Takakage Kobayakawa

Takakage Kobayakawa is Motonari's third son who was adopted into the Kobayakawa family at an early age. After Motonari passed away, he and his older brother, Motoharu Kikkawa, were responsible for Terumoto's upbringing. Takakage was the particularly harsh and stricter guardian of the two. Although he could have been severely punished for his actions, Terumoto appreciated him and saw him as his father figure. He had no children but adopted two, one of which includes Hideaki.

Before his playable Samurai Warriors appearance, he was a generic NPC since Samurai Warriors: State of War. He is ranked tenth place in the Samurai Warriors 4 character popularity poll and fifteenth place in the first Sengoku Musou Shoot character popularity poll.

Samurai Warriors
Takakage first appears in Samurai Warriors: State of War to oppose the Oda army. He next appears in Samurai Warriors 2: Empires alongside one of his brothers, Hidekane. Takakage participates in all of his father's and nephew's campaigns in Samurai Warriors 3. At Kizugawa, Motochika will try to kill Takakage as repentance for Mitsuhide's mistake. If Nobunaga is being controlled, Takakage will be commanding the fireball attack. He and his older brother can protect their nephew at Kozuki if Motonari manages to beat Ittetsu Inaba with full health. During Kanbei's Chugoku Invasion, Takakage lures his opponent, Kanbei, into a trap.

The second Empires entry has him assist his clan by assuming control over the Kobayakawa for its navy. He and his siblings take their father's three arrows analogy by heart, though they are shocked and awed when Motonari breaks them in favor of using more arrows to strengthen the Mōri's ideology.

Samurai Warriors 4 has Takakage begin his career by supporting his father's conquests. Both father and son frequently bounce ideas and strategies before each battle; Takakage often chooses humanistic solutions to counter his father's swift and logical plans. His weather predictions and swifting thinking led to the success at Itsukushima yet the Mōri fail to save the Saika Renegades at their home land.

Hideyoshi's western invasion leads to Takakage clashing wits with Hanbei and Kanbei. He opposes his father's initial plan at Aka, ordering the army to immediately capture the docks and Gochaku Castle rather than directly attack Himeji Castle. His tactic confuses Hideyoshi's troops and lures Kanbei away from his post. Despite being enemies, Takakage quickly empathizes with the two rival strategists. Unlike his father, Takakage correctly predicts that Hideyoshi and company would not easily abandon Kōzuki Castle. Takakage believes that Nobunaga's rule will not bring peace to the land and is surprised to learn from a defeated Kanbei that they seek a different future. Takakage worries about Hanbei's condition and instinctively senses the strategist's death.

He becomes curious in Kanbei's objective and seeks to see their future after Bichu-Takamatsu Castle. Takakage perceives Kanbei's thoughts and has faith in him. He orders the ardent Mōri generals to not pursue Hideyoshi's retreat. After he helps his father at Okitanawate and Iyo, Takakage becomes the Mōri's representative for the Toyotomi inquiries. When he reunites with the Toyotomi forces at Shikoku, Takakage decides to follow the late Hanbei's wishes by offering his friendship to Kanbei. Under the Toyotomi's orders, he arrives too late to save Jōun Takahashi at Iwaya Castle yet assists with the following subjugation of Kyushu. He continues to learn from Kanbei at Odawara Castle. After the battle, Takakage peacefully retires during Hideyoshi's unification. He bids Kanbei to join him and dies sometime off-screen before Sekigahara. Kanbei remembers him before the battle of Ishigakibaru.

His 4-II centric story has Takakage reprise his humane tactics beside his father at Kizugawaguchi and Bichu-Takamatsu Castle. His tactics stump Kanbei in the second conflict, and the strategists take note of their respective abilities. After his father retires and dies, Takakage continues to serve the Mōri and advises them to join hands with the Toyotomi. Acting as representative for the Mōri at Shikoku, he reunites with Kanbei. His personal goal is to realize a world of peace and to protect Terumoto from Hideyoshi's influences. Takakage admits that his strategies may be ill prepared for the task since he had relied on his father to compensate for his flaws. Kanbei's confidence in his abilities reaffirms his convictions. After the battle, when Hideyoshi chummily intimidates Takakage to establish himself as a warlord independent from the Mōri, Takakage stands his ground through a cordial refusal.

Grateful to the strategist, Takakage agrees to work with Kanbei to realize a world of peace together with as little bloodshed as possible. The strategists bounce plans and countermeasures effortlessly in and out of the battlefield. Takakage mentors his friend by stressing the importance of keeping compassion in mind with their judgments, comforting Kanbei over his lapse in judgment at Kyushu and Odawara Castle. Though the land is unified under Hideyoshi's rule, Takakage predicts that it won't last. He warns Terumoto of a war he thinks will take place a decade later and urges him to never be influenced by it. Takakage perishes to illness, but his spirit gently entrusts his legacy to Kanbei.

Kessen
Kessen III has Takakage be a minor enemy general serving under Terumoto.

Nobunaga's Ambition
Guruguru Dungeon Nobunyaga has Takakage star in the Mōri Three Arrows event. At the start of the scenario, he is waging war with his brother, Motoharu. The protagonist travels back into time and approaches him upon Takamoto's request. Takakage smugly greets him/her and explains that he is frustrated by his brothers' idiocy. Both brothers focus on narrow-minded objectives and pay no heed to the future. Takakage feels he is capable of leading the clan by himself. However, when Itsukushima occurs, Motonyari reminds Takakage of the three arrows oath he conducted with his brothers. His father's sound advice and trust in his abilities convinces Takakage to reconcile with his brothers.

Mōri Motonari: Chikai no Sanshi
In Mouri Motonari: Chikai no Sanshi, Takakage serves his father as one of his main generals. He follows the common perception of him in fictional media as a wise, considerate advisor and strategist. He continues to provide support for Terumoto and survives the wars as a trusted veteran for the Mōri.

Development
Mieda explained that they wanted to create an intellectual father-and-son duo for the series. Takakage is the most famous of Motonari's sons to allegedly match his father's wit so he made a perfect fit. He believes that their method of teamwork and strategic foreplay contrasts their rivals, Kanbei and Hanbei. The designers were mainly concerned with perfecting Takakage's outfit rather than his facial features. Since he is conceptualized to be the intelligent young bookworm, they wanted to give him loose scholarly clothing. His character was given a sword to help punctuate his conviction for his actions.

Personality
Takakage is a soft-spoken and mild-mannered analyst. He actively engages in debates to exercise his perceptiveness, always seeking knowledge to better his strategies. In his eyes, a successful tactic is one which doesn't sacrifice the common folk. Victory is not always a primary concern for him. While he appears confident and wise, his personal events in Chronicle Mode reveals that his sagacity is all he has to sustain himself before others. Takakage purposely conceals his inner thoughts and passions because he feels too insecure to honestly express them. If not for his avid addiction to learning, he would rarely seek to interact with people.

The son loves and admires his father, being the most voracious reader of the elder's verbose literary and historical works. They bond over their fondness for strategy and reading. Motonari is a bookworm for history while Takakage is entertained by idioms and poetry. The younger man favours puns dealing with kanji roots and radicals. His brilliance and empathy leads to his uncanny bonding with Hanbei and Kanbei. Takakage senses that he can understand them on a similar level as his father and welcomes their criticisms for his assessments. Since the white clothed strategist dies shortly after he knows him, Takakage thoroughly enjoys deciphering the black clothed one's commentary.

Character Symbolism
In the Samurai Warriors series, he is symbolized by the kanji for "sagacity" (怜) and "intelligence" (聡).

Takakage's rare weapon has Awanagi, a Japanese deity, act its namesake. According to the characters used to spell his name, he is a type of water deity who resided in the heavens. He is best known as a sea god who is Izanagi's father. Awanagi has been fabled to have later descended from the heavens to pacify and give his blessings to the Chugoku region.

Tokiokashinokami is mentioned in his DLC weapon. In the Furukoto Fumi he was born from Izanagi's discarded sack as he was cleansing himself from Yomi-no-kuni's spiritual taint. Depending on the spelling used for his name, he is regarded as the shape-shifting deity who either changes time itself, determines its pacing, or records it. The authors and compilers for the Manyoushuu famously recorded their debate regarding Tokiokashinokami's exact role in mythology in their discussion regarding time and sought to elaborate on his possible relations with other minor deities associated with time or creation.

His heirloom, Three Arrows Oath, can either be a reference to another game or the legend of Motonari and his three eldest sons, Takamoto, Motoharu and Takakage. As the story goes, Motonari challenged each of his sons to break a singular arrow, a task easily fulfilled by each son. He then bound three arrows together and repeated his inquiry, adding that they needed to snap through them simultaneously. Each son had different results –maybe breaking through one or two at best– but couldn't complete their father's challenge. Motonari explained that the arrows were a metaphor for the bonds he expects his sons to share. Even if they are being separated into different families, he expected the brothers to continue supporting one another and the Mōri legacy, tying into his motto that anything is possible when people unite for a cause. Variations may replace Takamoto with Terumoto, yet modern historians are skeptical if the episode ever happened. Anything which does mention it was made at least one hundred years after Motonari's death during the mid-to-late-Edo period, and there is no mention of it within historical records.

Voice Actors

 * Troy Baker - Samurai Warriors 3 (English)
 * Hiroshi Okamoto - Samurai Warriors 4
 * Kouji Kawakami - Nobunaga's Ambition: Sphere of Influence
 * Kenji Nojima - Mouri Motonari: Chikai no Sanshi

Quotes

 * "Fall back! The enemy fights with merciless ferocity!"
 * "Our plan has worked! Surround them!"
 * "Ah, tenth place. Exactly as I had predicted. By the way, as a man, I'm pleased. You could say I'm happy with this too."
 * "You're in top form today, Special Week."
 * "The commander whom the people see as an enemy will never be the final victor."

Charge Moveset

 * , undefined: Does an uppercut slash.
 * ,, undefined: Creates a small explosion.
 * ,, , undefined: Sends several paper toward, the paper fly in a boomerang clockwise fashion.
 * ,, , , undefined: Rises an energy pillar from the ground.
 * ,, , , , undefined: Sends a water sphere toward.
 * ,, , , , , undefined: Sends paper horizontally.
 * ,, , , , , , undefined: Slams his sword to create a wave.
 * ,, , , , , , , undefined: Takakage sends paper to fly around him circularly.
 * ,, , , , , , , , , , : Seven slashes with sword (N1-7) followed by a sustained water surge (N8-11), ending with a geyser from the ground (N12).

Hyper Moveset

 * undefined: Slashes forward with sword.
 * undefined, : Sends five book pages forward.
 * undefined, undefined, : Throws book into the air, the book sending pages downward which explode when they hit the ground.
 * undefined, undefined, undefined, : (Same as SS2)
 * undefined, undefined, undefined, undefined, : (Same as SS3)
 * undefined, undefined, undefined, undefined, undefined, : Four pages fly out around him.
 * undefined, undefined, undefined, undefined, undefined, undefined: Five forward slashes ending with a geyser from the ground.


 * Dashing : Slashes forward.
 * , undefined: Slams sword into the ground.
 * , : Slashes downwards.
 * Conjures five water orbs in front of him, which then explode.
 * (Ultimate/Kaiden): Releases book pages in a tornado around him.
 * Rage Attack/Musou Gokui effect: Adds the Wind element to all attacks.


 * Spirit Cancel:
 * Deadlock Attack & Mighty Strike: Slashes with sword, then sends one page directly forward.
 * R1: Temporarily boosts the stats of allies nearby. Boosts own stats as well if successful.
 * Awakened Skill effect (4-II only):

Mounted Moveset

 * , undefined: Slashes forcefully to the right.
 * ,, undefined: Sends book forward. The book releases a beam of light downwards.
 * ,, , undefined: Throws book into the air, which releases a barrage of pages downwards. (Similar to C4 and C7)
 * ,, , , , , , : Eight slashes to the right.

Weapons

 * See also: Takakage Kobayakawa/Weapons

Rare Weapon Acquisition

 * Stage: Conquest of Odawara (Story of Wise Men)

Trivia

 * FujiTV's Super News segment regarding recent historical findings played footage of Motonari and his sons' Sengoku Musou 3: Empires event during historian Atsushi Kawai's commentary about the three arrow oath.