Poa nemoralis
A grass whose pioneer starter ignores armor and ramps with every hit, played as a broad native buffer across the Old World and North America or an invasive attacker in Oceania and South America.
Wood meadowgrass is a fast-cruising Grass whose opening attack is a pioneer-spread move that ignores armor and grows stronger each time it lands. It is native across Africa, East Asia, Europe, Eastern and Western North America and South Asia, and invasive in Oceania and South America, so the arena can field it either way — as a native buffer or an invasive attacker.
Its starter attack, Stab, unlocks at level 1 for 2 Sun; it is a pioneer-spread move that ignores the target's armor and has no fixed damage number — it hits harder each time it lands. The free once-per-battle ability, Tillering, arrives at level 25: Throws new shoots from the crown: +4 ATK and speed, kept. It is a mid-fight boost. The advanced attack, Creeping Runner, unlocks at level 40 for 6 Sun, dealing about 36 damage as a native and 38 as an invasive in a clean hit. Most of your wood meadowgrass sit below level 40, where only the starter is unlocked. None of its moves carry an initiative rider. See Moves.
Wood meadowgrass keeps two always-on traits. Allelopathy arrives on the level 10 riser and projects a wilt aura onto the enemy active, wearing it down each turn. Spore-drift arrives on the level 68 riser and chips the enemy bench, spreading damage past the front. Both are always on once unlocked. See Abilities.
It is non-toxic and holds no Toxin trait, so it deals no contact recoil to attackers. Its habit is terrestrial, so it is not eligible for a Moss Pole. As a native, defensive field gear such as a Cloche or a calcium/magnesium amendment offsets its paper-thin armor; as an invasive, offensive gear pushes its attack. See statuses.
At level 40 wood meadowgrass reads 103 HP native and 89 invasive, with ATK of 29 native versus 33 invasive — a real gap in the invader's favor. DEF is just 1, at the floor of the grass band, so it soaks hits with almost no armor. Its tempo is lopsided: it is out-paced turn 1 by its low initiative (40) but turns relentless afterward on a much higher SPD (56), a slow starter and a fast cruiser. Retreat costs 12 Sun. As a native it gains a +15% HP cushion and projects a benched 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, wood meadowgrass swells to 190 HP native / 165 invasive and 55 / 65 ATK, but its DEF only reaches 1 — as a soft grass it gains bulk in health and none in armor. Retreat rises to 24 Sun, and its tempo has sunk to about 1% of cap, so even this fast cruiser acts last against almost anything younger.
As a grass, wood meadowgrass 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, shrubs, broadleaf trees), which strike it for ×1.5 while resisting its blows. Against other Ruderal plants and the off-wheel Weird group the matchup is neutral. See Weaknesses & Resistances.
Play wood meadowgrass as a wearing-down piece: its pioneer starter ignores armor and ramps, its wilt aura grinds the enemy active, and its spore-drift nibbles the bench, so it wins by accumulation rather than a big hit. As an invasive its higher ATK sharpens that pressure at the cost of self-damage and conceded prizes; as a native it is a steady buffer that chips while it shields the team. On economy, it is inedible, so any nutrient you feed it banks ×1.25 XP toward faster growth rather than coins. It plays as a slow-starting, fast-cruising skirmisher leaning harder on its bulk as it levels, crossing over around level 33 as a native and 36 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.