Physalis philadelphica
Mexican groundcherry (Physalis philadelphica) is a fast-cycling annual weed and annual forb card in Supplant — a native buffer and invasive attacker in the Ruderal succession group.
Mexican groundcherry is a fast-cycling annual weed in Supplant, fielded in the annual forb category. Native to Eastern North America, Western North America and South America, where it plays as a defensive buffer, it is also invasive in Africa, East Asia, Europe and Oceania, where it turns into an attacker. Its nativity — set by the arena region you fight in — is the spine of how it plays; see Nativity.
Its kit unlocks in three stages, and most cards you own sit well below the level where all three are live (the numbers on this page are read at level 40, where every slot is unlocked). See Moves and Abilities.
None of its attacks carry the initiative rider, so it never seizes a turn on a killing blow — it takes its turns in the normal order.
A card keeps at most two always-on traits, one per riser, and the rest of its category pool is dropped. This one holds:
See Abilities.
For field gear, a Calcium/Magnesium soil amendment adds flat DEF, worth more on a plant this soft than any single point of its own. Its growth habit is not a climbing or epiphytic one, so it does not take a Moss Pole.
Read at level 40: it carries 103 HP as a native and 89 as an invasive, with 22 and 33 ATK respectively, on 2 DEF (almost no armour). Mexican groundcherry's attack identity is built from how widely it spreads, with an added introduced-range term when invasive, so the invasive ATK reads higher — compare the two numbers for the real gap. As a native it gains a +15% HP cushion; as an invasive it pays "Faustian" self-damage to its own bench on every damaging attack and concedes 2 prizes when knocked out. Benched as a native, it projects part of the segmented green HP overshield onto your active plant, sized by how threatened this species is; that shield drains front-first against direct hits but is bypassed by poison, recoil and splash. Damage is diminishing armour — a hit scales by ATK ÷ (ATK + DEF), and poison ignores DEF entirely. On Sun (cap 120, refilling in real time), the starter costs 2 and the advanced attack 6; retreating costs 16 Sun.
It is quicker off the mark than it is in a long fight: its initiative (50, which sets turn 1) outreads its sustained speed (34, which sets turn 2 onward), so it wants to land an early blow and does not win drawn-out exchanges on tempo.
Grown to level 100, its HP climbs to 190 while DEF only inches up to 3 — biomass swells but armour stays soft, so it hardens as a bigger target rather than a tougher one. Retreat rises to 33 Sun, and its early tempo edge has faded to about its 1% floor by the cap.
It belongs to the Ruderal succession group. As a ruderal it presses succession Specialists — succulents, conifers, ferns and epiphytes — for ×1.5 damage, and is softened to ×0.667 against Competitors (perennial herbs, vines, shrubs and broadleaf trees). Weird-group plants are neutral both ways. There is no type effectiveness beyond this wheel; see Weaknesses & Resistances.
Play it as a native buffer — bench it behind a heavier active to lend the overshield, or field it and lean on its HP cushion — and as an invasive attacker where the region makes it one, pushing its higher invasive ATK while eating the Faustian bench cost. It is a middling card overall: fine for earning coins in single-player battles, but soft enough to want backup on the bench in a tougher fight. Its edible part is tagged, so feeding it the matching Phosphorus fertiliser pays ×1.25 coins; any other nutrient banks ×1.25 XP instead. See the N/P/K economy. It leans on its opening speed early and crosses onto a power footing around level 31, after which its accumulating HP and attack matter more than its fading turn-order edge. It still only gets stronger as it levels — turn order is about a 5% lever.
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.