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Here is a sentence:
Er blieb wie angewurzelt stehen.
I get the overall meaning of the phrase. However, for the sake of having a better command over its usage, I would like to know what sentence member "wie angewurzelt" is. Is it an adverbial of manner or an ellipsis of a Nebensatz?
It's an implicit comparison in place of a modal adverbial. You could simplify it as
Er bliebt angewurzelt stehen.
but that would mean that he grew roots for real and not just metaphorically. That item angewurzelt is a Partizip II and participles work like adjectives so they can modify verbs directly as in this example.
But you may also use wie angewurzelt as a floating modal adverbial as in the following example:
Er blieb in dem Moment wie angewurzelt an seinem Platz stehen.
