Capsicum annuum
A very fast, very fragile Annual forb card that acts before almost anything else and comes back from a knockout half the time.
Peppers is a Annual forb card with both roles: native across eastern and western North America and South America, invasive in Africa, East Asia, Europe, Oceania and South Asia. Native it takes the health cushion and projects a bench overshield; invasive it becomes a fast attacker. See nativity and categories.
The starter attack, Seed Scatter, unlocks at level 1 for 2 Sun, reading 29 native and 33 invasive. Scatters seed across the foe's whole back row.
The free once-per-battle ability, Germination Flush, unlocks at level 25 and costs no Sun. The seed bank breaks at once: +4 ATK, kept for the match.
The advanced attack, Allergenic Odor, unlocks at level 40 for 6 Sun, reading 29 native and 33 invasive. A pollen haze — the foe weakens and its whole bench sickens. See moves and abilities.
Photoblastic arrives on the first riser at level 10. It is a small self-heal each checkup, but it is conditional in two ways worth stating plainly: it only works in sunny weather, and like every sustain effect it triggers roughly 60% of the time rather than every checkup. In poor weather it does nothing at all, so do not build around it.
Soil Seed Bank stacks on at level 68 and is the trait that actually changes games. It is a revival: when this card would be knocked out it has a 50% chance to survive instead, coming back at a low fraction of its health. That is the highest revival chance in its group, paid for with the weakest comeback — many seeds, weak seedlings. It is a seeded roll, not a coin flip you can influence.
The species record lists no toxicity and no trait keywords here, so no poison rider applies despite what you might expect from a chilli. For field gear, armour is close to nothing, so anything that prevents damage outright is worth more than anything that reduces it. Its growth habit is not vine, epiphyte or hemiepiphyte, so a Moss Pole does not apply.
At level 40 native reads 103 HP and 26 ATK; invasive reads 89 HP and 38 ATK. Armour is 2 — effectively none. Retreat is 16 Sun. The standout is tempo: opening tempo is 50, among the highest you will see, and sustained tempo is 34. This card acts first in most matchups, which is its entire identity. Invasive it pays Faustian bench damage on every damaging attack and concedes 2 prizes on knockout. See stats.
By level 100 native reaches 190 HP and 47 ATK, invasive 165 HP and 79 ATK, and armour only 3. It stays a glass cannon at the cap — the health pool grows but the plating never arrives. Retreat climbs to 33 Sun, and critically the inverted tempo has sunk to its floor, so the speed that defined this card at level 40 is gone. That is a harsher trade for Peppers than for most cards, because speed was the point; what it keeps is the revival.
Annual forb is in the Ruderal succession group. Ruderal reclaims from Specialist, so this card hits succulents, conifers, ferns and epiphytes harder. It loses to Competitor — perennial herbs, vines, shrubs and broadleaf trees. See weaknesses and resistances.
Play it invasive and play it first. High opening tempo plus a solid attack stat means it frequently gets a full hit in before the opponent acts, and against Specialist-group plants the type bonus stacks on top. The revival at level 68 turns what looks like a fragile lead card into one that can survive a removal and keep going.
The weakness is not subtle: no armour and a small body mean any real hit removes it. Below level 68 there is no safety net at all, so an early copy is genuinely a one-hit card. Sunny-only healing is not a substitute.
It is edible with a fruit economy group, so a phosphorus amendment pays ×1.25 coins. Good income, good tempo, poor durability. 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.