Plant file · Mysterious Swamp — Center

Lightning Reed

Locks onto the toughest target, then hurts more with every hit.

Sun150

Recharge7.5s

Attack interval1.5s

Durability400

Lore

Lightning Reed reunites with the team in the Mysterious Swamp, already acquainted with Homing Thistle and Red Stinger. Hurriclover's mention of friends heading for the zombie lair brings the visit. Earlier travels reached the West, whose style even influenced Lightning Reed's later home.

A self-described electricity expert, Lightning Reed is delighted by electrical discussions and the exposed wiring of the Mechanical Snowfield. When Power Peony and Wiremoss argue, the first concern is being left out of a conversation about electricity. That enthusiasm occasionally interrupts a tense exchange.

The companions also remember electrically cooked fried chicken. Red Stinger regularly borrows sun from Homing Thistle to buy some, then repays it the next day. The diary preserves both the persistent fighter and the old friend responsible for a much-anticipated meal.

Mechanics

Role

Lock-on attacker · Stacking damage · Weak power source

Base data: 150 sun; 7.5s recharge; 1.5s attack interval; 400 HP.
Locks onto the highest-HP zombie in its lane or nearby and keeps attacking; releases only when the target becomes invalid (invincible, gone, friendly).
Input damage on the same target accumulates per hit and caps at 300.
Corchid rewrites linear stacking into doubling.
Powered Wiremoss adds a second target slot. Lightning Reed itself only outputs weak current, which can activate Mechanical Snowfield tiles and Wiremoss lines but is not strong enough to self-activate the second target slot.

Acquire a target, then retain the lock. Each target slot accumulates damage independently. Corchid changes the growth curve; sufficiently powered Wiremoss adds a slot. 100 cs = 1 second.

Candidate area and HP priority

When idle, candidates include eligible zombies in the same lane and cross-lane zombies whose collision boxes meet the roughly 320 px neighborhood. Invisible, untargetable, absent, friendly, or invalid-lane objects are excluded.

Highest current HP wins, with shorter horizontal distance breaking ties. A second slot uses the same rule but excludes the first target. The circular neighborhood limits cross-lane acquisition, not the whole current lane.

T=\operatorname*{arg\,max}_{z\in\mathcal C}\left(H_z,-|x_z-x_p|\right),\qquad \mathcal C=\mathcal C_{\text{lane}}\cup\mathcal C_{\text{nearby}}

Filter area before comparing HP and horizontal distance.

Persistent lock and reset

Once assigned, a target is not replaced by a healthier zombie or dropped for leaving the original acquisition area. Attacks occur about every 150 cs.

Death, departure, invulnerability, untargetability, friendly allegiance, or an invalid lane clears that slot and its hit count. Invulnerability from effects such as Flag Zombie’s protection also resets the lock before acquisition resumes.

Leaving acquisition range does not drop the lock.

Normal and supported damage curves

Let n count prior hits before the current hit. Normal input is 1, 8, 16, 24, 32… and reaches the 300 cap on hit 39; hit 38 deals 296.

With Corchid support, input is 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64… and caps at 300 on hit 10. Hit 1 ties; normal damage is higher on hits 2–6, and supported damage first overtakes it on hit 7. These are inputs before target-specific damage resolution.

D_n=\min\!\left(300,\begin{cases}1,&n=0\\8n,&n\ge1\end{cases}\right),\qquad D^{\text{Corchid}}_n=\min(300,\,2^n)

Support first wins on hit 7; both curves cap at 300.

A second target under power

Wiremoss meeting the power requirement enables a second slot at the plant’s tile. Both slots hit distinct targets within the same attack cycle and track their own hit counts; the second never inherits the first’s accumulated damage.

Losing the power condition clears the second slot; restored power starts fresh acquisition. Lightning Reed’s own weak current cannot enable this slot, so a lit line alone does not establish dual-target eligibility.

N_{\text{targets}}=1+\boldsymbol{1}\!\left(\text{tile covered by powered Wiremoss}\right),\qquad T_2\in\mathcal C\setminus\{T_1\}

Slots accumulate independently.

What weak current activates

Lightning Reed supplies weak current at L=2, lighting Wiremoss and activating Mechanical Snowfield tiles. Power Peony supplies strong current at L=6.

Each consumer interprets line state separately. Weak current operates the line but cannot feed back into Lightning Reed’s own second target slot.

A lit line does not activate every interface.

Journey notes

Hurriclover invites Lightning Reed to join in central Mysterious Swamp. Its travels and home reflect a western influence, while its interest in electricity continues into the snowfield’s wires and tiles.

Companions also remember its electrically cooked fried chicken. Side-diary notes about borrowing sun to buy it record another skill beyond combat.

Interactions & counters

Corchid
Locked-on damage stacks faster.
Wiremoss
Powered wire opens Lightning Reed's second target slot; Reed itself only supplies weak current.
Power Peony
Supplies strong current to Wiremoss, indirectly enabling Lightning Reed's second target slot.
Sinan Kin
Once damage stacking reaches the threshold, Sinan Kin answers with a targeted snipe.