Trunkle

Trunkle is a giant rock monster appearing as a boss in Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga and Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Minions. It is encountered in Teehee Valley near the passage connecting the valley to Little Fungitown. Trunkle has a rotund, bean-shaped build with a wide lower body, large hands and thin arms; the remake has the arms made of several smaller rocks. Trunkle has a small tree on its head, containing a single orange berry.

History
Once Mario and Luigi escort Princess Peach through most of Teehee Valley, Trunkle attacks the princess as she approaches the elevator leading to Little Fungitown, with two Toad guards hiding and whispering to each other. They spot Mario and Luigi as the brothers quickly arrive to engage Trunkle in battle, with the rock monster walking towards them and roaring. Upon defeat, it disappears, and Princess Peach and the Mario Bros. make it to Little Fungitown safely.

If the path to Little Fungitown is explored before Princess Peach arrives in the Beanbean Kingdom, Trunkle can be seen blocking the path, but it is sleeping and cannot be woken; this is not possible in the remake, Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Minions, since the Super Hammers needed to access Teehee Valley cannot be received until after Peach arrives.

Battle
Trunkle spins each of its arms and rolls its closed fists at Mario and Luigi, reforming its arm after each swing. Trunkle does so at least twice per attack, swinging its right arm to target Mario, and its left to target Luigi; if the fist is thrown spinning sideways, it will roll towards the opposite brother halfway through. Mario and Luigi can block the rolling stones using their hammers.

Trunkle can also vacuum objects into its mouth from behind the Mario Bros., causing the screen to scroll back as Gritty Goombas, Poison Mushrooms, and standard Mushrooms are pulled in. The objects can be dodged by jumping over them; touching the Poison Mushrooms may poison Mario or Luigi, while touching the mushrooms restores some HP. Trunkle chews up the inhaled objects to restore some HP.

When Trunkle's HP is reduced by half, it splits into four "Mini-Trunkles". One of them has the berry normally seen on the tree in its mouth; Mario and Luigi must keep track of it, as the Mini-Trunkles shuffle around often, including as soon as they split. The Mini-Trunkles open their mouth after attacking or being hit, revealing if they are the correct one. Mini-Trunkles attack by either rolling at one of the brothers (which can be countered by jumping) or burrowing underground and surfacing to attack a brother (which is countered by the hammer). The attacks are used twice each, with rolling Mini-Trunkles attacking first; the one containing the fruit always attacks last and uses the burrowing attack multiple times.

The other Mini-Trunkles simply crumble when attacked in the original, or when they lose their own HP in the remake; the Mini-Trunkle with the berry uses the 'main' HP pool and continues to take damage. After a few turns, if the 'main' Mini-Trunkle is still alive, it pulls its body back together using the other Mini-Trunkles (and/or their crumbled forms) and returns to normal, with its HP restored; if the 'main' Mini-Trunkle is defeated, the others are defeated as well. In Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Minions, Trunkle gains the Fury status upon losing half its HP or more, and begins attacking faster and more often each turn like most other bosses; this takes effect in the Mini-Trunkle state and causes it to reform itself immediately, with the status persisting once it eventually splits again.

Alternatively, if Mario and Luigi attack Trunkle's tree on top of its head, they can defeat it by destroying the berry prematurely. Although its tree has much lower HP, it also has higher defense and is extremely resistant to jump attacks, only taking significant damage from hammer-based moves that can reach it (i.e. the regular Chopper Bros. and both versions of the Knockback Bros.). Defeating it in this way keeps Trunkle from using most of its other attacks; this also circumvents the splitting phase of the fight, which only checks for the main body's HP. In the 3DS version, once Trunkle's tree is attacked, it will cover its tree with its hands if the Mario Bros. attack it again, preventing damage to it until it divides into four. Once the four Mini-Trunkles become whole, the Mario Bros. will be able to damage Trunkle's tree again, although afterwards Trunkle will cover the tree again until the next time it divides.

Trunkle is one of the only two bosses in the original Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga that moves the screen during its battle (the other being Cackletta's Soul); additional screens are loaded during every battle in the original game, and the size of the backgrounds, along with other portions of the game's code, suggested that many other bosses were set to use attacks with a similar mechanic prior to the final release. This mechanic was fully implemented in the remake.

Trivia

 * Trunkle has a few changes in the Japanese version of Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga:
 * Any time the player damages Trunkle's head-tree, it will immediately restore 40 to 47 HP in the Japanese version.
 * The white mushroom brought during Trunkle's vacuum attack heals 5 HP in the original American/European versions, and 8 HP in the Japanese version.
 * When Trunkle's vacuum attack finishes, it heals its body for 10 HP in the original American/European versions. It heals a bit more in the Japanese version, because each object it swallows heals it for a different amount; 4 HP per Gritty Goomba, 8 HP per mushroom, and 2 HP per poisonous mushroom.

Geröllinger Pietro