Ivy Entangling Thorns In Deadlock: How The Slow Field, Charges, And Immobilize Work
Ivy 1 is Entangling Thorns, the renamed Kudzu Bomb: a damaging slow field that can gain charges, radius, scaling, and an immobilize check.
Entangling Thorns is Ivy making the floor negotiate. If the enemy keeps standing there, the floor wins.
Short answer: Entangling Thorns is Ivy’s ground-control ability in Deadlock. She creates a patch of choking thorns that damages enemies, slows movement, and, with the final upgrade, immobilizes players who stay inside too long.
| Image | Ability |
|---|---|
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Entangling Thorns Ivy throws down a thorn patch that damages and slows enemies, then upgrades into extra charges, wider control, and immobilize. |
Current Mechanics
Deadlock.one’s current Ivy data lists Entangling Thorns at a 32-second cooldown, 4-second duration, 1 charge, 5-second charge delay, 6-meter radius, 40 damage per second, and a 35 percent move-speed slow. The public tooltip still makes the important thing plain: this is not a burst button. It is a space tax.
That matters because Ivy wants enemies to make ugly pathing decisions. The field can clear clustered troopers, punish a retreat lane, or force a hero to either walk through damage or surrender the angle. The Dapper Rat’s April 28, 2026 Ivy guide leans on that idea: in spirit-support play, Thorns is a major damage and farming tool, especially when Ivy saves a charge for the fight instead of spending every cast on the wave.
Upgrade Path
- 1 AP: gain +1 charge.
- 2 AP: gain +2m radius and increased DPS spirit scaling.
- 5 AP: enemies caught in thorns for 2.0 seconds are immobilized for 1.6 seconds.
The first upgrade changes availability. The second changes footprint. The final upgrade changes the threat from “this hurts” to “you may not be leaving when you planned.” That is the point where Thorns becomes a real setup tool for Stone Form, Air Drop, or a teammate’s follow-up.
Key Patch Changes
Valve’s March 6, 2026 gameplay update renamed Kudzu Bomb to Entangling Thorns. The same update reduced recharge time from 8 seconds to 5 seconds, reduced spirit scaling, changed T2 into the radius/scaling upgrade, and changed T3 into the two-second immobilize check.
On March 7, 2026, Valve reduced Entangling Thorns spirit scaling again in the official forum follow-up. On April 30, 2026, Valve put Entangling Thorns on the Street Brawl list for a 15 percent radius reduction in that mode.
How To Use It
Use Thorns before the enemy has already escaped. It is best placed where the fight is about to happen, not where the fight used to be. Drop it on a narrow lane path, an objective angle, a camp you want to steal, or the space an enemy must cross to punish Ivy.
The nasty combo is simple: force movement with Air Drop or Vortex Web, plant Thorns under the clump, then use Stone Form to keep bodies in the patch. That combo is not subtle, but subtlety is overrated when the floor has teeth.
Counterplay
Leave the patch early. That sounds insulting, but most Thorns value comes from players trying to finish a trade while standing in Ivy’s bad garden. Mobility, displacement, silence before the cast, and anti-spirit itemization all help. Against the 5 AP version, treat the two-second stay time like a fuse.
Lore Context
Ivy is a living gargoyle who spent 18 years fighting the Mendoza Syndicate for the Arroyos in Spanish Harlem. Entangling Thorns fits that vigilante read: it is not elegant magic from a classroom. It is Ivy turning the street itself into a problem for anyone chasing her people.
Sources
Current mechanics and the ability icon were checked against Deadlock.one’s Ivy page and the Entangling Thorns modal. Patch history was checked against Valve’s March 6 gameplay update, the official March 6 forum thread, and the April 30 update. Video context came from The Dapper Rat’s How To Play Ivy guide.
For the broader Ivy file, see DramaLock’s Ivy lore guide and the current NekitBrokin Ivy build breakdown.