Ruellia ciliatiflora
A perennial herb built for the long game: it withers attackers, poisons through its ability, and gains ATK from turn 3 on; a native buffer or a grinding attacker where it has naturalised.
Hairyflower wild petunia (Ruellia ciliatiflora) is a Perennial herb in Supplant — a low, hairy-flowered herb. It is native to eastern and western North America and South America, and listed as invasive in South Asia, so it can hold both roles: a buffer at home and an attacker where it has naturalised.
Numbers below are read at Level 40, where every move in its kit has unlocked.
Its kit unlocks in three stages. The starter attack, Taproot Anchor, is available from Level 1 for 2 Sun, dealing 30 as a native and 31 as an invasive: Anchors deep and holds the foe with it.
The free ability, Allelochemical Priming (Level 25), costs no Sun because it is once per battle: Primes root chemistry — Poison the foe.
The advanced attack, Rhizome Lock (Level 40, 6 Sun), deals 22 native and 23 invasive: Locks the foe down underground and saps it. None of its moves carry the initiative rider, so it never seizes first strike — turn order runs on its tempo stats (see Stats). Most cards you meet are well below this Level 40 snapshot and unlock their kit slot by slot.
Every card keeps at most two always-on traits, drawn from its category pool with the rest dropped for good. This one keeps two, and both are working traits — there are no inert abilities in the game:
Each arrives at full strength on the riser shown, so for much of the card's climb it plays with only the earlier of the two; the second joins late.
It carries no Toxin or Thorns trait, so biting it inflicts no chemical or thorn recoil — the sting is its Bitter Principle trait, not a keyword. As a native it leans on a Calcium/Magnesium amendment and the bench overshield; as an invasive a Cloche helps it outlast its own Faustian self-damage while it grinds. It is not a climber, so a Moss Pole does nothing for it. See field gear and nativity.
Read at the Level 40 snapshot, its DEF is 4 and it retreats for 16 Sun — a perennial herb sits low-to-middling on DEF, firmer than a weed but no wall. Turn 1 is ordered by its initiative (35) and every turn after by its SPD (34); its opening and sustained tempo sit close together, so its turn order holds roughly steady. As a native it takes a +15% HP cushion (103 HP, 25 ATK) and, from the bench, projects an HP overshield onto your active. As an invasive it reads 89 HP and a harder 28 ATK, but pays Faustian self-damage to its own bench on every damaging attack and concedes 2 prizes when it is knocked out. The overshield is a bench-built ring: up to four green HP bars from benched natives (spent before base HP by direct damage, but bypassed by poison, recoil and splash) and up to two gold Sun bars from benched Network trees. See stats.
By Level 100 its DEF creeps up its modest band to 8 while HP grows toward 190; retreat rises to 33 Sun and its brisk early tempo sinks to roughly 1% of cap. It matures into a sturdier body that no longer strikes first.
It is a Competitor on the succession wheel: it crowds out Ruderals (annual forbs, grasses, aquatics and bulbs), hitting them ×1.5 and resisting their blows, but is outlasted by Specialists (succulents, conifers, ferns and epiphytes), which turn that ×1.5 against it. The Weird categories (carrion-aroids, carnivores, mycotrophs and vascular parasites) sit off the wheel and trade neutrally with it. See weaknesses & resistances and categories.
Built for a long fight. Bitter Principle withers attackers, Allelochemical Priming poisons the foe outright, and Vernalization Memory hands it +5 ATK from the third turn on, so it hits harder the longer it survives. Native, it is a durable, punishing buffer; invasive in South Asia, that late ATK ramp plus a harder base makes it a grinding attacker, though it pays Faustian self-damage to do it. It has no resolved edible part, so fertilizer banks ×1.25 XP, not coins. Its native crossover falls near Level 23 and its invasive near Level 26 — below, it trades on turn order; above, on bulk and attack — and it only strengthens as it levels.
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.