Solidago bicolor
A native-only perennial herb built around double healing and a survival trait — a soft, self-mending buffer.
Silverrod is a soft Perennial herb that fights as a self-mending staller: two of its slots heal and a survival trait can hold it up. It is native to eastern North America, and the arena only ever casts it as a native — no invasive card exists — so it plays purely as a buffer for your bench. It is a fragile but sticky card that wins time rather than fights.
Its starter attack, Bitter Sap, unlocks at level 1 and costs 2 Sun, dealing a plain hit of about 30 damage. The free once-per-battle ability, Alkaloid Reservoir, comes in at level 25: Empties a season of alkaloids into the foe — saturating Poison. The advanced attack, Deep Root Strike, unlocks at level 40 for 6 Sun (43 damage) and mends the plant as it strikes. Most of your silverrod sit below level 40, where only the starter is available. None of its moves carry an initiative rider, so it never seizes a turn.
Silverrod keeps a single always-on trait: Resprout. It draws only one eligible trait, so Resprout arrives at half strength on the level 10 riser and matures on the level 68 one. When it works it lets the plant survive one otherwise-lethal hit at roughly a quarter health — but it triggers only about 60% of the time, so treat it as a coin-flip reprieve rather than a guarantee. See Abilities.
It carries no special trait keywords, so nothing punishes an attacker for hitting it. It is non-toxic: no contact recoil, no hazard ring. Its growth habit is terrestrial, so it is not eligible for a Moss Pole. With DEF at the floor, HP-boosting field gear best extends its stalling game.
At level 40 silverrod reads 103 HP and 25 ATK. Because it is native-only, there is no invasive variant — the arena never casts it as an attacker. DEF is just 1, at the soft floor of the perennial-herb band, so it takes hits with almost no armor. Its tempo is even but slightly back-loaded: turn 1 runs on its initiative (46) and every turn after on a higher SPD (50), so it is out-paced early and steadier later. Retreat costs 12 Sun. As a native it gains a +15% HP cushion and, while benched, projects an HP overshield bar onto your active. See Stats.
Matured to level 100, silverrod grows to 190 HP and 44 ATK, but its DEF only reaches 1 — as a soft herb it gains bulk in health, never armor, so it stays vulnerable to any real hitter. Retreat rises to 23 Sun, and its tempo has sunk to roughly 1% of cap, so a mature silverrod acts last against almost anything young.
As a perennial herb, silverrod is in the Competitor succession group. It hits Ruderal plants for x1.5 and is hit for only x0.667 by them; it is weak to Specialist plants, which strike it for x1.5 while resisting its blows. Against other Competitors and the off-wheel Weird group the matchup is neutral. See Weaknesses & Resistances.
Play silverrod as a cheap, self-healing time-buyer: its double heal and Resprout let it soak turns while your real hitter recovers, and its bench overshield props up a fragile partner. Its damage is only fair, so it supports rather than finishes. Its economy is growth-only — it is inedible, so any nutrient you feed it banks x1.25 XP rather than coins, making it an XP investment. It fights as an even, sticky skirmisher and leans on its bulk as it levels, crossing over around level 34 — and 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.