Talk:Survival: Endless/Strategies/@comment-27005222-20150921024552/@comment-35529815-20180510071144

If a strategy cannot consistently allow you to at least reach flag 40, where Giga Gargantuars starts coming in multiple waves, then it’s not really a “great” strategy, it’s a flawed one, but the flaw will only be seen later on. When you ascend beyond flag 50, expect to see Giga Gargantuars in droves every single wave, not just every flag, as 2 or 3 waves stack up into dozens of Gigas every single lane. So how do you learn how to create a good strategy/formation in order to deal with this? Well, you should carefully read through this page first and analyse the similarities between some builds, to find inspiration and experience in optimising a setup, then you can look up guides on the internet for more in depth details. Personally, I recommend Draco89123’s Survival Endless Guide with full illustrations and explanations on Yumpu:

https://www.yumpu.com/en/document/view/11806523/the-ultimate-survival-endless-guide-theory-and-breueronlinede

By reading this, you are able to dissect the strategies of other players along with their discoveries, thus incorporating them into your own gameplay. Now that you understand how it works, why it works, and the way it should work, you will be able to create your own improved setup through trial and reset. The first telltale sign that your previous formation was weak was the fact that you needed to use Spikerocks to deal with Zombonies and Gargantuars (the normal version). If you really have to rely on such a thing to fight against a normal Gargantuar then how will you even hold up against multiple Gigas?

As for general advice, well I can provide a few things. First of all, never ever EVER rely on Wallnuts to protect you from anything other than Dolphin Zombies. Seriously, they cost space, and doesn’t contribute into either increasing your overall DPS or improving your Sun count, thus making them extremely ineffective. If you want to lower your Pumpkin maintenance, then use Ladders to avoid Imps. If you want to delay Gargantuars for Cobs to recharge, use Ice Shrooms and Imitaters, along with fast recharge and low cost plants to sacrifice (like Puff Shrooms/Flower Pots). If you want to stop Football Zombies, then Increase your DPS to the point that your formation is able to handle it on its own (with or without Ice Shrooms for example). Don’t unnecessarily add extra space to your strategy, because it does not work. Spikerocks are at least acceptable on the first and last lanes due to their delaying effect, but Wallnuts are nothing but waste of space, which you could have used for Sunflowers/extra DPS. Another thing to note is timing, which many new players do not get. Just because you CAN use an instant, doesn’t mean you SHOULD use it. Congratulations, you just annihilated the Giga Gargantuars from the first three to four waves with your Cob Cannons, Cherry Bombs, and Squashes, now watch as the next two waves sweep by unharmed because your plants can’t recharge fast enough. The more damage you inflict on the current wave, the quicker the next wave will arrive. Don’t waste your instants, but don’t hold back on them, just know WHEN to use them so that they don’t run out. For example, since you had 4 Cob Cannons, and each of them took 36.41 seconds to recharge. This means that on average, you should use 1 Cob every 10 seconds. If we add in Cherry Bombs (50 seconds recharge) and Squashes (30 seconds recharge), then you are able to use 16 instants every 100 seconds, or an instant every 6 seconds or so, which is easily attained in tandem with delaying strategies like Ice Shrooms, Imitaters, No cost Plants.

Timing is the key to playing Survival Endless. Don’t waste all of your instants on just two or three waves then complain about not being able to handle it. Gigas Can only take two instant themselves, if your setup is already able to handle normal Gargantuars on its own (and if they are on the inner row, then one instant is enough thanks to the pool Glooms’s DPS). If you factor Ice Shrooms freezing and delay into all of these, you should have more than enough ways to handle Giga Gargantuars with just 5 Slots (Ice Shroom, Imitater Ice Shroom, Coffee Bean, Cherry Bomb, Squash). Since you play on Android, you still have 4 extra Slots for everything else: Fume Shroom, Gloom Shroom, Lilypad, Pumpkin, exactly 4.