Tomb Tangler

When he sees zombies, he goes SPLAT!

This item is only obtainable during certain events. However, it can still be used if you have already obtained it. It is currently not available.

Tomb Tangler
Tomb Tangler swallows Tombstones and emits a fog that will slow Zombies and can randomly pull them into the ground.
Short description
Plant on Tombstones. The fog slows Zombies and may pull them down.
Statistics
Sun Cost	25
Recharge	10 seconds
Toughness	2500 damage
Range	Close
Damage	1100 damage
Plant Food Power	20%
Fog Pull Chance	50%
Fog Zombie Slow	50%
Consume Tombstone Health	80%
Usage	On Gravestone
Family	Contain-mint
Plant Food effect	Drags up to 2 zombies down.
In-game statistics
Unlocked	250 seed packets
Code name	tombtangler
Rarity	Rare
"I don't know what these tombstones are made out of, but they sure make me belch out loud. Anyone dares disturb my siesta, I'll pull them down!"

Tomb Tangler is a plant in Plants vs. Zombies 2 introduced in the 9.9.1 update for the Tomb Tangler's Crushing Arena season. He can only be planted on gravestones, destroying it immediately while adding 80% of its current health to his own.

Unlike Grave Buster, who lacks direct offense, Tomb Tangler emits a slowing fog. Each zombie in this fog has a 50% chance to be dragged down into the ground, similarly to Grimrose and Shadow Peashooter, with a ten-second cooldown.

Tomb Tangler cannot drag but can damage the following zombies: Gargantuar variants, Imp Cannon, Dr. Zomboss, Cardio Zombie, Z-Mech, Roman Caesar Zombie, Treasure Yeti, Zcorpion Zombie, Zombie King, Zombie Medusa's statue, Fisherman Zombie, Pianist Zombie, Stiltwalker Zombie, Shield Zombie, Robo-Cone Zombie, Zombie Hamsterball, Catapult Zombie, Zombie Bobsled Team, and Zomboni. Gummed zombies can only be damaged too. He cannot target #caketank.

Origins

The plant Tomb Tangler is based on is never explicitly confirmed in-game, but a comment by the official Plants vs. Zombies 2 staff's Reddit account confirms that Tomb Tangler is based on a Strangler fig, tropical plants that grow around other plants in such a way that it "strangles" them.

Tomb Tangler's ability to absorb tombstones' health is likely inspired by how strangler figs absorb nutrients from the plants that they "strangle" due to growing in dark forests with scarce light.

Almanac entry

Note: The stats shown below only apply to Level 1.

Tomb Tangler
	SUN COST 25 RECHARGE 10 TOUGHNESS 2500 RANGE Close DAMAGE 1100 PLANT FOOD POWER 20% Fog Pull Chance 50 Fog Zombie Slow 50 Consume Tombstone Health 80 Usage On Gravestone Contain-mint Plant Food: Drags up to 2 zombies down. Tomb Tangler swallows Tombstones and emits a fog that will slow Zombies and can randomly pull them into the ground. "I don't know what these tombstones are made out of, but they sure make me belch out loud. Anyone dares disturb my siesta, I'll pull them down!"

Tomb Tangler

SUN COST 25 RECHARGE 10 TOUGHNESS 2500 RANGE Close DAMAGE 1100 PLANT FOOD POWER 20% Fog Pull Chance 50 Fog Zombie Slow 50 Consume Tombstone Health 80 Usage On Gravestone Contain-mint Plant Food: Drags up to 2 zombies down. Tomb Tangler swallows Tombstones and emits a fog that will slow Zombies and can randomly pull them into the ground. "I don't know what these tombstones are made out of, but they sure make me belch out loud. Anyone dares disturb my siesta, I'll pull them down!"

Upgrades

Plant Food effect

Plant Food animation

When given Plant Food, Tomb Tangler will pull 2 random zombies down.

Contain-mint effect

When boosted by Contain-mint, Tomb Tangler will have his underground damage increased by 800 damage, his fog will have a 100% chance to pull zombies down, and his Plant Food effect will target 8 zombies regardless of level.

Level upgrades

Level	Seed Packets	Coins	Upgrades
			Sun Cost	Recharge	Starting Recharge	Toughness	Damage	Fog Pull Tick Time	Plant Food Power (Pull Zombies Down)
1	0	0	25	10 seconds	5 seconds	2500 damage	1100 damage	10 seconds	2
2	50					3000 damage	1150 damage	9 seconds
3	100					3500 damage	1200 damage	8 seconds	3
4	200					4000 damage	1250 damage	7 seconds
5	300					4500 damage	1350 damage	6 seconds
6	400					5000 damage	1450 damage		4
7	500					5500 damage	1550 damage
8	600					6000 damage	1700 damage	5 seconds
9	800					7000 damage	1800 damage		5
10	1,000					8000 damage	2000 damage		6

Note: At level 4, Tomb Tangler gains the ability to eat Surfboard. At level 9, it can eat Tent.

Mastery upgrades

• Chance to Boost
• Toughness Bonus

Strategies

As a plant that can only be planted on tombstones, there is not much to introduce about Tomb Tangler. Just like Grave Buster, he is very useful in levels with a large number of tombstones, such as Ancient Egypt, Dark Ages, and Modern Day, especially when tombstones can appear frequently and respawn. He's actually more effective than Grave Buster. One reason is that he can swallow the tombstone immediately to prevent other zombies from eating it unnecessarily. The second reason is that he is not an instant-use plant and will not disappear after swallowing the tombstone, while converting most of tombstone's health into himself. The last reason is that its health is much higher than that of Grave Buster. With the second reason, he can be used as a wall plant.

Although the high-level Grave Buster has an attack mode (generating 1x1 explosion), Tomb Tangler also has a unique attack mode - he first emits a slowing fog, and then randomly drags the zombie into the ground every 10 seconds, dealing 1100 damage to the target that cannot be dragged. Dragging zombies into the ground is regarded as a instant-kill, ignoring the zombies' level. At the same time, because of his ability to convert tombstone's health to his own, he will benefit more from swallowing high-level tombstone, and better resist the high-level zombies. This ability especially works in arena levels where you can no longer rely on direct damage to destroy them.

However, Tomb Tangler has his own weaknesses and competitors. Boingsetta can be planted anywhere and does extreme damage to tombstones/chickens/weasels, while also being capable of slowing zombies, with full-board effects on planting and lane-wide afterwards. The advantages of the Tomb Tangler are his low sun cost and the ability to directly destroy gravestones (meaning it can work when Boingsetta can't brute force it). At the same time, Grave Buster costs 0 sun, has a shorter recharge and an explosion effect when leveled that Tomb Tangler does not have. Their utility remains scenario dependent.

Tomb Tangler's Plant Food effect, dragging two random zombies into the ground, appears to be quite weak. However, considering that dragging zombies into the ground is a instant-kill, and plants of the same type Grimrose can only affect one target, it is still acceptable. The most important thing is to restore all of his health and let him play his role as a Wall plant again. Due to the limitation of planting Tomb Tangler has, it is difficult to play a role at the level of no or few tombstones, resulting in a waste of a seed slot.

Balance changes

Update 9.9.2

• ▼ Sun cost across all levels is increased from 40 to 50.

Update 10.8.1

• ▲ Sun cost is reduced from 50 to 25.
• ▲ Cooldown is reduced from 20 to 10 seconds.
• ▲ Starting Cooldown is reduced from 12 to 5 seconds.
• ▲ Health is increased from 2000-4700 to 2500-8000 damage.
• ▲ Damage is increased from 400-1400 to 1100-2000 damage.
• ▲ Fog Pull Tick Time is reduced from 8 to 10-5 seconds.
• ▼ Fog Slowdown Percentage is reduced from 40-70% to 50%.
• ▲ Fog Pull Chance is increased from 10% to 50%.
• ▲ Plant Food zombies pull is increased from 2-4 to 2-6.

Gallery

Tomb Tangler has a gallery!

Visit this page to see it.

In other languages

Please note that only official translations are used.

Language	Name	Description
English	Tomb Tangler
French	Entortueur de tombes
German	Grabwickler
Italian	Attorcigliatombe
Brazilian Portuguese	Enrosca-cova
Spanish	Zampatumbas

Trivia

• Tomb Tangler is the second plant that can only be planted on Tombstones, the first being Grave Buster.
• He, Sweet Potato, Sap-fling, Gold Leaf, and Thyme Warp are the only plants to have their sun cost changed in the updates.
• Tomb Tangler used to cost 40 sun. However, this was later changed to 50 sun, meaning that now only Gold Leaf, upgraded Thyme Warp and Tile Turnip are the plants with sun costs in non-25-increments in Plants vs. Zombies 2.
• In some promotional material, Tomb Tangler only appears as a head with a few roots. This could mean that Tomb Tangler is capable of changing his shape.

See also

• Grave Buster
• Grimrose
• Shadow Peashooter

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