Puff-shroom
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—Puff-shroom in the original Plants vs. Zombies | ||
- For other uses, see Puff-shroom (disambiguation).
Puff-shroom is a recurring character within the Plants vs. Zombies franchise. Puff-shrooms are usually the first mushroom the player obtains and are quite weak, though they are completely free in return.
As of Plants vs. Zombies 3, Puff-shroom has appeared in five games.
Origins
Puff-shroom may be based on the purple-spored puffball, (Calvatia cyathiformis), a large edible saprobic species of Calvatia; and possibly the violet webcap (Cortinarius violaceus), also known as the violet cort, a fungus in the webcap genus Cortinarius native across the Northern Hemisphere.
His name is a combination of the word "puff," which means a short burst of breath or wind, referring to how he puffs little spores as his attack and the suffix "-shroom" referring to how he is a mushroom.
In the French translations, the name Puff-shroom is translated as "Champi-gnon," which is a pun on the words "champignon" (the French term for a mushroom) and "gnon" (a French argot term, meaning the act of punching).
History
Plants vs. Zombies
- Main article: Puff-shroom (PvZ)
In the original Plants vs. Zombies game, as well as Plants vs. Zombies: Journey to the West, a Chinese spin-off, Puff-shroom is the first mushroom to be obtained by the player. Being unlocked be beating Level 1-10.
Being introduced at the end of the Day levels, Puff-shroom costs zero sun to help overcome night areas' lack of naturally falling sunlight, allowing the player to have a ready offense while their sun production builds up more slowly than usual.
Puff-shroom attacks by firing spores at zombies ahead of him, these spores deal the same damage as Peashooter's peas, but Puff-shroom can only fire these spores three tiles ahead of him. Being a mushroom, however, Puff-shroom will fall asleep in during daytime levels unless waken up by a Coffee Bean effectively making him 25 sun cheaper than a Peashooter, with his inferior range making him non-preferable.
He has an aquatic counterpart, Sea-shroom, who is also a free mushroom, but has a much slower recharge due to there being fewer water spaces than ground tiles.
Plants vs. Zombies 2
- Main article: Puff-shroom (PvZ2)
Puff-shroom next appears in Plants vs. Zombies 2 where he has been drastically nerfed. He is still a free plant and even can stay awake no matter the world, but now he has a finite lifespan before he vanishes. If any Puff-shroom on-screen is fed Plant Food, not only will their timer reset, but they'll also activate the Plant Food of every other Puff-shroom on the screen, resetting their timers as well.
He is a member of the Ail-mint family, who lets him deal an additional 110 damage per spore, an additional 30 damage per spores from his Plant Food ability and last two extra minutes. His Plant Food effect not only unleashes 30 spores ahead of him, but resets his timer and activates the Plant Food effect of other Puff-shrooms on the lawn.
Witch Hazel can naturally transform zombies into more Puff-shrooms until she reaches level 7, where she'll turn them into Fume-shrooms instead.
Plants vs. Zombies: All Stars (China only) (Archived content)
- Main article: Spray Mushroom line
Puff-shroom appeared in the Chinese-exclusive turn-based game Plants vs. Zombies: All Stars as the first plant in the Mushroom line, evolving into Scaredy-shroom and then Fume-shroom. He attacked by stretching up and shooting spores at zombies.
His active ability was Spore Spray, which dealt damage to all enemies in their lane. His Soulmates were members of the Sunflower line for a damage boost and members of the Tree line or members of the Clover line and Corn line together for a boost to their critical hit chance.
Plants vs. Zombies Heroes
- Main article: Puff-Shroom (PvZH)
Puff-Shroom also appears in the turn-based mobile card game Plants vs. Zombies Heroes, once again costing 0
, having 1
/1
stats and the Team-Up trait, which allows another card to exist in the same lane as him.
Puff-Shroom used to be a Token card only before finally being added as an obtainable card in the Colossal Fossils set. Shroom for Two, Mushroom Grotto and Witch Hazel can all create Puff-Shroom without him being in the deck itself, making him a common mushroom the player will use and see in the game.
Plants vs. Zombies 3
- Main article: Puff-Shroom (PvZ3)
Puff-Shroom's most recent appearance is in Plants vs. Zombies 3. Here he works almost identically to his Plants vs. Zombies 2 counterpart, except he damages himself rather than having a natural timer. The player can overcome this by pairing Puff-Shroom with healing plants such as Aloe Vera.
His Plant Food ability is the same as it was in Plants vs. Zombies 2 while his Tacobility lets him fire three spores at a time along with removing his "timer".
Similar to Witch Hazel in the previous game, Fairy Ring Mushroom transforms zombies in a 3x3 area around her into Puff-Shrooms if she's the one who defeated them.
Gallery
Plants vs. Zombies Wiki has a gallery for Puff-shroom.
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Trivia
- Puff-shroom was considered to be added to the ill-fated Facebook exclusive game Plants vs. Zombies Adventures, but he ended up getting scrapped.
- It is likely that, because Magnet-shroom was reworked into Magnet Plant, it was believed that mushrooms wouldn't be able to work in Adventures' format and instead of letting all mushrooms be awake during the day, they were simply scrapped instead.
- Puff-shroom has never costed more than 0 sun, being one of the only plants who cost has stayed the same in all their appearances, even counting spin-offs.
- In the original Plants vs. Zombies game, as well as all Chinese spin-off games based on it, Puff-shrooms are the first mushroom obtained.
See also
- Sea-shroom
- Witch Hazel
- Fairy Ring Mushroom
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