Primal Potato Mine

*Primal Potato Mines cost more than regular Potato Mines but do damage over a larger area.*

## In-game statistics

### Codename alias

primalpotatomine

**Primal Potato Mine doesn't consider himself to be primal. As far as he's concerned he's state-of-the-art. And who knows? Maybe he is.**

**Primal Potato Mine** is a plant in *Plants vs. Zombies 2: Reflourished* and the fifth plant obtained in Jurassic Marsh. He is unlocked at Jurassic Marsh - Day 23.

Primal Potato Mine is the primal version of Potato Mine. He does 2400 armor-piercing damage in a 3x3 area and takes 15 seconds to arm, while costing 50 sun instead of 25.

## Almanac entry

**Primal Potato Mine**

Primal Potato Mines cost more than regular Potato Mines but do damage over a larger area.

Usage: single use, delayed activation
Range: affects area around it

Primal Potato Mine doesn't consider himself to be primal. As far as he's concerned he's state-of-the-art. And who knows? Maybe he is.

## Plant Food effect

When fed with Plant Food, Primal Potato Mine will instantly arm himself (if unarmed) and will create one new and fully armed Primal Potato Mines on a random tile, similar to his modern counterpart's Plant Food ability.

## Strategies

With a much slower arming time versus his Vanilla counterpart, Primal Potato Mine is more comparable in function to Potato Mine. While maintaining the explosive area of a Cherry Bomb, destroying groups of zombies requires planting ahead of time. Redirecting zombies, such as through Garlic or Hot Date, can bring more zombies towards the explosion, destroying almost any zombie type in the process.

Unlike Potato Mine and other low cost single-use plants, Primal Potato Mine has a poor starting cooldown that makes for an unsuitable handler of early game zombies. Pulling off such a feat requires assistance from cheap stallers such as Iceberg Lettuce or Sap-fling, buying enough time to plant down a mine. That being said, Primal Potato Mine's large explosions can be useful for clearing zombies over multiple lanes in early waves, where most alternatives can only deal with one lane at a time.

Primal Potato Mine's greatly increased damage versus most instant-use plants makes for a great option in dealing with Gargantuars and mechanised zombies. A single Primal Potato Mine can either destroy or severely cripple these zombies, making them easy to finish off through other means. A well timed explosion can even skip the imp-throwing phase of an already damaged Gargantuar, destroying it without any issues. This increased damage is also important against Jurassic Gargantuar, whose enhanced health makes other instant-use plants relatively ineffective.

If necessary, Plant Food can be used to instantly arm Primal Potato Mine for a more reactive explosion. This also creates a second armed Primal Potato Mine, which can potentially annihilate an entire wave when combined.

## Balance changes

### Initial launch

* ▼ No longer has starting cooldown
* ▼ +10 second recharge
* ▼ +10 second arming time
* ▼ Plantfood creates only one more copy

## Trivia

* Primal Potato Mine's "Between a Rock and a Hard Candy" costume is one of the Harvest Festival Costume Contest winners, submitted by arthumgo and redrawn to fit the game's art style.