Zanthoxylum americanum
A native-only shrub that plays as a defensive buffer.
The Prickly ash is a shrub in Supplant. It is native to Eastern North America and Western North America 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.
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. Snarl is the starter attack, available from level 1 for 2 Sun. The free once-per-battle ability, Bramble Barrier, unlocks at level 25: A wall of thorns — the foe withers against it. The advanced attack, Hedgerow Havoc, comes online at level 40 for 6 Sun — The whole hedgerow comes down on the bench.
Its attacks land for about 30 (starter) and 27 (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.
Prickly ash holds two working traits. Extrafloral Nectaries (level 10) recruits a guard that takes 3% of any attacker's own max HP, ignoring DEF and shields — a chemical echo of the physical armament the plant is named for. Sapromyophily (level 68) then pulls single-victim picks onto it and away from the bench. See Abilities.
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.
At the snapshot level (40) it reads roughly HP 103, DEF 13, with a retreat cost of 16 Sun and tempo pips of 51 initiative / 34 SPD. Its DEF sits in the firm shrub band — better than a weed, well short of a tree. 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.
It firms into a solid mid-armor bruiser: DEF around 28 and HP toward 190 — tougher than a weed, still short of a tree. 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.
In the succession wheel it is a Competitor. It hits Ruderal plants (annual forbs, grasses, aquatics and bulbs) for extra damage (×1.5), and takes extra damage from Specialist plants (succulents, conifers, ferns and epiphytes). Against its own group and the off-wheel "Weird" categories it is neutral. See the type chart.
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 shrub sits in the middle of the armor table — firmer than a weed, nowhere near a tree. It is a serviceable mid-line body rather than a carry. It is edible (the game tags the fruit as the eaten part), so feeding it the matching Phosphorus fertilizer pays ×1.25 coins — a steady earner between battles; any other nutrient banks ×1.25 XP instead. 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 28, after which its power takes over. It is monotonically stronger the higher it goes, so there is never a 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.