Nothoscordum × borbonicum
A soft, low-damage bulb that poisons on its opening hit and pools defence from its benched ruderals, playing either arena role — a South American native or an Old World invader.
Fragrant false garlic is a slender Bulb that fights as a poisoning skirmisher: it leaves its target poisoned on the opening hit and borrows armor from the ruderals behind it, but its own damage is low. It is native to South America and invasive across Africa and Europe, so the arena can field it either way — as a native buffer or as an invasive attacker — though it is a weak card in raw power.
Its starter attack, Triple Nose, unlocks at level 1 for 2 Sun, dealing about 48 damage as a native and 57 as an invasive and leaving the target poisoned. The free once-per-battle ability, Spring Ephemeral, arrives at level 25: Up and flowering before the canopy closes — a burst of speed, kept. The advanced attack, Forcing Function, unlocks at level 40 for 6 Sun (31 native / 34 invasive) and splashes damage onto the enemy bench as it strikes. Most of your false garlic sit below level 40, where only the starter is unlocked. None of its moves carry an initiative rider. See Moves.
Fragrant false garlic keeps two always-on traits. Duff Stuff arrives on the level 10 riser: while it is your active plant its effective DEF rises by half the summed DEF of your alive benched ruderals — annual forbs, grasses, aquatics, and bulbs. It is recomputed live, so the bonus shrinks as those allies faint, and the donors keep their own DEF; it is a genuine, always-on defence, not a chance-based one. Resprout arrives later, on the level 68 riser, and lets false garlic survive one otherwise-lethal hit at roughly a quarter of its health — but it fires only about 60% of the time, so treat it as a lucky reprieve rather than a guarantee. See Abilities.
Fragrant false garlic is non-toxic as a trait — despite the poison its opening move applies, it holds no Toxin trait, so it has no contact recoil and touching it costs an attacker nothing. Its habit is terrestrial, so it is not eligible for a Moss Pole. As a native, defensive field gear — a Cloche, or a calcium or magnesium amendment for a little DEF — shores up its thin armor; as an invasive, offensive gear pushes its aggression. See statuses.
At level 40 false garlic reads 103 HP native and 89 invasive, with ATK of 15 native versus 23 invasive — the invasive gap is real, but its raw attack is low in both roles, which is the plainest reason it is a weak card. DEF is just 2, at the soft floor of the bulb band, so on its own it takes hits with almost no armor and relies on the Duff Stuff pool instead. Its tempo is very uneven: turn 1 runs on a low initiative (13) and every turn after on a much higher SPD (34), so it is badly out-paced on the opening exchange but relentless once the fight settles. Retreat costs 16 Sun. As a native it gains a +15% HP cushion and, while benched, projects an HP overshield onto your active; as an invasive it pays Faustian self-damage to its own bench on each damaging attack and concedes 2 prizes when knocked out. See Stats.
Matured to level 100, false garlic swells to 190 HP native / 165 invasive and 25 / 44 ATK, but its DEF only reaches 3 — as a soft bulb it buys bulk in health and almost none in armor, so it stays exposed to any real hitter and depends on the benched-ruderal pool for real toughness. Retreat rises to 33 Sun, and its tempo has sunk to about 1% of cap, so a mature card acts last against almost anything younger.
As a ruderal, false garlic sits in the Ruderal succession group. It hits Specialist plants (succulents, conifers, ferns, epiphytes) for ×1.5 and takes only ×0.667 from them; it is weak to Competitor plants (perennial herbs, vines, shrubs, broadleaf trees), which strike it for ×1.5 while resisting its blows. Against other Ruderals and the off-wheel Weird group the matchup is neutral. See Weaknesses & Resistances.
Play Fragrant false garlic as a poison-and-chip skirmisher: keep a couple of live ruderals behind it so Duff Stuff holds its armor up, poison the enemy active with the opener, and once the advanced attack is online, splash the enemy bench while the poison ticks. Its damage is low, so it wins by attrition, not force — as a native it is a fine buffer that stiffens while your other weeds are alive, and as an invasive its higher ATK only slightly widens that. On economy, false garlic is inedible, so any nutrient you feed it banks ×1.25 XP toward faster growth rather than coins. It plays as a slow-opening, fast-cruising skirmisher that leans harder on its bulk as it levels, crossing over around level 14 as a native and 17 as an invasive — but it is always stronger at higher levels, 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.