Paeonia peregrina
A native-only European perennial herb that starts slow but cruises relentlessly, mends itself mid-fight, and can survive a lethal blow.
Scarlet peony is a leafy Perennial herb that fights as a patient staller: cheap hits, a mid-fight heal, and a chance to cling to life. It is native to Europe and invasive nowhere, so the arena only ever fields it as a native buffer for your bench. It is a solid, unspectacular support card — durable and self-sustaining, but light on damage — that wants a stronger hitter beside it.
Its starter attack, Herbal Draught, unlocks at level 1 for 2 Sun and lands a reliable, even strike for about 28 damage. The free once-per-battle ability, Autogenic Reaction, arrives at level 25: Remakes its own ground: +6 ATK and heal 25%. — a mid-fight mend that stretches its longevity. The advanced attack, Winterkill, unlocks at level 40 for 6 Sun (25 damage) and draws on its deep roots for a heavier blow. Most of your peonies sit below level 40, where only the starter is unlocked. None of its moves carry an initiative rider, so it never seizes a turn. See Moves.
Scarlet peony keeps a single always-on trait, Resprout. Because it draws only one eligible trait, Resprout arrives at half strength on the level 10 riser and matures on the level 68 one. When it works it lets the peony 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 coin-flip reprieve rather than a guarantee. See Abilities.
Scarlet peony carries no trait keywords — no thorns, no toxin, no spore chemistry — so nothing punishes an attacker for striking it; it is non-toxic, so nothing chemical bites back. Its growth habit is terrestrial, so it is not eligible for a Moss Pole. As a native, defensive field gear — a Cloche, or a calcium/magnesium amendment for a little extra DEF — suits its stalling game.
At level 40 scarlet peony reads 103 HP and 20 ATK. DEF is just 4, at the soft floor of the perennial-herb band, so it takes hits with almost no armor and relies on its healing instead. Its tempo is back-loaded: a low initiative (25) means it is slow off the mark and often takes the first hit, but a higher SPD (34) lets it out-pace foes from turn 2 on, so it grows more dangerous the longer a fight runs. Retreat costs 16 Sun. As a native it gains a +15% HP cushion and, while benched, projects an HP overshield onto your active. See Stats.
Matured to level 100, scarlet peony swells to 190 HP and 36 ATK, but its DEF only reaches 8 — as a soft herb it gains bulk in health and almost none in armor, so it stays vulnerable to any real hitter and leans on Resprout and its heal to survive. Retreat rises to 33 Sun as it roots in, and its tempo has sunk to about 1% of cap, so even its SPD advantage over its own initiative barely registers by then.
As a perennial herb, scarlet peony sits in the Competitor succession group. It hits Ruderal plants (annual forbs, grasses, aquatics, bulbs) for ×1.5 and takes only ×0.667 from 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.
Play scarlet peony as a native buffer and patient staller: bench it to lend a fragile hitter the HP cushion and overshield, or lead with it to heal through a long exchange and out-cruise a fading opener. Its damage is modest, so it works better as support than as a finisher. On economy, it is inedible, so any nutrient you feed it banks ×1.25 XP as a growth boost rather than paying coins. It fights as a slow-starting skirmisher whose bulk and staying power take over as it levels, crossing over around level 20 — but it is always stronger at higher levels in raw stats, 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.