Queen of Cards

CARDIA (Shovel Knight: King of Cards)

• Fairly large target that isn't especially heavy (Rosalina's size, Mewtwo's weight)
• Grounded movement is lackluster, aerial movement is better but not outstanding
• Excels at stage control; specials and smashes fill parts of the stage with hitboxes, herding opponents to where Cardia wants them
• Normals generally aren't very fast, but several of them linger for a while, making it easier for Cardia to catch fighters who misstep while trying to avoid her bullet hell

- nspec: Play
With a flick of her wrist, Cardia causes one of the Joustus cards orbiting her body to spin rapidly and shoot forward. The card travels at a somewhat meandering pace--about as fast as ???. It does 1% damage and extremely low horizontal knockback, such that it will drag opponents along until the end of its path. Its path isn't particularly long, however, only being the length of a Battlefield platform. Once the card has reached this distance, it immediately stops, floating motionless in place for the briefest of moments before, in a puff of purple smoke, it instantly expands to the size of ???. This sudden transformation is also a hitbox, dealing 4% and weak, low-angled knockback that won't kill until absurdly high percentages. Landing any part of the actual projectile will basically guarantee that the last hit will connect as well. At point-blank range, the card will hit four times--three as it flies and one from the smoke poof--meaning the maximum damage it can net you is 7%. The startup on shooting the card is pretty quick, so this can make for a decent poking tool or a way to get someone off of you if they're right in your face. Hitting someone early enough into the card's flight can even set up for an easy combo into something like ???. It's still just a card, though, so it's rather small (before it grows, at least), only about as big as a Pokeball, making it somewhat tricky to hit with.

Of course, you're probably wondering what happens when the card stops moving, no? Well, once it's expanded, the card flips to reveal its face (the blank backside of card has been facing the screen up until this point). The face of the card depicts a random character from Shovel Knight; it could be an enemy, an NPC, a major character, or even Cardia herself! This is purely visual, however. When the card enters this state, if you hold B, Cardia will close her eyes and lower her head slightly as the card faintly glows purple. In this stance, inputting a cardinal direction will make Cardia quickly open her eyes, snap her head back up, and throw her arm out in the direction you chose, influencing the card to move in that direction as well! Cardia can enter and exit the card moving stance almost instantly, but her gesture does have some lag, albeit only about as much as Olimar's whistle. The properties of the card's movement, including its damage, knockback, distance, and speed, all depend on what type of card Cardia threw out.

• Standard
• Double
• Triple
• Bomb
• Conveyor
• Cascade
• Grave

- uspec: Crystal Flash
• Cardia detonates one of her crystals, causing an explosion of light that propels her a great distance
• The explosion is small but very powerful
• Cardia's herself is weaker than the flash, but still rather strong, and she travels pretty far
• It's a great recovery, but whichever crystal Cardia explodes cannot be used again for the rest of her stock