Watersprite

Overview

Watersprite is a fern in Supplant, fielded in the fern category. Native to Africa, East Asia, Eastern North America, Western North America, Oceania, South America and South Asia, where it plays as a defensive buffer, it is also invasive in Europe, where it turns into an attacker. Its nativity — set by the arena region you fight in — is the spine of how it plays; see Nativity.

Moves

Its kit unlocks in three stages, and most cards you own sit well below the level where all three are live (the numbers on this page are read at level 40, where every slot is unlocked). See Moves and Abilities.

• Spore Broadcast (starter attack, unlocks at level 1, costs 2 Sun): Broadcasts spores over the foe's whole bench. It deals about 28 as a native and 28 as an invasive.
• Understory Ecesis (free ability, unlocks at level 25, once per battle, no Sun): Takes the forest floor: heal 30%, and the foe can't heal.
• Silica Edge (advanced attack, unlocks at level 40, costs 6 Sun): Silica-hardened fronds bite deep and drain. It deals about 36 as a native and 36 as an invasive.

None of its attacks carry the initiative rider, so it never seizes a turn on a killing blow — it takes its turns in the normal order.

Abilities

A card keeps at most two always-on traits, one per riser, and the rest of its category pool is dropped. This one holds:

• Unpalatable — its fiddlehead chemistry punishes any attacker that strikes it, poisoning the striker with a flat 2 stacks per hit (a Sulfur soil amendment neutralises this). It comes in on the level 10 riser.
• Spore-drift — it chips the enemy bench with drifting spores. It comes in on the level 68 riser.

See Abilities.

Features

For field gear, a Calcium/Magnesium soil amendment adds flat DEF, worth more on a plant this soft than any single point of its own. Its growth habit is not a climbing or epiphytic one, so it does not take a Moss Pole.

Stats

Read at level 40: it carries 103 HP as a native and 89 as an invasive, with 28 and 29 ATK respectively, on 2 DEF (almost no armour). Watersprite's attack identity is built from how widely it spreads, with an added introduced-range term when invasive, so the invasive ATK reads higher — compare the two numbers for the real gap. As a native it gains a +15% HP cushion; as an invasive it pays "Faustian" self-damage to its own bench on every damaging attack and concedes 2 prizes when knocked out. Benched as a native, it projects part of the segmented green HP overshield onto your active plant, sized by how threatened this species is; that shield drains front-first against direct hits but is bypassed by poison, recoil and splash. Damage is diminishing armour — a hit scales by ATK ÷ (ATK + DEF), and poison ignores DEF entirely. On Sun (cap 120, refilling in real time), the starter costs 2 and the advanced attack 6; retreating costs 16 Sun.

It is quicker off the mark than it is in a long fight: its initiative (51, which sets turn 1) outreads its sustained speed (34, which sets turn 2 onward), so it wants to land an early blow and does not win drawn-out exchanges on tempo.

At Level 100

Grown to level 100, its HP climbs to 190 while DEF only inches up to 3 — biomass swells but armour stays soft, so it hardens as a bigger target rather than a tougher one. Retreat rises to 33 Sun, and its early tempo edge has faded to about its 1% floor by the cap.

Weaknesses & Resistances

It belongs to the Specialist succession group. As a specialist it presses Competitors — perennial herbs, vines, shrubs and broadleaf trees — for ×1.5 damage, and is resisted to ×0.667 by Ruderals (annual forbs, grasses, aquatics and bulbs). Weird-group plants are neutral both ways. There is no type effectiveness beyond this wheel; see Weaknesses & Resistances.

Gameplay uses

Play it as a native buffer — bench it behind a heavier active to lend the overshield, or field it and lean on its HP cushion — and as an invasive attacker where the region makes it one, pushing its higher invasive ATK while eating the Faustian bench cost. It is a middling card overall: fine for earning coins in single-player battles, but soft enough to want backup on the bench in a tougher fight. Its edible part is tagged, so feeding it the matching Nitrogen fertiliser pays ×1.25 coins; any other nutrient banks ×1.25 XP instead. See the N/P/K economy. It leans on its opening speed early and crosses onto a power footing around level 30, after which its accumulating HP and attack matter more than its fading turn-order edge. It still only gets stronger as it levels — turn order is about a 5% lever.