Gutierrezia texana
Texas broomweed (Gutierrezia texana) is a annual forb that plays a native buffer, with no introduced range to make it an attacker.
Texas broomweed is an annual forb — a fast, disposable weed with a hard finishing hit. It is native to 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, Colonize (unlocked at level 1, 2 Sun), has no fixed damage number — it hits harder each time it lands and ignores armor: Pioneer spread that ignores armor and hits harder each time it lands. Its once-per-battle ability, r-Selected Riot (level 25, free), is pure utility: All-out reproduction: +8 ATK and speed, kept. Its advanced attack, Ragweed Burst (level 40, 6 Sun), deals 46 native: An all-in burst of growth.
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, Ephemeral Bolt gives it bonus attack power while it is above half health, burning bright early and fading once it is worn down. From level 68, Ballistic Dispersal flings seed on the way down: when it is knocked out it chips every enemy still standing.
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 20 attack as a native, with 1 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 12 Sun. On tempo it opens at 31 initiative (which orders the first turn) and cruises at 44 speed (which orders every turn after). It is slow off the mark but relentless afterward — it often cedes the opening hit, then out-paces the foe from turn 2. 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 36, but its armor stays low (1 DEF) — it never becomes a wall, just a bigger version of the same soft plant. Retreat rises to 23 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, Texas broomweed's category (annual forb) belongs to the Ruderal group. Ruderal, Competitor, and Specialist form a wheel: Ruderal hits Specialist plants (succulents, conifers, ferns, and epiphytes) for 1.5× damage, and takes 1.5× from Competitor plants (perennial herbs, vines, shrubs, and broadleaf trees), resisting each the other way at about two-thirds. The off-wheel Weird categories are neutral both ways.
A weak but spiky card: almost no armor, but a strong late attack and a kept speed-and-attack buff from its ability. Use it to open or to finish a chipped foe, not to hold a line. Native-only, so it never plays the invader. 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 27, 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.