Kalmia buxifolia
A native-only evergreen shrub with the highest HP of the shrubs here and a slow opening, playing as a durable bench buffer.
Sand myrtle is a shrub card native to eastern North America and introduced nowhere, so it plays purely as a native buffer -- there is no attacker form, and the page reads through the native (or neutral base) profile. Its category places it in the Competitor succession group (see categories).
Numbers are read at the snapshot level 40, where every slot is unlocked.
The starter, Hedge Hammer, unlocks at Lv 1 and costs 2 Sun for 30: The whole hedge comes down on it — the foe weakens. The free once-per-battle ability, Thicket Formation, unlocks at Lv 25 and deals no damage: Closes into thicket — Bind, and the foe can't heal. The advanced attack, Sucker Punch, unlocks at Lv 40, costs 6 Sun for 33: Comes up from the roots before the foe sees it. No move carries the initiative rider. See moves.
This card keeps two always-on traits, one per riser. At Lv 10 it gains sclerophylly: its tough, hard leaves shave a flat 3 damage off every incoming direct attack, on top of whatever DEF absorbs. At Lv 68 lignotuber stacks on top, making it immune to Burn -- and a Burn that would land instead heals it for about 4% of its max HP, since a chaparral shrub is released by fire rather than spared. Below Lv 68 only the sclerophylly damage reduction is active.
It holds no Thorns, Toxin or Unpalatable contact trait, so attackers take no recoil for striking it. As a shrub it sits in a firmer DEF band, and a Calcium/Magnesium amendment (flat DEF) hardens it further. Its growth habit is not a climber, so it is not Moss Pole eligible. See field gear.
At 40 it reads 121 HP -- the highest of the shrubs in this batch -- on 20 ATK and a firm 11 DEF, with retreat at 13 Sun. Its opening initiative 22 is notably low, well under its sustained SPD 30, so it is a slow starter that picks up a little once the fight is underway; expect it to act second on turn 1 against most foes. As a native it carries a +15% HP cushion and, while benched, projects an HP overshield onto your active. It is invasive nowhere, so it never pays bench self-damage and concedes no extra prizes. See stats.
Fully grown, HP climbs toward 233 and DEF hardens to 21 -- a durable shrub, firmer than any herb here but short of a tree wall. ATK reaches 36, retreat rises to 26 Sun, and the inverted tempo sinks to roughly its 1% floor, leaving a slow but sturdy body.
As a shrub it is a Competitor: ×1.5 into Ruderal (annual forbs, grasses, aquatics, bulbs), resisted to ×0.667 by Specialists (succulents, conifers, ferns, epiphytes), neutral into other Competitors and the Weird group. See weaknesses & resistances.
Play it as a durable native buffer: high HP and firm DEF make it a good bench anchor for the overshield, and its Bind-and-block ability can stall a target while a faster teammate finishes up. Its low opening initiative means it usually eats the first hit, so pair it with something that strikes first. Its damage is only average, so it supports rather than carries. It is not edible, so fertilizer banks the ×1.25 XP boost rather than coins. On the total-power gallery its bulk is favored from a low level (about Lv 10) given a shrub's early size -- which edge dominates, not a reason to avoid leveling.
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.