Flower Planting, as demonstrated in a tutorial image in Pikmin Bloom. (This is cropped from a texture used in-game.)
Flowers being planted behind the player.

Flower planting is a game mechanic in Pikmin Bloom. When it is turned on, small flowers will be planted in a trail behind the player, and will appear on the map screen as the player walks around the real world. Planting flowers consumes petals of the type that is being planted. Planted flowers on the map are visible to all players. Planted flowers are used to bloom Big Flowers. While within a Big Flower's radius, players can plant flowers in the circle to encourage growth and allow the Big Flower to bloom once 300 flowers are planted.

While planting flowers, a widget appears at the top of the map screen showing how many total flowers have been planted so far, how many coins have been earned so far, and how many more flower need to be planted before the next coin is earned. Below this, a smaller widget labeled "Accelerate" appears, which can be tapped to quickly open the confirmation menu to use a Flower Planting Accelerator.

Flowers last for 7 days and then vanish, though they can vanish a few days earlier if approached by the player while planting more. Flowers within the radius of a Big Flower instead last until the Big Flower wilts.

Changing the selected petal type during planting will change to planting that flower type without interrupting the session, though doing so will immediately spend a petal and start the spending timer from there, so it will always be slightly less efficient. Running out of selected petals while the device is asleep will cause the flower planting session to immediately end.

Flower planting also provides additional boosts to various aspects of the game:

  • Having flower planting on grows seedlings faster. If a player is planting flowers, seedlings will reach maturity faster with an automatic step-count bonus. Initially, it starts with a 10% bonus, and eventually reaches a maximum of 30% as the player's flowers are continually planted.
  • For every 250 flowers that are planted, one coin is earned, with up to 60 coins available to earn every day. Progress towards the next coin is reset when planting ends, and all coins earned from flower planting are rewarded.

Mechanics

For the purposes of flower planting, the world is divided into a grid of cells that are around 5 by 5 meters.[1] These cells are determined by a grid of larger cells sized at 0.00036 decimal degrees across both dimensions. These larger cells are then divided into a number of smaller cells, depending on their respective latitiude. At the equator, as well as for the majority of the populated ranges of the earth, the division is into 64 smaller cells, each with edges sized at 0.000045 decimal degrees.[2] The cells are not shown to the player, but are used to calculate many features of flower planting.

One flower can be planted in each cell, and once a flower is in a cell, another one cannot take its place until 5 minutes have passed. As a player walks with flower planting turned on, they will plant flowers in nearby grid cells. This will only happen if the player is moving less than 16-20 kilometers per hour (10-13 miles per hour), to prevent players from being able to plant lots of flowers from within a vehicle. This maximum speed seems to vary between players/locations.

Not all flowers are rendered on the map screen. When flowers are directly adjacent to each other, only some will be shown, and the density shown depends on how far in front of the camera they are, as well as the performance of the device being used to play the game. Flowers are also not rendered when they are on top of roads. However, all flowers, including non-rendered ones, are counted in the banner at the top of the screen that says how many flowers have been planted in a session.

During flower planting, flowers are set down around the player in a rectangular area, which is longer along the north-south axis. The size of the player's squad controls the size of this planting area. For every 10 Pikmin added to the squad, the rectangle will increase by one cell along both dimensions. The rate at which petals are consumed will also increase, though this does not outweigh the benefits of increasing the planting area. [1]

Pikmin in squad Minimum level Planting area Petal use interval (seconds) Petals used per minute
1-9 1 2x1 (2)   30 2
10-19 7 3x2 (6)   20 3
20-29 9 4x3 (12)   15 4
30-39 15 5x4 (20)   12 5
40 55 6x5 (30)   10 6
Squad Size Level Requirements before August 14th, 2023
Pikmin in squad 1-9 10-19 20-29 30-39 40
Minimum level 1 10 20 40 60
 
A diagram depicting the flower grid situated around a Big Flower. Pink panels represent area that contributes to the Big Flower's count when planted in. This shape is uniform for all Big Flowers.

With Others

The following article or section is in need of assistance from someone who plays Pikmin Bloom.
Particularly: From what distance can players see one another?

The flower planting menu contains a setting that toggles the "With Others" mode. When a player is planting flowers in this mode, other players will be able to see that player's Mii and their squad walking around and planting flowers. This mode does not display player usernames, and is disabled for child accounts.

Privacy zones

 
A placed privacy zone.

The following article or section is in need of assistance from someone who plays Pikmin Bloom.
Particularly: Note whether privacy zones limit the effect of planting With Others.

Privacy zones allow a player to designate circular areas within which their own flowers will temporarily cease to be planted during planting, and as a result, coins will not be earned nor will flowers be counted toward Event Challenge missions. However, other planting effects will otherwise continue as normal, consuming petals at a rate proportional to squad size, and maintaining the seedling growth rate bonus. Zones do not affect other players or their planting, nor are they visible to other players.

To place a privacy zone, a player must open the settings menu, followed by the "Privacy" and "Flower Planting" submenus, and then select "Create Privacy Zone". A zone's radius of effect can range between 50 to 300 metres. Zones will be named after their district location by default, but this can be changed by the player. A player may add as many as 5 concurrent privacy zones, which can be deleted or have their locations, sizes and names edited at any time.

Flower Planting Accelerator

 
A Flower Planting Accelerator.

The Flower Planting Accelerator is an item unlocked at level 12 that doubles petal usage and flower output for 15 minutes while flower planting. It is a consumable item that can be bought from the shop, or obtained as rewards from events. One can be used by pressing the "Accelerate" button while flower planting that appears in multiple menus, and then confirming the use of the accelerator in a pop-up box. If another accelerator is used before the current one expires, the period is extended.

When an accelerator is active, all instances of the "Accelerate" button changed to show an activated version of the accelerator, and the word accelerate is replaced by a timer that counts down how much accelerated flower planting time remains.

The doubling effect is done by planting 2 flowers in each cell instead of 1, not by increasing the planting radius. The cooldown period before the same player can plant into the same cell again remains the same. Big Flower flower counts, progress towards coins earned from flower planting, and progress towards Event Challenge missions are all affected by the doubled output.

Strategy

The following article or section contains guides.
The strategies shown are just suggestions.

The most efficient way to plant flowers is to be moving consistently at under the maximum allowed speed of 16-20km/h (10-13mph), through methods such as riding a bike or driving in a car. Moving east-west is more efficient than moving north-south.

If you are stationary but need to plant flowers for an Event Challenge mission, starting and stopping planting for a few seconds every 5 minutes is effective, as this limits wasting petals. This is most efficient when your squad is full.

When sending your Pikmin on expeditions, be careful about sending Pikmin from your squad, since if your squad size is reduced below a certain threshold, your flower planting rate could drop significantly. Sending standby Pikmin or checking your squad after sending Pikmin on expeditions helps avoid this.

Badges

There are 5 badges the player can gain from flower planting:

  • Apprentice Flower Badge: Plant 1,000 flowers.
  • Novice Flower Badge: Plant 20,000 flowers.
  • Enthusiast Flower Badge: Plant 500,000 flowers.
  • Expert Flower Badge: Plant 1,600,000 flowers.
  • Master Flower Badge: Plant 3,000,000 flowers.

Gallery

Screenshots

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Flower types

On the map, planted flowers are shown as 2D sprites that turn around to face the camera. The sprite depends on the type of flower.

White Yellow Red Blue
Basic        
Pansy        
Rose        
Poinsettia        
Camellia   N/A   N/A
Plum blossom       N/A
Cherry blossom   N/A N/A N/A
Tulip        
Carnation        
Hydrangea   N/A    
Lily       N/A
Sunflower N/A   N/A N/A
Spider Lily       N/A
Cosmos       N/A
Cyclamen   N/A    
Daffodil     N/A N/A
Windflower        
Baby Blue Eyes N/A N/A N/A  
Calla Lily        
Frangipani       N/A
Hibiscus       N/A
Dianthus   N/A    
Gentian   N/A    
Chrysanthemum        
Helleborus        
Cattleya        
Hyacinth        
Sweet Pea        
Lily of the Valley   N/A   N/A
Peony        
Water Lily        
Morning Glory        
Bougainvillea        
Dahlia        
Clematis        

History

The following changes have been made to flower planting over time:

Update or date Changes
February 18th, 2022 Added privacy zones, allowing areas to be designated within which the player will not plant flowers, obscuring their trail.
June 8th, 2022 Doubled the rate of petal consumption while flower planting. Changed the planted flowers required per coin from 500 to 250.
February 9th, 2023 Added the Flower Planting Accelerator, which doubles flowers planted and petal usage for 15 minutes after use.

|- |November 1st, 2024 |Pikmins now receive one friendship point if they are in your active squad when you end a flower planting session. There is a cooldown on receiving this friendship point of 24 hours, resetting at midnight local time. You can swap new Pikmins in after starting a flower planting session; once the session is ended manually or by exhausting all the petals in your petal jar of a flower variety, the game will then check and award any Pikmin who have not received their daily friendship point and then give the point to each Pikmin accordingly. |}

Trivia

  • Flowers cannot be planted in military areas.
    • This means that Big Flowers in military areas cannot ever bloom.
  • There are currently no flowers that exclusively come in only the red color.
    • However, there have been flowers in the past that only came in red, but have had other colors added since.

See also

References

  1. ^ a b Post by u/connection_lost on Reddit, published on December 19th, 2021, retrieved on June 9th, 2024
  2. ^ Comment by u/Cirrus_Aeltir on Reddit, published on December 27th, 2022, retrieved on June 9th, 2024