Pilosella aurantiaca
A soft Competitor herb that punches well above its DEF as an invasive attacker, self-heals, and clings to life through Resprout once mature.
Orange Hawkweed is a perennial-herb, one of the Competitor categories. It is native to East Asia and Europe and invasive in eastern and western North America, Oceania and South America - so it fills both roles: a native HP buffer, or a hard-hitting invasive attacker depending on the arena. See categories for what a perennial-herb is built to do.
Its kit unlocks in three stages. Crown Split is the starter attack from Lv 1 at 2 Sun, striking from two crowns for 42 native or 50 invasive. Perennating Bud is the free once-per-battle ability at Lv 25: Breaks a stored bud: heal 40%. It deals no damage but heals 40%. Taproot Canal is the advanced attack at Lv 40 for 6 Sun, draining the foe for 26 native or 30 invasive. No move carries an initiative rider, so it acts in the normal order.
From its trait schedule it keeps two always-on traits. Basal-Rosette arrives at Lv 10: a low, ground-hugging rosette that grants a flat +3 DEF, always on. Resprout stacks on at Lv 68: a save that lets it survive one otherwise-lethal hit at roughly 25% HP, but it triggers only about 60% of the time, so treat it as a coin-flip-plus reprieve, never a guarantee. At the snapshot level of 40 it has only Basal-Rosette; Resprout is still ahead of it.
It carries no special combat keywords and is not toxic or thorny. It is not a climber, so it is not Moss Pole eligible. Its field gear picks split by role: as a native, a Calcium/Magnesium amendment shores up its paper DEF; as an invasive attacker, an aggressive amendment presses its already-high ATK.
At Lv 40 its native card shows 103 HP (with the +15% cushion) and 23 ATK; its invasive card trades the cushion for a much heavier 89 HP and 35 ATK, a large jump that marks it as a real attacker. DEF is floor-tier at 1 either way, and retreat costs 12 Sun. Its tempo favors the long game: initiative 29 orders turn 1 while a higher SPD 40 orders the rest, so it is a slow starter but a fast cruiser. The invasive card pays Faustian self-damage to its own bench on every damaging attack (growing as it levels) and concedes 2 prizes when it is knocked out; the native card instead projects an overshield bar from the bench.
HP climbs to 190 native or 165 invasive, and its ATK caps at 42 native or 72 invasive - the invasive edge, deferred onto the cap, is fully paid off by now. DEF barely moves, ending at 1: a soft herb swells in biomass but never in armor. Retreat rises to 23 Sun and its tempo falls to roughly one percent of cap, so the fast-cruiser edge it had at Lv 40 is gone.
Perennial-herb is a Competitor category. Competitors crowd out Ruderals, dealing x1.5 to annual-forbs, grasses, aquatics and bulbs, but are outlasted by Specialists, taking x1.5 from succulents, conifers, ferns and epiphytes. Damage is even against other Competitors and the neutral Weird group.
As an invasive this is a strong glass-cannon attacker: high ATK, a hefty Crown Split, a draining advanced move, and a 40% self-heal to extend its stay, all riding on almost no DEF - so it hits hard but folds to a solid counter-hit, and the Faustian self-damage nibbles your own bench. As a native it is a softer buffer. Either way, Resprout at Lv 68 makes it stubborn to finish about 60% of the time. It is not edible, so any fertilizer banks x1.25 XP rather than coins, which suits leveling it toward that Resprout. It plays as a fast skirmisher until roughly Lv 25 as an invasive (Lv 24 native), after which its bulk and attack take the lead from its tempo.
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.