California black oak

Overview

California black oak is slower off the mark than almost any other broadleaf tree: fewer than 1 in 50 broadleaf trees in the game sit as low as its initiative of 3 at Lv 40.

California black oak fights as a broadleaf tree (categories) in the Competitor succession group. It has no recorded native or invasive range, so it plays neutral wherever it turns up, with neither the native HP cushion nor the invasive attack edge (nativity).

Moves

Every card has three move slots (moves): a starter attack from Lv 1, a free once-per-battle ability from Lv 25 and an advanced attack from Lv 40. Damage is the expected hit at Lv 40, before the target's DEF and the succession wheel.

• Limb Lash — starter attack, 2 Sun. Two lashes from a heavy limb. Expected damage: 36.
• Stand Replacement — ability, free once per battle. A fire that takes the whole stand — the foe burns, and so do its neighbours.
• Deadfall — advanced attack, 6 Sun. The whole tree comes down. Expected damage: 40.

Always-on traits

Always-on traits arrive on two trait risers, Lv 10 and Lv 68, one trait on each; anything else its category offered is dropped for good (abilities).

• Tannin Load — from Lv 10. Every direct hit on it Withers the attacker by 2 ATK.
• Heartwood Core — from Lv 68. It gains up to +8 DEF, growing with its level — nothing at Lv 1, all of it at Lv 100.

Items and economy

• It is edible, so in a wild battle it earns 4 coins for every turn it spends on your team. It is eaten for its fruit or seeds, so a Phosphorus amendment raises those coins by 25%; an N/P/K amendment that doesn't match earns 25% more battle XP instead.
• A Ca/Mg amendment adds +2 DEF.

Stats

Every number here is the card without per-card genetics, which nudge HP, ATK, sustained tempo, initiative, retreat cost and DEF on the plant you actually own (stats). HP, ATK, DEF and retreat climb in a straight line from Lv 1 to Lv 100, while both tempo stats fall.

Stat	Lv 40	Lv 100
HP (neutral)	214	473
ATK (neutral)	17	30
DEF	60	146
Initiative	3	0.05
Sustained tempo (SPD)	19	0.31
Retreat cost (Sun)	23	50

• DEF is diminishing armour: a hit is scaled by ATK ÷ (ATK + DEF), so a strong attacker pushes through armour a weak one can't, and Poison ignores DEF entirely.
• Tempo: initiative decides who acts first on turn 1 and sustained tempo decides every turn after; it opens slower than it cruises. In a wild battle, a tie goes to you. Both fall as it grows, and by Lv 100 every plant is down to a fraction of a point — which is why the Lv 100 tempo column reads in decimals while the rest are whole numbers.
• Retreat: switching it out costs 23 Sun at Lv 40, and after it enters the active slot it must stay 2 turns before it can switch out.
• Sun is what attacks cost. Its bar holds 120, and an empty bar leaves it unable to attack, though its free ability still works.
• Refilling: out of battle it regains one Sun every 15 minutes at Lv 1, rising to 3 times that pace by Lv 45. Above Lv 52 it also regains Sun during battle, up to 4 a turn at Lv 100, and from Lv 85 its starter attack is free and its advanced attack costs 2 Sun.

Hardiness

USDA zone 6, per Trees and Shrubs Online (Coombes & Cameron 2026) — it should come through winters that bottom out near -23 °C. Colder than that and it wants shelter, a wall, or a winter indoors. The zone comes from a regression with an error of about one full zone, so treat it as a guide rather than a promise.

Its measured range runs from a cold edge of -0.7 °C to a warm edge of 23.8 °C, in the temperate band. These are not the same kind of number as the zone above, which is why they look so far apart: the cold edge is how cold the coldest month typically gets across the places it grows, while a hardiness zone is quoted on the extreme annual low, and that runs far below any month's figure. The card's climate chip compares this measured range with where the player is standing, and the only thing it affects is battle XP.

Chip	Meaning	Battle XP
Thrives here	the local winter low and summer heat both sit inside its range	×2
In range	it survives here, but near one of its edges	×1.25
Colder than its range	winters here go below what it tolerates	no bonus
Hotter than its range	summers here run past its warm edge	no bonus

Succession matchups

California black oak is in the Competitor group (weaknesses and resistances). Its hits land at ×1.5 on Ruderal plants (annual forbs, grasses, aquatic plants and bulbs) and at ×0.67 on Specialist plants (succulents, conifers, ferns and epiphytes). In return, Specialist plants hit it at ×1.5 and Ruderal plants at ×0.67. Everything else is neutral.

Playing it

• Neutral everywhere, it brings its base stats, its kit and its traits, with no stance bonus either way.
• Over its life, its power leads its tempo from Lv 1, so it plays as a heavyweight from the start. The Total power gallery below shows each crossover, with the card at that level and fully grown.