Common Stinging Pink

Overview

Common stinging pink is a wiry Perennial herb that fights as a patient cruiser: cheap hits, a mid-fight heal, and a chance to survive an otherwise-lethal blow. It is native to Europe and Africa and invasive nowhere, so the arena only ever fields it as a native buffer for your bench. It is a modest, self-sustaining support card rather than a heavy hitter, best valued for endurance over damage.

Moves

Its starter attack, Steady Growth, unlocks at level 1 for 2 Sun and lands a reliable, even strike for about 32 damage. The free once-per-battle ability, Autogenic Reaction, arrives at level 25: Remakes its own ground: +6 ATK and heal 25%. — a mid-fight mend that suits its stalling game. The advanced attack, Deep Root Strike, unlocks at level 40 for 6 Sun (40 damage) and mends the plant as it strikes. Most of your stinging pinks sit below level 40, where only the starter is unlocked. None of its moves carry an initiative rider, so it never seizes a turn. See Moves.

Abilities

Common stinging pink keeps a single always-on trait, Resprout. Because it draws only one eligible trait, Resprout arrives at half strength on the level 10 riser and matures on the level 68 one. When it works it lets the plant survive one otherwise-lethal hit at roughly a quarter of its health — but it fires only about 60% of the time, so treat it as a coin-flip reprieve rather than a guarantee. See Abilities.

Features

Common stinging pink carries no trait keywords — no thorns, no toxin, no spore chemistry — so nothing punishes an attacker for striking it; it is non-toxic, so nothing chemical bites back. Its growth habit is terrestrial, so it is not eligible for a Moss Pole. As a native, defensive field gear — a Cloche, or a calcium/magnesium amendment for a little extra DEF — suits its stalling game.

Stats

At level 40 common stinging pink reads 103 HP and 17 ATK. DEF is just 4, at the soft floor of the perennial-herb band, so it takes hits with almost no armor and relies on its healing instead. Its tempo is sharply back-loaded: a very low initiative (13) means it is slow off the mark and usually takes the first hit, but a much higher SPD (34) lets it dominate turn order from turn 2 on, so it becomes more dangerous the longer a fight runs. Retreat costs 16 Sun. As a native it gains a +15% HP cushion and, while benched, projects an HP overshield onto your active. See Stats.

At Level 100

Matured to level 100, common stinging pink swells to 190 HP and 30 ATK, but its DEF only reaches 8 — as a soft herb it gains bulk in health and almost none in armor, so it stays vulnerable to any real hitter. Retreat rises to 33 Sun as it roots in, and its tempo has sunk to about 1% of cap, so even its once-large SPD lead over its own initiative flattens out and it acts last against almost anything younger.

Weaknesses & Resistances

As a perennial herb, common stinging pink sits in the Competitor succession group. It hits Ruderal plants (annual forbs, grasses, aquatics, bulbs) for ×1.5 and takes only ×0.667 from them; it is weak to Specialist plants (succulents, conifers, ferns, epiphytes), which strike it for ×1.5 while resisting its blows. Against other Competitors and the off-wheel Weird group the matchup is neutral. See Weaknesses & Resistances.

Gameplay uses

Play common stinging pink as a native buffer and patient cruiser: bench it for the HP cushion and overshield, or lead with it to heal through a long exchange and out-pace a fading opener. Its damage is modest, so it works better as support than as a finisher. On economy, it is inedible, so any nutrient you feed it banks ×1.25 XP as a growth boost rather than paying coins. It fights as a slow-starting cruiser whose bulk takes over as it levels, crossing over around level 13 — but it is always stronger at higher levels in raw stats, so there is no reason to hold it back.