Fume-shroom (PvZ)

Fume-shroom is a Mushroom present in Plants vs. Zombies as well as their Chinese spin-offs. It is capable of spraying fumes doing 20 damage per shot, able to hit every zombie hit by the fumes. Fume-shroom suffers from limited range, its attack only being triggered by and having effect on a zombie appearing 4 spaces in front of it. It is a nocturnal plant, thus requiring Coffee Bean to be able to function normally in Day, Pool, and Roof levels.

About

 * For more information about this character, see Fume-shroom.

Fume-shroom is unlocked after completing Level 2-2. It has the same fire rate as Peashooter, an effective range of four tiles (or five tiles on the iOS version) and deals 20 damage per shot worth of damage to each zombie in its range. Presumably it is lower in cost than Peashooter due to its much shorter range. Fume-shroom can be upgraded to the Gloom-shroom, provided that the required seed packet has been purchased from Crazy Dave's Twiddydinkies for $7,500. Fume-shroom's spore cloud is not affected by the slope on Roof levels, and by extension High Gravity's gravity effect.

In Beghouled and Beghouled Twist mini-games, it acts as Puff-shroom's upgrade which requires 500 sun.

Almanac entry
Fume-shroom

Fume-shrooms shoot fumes that can pass through screen doors.

Damage: normal, penetrates screen doors

Range: all zombies in the fume cloud

Sleeps during the day

"I was in a dead-end job producing yeast spores for a bakery," says Fume-shroom. "Then Puff-shroom, bless 'im, told me about this great opportunity blasting zombies. Now I really feel like I'm making a difference."

Cost: 75

Recharge: fast

Upgrades

 * Gloom-shroom: It can only attack zombies in a 3x3 area around itself, but retains the area-of-effect nature and shoots four fumes at once. It can be purchased before playing Level 4-5 and costs $7500 coins to unlock, and 150 sun to upgrade.
 * Icy Fume-shroom: In Plants vs. Zombies Social Edition, Fume-shroom had a second upgrade, Icy Fume-shroom, which works more like Fume-shroom themselves, costing 200 sun to upgrade and can also slow zombies down.

Strategies
Fume-shroom stands out as one of the few plants in the game with an area-of-effect attack. At first look, this means that Fume-shroom will be an excellent counter against Screen Door Zombies or Ladder Zombies, who can otherwise block straight shooting projectiles with their shield of choice, as well as Dancing Zombie, who will attempt to summon Backup Dancers for cover. However, Fume-shroom's true value lies in its ability to target an infinite amount of enemies with each attack - a single Fume-shroom means that no basic Zombie or Imp can get past the defense line, and two Fume-shrooms can permanently defend the player from Conehead Zombies.

Due to the limited range, Fume-shroom should be placed on the front line in order to make full use of its attack, ideally from the fifth column onwards. Pumpkin can be used to protect Fume-shroom while not limiting its range like other defensive plants. Fume-shroom is particularly useful in Survival: Endless, as its power is not affected by the ever-increasing amount of incoming enemies.

Fume-shroom also has a relatively low cost, making it ideal for the early game, but its range may prove later on to be detrimental to Fume-shroom's performance, as it limits the amount of time that the player has to get rid of zombies,

Trivia

 * It is the only non-lobbed-shot plant that is capable of attacking zombies even if they are on the roof's slope.
 * Unlike other mushrooms, only the mushroom cap of the Fume-shroom moves.
 * In the iPad version, the range of it becomes five squares instead of four.
 * In Versus Mode, when it is near the red line and attacks multiple Zombie Gravestones, the gravestone closest to the Fume-shroom is damaged, while the gravestones behind it do not get damaged at all.
 * Counting all versions of the original Plants vs. Zombies and all spin-offs that were based on it, it has the most alternate versions of themselves out of any plant. With a total of 2 upgrades, it can upgrade to both Gloom-shroom and Icy Fume-shroom in the Chinese-exclusive Plants vs. Zombies Social Edition.