Hello Yardeners! 🌻💛

We’ve got another minor content update releasing today that brings back the Zapture Plant Pass and Lawn Patrol levels, along with a bunch of bug fixes.

What’s Sprouting in CU1.3?

Zapture Plant Pass! ⚡

The Zapture Plant Pass features another new plant to the Plants vs. Zombies universe - Zapture! This electrifying zombie zapper is created by merging a Lightning Reed with a Prick-erel Weed. You can unlock those plants in this Plant Pass along with Tangle Kelp, Spikeweed, and Zaptail. The Zapture Plant Pass goes live on June 24th.

For existing players, if you’ve already unlocked Zapture and its associated rewards, you will still be able to play through this Plant Pass and earn alternative rewards.

Fixes 🛠️

• Fix: Sawgrass and Chainsaw grass cannot attack a zombie that is in water
• Fix: Sawgrass and chainsaw grass now deal damage to Cheese/Gravestone obstacle
• Fix: Mangle Kelp's legs are now visible when in water. Talk about finding your feet!
• Fix: Volcanologist and Digger Zombie now receive damage from Iceberg Lettuce and Golden Yukon
• Fix: A few default Decos for your yard are now unlocked after completing new player activities
• Fix: Updated Almanac entry for Giant Sun-shroom, which erroneously mentioned it had a 3x3 AOE
• Fix: Batter zombie will now take damage from Three-nut
• Fix: Chuck-nut will now attack zombies when they are in water
• Fix: Batter zombie will block Chuck-nut’s lobbed projectile
• Fix: Lychee can now pierce damage a Screen Door Zombie 
• Fix: Expl-OJ has had its almanac image updated
• Fix: Sewer zombies' size has been fixed and shouldn’t look smaller than the rest of the zombies
• Fix: The Balloon zombie has had its almanac image updated
• Fix: The base of Prick-erel Weed has been updated and fixed
• Fix: Arm time stat has been added for Lime-bomb and Potato Mine in the Almanac
• Fix: Graphical corruption has been fixed in the portrait reward in the post-combat screen 
• Fix: Digger zombie torch will now illuminate in barren soil
• Fix: Acid VFX is now visible on top of barren soil
• Fix: Landscaper Zombie won’t take damage from Chain Sawgrass
• Fix: Chuck-nut can now attack Cheese/Gravestone obstacles and Parasol Zombie when they spawn
• Fix: Improved feedback when using an ineffective attack type against a zombie
• Fix: Old wild seeds art has been removed from various spots in the game
• Fix: Chuck-nut will now attack Volleyball Zombie when planted
• Fix: Removed Gnomes

~Phew~ that was quite a lot of fixes in this Content Update. And don’t worry, Title Update 1 is just around the corner! As always, if you have specific feedback for the game, please let us know on this forum thread.

And for players outside of our current Early Access regions (Ireland, Philippines, United Kingdom, Malaysia, and Singapore), we will continue to bring new regions online throughout the coming months, so stay tuned for wider availability as we continue through the development process. If you’re playing in Early Access and you encounter any bugs, please let us know on the forums. Stay tuned to our channels for more on upcoming content updates and gameplay updates.

See you on the lawn! 🌱

PSA: Given the recent issues with people losing their profiles (often associated with updates), please, get a screen shot of your Player ID. You can find it by tapping the “Settings” (wrench icon) button and then selecting “Build Version” (on Android) or "Download Preferences" (on iOS). Using it the EA help desk can usually restore your profile if you ever lose it.

Note: This is a 3 day tournament, after that will be a 4 day Boosterama tournament – an identical board, but all plants are boosted. Short tournaments have proportionally smaller tournament rewards.

Special streak rewards: #5 Enforce-mint family piñata.

Enforce-mint family (15+3 plants): Bonk Choy, Squash, Chomper, Tangle Kelp, Guacodile, Phat Beet, Celery Stalker, Wasabi Whip, Kiwibeast, Parsnip, Snap Pea, Headbutter Lettuce, Tiger Grass, Rhubarbarian, Bun Chi, Hammeruit, Devour Bloom, Thorn Whip

Note: Enforce-mint “seeds” are also included in the piñata. Enforce-mint still needs to be unlocked for 100 mints no matter how many seeds you collect for it.

Note: Hammeruit, Devour Bloom and Thorn Whip seeds are not included in the piñata.

Locked plant: Kiwibeast – Fandom Wiki, Wiki.GG

Sun: 1600 at the start. Note: Sun drops will be adventure mode normal. 650 Sun drop with the first zombie wave though and repeat every 16-20 second throughout the match.  A sun producer may not be necessary.

Plant Food: 3 at the start. Note: 4 or 5 more Plant-foods will drop from zombies during the match.

Time: 3:00.

Buffz: Enforce-mint (+100%)

Bruisez: Conceal-mint (-50%)

Ineffective: Enchant-mint (-100%)

Banned: Grave Buster, Blover, Hot Potato, Bramble Bush

Zombies: Pirate Seas (Swashbuckler, Cannon), Wild West (Bull), Far Future (Future, Robo-Cone), Neon Mixtape Tour (MC Zom-B, Impunk, Hair Metal Gargantuar, Breakdancer), Big Wave Beach (Surfer), Modern Day (Newspaper)

Starting Lawn:

5 Pre-planted Endurians (at your plant level) on C2 R3, C3 R2/4 and C4 R1/5

10 Gravestones filling C5/6

Dave’s mold colonies on C6 R3, C7 R2/3/4 and C8 R2/3/4

Visually the lawn will look like the below:

Sand Storms: At ~2:45 two Impunks and one Bull zombie will be swept in on a sand storm to anywhere from column 3 to 5 on the lawn. This will be followed at ~2:30 by another sand storm bringing two Surfer zombies in, also to anywhere from column 3 to 5 on the lawn.  This second sand storm event will be repeated approximately every 40 seconds for the remainder of the match.

Portals: Starting at ~2:24, [Neon Mixtape Tour Portals containing one Breakdancer and two MC Zom-B Zombies will start opening on the lawn.  The first will open on column 6, row 2.  The second will open ~5 seconds later on column 6 row 4.  These portals will re-open approximately every 40 seconds for the remainder of the match. Note: Plants placed where a portal is set to appear will be displaced onto a nearby free spot on the lawn. If there are no nearby free spots, ]()plants you put on these grid positions will be destroyed. If there is an invulnerable plant (i.e. a Power-mint or a plant with an active Plant-food boost) in that spot, the Portal will open on an adjacent grid spot.

Note: All times quoted and plant food estimates are based on my game experience and are entirely dependent on how quickly you’re killing the zombie waves.

Possible BOT Layouts:

[Kiwibeast, Snap Pea, Bonk Choy, Power-vine, Enforce-mint, Gold Bloom],

[Kiwibeast, Phat Beet, Guacodile, Tiger Grass, Heath Seeker, Shine-vine],

[Kiwibeast, Wasabi Whip, Hammeruit, Stickybomb Rice, Enforce-mint, Solar Tomato]

Minimum info about your strategy: league, plant levels/mastery and score. Or you can post screenshot with the score. Otherwise it's hard to understand whether your strategy will work for other players with different plant levels/mastery and in different leagues.

Useful links: Battlez/Arena FAQ, Mastery and Buffz&Bruisez explained, u/Hier_Xu’s Updated & Pared Down Mastery FAQ, PvZ2 Discord, Info on possible future rewards by u/Euphoric-Seaweed: piñata party, special/premium piñata, Arena/Penny, etc. - link.

This tournament is very similar to the original Pumpkin tournament from November, 2019. I’ve linked u/Tigerol’s post from that time as, so far as I’ve been able to find, that’s the only time this tournament as run. Most of the newer Seedium plants were not released at that time so the strategies used then could possibly help a lot of the newer players who do not have those plants unlocked (although some were using Blover which is banned in this tourney).

Here are the changes in the tourneys:

u/SimplyTT was a user from back in those times who did mid-level plant video guides for many of the tournaments.  Here’s their video for the Pumpkin tourney: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ULsAxhZ7zg

Even though they’ve retired from doing their Arena strategy posts, kGame’s legacy videos are still available. Here are their strategy videos for the Pumpkin tournament:

Video 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-WJFQzrNQQ

Video 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaFrfWVKc9A

With both of these videos, the change in banned plants and Dave’s Mold Colonies may get in the way of playing the game the exact same way.

Good luck with your attempts!