Coptis trifolia
Threeleaf goldthread (Coptis trifolia) is a perennial herb that plays a native buffer, with no introduced range to make it an attacker.
Threeleaf goldthread is a perennial herb — a soft plant with a quick opening and a chance to cling on. It is native to East Asia, eastern North America, and western North America and has no introduced range, so it only ever plays the native buffer role — there is no attacker scenario for it.
Its kit unlocks in three stages. Its starter attack, Volatile Oils (unlocked at level 1, 2 Sun), deals 27 as a native: Releases volatile oils — Poison the foe. Its once-per-battle ability, Allelochemical Priming (level 25, free), is pure utility: Primes root chemistry — Poison the foe. Its advanced attack, Deep-Seated Grudge (level 40, 6 Sun), deals 38 native: Roots in deep and refuses to let go.
These are the always-on traits this card actually keeps, and the level each one arrives at (a plant draws at most one trait per growth stage). From level 10, Basal Rosette gives a small flat DEF bonus — the ground-hugging rosette shrugs off a little of every blow, the way it shrugs off grazing and mowing. From level 68, Resprout gives it a 60% chance to survive a single otherwise-lethal hit, clinging on at roughly a quarter of its health. It is a coin-flip-plus save, not a guarantee.
On the field it draws on field gear to shore up its weaknesses. With little natural armor it leans on amendments that add DEF or on healing gear to offset its fragility.
Read at level 40, where every move is unlocked, it holds 103 health and 26 attack as a native, with 4 DEF. That is thin armor, so it takes close to full damage from any real attacker; its defense is its health pool and its tricks, not its DEF. Its retreat costs 16 Sun. On tempo it opens at 45 initiative (which orders the first turn) and cruises at 34 speed (which orders every turn after). It is a quick starter but a slower cruiser — it tends to land the first hit and then get out-paced. As a native it carries a 15% health cushion (103 versus 89 as an invader), and while benched it projects a green overshield bar onto your active plant, sized by how threatened it is.
Grown to level 100, its health swells to 190 and its attack to 47, but its armor stays low (8 DEF) — it never becomes a wall, just a bigger version of the same soft plant. Retreat rises to 33 Sun as the older plant grows more rooted, and its once-quick tempo has sunk to a sliver — it goes late in turn order now. Maturing buys it raw bulk and hitting power; it costs it the speed edge it had as a seedling.
In the succession type chart, Threeleaf goldthread's category (perennial herb) belongs to the Competitor group. Ruderal, Competitor, and Specialist form a wheel: Competitor hits Ruderal plants (annual-forbs, grasses, aquatic plants, and bulbs) for 1.5× damage, and takes 1.5× from Specialist plants (succulents, conifers, ferns, and epiphytes), resisting each the other way at about two-thirds. The off-wheel Weird categories are neutral both ways.
A fragile but sticky card: fast off the mark, and Resprout gives it a 60% chance to survive one lethal hit. Low armor caps its ceiling, so treat it as a nimble skirmisher and a collection piece. It is not a coin-earner through fertilizer — feeding it any nutrient banks 1.25× experience rather than coins, so its off-battle value is leveling and family-tree collection. On the power curves below, it fights as a fast skirmisher until about level 28, after which its growing bulk and attack take over from its fading speed — a shift in which edge dominates, not a sign it is weaker when grown.
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.