Wizard Zombie

Wizard Zombie is a zombie encountered in Dark Ages in Plants vs. Zombies 2: It's About Time. It transforms plants except the Ghost Pepper into sheep. If there are no plants in front of it, it will then proceed to the Player's House.

Almanac entry
TOUGHNESS:  Protected

SPEED:  Creeper

Transforms plants into passive sheep.

All the zombies agree, Wizard Zombie's powers of transmutation are impressive. But what they don't get is ... why sheep? Everyone knows it would be more helpful if the Wizard used his powers to turn plants into, say, more zombies. But yeah, no one is going to say that to his face.

Overview
Wizard Zombie absorbs 24 normal damage shots and its appearance changes at 12 normal damage shots before dying at 24 normal damage shots.

Appearances
Dark Ages: Nights 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, Arthur's Challenge and Piñata Party

General
This is a very dangerous zombie, especially if many of this kind come in groups. What's more, this zombie does not have a weakness. Additional fact, it also uses its disadvantage, which is its speed, as its advantage in order to keep on bombarding black magic to your plants. Therefore, an instant-kill plant is the only way to stop them from transforming plants. Kill it quickly, as it can transform an unlimited number of plants. This could result in all plants being transformed into sheep and lead to losing the level. To make its special ability useless, keep planting more plants until it dies. The Split Pea will be useful as the Wizard Zombie cannot transform plants backwards, so it is a good idea to have it boosted for Arthur's Challenge's levels. Or it is actually best to use Magnifying Grass on the first row to deal with them. Be careful though, the Wizard Zombies can be spawned during Necromancy if you do not break all the remaining graves.

As the Ghost Pepper was released in the store and costs 109 gems and it cannot be transformed by this zombie, use this plant to take care. It is recommended to plant the Ghost Peppers near the Wizard Zombies since their range are close.

Note: The Wizard Zombie never eats plants, meaning Hypno-shrooms and Chili Beans are totally useless against it. Boosting Iceberg Lettuce will also help you halt a horde of Wizard Zombies. Use it instead.

Arthur's Challenge
Wizard Zombies and Dark Ages Gargantuars are considered to be very dangerous and troublesome to your plants. While the Dark Ages Gargantuar crushes your plants, the Wizard Zombie turns all your plants into sheep. You must have Cherry Bomb, boosted Iceberg Lettuce, and boosted Kernel-pult for your disposal to prevent this from happening. Otherwise, you will risk spending coins on Plant Food or Power Ups. Combining these with Jester Zombies can cause you a lot of trouble. If Wizard Zombies are also combined with Knight Zombies and Zombie Kings (and the surprise attack), they can also be troublesome and empty everything on your lawn. Think of this as a Gargantuar Prime with slower speed and less health but frequently uses its magic to aid its allies. Remember that one is already deadly, five is already an obstacle, and twenty of these can be extremely troublesome because not even two columns of Winter Melons or Melon-pults can assist you. Additionally, a boosted Coconut Cannon along with Cherry Bomb can also be of great help.

Another strategy is to lure the Wizard Zombies into the adjacent sheep respectively then blow all of them up with a Cherry Bomb, better if you have a copy of it with you. It will greatly revert all sheep into plants and all of them will be heavily bombarded. It then will slowly reduce any Wizard Zombies lured nearby. Better yet, you can keep on spamming them with boosted Kernel-pults but first make sure that you have enough amounts of Sun-shrooms and Sunflowers. It is better if Sun-shroom is boosted because it is easy to shovel it up after it gives you 235 sun, although at some points upcoming Wizard Zombies can cause more havoc. But then again, if there are Dark Ages Gargantuars, Jester Zombies and this zombie in the same level, plan carefully.

Ghost Peppers are in to your disposal. Once you have purchased it, use it. Don't hesitate on doing so as it will greatly aid you in the future levels, saving you much time from using Cherry Bombs or Jalapenos. Still, boosting it makes it more usable as it will bombard tons of Wizard Zombies. Also, timing is of the essence if you are planning to drag all Wizard Zombies close to it.


 * For the strategy how to get Not Baaad achievement, see Not Baaad.

Trivia

 * This is the only zombie that can transform a plant through magic.
 * So long as there are many plants in front of it, it will transform all of them into sheep.
 * When it lifts up its rod, it groans heavily, even though it has no lungs.
 * It plays a sound as it is about to transform a plant into sheep. The sound resembles the sound when feeding Plant Food on a Snapdragon.
 * If a plant is right in front of it, it will just turn it into sheep instead of eating it.
 * Before the release of the 2.3 update, the Wizard Zombie was going to shoot projectiles at the plants, just killing them, but as of the 2.3 update, its ability is to turn plants into sheep. The deflecting part was then bestowed to the Jester Zombie.
 * This zombie, the Camel Zombies, and the Pianist Zombie are the only zombies that have creeper speed, which means they are the slowest zombies in Plants vs. Zombies 2: It's About Time.
 * It has the legs of a Mummy Zombie. This is because in medieval times, people would bandage their limbs to protect themselves from the plague. However, it is unusual that none of the other zombies have bandaged up limbs.
 * The sheep does not eat plants; they just block a tile for planting. However, the sheep will turn back into plants when the Wizard Zombie dies.  Also, the sheep cannot be shoveled and eaten by the zombies.
 * Transforming plants will not be counted as losing plants. Its magic may sometimes save your endangered plant. Transforming "sheep" plant promptly becomes invulnerable and cannot be eaten by other zombies. It only lasts until the Wizard Zombie dies, though.
 * The only thing it eats is Infi-nut's barrier and hypnotized zombies. The rest are transformed into sheep.
 * When a Magnet-shroom attracts a bucket or knight helmet and then is transformed into sheep, the sheep looks like it is wearing a bucket or knight helmet.
 * Sheep will not be tossed by graves, meaning it will still stand on them. It will not turn back into plants, instead it will disappear.
 * The Wizard Zombie resembles Gandalf the Grey from Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit as both are wizards and have similar appearances and scepters.
 * When a Wizard Zombie was about to turn a Power Lily into a sheep, it gave the player Plant Food before being turned into sheep. When that Wizard Zombie was killed, the sheep would turn back into a Power Lily and would give the player another Plant Food. This trait shows that any instant-usage plants transformed by it when turning back, they started again their action. This was fixed after the 2.7.1 update.
 * Plants that are given Plant Food cannot be transformed into sheep.
 * There is a glitch that if the Wizard Zombie is eating a Force Field or hypnotized zombie, and is missing an arm, its hand from the missing arm will still be visible while eating, resulting in a floating hand.
 * Sheep cannot be burned by Zombot Dark Dragon. However, it disappears when turning back.
 * For some reasons, when a transformed Grave Buster turns back into its original form, it always disappears along with the tombstone it is busting.
 * Wizard Zombies can use their abilities off the game's screen where it is impossible to get hit.
 * When looking closely, the transformed plant will disappear first, then a sheep will replace that plant.
 * Ghost Pepper is currently the only plant that cannot be transformed by this zombie.