Primal Peashooter

Primal Peashooter is the first plant obtained in Jurassic Marsh in Plants vs. Zombies 2. It is the primal version of Peashooter. Every three seconds, it shoots a rock-like pea that either immobilizes a zombie for half a second or sends it back for a tile. Each rock pea does 2.5 normal damage shots to zombies. The only normal zombie immune to its knockback capability is Jurassic Bully. Due to its knockback effect, stunned zombies that are knocked back will no longer be immobilized.

Origins
Like its modern counterpart, Primal Peashooter is based on the plant Pisum sativum. The term peashooter is normally used to refer to a toy version of a blowgun, or as slang for small or low-caliber firearms.

Almanac entry
Sun cost: 175

DAMAGE: Normal

RANGE: Straight

RECHARGE: Fast

Primal Peashooters shoot heavy stunning peas at zombies.

Special: primal peas occasionally knock zombies back

Primal Peashooter may be primitive, but that doesn't stop him from enrolling and excelling in several software development correspondence courses.

Plant Food effect
When fed Plant Food, Primal Peashooter gains Stegosaurus-like plates on its head and will shoot five rock peas that look identical to its regular ones. However, these rock peas deal five normal damage shots and have an area of effect of a tile, pushing all zombies located on it.

Strategies
Primal Peashooter is a powerful plant for taking out single zombies, regardless of their health, as the zombies are greatly delayed from the push backwards. However, its slow rate of fire allows large groups of zombies to damage the defenses easily, especially if the player does not deploy a large number of Primal Peashooters on the lawn.
 * Primal Peashooter should not be paired with Celery Stalker or any lobbed-shot plants with exception of any that deals splash damage, since it is possible that the peas will knock back the zombies and make Celery Stalker vulnerable, and the lobbed projectiles are more likely to miss their targets. However, Primal Peashooters work well with area of effect plants like Fume-shroom, Phat Beet, and Snapdragon, since the knockback effect is effective in clustering crowds of zombies.
 * The Plant Food upgrade of this plant is weak as far as damage is concerned, but it is great for knocking zombies back to the beginning of the lawn, which will allow the player to have more time and restore lost plants either by using an Intensive Carrot or replanting.
 * An advantage of Primal Peashooter's projectiles is when knocking zombies back, it momentarily throws them a short distance off the ground, opening up a chance for them to be eliminated by Blover, as any zombie that does not touch the ground before the Blover activates will be blown away. This means that, save for Jurassic Bully and Zombots, these peas, when combined with Blover, can knock out any pushable zombies, even Gargantuars, with one hit. This can be done most easily when Primal Peashooter is boosted.
 * Like other peashooting plants, Primal Peashooter can be combined with Torchwood to cause more damage to the zombies, and that stunning and knocking zombies back capacity continues to operate.
 * In Ancient Egypt levels without Tomb Raiser Zombie, Primal Peashooter is useful for stopping sandstorms because its projectile can immediately end this attack, forcing the zombie to come out of the storm.
 * In Pirate Seas, Primal Peashooter is useful for combating zombies in water lanes if the zombies are on land. Swashbuckler Zombie and Imp Pirate Zombies can be pushed back into the water if they are airborne but sometimes will not kill them due to the glitch that they will walk on water.
 * In Frostbite Caves, Primal Peashooters can stop snowstorms similar to Ancient Egypt. They can also force any Dodo Rider Zombies on the ground with their knockback affect.
 * In Neon Mixtape Tour levels without Arcade Zombies, Primal Peashooters are useful for keeping Punk Zombies away from other plants and exposing zombies protected by Glitter Zombies.
 * In Modern Day, the Primal Peashooter can knock away zombies that come from Portals making them less of the threat. They can also push back Super-Fan Imps to have them incinerate plants that aren't important assuming the player has put their most valuable plants in the back.

However, Primal Peashooter still has many weaknesses:
 * In Far Future, Shield Zombie poses a major threat. It will protect very dangerous zombies with its shield, which Primal Peashooter's peas cannot combat. However, using E.M.Peach could ease the situation.
 * In Dark Ages, avoid using Primal Peashooter, as Tombstones will get in the way, as well as the sheer amount of Jester Zombies that are present. This applies to Arthur's Challenge as well.
 * In Lost City, there are many obstructions. Excavator Zombie is unfazed by Primal Peashooter damage though it will still be pushed/stunned. In addition, Lost Pilot Zombies, Bug Zombies, and Relic Hunter Zombies can all be considered meat shields for Primal Peashooter, and protect more dangerous zombies like Turquoise Skull Zombie. Imp Porter is especially dangerous, as the constant supply of zombies (especially Buckethead variants), can make it extremely hard to get rid of the tent without support.
 * In the later parts of Jurassic Marsh, avoid using Primal Peashooter. Jurassic Bully now counters this. Jurassic Bully will take its shots (with the stun effect still working), but end up shielding other zombies. Not to mention, Jurassic Bully can sustain many blows. Combined with powerful zombies like Jurassic Fossilhead and Dinosaurs, Primal Peashooter is not very good at defending later in Jurassic Marsh.
 * In Modern Day, Primal Peashooter will only be useful in some levels. Some levels contain early ambushes, something Primal Peashooter may not be able to contain quickly. In addition, the previously mentioned zombies can also appear, so take caution when selecting plants.

Trivia

 * It is one of the five plants that can knock back zombies without Plant Food and the first one to be offensive.
 * It is the second offensive plant that can immobilize zombies with its primary attack, with the first being Kernel-pult and the third being Apple Mortar. However, the time immobilized is much greater for Kernel-pults.
 * If a rock pea hits a Pianist Zombie, the music it plays will restart.
 * Although Excavator Zombies will not be damaged by it, the latter can still stun or push him back.
 * However, the Excavator Zombie can be damaged if it is fed with Plant Food while zombies are in front of Excavator Zombie, because the Plant Food peas do splash damage.
 * Lost Pilot Zombies can get pushed back by it, even when dangling in the air. However, it will not fall to the ground after getting pushed back, until after a few seconds or if Blover is used.
 * It and Pea Pod shoot the least amount of peas in their Plant Food upgrade, with only five peas. However, Fire Peashooter breathes a stream of fire when given Plant Food, instead of shooting any peas at all.
 * It makes a cough-like sound when using its Plant Food upgrade.
 * Although its projectile is different than other peashooting plants, when its projectile passes through a normal or napalm Torchwood, the projectile becomes a common Peashooter's fire pea or napalm pea respectively. However, these fire/napalm peas are larger than normal.
 * In addition, the peas will still stun or knock back zombies.
 * Its projectiles can knock back Barrel Roller Zombie's barrel, but not frozen blocks and arcade machines.
 * This is because a pirate barrel is listed as a zombie by the game's code (as it can be stunned, stalled, and pushed even by other plants with such capabilities).
 * Its knock-back can wear off the gassed effect from zombies affected by a Chili Bean or a Stunion.
 * The same applies to Chard Guard.