's master strategist of all people. However, he is extremely paranoid and finds it hard to trust those with talent surpassing his own, as was the case with Hanbei, where he quickly grew to fear her intellect, and her Shikigami. Although, to be fair, she very easily could have destroyed Mino by herself, she just had no intention of doing it.

After his defeat, he comes to realise that Dousan was right to give Nobuna leadership of Mino, as he was undone more or less in his eyes by his own poor judgement. After his defeat he is much more level headed and humble, immediately appologising to Hanbei for not employing her properly and noting that so long as his men live on he has no problem admitting his defeat. He admits he was somewhat proud to be Dousan's successor and wanted to prove he was better than Nobuna, but now knows he isn't. Finally, the only thing keeping him from Seppuku is that he feels obligated to inform Nobuna of Azai Nagamasa's treachery. When Dousan promptly tells Nobuna she should kill Yoshitatsu, he seems to understand his father's decision, if a little shocked by it. He leaves Mino as a rather different sort of man than he was when he first took it over.

After contracting a fatal disease like his father, Saitou Dousan, he comes to realise that he is in fact the man's genuine son and relents for his past actions in full. he makes good on his actions by aiding his father in repelling Takeda Shingen, effectively saving the Oda clan in the process in what can be called one of their darkest hours. Finally, with nothing else to do but find a fitting place to die, he looks for a buddhist temple and is met on the road by a monk, who is in reality the now equally repentant sniper who once shot Nobuna, Sugitani Zenjuurou, who stays with him in his final moments.

His ultimate wish was to be buried with his father, which Zenjuurou was happy to grant.

Background
Yoshitatsu was allegedly born to the previous lord of Mino before Saitou Dousan took it over and adopted him as his son, he has developed a hatred for Dousan for banishing his (alleged)father and seizing his lands.

Arrival in the Sengoku Period Arc
Yoshitatsu caught wind of Saitou Dousan handing Mino, his birthright, over to Nobuna and rebelled against him, effectively trying to kill his father. However, Saitou Dousan was saved by the efforts of Yoshiharu, Goemon and her men, and the arrival of Nobuna herself. His actions allowed the Imagawa army to invade Owari however.

Invasion of Mino Arc
He is noted by Dousan to have gained Hanbei's aid in fighting the war and repelling the Oda clan's repeated invasions. Also, because of the policies being written by Dousan, Yoshitatsu undoes many of the beneficial policies his father implimented and gained the undeserved praise of the men serving under him, mainly nobles who can now tax the people more because of it.

It is revealed later that, despite her usefulness, he is wary of Hanbei due to her intellect and the fact her uncle used to be Saitou Dousan's right hand man, so he orders Hanbei to come and reveal herself to him. Yoshiharu Sagara, Inuchiyo and Azai Nagamasa manage to join her as retainers and sneak into this event.

Skills and Abilities
While initially portrayed somewhat as a shameless coward, Yoshitatsu quickly shows himself to be quite a lot more. He has shown enough skill with his giant body's strength for force his men into submission when their moral dropped and ultimately forced them to choose between fighting the enemy and losing or fighting him alone. He is as such both a powerful and intimidating man who is able to translate those skills into controlling his men. He is also no stranger to tactics, such as those he used to take the hearts and minds of Mino's nobility, if only for a time, and rule the province, he was also a skilled enough actor to deceive takeda Shingen's strategist, a man on par with his father, Saitou Dousan, in intelligence. Finally, he seems to at the very least possess great levels of willpower, even with a dying body he was able to aid his father, help force back the Takeda army and drag himself as close as he could to a temple where he had chosen to die all in quick succession. He only truly collapsed after Zanjuurou showed up and heard his dying whims for him.

In the Anime he managed to fight Katsuie and Nobuna at separate but successive points, this alone makes him a very capable fighter.

Trivia

 * Also in the anime, for some reason, he wields a cannon after losing his spear in his pursuit of Yoshiharu, one really has to question where he was hiding something like that in the Sengoku Era.