Caesalpinia pulcherrima
A quick Shrub card that chips whatever strikes it, hits hard across six invasive regions, and heals your bench when it falls.
Pride of Barbados is a Shrub card with both roles: native to eastern North America and South America, invasive across Africa, East Asia, Europe, western North America, Oceania and South Asia. Six invasive regions is a wide spread and it shows in the attacker numbers. See nativity and categories.
The starter attack, Berry, unlocks at level 1 for 2 Sun, reading 27 native and 33 invasive. A measured strike.
The free once-per-battle ability, Nurse Shrub, unlocks at level 25 and costs no Sun. Shelters the whole bench — evens their health, and calls the fallen back.
The advanced attack, Sucker Punch, unlocks at level 40 for 6 Sun, reading 33 native and 38 invasive. Comes up from the roots before the foe sees it. A real step up from the starter, and worth the Sun once unlocked. See moves.
Extrafloral Nectaries arrives on the first riser at level 10 at full strength. Nectar recruits ant bodyguards, and the trait models that as a counter-chip: anything that strikes this card takes damage back automatically, with no turn or Sun spent.
Drupe Mast stacks on at level 68. When this card is knocked out it heals your own bench, so its removal still leaves your board better off than it was.
The species record lists no toxicity and no trait keywords on this card's schedule, so no poison rider applies. For field gear, gear that extends its stay compounds — every extra turn is another counter-chip. Its growth habit is not vine, epiphyte or hemiepiphyte, so a Moss Pole does not apply.
At level 40 native reads 103 HP and 19 ATK; invasive reads 89 HP and 34 ATK — a large step from that wide introduced range. Armour is 11, moderate. Retreat is a cheap 13 Sun. Opening tempo is 45 and sustained tempo is 45, both good. Invasive it pays Faustian bench damage per damaging attack and concedes 2 prizes on knockout. See stats.
By level 100 native reaches 190 HP and 33 ATK, invasive 165 HP and 70 ATK, with armour at 21. The shrub pattern sits between a tree's wall and a herb's softness — plating rises, but not far. Retreat rises to 25 Sun and the inverted tempo has sunk to its floor.
Shrub is Competitor: strong into Ruderal — annual forbs, grasses, aquatics and bulbs — and weak to Specialist, meaning succulents, conifers, ferns and epiphytes. See weaknesses and resistances.
A well-rounded aggressive card. Played invasive it hits hard, acts early, punishes anything that hits back, and leaves a bench heal behind when it finally goes. The cheap retreat gives you the option to preserve it.
Native it is much flatter — the attack stat drops sharply, and it becomes a support body with a counter-chip. Judge it mostly on the attacker role.
It is not eaten, so a soil amendment earns no matching fertiliser coins and instead banks the ×1.25 XP an inedible plant pays. See the battle lab.
Leveling trades speed for power. A plant’s tempo (SPD + INI, the turn-order edge) fades as it grows, while its power (HP + ATK + DEF, net of the rising Sun cost to retreat) climbs. The crossover is the level where power overtakes tempo: below it the plant is a fast skirmisher, above it a heavyweight. Shown for each stance this plant can actually hold — native adds a HP cushion, invasive an attack edge, neutral neither — with the card at its crossover and fully grown at Lv 100.