Malus
A hard-hitting, thorned broadleaf tree that splashes the bench and shields your team, playable as a widely native card or a Southern-Hemisphere invader.
Apple is a heavy Broadleaf tree that fights as a hard-hitting, thorned front-liner. It is native across East Asia, Europe, Eastern and Western North America and South Asia, and invasive in Africa, Oceania and South America, so the arena can cast it either way — as a native buffer or as an invasive attacker (see nativity). It is one of the stronger trees in this set: real armor, a big invasive attack, contact thorns, and a starter that splashes the enemy bench.
Its starter attack, Acorn Drop, unlocks at level 1 and costs 2 Sun, dealing about 28 damage as a native and 31 as an invasive, and it splashes a little damage onto the target's benched plants as well. The free once-per-battle ability, Leaf Litter, arrives at level 25: Buries the ground in litter — the foe's whole bench withers. The advanced attack, Mast Bombard, unlocks at level 40 for 6 Sun (26 native / 29 invasive) and mends the plant as it strikes. Most of your apples sit well below level 40, where only the starter is available. None of its moves carry an initiative rider. See moves.
Apple keeps two working always-on traits. Thorns arrives at level 10 at full strength: attackers that strike it in melee take contact recoil, so hitting apple hurts. Mycorrhiza arrives at level 68 and heals a benched ally, but it triggers only about 60% of the time, so it is a bonus rather than a reliable clock. See abilities.
Apple carries the Thorns trait keyword, which punishes attackers with recoil damage each time they hit it. It is non-toxic: no poison rider and no hazard ring, but its thorns still bite. Its growth habit is terrestrial, so it is not eligible for a Moss Pole. As a native, defensive field gear deepens its wall and makes the thorns matter more; as an invasive, offensive gear presses its heavy attack.
At level 40 apple reads 103 HP as a native and 89 as an invasive, with ATK of 29 native versus 37 invasive — a large invasive jump that makes the invader hit very hard. DEF is 26, high for the broadleaf-tree band, so it shrugs off most hits. Its tempo is front-loaded: turn 1 runs on its initiative (47) and every turn after on its SPD (28), so it leads the first exchange but is out-paced later. Retreat costs 14 Sun. As a native it gains a +15% HP cushion and, while benched, projects an HP overshield bar onto your active; as an invasive it pays self-damage to its own bench on each damaging attack and concedes 2 prizes when knocked out. See Stats.
Matured to level 100, apple climbs to 190 HP native / 165 invasive and 54 / 73 ATK, and its DEF reaches 60 — a heavy armored wall, since a tree keeps converting growth into armor. Retreat rises to 28 Sun, and its tempo has sunk to roughly 1% of cap, so its fast start is gone; a mature apple acts late but hits hard and stands firm. Maturing buys a wall-plus-hammer at the cost of tempo.
As a broadleaf tree, apple is in the Competitor succession group. It hits Ruderal plants (annual forbs, grasses, aquatics, bulbs) for ×1.5 and is hit for only ×0.667 by 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.
Apple is a strong all-rounder. As an invasive it is a heavy hitter whose starter chips the enemy bench and whose thorns punish anyone who trades with it; as a native it is a durable wall that shields your team while still hurting attackers. It rewards a straightforward, front-line game plan. It is inedible in this card set, so any nutrient you feed it banks ×1.25 XP rather than coins, making it a steady growth-earner. It fights as a fast opener early and settles into a wall-plus-hammer as it levels, crossing over around level 20 — and higher levels only make it scarier, so keep leveling it.
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.