Walking Mortar Tower

Walking Mortar Towers are enemies from the Angry Birds Transformers continuity.

As if the Eggbots transforming the local Minion Pigs into a robotic army wasn't bad enough, they also created Walking Mortar Towers, stony pig-faced robots that launch massive lava balls at their targets. These behemoths are vast in number and one of the island's biggest threats!

Commercial appearances

A Walking Mortar Tower proved too tough of an opponent for Optimus Prime Bird to handle on his own, and he called upon Megatron Pig to help him out. The two of them together brought down their foe. Angry Birds Transformers Comic-Con trailer

Games

Angry Birds Transformers

Players can encounter Walking Mortar Towers in any type of level. They appear as vaguely-cube-shaped rock piles until they transform and start shooting deadly balls of lava that take out a large fraction of a heart. You can dodge the lava balls by transforming to vehicle mode, but the Towers can readjust their aim fairly quick and can nail even a speeding jet if given time to aim! Also, these balls cause explosive splash effects upon their impact; they can still scratch with residual damage even if the player nearly dodges them. A winding course or change in elevation can also cause them to miss, plus they simply cannot hit anything at close range, their shots sailing right overhead every time. While the lava balls cannot be locked onto, they can be destroyed by some characters with carefully-timed aiming, but it's a risky proposition.

Thankfully, they're just as dangerous to their allies, as their lava balls can smash block towers and take nice chunks of Health out of other Towers if they get in the way. Plus they'll walk right through any blocks in their path to get at you, knocking them over.

The Towers are only vulnerable to attack when walking, or if stunned by an electromagnetic pulse attack. Some characters can barely make a scratch on them without a powerful Energonicon, while others like Heatwave Bird and Grimlock Bird have enough firepower to destroy them with ease. There are actually multiple variants of the Towers; the ones with smaller arm cannons have less health, so they can be dealt with more easily. They explode violently when destroyed, taking anything destructible with it in a blast radius even wider than that of a TNT block. But if they're not destroyed and walk far enough (or are blocked by a cliff or unmovable piece of scenery), they will transform back into a dormant rock and cannot be damaged any further... at least, by direct attacks. Health-draining effects like acid rounds will continue to take their toll after the Towers shut down, which will destroy them if they stay on-screen long enough.

Using the Ghostbot Energonicon, calling in a buddy, or switching characters during Challenge Events will confuse them for a few seconds, leaving them scratching their heads.

Notes

• Despite having two cannon-arms, they only launch lava-balls from their left cannon (screen right). Early builds of the game launched them from both, but this was quickly changed to reduce their threat level.
• Walking Mortar Towers have the highest Coin yield for any common foe in the game, netting you 100 Coins when one goes kaflooey.
• They also have the highest point counts for "common" foes during Challenge Events. Whenever they're the daily target, they're worth a whopping 75 points rather than the normal 15. On every other day, they give you a 5-point score rather than the normal 1.
• A Walking Mortar Tower also makes an appearance in the Jenga stage, but it's just there to... be there. It'll leave you completely alone, but it will block your gunner's shots if your driver fails the course early enough.
• If you find a walking mortar tower in Spark Run, you better run. At higher levels they do more damage than usual leaving you to the death. This was probably done so combiners weren't a threat to spark run as they could destroy levels with ease but not really for walking mortar tower lava balls.