Gymnocladus dioicus
A durable broadleaf-tree wall and nitrogen-fixing legume, native to eastern North America (with a large overshield from its Vulnerable status) and invasive in East Asia and Europe.
Kentucky coffee tree is a broadleaf-tree and a Competitor — an armored wall that trades speed for durability. It is native to eastern North America (buffer role) and invasive in East Asia and Europe (attacker role). Because it is a Vulnerable species, its rarity makes it project an unusually large overshield when benched native (see Stats).
It opens with Branch Slam at level 1 for 2 Sun, dealing 34 native / 37 invasive. At level 25 it gains Canopy Recruitment — Pushes a sapling into the canopy: heal 35% and +3 ATK.. Its advanced attack, Forest Fire, unlocks at level 40 for 6 Sun, striking for 34 / 37 and healing as it hits. No move carries an initiative rider.
It keeps two canopy traits. Network comes online at level 10: while benched, it contributes a gold Sun overshield bar to your active regardless of nativity. Mycorrhiza stacks on at level 68 — a bench-heal that, like all sustain, triggers about 60% of the time. Together they make it a strong support card from the bench even when it is not the one fighting.
As a tree it is naturally armored (see Stats). It carries no thorns and no toxin trait, and is not a climber, so no Moss Pole. A calcium/magnesium amendment pushes its already-high DEF higher, the pick for leaning fully into the wall role.
At level 40 it reads 103 / 89 HP, 24 / 32 ATK, and a firm 23 DEF that keeps climbing with level. Opening tempo is 36 but sustained tempo is only 21: a vigorous seedling that lands the first hit and is then out-paced — a classic quick-starter, slow-cruiser tree. Native it carries a 15% HP cushion and, thanks to its Vulnerable rarity, projects a large HP overshield onto your active while benched; invasive it hits harder, pays Faustian self-damage each attack, and concedes 2 prizes on a knockout. Retreat costs 13 Sun.
By level 100 it hardens into a genuine wall: DEF reaches 53 on its wood density, HP climbs to 190 native / 165 invasive, and ATK to 43 / 63. Retreat rises to 26 Sun as it roots down, and its already-slow tempo has all but vanished. Maturing turns it into a durable, hard-hitting anchor — the cost is that it moves last.
As a Competitor it deals 1.5× to Ruderals (annual-forb, grass, aquatic, bulb) and takes 1.5× from Specialists (succulent, conifer, fern, epiphyte), resisting Ruderal hits at 0.667×; Weird is neutral. Its real weakness is poison, which ignores DEF entirely and so bypasses everything that makes it a wall.
This is a strong card in both roles: native, a bench support that stacks an HP overshield and a Sun overshield onto your active and heals the bench; invasive, a durable attacker that is hard to remove. As a legume (Fabaceae), one in four caught in the wild arrives with the Nitrogen amendment already applied — a free head start worth a few hundred coins, though it occupies a soil slot and decomposes after about a month. Inedible, so fertilizer banks ×1.25 XP. Being bulk-rich, it is power-favoured from a low level (around 14); level it up freely, as its wall only gets better.
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.