Thanks to Ivy840 for suggesting this cat!

I have mixed feelings about Rowanstar.

First of all, I'll start with why I don't really like him.

He was a bit of a coward. I don't really see completely why he stepped down from leadership. Also, once warmly welcomed into ThunderClan, he tried to tell Bramblestar how to lead when he was already doing a good job.

He left his Clan when a rogue took over, lost all hope in his Clanmates and just allowed cats that he vowed to protect to die.

He separated Violetkit and Twigkit when they were kits, which I really don't like. They only had each other, and he took even that from them.

I do like the father-son interactions between him and Tigerheart, though, in Tigerheart's Shadow. You rarely see cats in other Clans, especially leaders, actually caring for their kits (or having kits to care for in the first place).

I'll make a list to prove my point.

Mistystar was shown to care about her son in her book, but no interactions that show otherwise in other books.
Leopardstar had no kits.
Blackstar had no kits.
Brokenstar had no kits.
Crookedstar definitely loves Silverstream, though it isn't shown too much in the main books.
Harestar has no kits.
Tallstar has no kits.
Leafstar probably cares about her kits, but do you know? No, because she treats all of her Clanmates the same as far as I'm aware. Except for Tree. She treats Tree like he's a tree who decided to plant himself in the middle of the camp and is blocking the way for cats to move.
Heatherstar has no kits.
Hailstar definitely cared about his mate but I don't recall too much interaction between the old RiverClan leader and his kits.
Cedarstar had no kits.
Houndstar had no kits.
Raggedstar had Brokenstar, but after he realised that he was pretty much a killing machine, he didn't like him much. Plus, Brokenstar killed him, so...
Onestar's kit was Darktail. Must I say more?
Nightstar wasn't really a leader, but he didn't have kits.
Current Tigerstar has kits and definitely loves them. But this is about his father and not him.

That makes three...? Not much considering in ThunderClan, we had Oakstar who cared, Pinestar who definitely had a lot of interesting interactions involving or revolving around his son, Bluestar who definitely loved her kits, Firestar who definitely loved his kits and Bramblestar who loves both his "kits" and his kits. More than all the Clans put together. Yes, we had Sunstar and Doestar, who has no kits, but the numbers are significant higher in ThunderClan. That's why it's nice to see that Rowanstar had some very interesting interactions with his son.

We haven't had a father who feels like his kit is going to be better than them. Who feels like his leadership is in danger because his son is a better leader than him. Who feels like his son could be undermining him. Who knows that his son is actually better than him.

I like that Rowanstar still loved his son even though he literally had a prophecy showing that Tigerheart would outgrow him, take over, make the Clan better but also leave for a bit.

Also, his mate is Tawnypelt, whose brother is Bramblestar. While I said a moment ago that I found it annoying that Rowanstar tried to tell Bramblestar how to lead ThunderClan, I like the idea that maybe he was just trying to help out his mate's brother, his little brother in law. As strange as it sounds.

I haven't really mentioned his other two kits, but that's because they don't really have much of an obvious relationship with their father that I can delve into. Of course, Flametail's death angered the whole Clan, so I suppose I can't really say it for certain that he wasn't affected by that. Dawnpelt too, of course.

There is something else that I love about Rowanstar, though, that I haven't mentioned.

He isn't discriminative.

So many cats judge kittypets, cats from other Clans and outsiders if they join the Clan. Some cats just judge cats in general. While he may not be great, he didn't really judge cats for their background. He never insulted Firestar for it, his mate was a ThunderClan cat, he let in Violetshine without a second thought and never treated her like an outsider, and he was overall just a generally nice cat when it came to this kind of thing.

Anyway, I'll wrap this up by saying that while he certainly annoys me sometimes, and that he didn't make the best choices, he had an interesting relationship with his son, and he is actually quite sweet when you look at his inferred actions rather than what's on the surface. Basically, if he gets a side book, I really want to read it.