Geranium phaeum
A European perennial herb that fights as a self-healing native staller, trading a poison opener for a long war of attrition.
Dusky crane's-bill is a shade-loving Perennial herb that fights as a durable, self-healing staller. It is native to Europe and has no invasive form, so the arena only ever fields it as a native buffer for your bench. It is a solid but unspectacular card: modest damage, thin armor, and a habit of clinging to life through long fights. Lean on it to buy time, not to close games. See nativity.
Its starter attack, Herbal Draught, unlocks at level 1 and costs 2 Sun for about 29 damage, leaving the target poisoned so it keeps losing health over the next turns — see statuses. The free once-per-battle ability, Chronosequence, arrives at level 25: Time on its side: +3 ATK and speed, kept. Its advanced attack, Perennial Problem, unlocks at level 40 for 6 Sun (42 damage) and mends the plant as it strikes. Most of your specimens sit below level 40, where only the starter is available. See moves.
Dusky crane's-bill keeps a single always-on trait: Resprout. It draws only one eligible trait, so Resprout comes in 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 health, but it triggers only about 60% of the time, so treat it as a coin-flip reprieve rather than a guarantee. See abilities.
It carries no trait keywords — no thorns, no toxin — so nothing punishes an attacker for hitting it, and it is non-toxic with no hazard ring. Its growth habit is terrestrial, so it is not eligible for a Moss Pole. As a native, general defensive field gear such as a Cloche or a Ca/Mg amendment for a little extra DEF suits its stalling game.
At level 40 it reads 103 HP with 23 ATK; there is no invasive form, so it has only the one attack line. DEF is just 4, low in the perennial-herb band, so it takes hits with almost no armor. Its tempo is uneven: turn 1 runs on a low initiative (13), so it is out-paced off the mark, but every turn after runs on a higher SPD (34), so it grows relentless as a fight drags on. 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.
Matured to level 100 it swells to 190 HP and 40 ATK, but its DEF only reaches 8 — as a soft herb it gains bulk in health, never armor, so it stays vulnerable to any real hitter. Retreat rises to 33 Sun and its tempo sinks to roughly 1% of cap, so a mature plant acts last against almost anything younger. Maturing buys staying power through HP and healing, not toughness.
As a perennial herb it sits in the Competitor succession group. It hits Ruderal plants (annual forbs, grasses, aquatics, bulbs) for x1.5 and is struck for only x0.667 by them; it is weak to Specialist plants (succulents, conifers, ferns, epiphytes), which hit it for x1.5 while resisting its blows. Against other Competitors and the off-wheel Weird group the matchup is neutral. See Weaknesses & Resistances.
Play it as a cheap, self-healing native filler that trades evenly and buys time: park it behind a stronger hitter, where the HP cushion and bench overshield help a fragile attacker survive while the crane's-bill wears the enemy down with poison and mends itself. It is a support piece, not a finisher. Its value is also economic: it is inedible, so any nutrient banks x1.25 XP rather than coins, giving you a steady growth-fund. It fights as a slow-opening skirmisher whose bulk takes over as it levels, crossing over around level 12 — but it is always stronger in raw stats higher up, so there is no reason to hold it back.
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.