Small cow wheat

Overview

The Small cow wheat is a vascular parasite in Supplant. It is native to East Asia and Europe and is recorded as invasive nowhere, so it plays purely as a defensive buffer: a card that shores up your team rather than an attacker.

Moves

Its kit fills in across three slots, and most of your copies will be well below the snapshot level of 40 where all three are live — the plant unlocks them as it grows. Sap Tap is the starter attack, available from level 1 for 2 Sun. The free once-per-battle ability, Grafting, unlocks at level 25: Grafts onto the host and draws: heal 35%, and the foe withers. The advanced attack, Haustorium Hostage, comes online at level 40 for 6 Sun — Haustoria sunk deep — the foe is held and bled.

Its attacks land for about 30 (starter) and 24 (advanced) at the snapshot level.

Turn order splits across two stats: initiative (51) decides who moves first on turn 1, and SPD (34) decides every turn after. This one is the quicker starter — it tends to land the opening blow on turn 1, then cede the pace as the fight wears on. See turn order for how the two interact.

Abilities

It reads Haustorial Drain from level 1, and a second passive, Sun-siphon, stacks on at level 10.

Haustorial Drain. When this parasite is knocked out, its haustoria pull one last draw of HP from the enemy active — damage that bypasses the overshield entirely. It turns its own death into a parting blow.

Sun-siphon. When it cannot cover a move from its own Sun bar it siphons the shortfall from its benched allies' Sun. This is a taker's mechanic — it funds its attacks off your own team rather than buffing itself — and it arrives weak, strengthening only as it matures.

Features

For field gear, a Calcium/Magnesium amendment adds flat DEF (most worthwhile on a bulky front-liner, least on a soft body), and the N/P/K fertilizers drive its economy (see Gameplay uses). This species is not Moss-Pole-eligible: that gear is keyed on a climbing growth habit (vine, epiphyte or hemiepiphyte), and its species record carries no growth-habit tag.

Stats

At the snapshot level (40) it reads roughly HP 103, DEF 10, with a retreat cost of 16 Sun and tempo pips of 51 initiative / 34 SPD. Its DEF sits in the soft-to-mid parasite band. As a native it gains a +15% HP cushion and, while benched, projects a green HP overshield bar onto your active — its whole role is defensive support. Sun refills at +1 every 15 minutes up to a cap of 120; an empty bar attack-locks the plant. From level 52 it regenerates Sun mid-battle, and a level 85 capstone drops its starter to free. See stats.

At Level 100

HP grows toward 190 while DEF settles in the soft-to-mid band (20). Retreat rises to 33 Sun (an older plant is more rooted and costlier to pull), and the inverted tempo has sunk to its floor by now — the fast opening it had as a seedling is gone, so a mature copy leans entirely on power rather than turn order.

Weaknesses & Resistances

Its category is off the succession wheel entirely, so it deals and takes neutral damage against every group — no type advantage in either direction. It lives or dies on raw stats and its kit, not the matchup chart.

Gameplay uses

Its only role is the native buffer: sit it on the bench to project an overshield, or field it as a body that soaks hits for your carries. A parasite that turns its own death into damage. It is off the succession wheel and soft-to-mid in armor — a spoiler and collection piece rather than a front-line carry. It is inedible in the game's economy, so any fertilizer you feed it banks ×1.25 XP rather than coins — useful as level fodder, not as a coin source. In the Total power gallery below you can watch it trade a fast-skirmisher opening for raw bulk as it levels: it leans on speed until about level 29, after which its power takes over. It is monotonically stronger the higher it goes, so there is never a reason to hold it back.