Citrullus colocynthis
A Vine card that opens strong for exactly two turns, then settles into an ordinary attacker.
Colocynth is a Vine card with both roles: native to Africa, East Asia, Europe and South Asia, and invasive across both halves of North America, Oceania and South America. Native it is a cushioned bench piece; invasive it is an attacker. See nativity and categories.
The starter attack, Twine, unlocks at level 1 for 2 Sun, reading 25 native and 27 invasive. Twines around and holds it fast.
The free once-per-battle ability, Gap Colonizer, unlocks at level 25 and costs no Sun. Races into a light gap: +4 ATK and speed, kept.
The advanced attack, Girdling, unlocks at level 40 for 6 Sun, reading 30 native and 32 invasive. Rings the stem — the foe wilts and can't heal. See moves.
Heteroblasty arrives on the first riser at level 10 and adds attack power — but only on the first two turns of a battle. Juvenile and adult leaves differ, and the trait models that: it is an opening burst, not a standing bonus. From turn three onward the card is running on its base attack stat alone, so plan to spend those first two turns doing damage rather than positioning.
Structural Load stacks on at level 68 and fires when this card is knocked out, chipping the opposing bench rather than the plant that removed it. Trading into this card costs the opponent something behind their front line.
The species record lists no toxicity and no trait keywords, so no poison rider applies. For field gear, the thin armour means damage prevention beats damage reduction. Its growth habit is a vine, so a Moss Pole does fit this card.
At level 40 native reads 103 HP and 26 ATK; invasive reads 89 HP and 33 ATK. Armour is 8 and retreat is 16 Sun. Opening tempo is 30, which is on the low side, and sustained tempo is 34 — an awkward combination given that its best trait only works on the opening turns it may not win. Invasive it pays Faustian self-damage to its own bench on every damaging attack and concedes 2 prizes on knockout. See stats.
By level 100 native reaches 190 HP and 48 ATK, invasive 165 HP and 66 ATK, with armour only at 15. The soft-vine shape: much more biomass, barely more plating. Retreat rises to 33 Sun and the inverted tempo has bottomed out, which hurts here — a slower card is even less likely to make its two-turn window count.
Vine is Competitor: strong into Ruderal — annual forbs, grasses, aquatics, bulbs — and weak to Specialist, meaning succulents, conifers, ferns and epiphytes. See weaknesses and resistances.
The honest read is that this card's trait and its stats pull against each other. Heteroblasty rewards acting first and hitting hard immediately, but the opening tempo is mediocre, so you will often spend the bonus window taking a hit instead of landing one. Lead with it when you have tempo support, and treat it as an ordinary vine when you do not.
Invasive it has a reasonable attack step and the knockout chip gives it a floor. Native it is unremarkable and mostly a bench body.
It is edible with a fruit economy group, so a phosphorus soil amendment pays it ×1.25 coins — the economy case is stronger than the battle case here. 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.