Garden Ops

Garden Ops is a mode in Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare. This mode is similar to base defense from classic first person shooter games. Garden Ops consists of one to four players working as a team to defeat ten waves of zombies while defending their Garden. In the beginning of the mode, the team chooses their plants. After that, the team can choose one of three spots to plant their Garden. There will a chance that a Golden Garden can be planted, giving a Bonus when successfully defended. Once the Garden is planted and after the timer goes to 0:00, the game starts. Plant Pots can be found near the Garden, allowing players to plant Spawnable Plants for defensive support. After each wave, players have ten seconds for a break, to heal or to plant Plant Pots. Every so often, special waves will occur. On the fifth and tenth waves, boss waves occur. Super waves only occur on the tenth wave (excluding Tombstone waves). After the garden is defended, players must get to the landing zone to escape.

Game description
Plant a garden and protect it from the Zombies until Crazy Dave returns.

Maps

 * Suburban Flats
 * Chomp Town
 * Garden Center
 * Port Scallywag
 * Sharkbite Shores
 * Zomboss Estate
 * Jewel Junction (and its night variant)
 * Crash Course (and its night variant)

Zombies exclusive to this mode

 * Baron von Bats*
 * Berserker
 * Buckethead Pirate
 * Conehead Pirate
 * Disco Zombie*
 * Flag Pirate
 * Gargantuar*


 * Giga Gargantuar*
 * Giga Imp
 * Pirate Zombie
 * Steering Wheel Pirate
 * Treasure Yeti
 * Yeti Zombie*
 * Zombomb*


 * Note: Asterisks indicate a zombie that is a boss.

Special Waves
Special Waves appear randomly between the ten waves, except Waves 5 and 10. Each wave has special zombies that appear in these waves.

Types of Special Waves

 * Ambush: A surprise wave, skipping the break time. Consists of zombies that would regularly appear in the next wave, backed up with Camo Rangers.
 * Brain Freeze: Consists of Arctic Troopers and Yeti Imps.
 * Brainless Brigade: Consists of Flag Zombies and most varieties of the Foot Soldier.
 * Cone Company: Consists of only Conehead Zombies.
 * Fan Frenzy: Consists of only Exploding Imps.
 * Flame Retardant: Consists of only Welders.
 * For Science: Consists of most varieties of the Scientist.
 * Grumps: Consists of only Newspaper Zombies.
 * Goon Squad: Consists of Exploding Imps and most varieties of the All-Star.
 * Improvised Armor: Consists of multiple armored Zombies such as Buckethead Zombie, Newspaper Zombie, Screen Door Zombie, Coffin Zombie and Outhouse Zombie.
 * Legion of Boom: Consists of only Wrestling Stars.
 * Marathon: Consists of only Flag Zombies.
 * Safety First: Consists of Conehead Zombies and most varieties of the Engineer. Engineers have roadcones with STOP signs on them as their hats.
 * Sci-fi Action Theatre: Consists of Browncoat Zombies and Foot Soldiers that have been customized with the zomboss tech set and Astronauts with the science channel hat and Baseball Stars with the zombie mascot hat.
 * Sky Guys: Consists of only Sky Troopers.
 * Sneak Attack: Consists of Browncoat Zombies and Camo Rangers.
 * Tackle Dummies: Consists of only Berserkers.
 * The Dino King: Consists of Cricket Stars and one Paleontologist with increased health.
 * The Elder King: Consists of Scientists and Foot Soldiers that are customized to look like old men and one Golf Star with increased health.
 * The Garbage King: Consists of Dr. Toxics and one Sanitation Expert with increased health.
 * The Pyre Prince: Consists of Foot Soldiers and one Centurion with increased health.
 * The Z Team: Consists of Zombie Heroes such as Foot Soldiers, Engineers, Scientists, and All-Stars
 * They Hunger: Consists of Zombies with food-themed customizations.
 * Toilet Troubles: Consists of Plumbers, Outhouse Zombies and Newspaper Zombies.
 * Weed Whackers: Consists of only Landscapers.

Objectives
On the third and eighth waves, there is an objective that must be completed. The players will earn 125 coins if they complete it. The higher the difficulty, the more coins they will earn when completing these objectives. Sometimes, these objectives will appear along with a special wave.

Types of Objectives

 * Break the Vases: Players need to destroy all the vases in a limited amount of time.
 * Destroy All Tombstones: Destroy all Tombstones in a limited amount of time.
 * Hack the Triangulabobers: Players must hack the Triangulabobers in a limited amount of time or else an airstrike will be launched at the garden.
 * Hunt the Chieftains: Vanquish all three Chieftains before time runs out.
 * No Garden Damage: Get a perfect wave (the garden must not take any damage).
 * No Knockouts: Don't get KO'd.
 * No Player Damage: No players can receive any damage.
 * Protect the Wee Gardens: Players need to protect one to four small gardens before the zombies eat it. The number of gardens is dependent on the amount of players.
 * Speed Run: Finish the wave in a certain amount of time.
 * Stop the Zombomb: Stop the Zombomb before it reaches the garden and does heavy damage.
 * Vanquish that Yeti: Players need to defeat the Treasure Yeti in a limited amount of time.

Boss Waves
On the fifth and tenth waves, Dr. Zomboss will deploy the Zomboss Slots. A slot machine will start rolling at the top center part of the screen to determine what the team must fight during that wave. Panels include:
 * Disco Zombie
 * Gargantuar
 * Giga Gargantuar
 * Yeti Zombie
 * Baron von Bats
 * Tombstone
 * Strong Zombies
 * Money bag (250 coins)
 * Diamond (1000 coins)

Getting three of a kind in the slot machine will activate a Super Wave. Getting three Diamonds/Moneybags slots can get a Jackpot with extra money and Dr. Zomboss will reroll the slot machine. Rolling three money bags will reward you with 2,500 coins and three diamonds will reward you with 10,000 coins.

Revives, Retries, and Losing the Garden
If a plant is down and unable to revive in time, the plant can use a Self-revive to revive the player with 50% of its HP. Self-revives can only obtained through Sticker Packs and each player can only use it up to three times in one game. If the Garden is destroyed or all plants have been KO'd, one of the players can use a Team Retry to reset the wave. The team can only use this three times. Should three Team Retries get used and the Garden is destroyed once again, the game ends with the zombies taking over the Garden.

As soon as the Zombies successfully destroy the garden or all players have been KO'd, a message saying "YOUR TEAM HAS BEEN KNOCKED OUT" appears, and a Graveyard begins replacing the Garden, followed by "GAME OVER" appearing on the screen.

Get to the Landing Zone
After the players survive for ten waves, they need to go to the Landing Zone. The Zombies will constantly be after the players in this period. Tombstones will also rise. To win, players must be in the landing zone when the timer hits 0:00. "THE PLANTS FAILED TO ESCAPE", "YOU ESCAPED SUCCESSFULLY", or "ALL PLANTS ESCAPED" will be shown.

Endgame results
After the players complete Garden Ops, be it by successfully completing the ten waves and getting to the landing zone or having the garden destroyed, each player will be given a sum of Coins. In addition, stickers with numbers on them will appear on the rear of Crazy Dave's RV on the endgame results screen. If the players completed/failed the objectives on Waves 3 and 8, there will be check marks or cross marks on them, respectively. There is a bonus wave called Wave 11 (possibly the bonus wave after Crazy Dave arrives) and it will appear as a trophy sticker with a number 11 on it.

Trivia

 * This game mode (and some of its features) appears to homage certain features of the Call of Duty franchise.
 * The name could be a reference to both the Spec Ops mode from the Modern Warfare series and the Black Ops series, while the boss zombies appearing on certain rounds is similar to some of the maps within the Zombies sub-series.
 * The act of escaping after completing the objective could also reference some Spec Ops missions along with Extinction Mode from Call of Duty: Ghosts.
 * If the player looks closely on Crazy Dave's RV on the result screen, there are two live-action plush toys of the Peashooter and the Sunflower.
 * The boss waves are the only instances in the game in which Dr. Zomboss makes an announcement for the Plants team rather than the Zombies team.
 * This is the only mode in the game where the players cannot play as the zombies.