TL;DR: Spam path 1 turrets since they are godlike, with some slowing towers along with it. Send high level pigmen and defend yourself with the now overpowered inferno potions.
Hi everyone!
Tower Defence was recently updated and not a single thing was left untouched. The strategies are completely different. Here is how I run most of my games when I don't want to have fun and just want to win.
Defence
The best tower is now the Path 1 Turret. Turrets used to be horrible. The Path 2 turret is almost a joke and does no damage. However, the first path will obliterate everything but cave spiders. I'm serious. Let's say someone wants to defend their team from anything which was sent by the enemy.
Don't even ask questions, build a path 1 turret. Every other damage tower (Artillery, poison, necromancer, leach, archer, sorcerer, zeus) is purely useless compared to the holy path 1 turret. You might think that the landmines from the artillery are fun, and they are, but think about it: you could have built another path 1 turret with those coins.
What this means: to have the best defence possible, place down an ice, quake (for the slowdown) and mage (for the cave spiders) every so often and fill everything else with path 1 turrets. Nothing else. I'm not making this up, place them everywhere, even on the 3x3 spots. They are godlike.
So start off the game with a level 3 mage, follow the strategies in Offence, and build turrets when you have enough gold. Once you have 3 maxed path 1 turrets, place down an ice, a quake and a mage, rince and repeat.
Eventually armageddon will come. If it's the lightning, you'll lose some of your turrets, it's sad, but it happens. Rebuild them. If it's the Wither, then it will just get melted by the turrets, it might destroy 1 or 2 though. Don't build sorcerers to defend yourself from the skulls, you could be using those coins for more turrets. The Horde is a bit more challenging: every mob in it will get annihilated by the turrets, but some giants might survive, which brings me onto my next point.
Inferno potions.
They used to be horrible, just like the turrets. But now it's the best potion. The only mobs immune to it are flying troops, magma cubes, wither skeletons, the Wither and pigmen. Everything else will get voided in seconds. 12 level 1 giants? Throw down 1 or 2 inferno potions on their heads and they are gone. That is right, 72000 coins obliterated by a mere 800 coins. The higher level giants might be harder to deal with, but 5 or 6 infernos should terminate the diamond giants. If you have enough turrets it will be really easy, trust me.
You basically need the inferno potions to survive the Horde.
That's basically it.
Offence
I like to divide the game in 3 parts:
1. The Rise of the Dead (where you gain EXP and potentially win)
2. The Porcine Armies (the main attack of the game, where you try to win)
3. The Stalling (when you have failed 1 and 2)
(Sorry for the cringy names, I will never do it again)
General tip: lookout for powerups (nether stars with green particles on the track). It's actually possible to steal powerups from the enemy track if they aren't paying attention, so use that to your advantage.
1.
When the game starts and you placed your level 3 mage, send some zombies. Repeat sending waves of zombies until you have 125 EXP, and upgrade your goldmine. Continue sending zombies but upgrade them as soon as possible. Keep on sending once you have the level 5 zombies, and move on to phase 2 once you have 15 coins/second.
An alternative strategy allows you to win in less than 5 minutes, but only if done right. You will need the help of your teammates for this. Send zombies, but focus exclusively on upgrading them up to level 5. Hopefully, at one point there will be so many and the enemy team will be overrun.
With some luck, the diamond zombies will queue up in front of the enemy castle and maul it with their green fists.
You should only do this if the opposing team are beginners (and don't have mercy for them), or if you can coordinate the attack proprely with your teammates.
2.
This is the part where you try to win before armageddon. Since it's rare to see a full team of experienced players in the new update, this will make you win 90% of your games in less than 15 minutes. Very good for point grinding.
Pigmen. They are now very good. I would even say they are the new creepers. (Early game rusher) Grind up some EXP with your zombies until you have at least 15 coins/second (25 could work too). Then, unlock pigmen and send a full wave of them (level 1). Watch how far they make it. If they don't get demolished in seconds, upgrade them to the next level, send waves, upgrade to level 3, again and again until you get level 5 pigmen. Each wave should chip away 50 to 100 castle health, maybe even 200. If you are lacking coins, send level 5 zombies to catch up with EXP. You can also look for powerups while your wave cooldown is refreshing.
The reasons the pig zombies are so good:
+Their speed allows them to run past the turrets quickly
+The turrets will also miss them sometimes due to their speed
+Immunity to Inferno, the overpowered potion (and the zeus tower, another popular tower which is somewhat effective, but still nothing compared to the almighty turrets)
+Large health pool to tank the attacks of other lesser towers.
Don't underestimate the pigmen, they have won almost all my games for me.
3.
If you have reached the point where the enemy defence is starting to look like the one I described in my Defence section, (15+ turrets) you can't win.
You can't.
Really, it's impossible.
No matter what you send, your mobs will get torn apart by the turrets.
Your only chance to win before game end is if the Horde comes and the enemy team doesn't know the true power of the inferno potion, or if the wither decides that their turrets are quite menacing. Or just hope for a miracle, maybe a teammate was saving up for diamond giants this whole time and lightning destroys half the enemy turrets.
Actually...
There is still an old strategy which can save you: the cave spider rush. By constantly healing cave spiders with regeneration potions it's possible to win. This must be done with stealth however, since one inferno potion will terminate all of them in 2 seconds. A good moment to do is while you are getting rushed with something which you don't think will make it, since the attention of your adversaries will be on your track. Send a full wave of tier 5 spiders, and throw regeneration potions in front of the group, not in the middle every time you can.. Many desperate games were won this way.
If that fails, just keep throwing down some inferno at the mobs and let the turrets do the rest, there's nothing left to do. Hopefully one of your zombies or pigmen did 1 damage and will make you win at game end. Otherwise it should be a tie, which will still grant you the 55 points you get for winning.
Conclusion
I like and dislike this new update. I like it because it looks very nice, it feels modern now and well made. Some bugs still need to be fixed (such as the ice damage from ice towers being so low it's a joke, or the path 2 turret which is also pure disappointment) but that's understandable, the update is quite recent. It includes some very creative concepts like the landmines, meteors and a nice use of less popular mobs in minigames (shulker and snowman, for example).
I only have one problem with it: it's unbalanced. I'm sure that by changing some numbers, everything will be fixed and who knows, people might even stop asking for classic mode. I understand them, they want variety in their towers, complex and diverse strategies and not a single one true path to victory. But again, make the turrets and inferno decent, but not overpowered like this, buff some other towers like the leach or necromancer (zeus' rage is very average now too) and everything will be better.
(I did not address the fact that it's basically impossible to win if you don't have point unlocks and are opposed to someone who does, especially the path 1 turret).
Until next time,
-Manchot
AS MENTIONNED BY DeDeDestroyed
"That being said, sending T5 witches alongside some T5 skeletons has had success, especially if sent during the Horde. The turrets will focus the skeletons usually, and if they don't you can just throw a regen pot. Wither skeletons are immune to fire (?), and sometimes people don't spot the witches and don't inferno them."
I can confirm this can make you win at armageddon when the enemy team is using inferno potions and 7 turrets or less. Add some regeneration potions into the mix if the enemy has a large supply of turrets. Never send giants.
Hi everyone!
Tower Defence was recently updated and not a single thing was left untouched. The strategies are completely different. Here is how I run most of my games when I don't want to have fun and just want to win.
Defence
The best tower is now the Path 1 Turret. Turrets used to be horrible. The Path 2 turret is almost a joke and does no damage. However, the first path will obliterate everything but cave spiders. I'm serious. Let's say someone wants to defend their team from anything which was sent by the enemy.
Don't even ask questions, build a path 1 turret. Every other damage tower (Artillery, poison, necromancer, leach, archer, sorcerer, zeus) is purely useless compared to the holy path 1 turret. You might think that the landmines from the artillery are fun, and they are, but think about it: you could have built another path 1 turret with those coins.
What this means: to have the best defence possible, place down an ice, quake (for the slowdown) and mage (for the cave spiders) every so often and fill everything else with path 1 turrets. Nothing else. I'm not making this up, place them everywhere, even on the 3x3 spots. They are godlike.
So start off the game with a level 3 mage, follow the strategies in Offence, and build turrets when you have enough gold. Once you have 3 maxed path 1 turrets, place down an ice, a quake and a mage, rince and repeat.
Eventually armageddon will come. If it's the lightning, you'll lose some of your turrets, it's sad, but it happens. Rebuild them. If it's the Wither, then it will just get melted by the turrets, it might destroy 1 or 2 though. Don't build sorcerers to defend yourself from the skulls, you could be using those coins for more turrets. The Horde is a bit more challenging: every mob in it will get annihilated by the turrets, but some giants might survive, which brings me onto my next point.
Inferno potions.
They used to be horrible, just like the turrets. But now it's the best potion. The only mobs immune to it are flying troops, magma cubes, wither skeletons, the Wither and pigmen. Everything else will get voided in seconds. 12 level 1 giants? Throw down 1 or 2 inferno potions on their heads and they are gone. That is right, 72000 coins obliterated by a mere 800 coins. The higher level giants might be harder to deal with, but 5 or 6 infernos should terminate the diamond giants. If you have enough turrets it will be really easy, trust me.
You basically need the inferno potions to survive the Horde.
That's basically it.
Offence
I like to divide the game in 3 parts:
1. The Rise of the Dead (where you gain EXP and potentially win)
2. The Porcine Armies (the main attack of the game, where you try to win)
3. The Stalling (when you have failed 1 and 2)
(Sorry for the cringy names, I will never do it again)
General tip: lookout for powerups (nether stars with green particles on the track). It's actually possible to steal powerups from the enemy track if they aren't paying attention, so use that to your advantage.
1.
When the game starts and you placed your level 3 mage, send some zombies. Repeat sending waves of zombies until you have 125 EXP, and upgrade your goldmine. Continue sending zombies but upgrade them as soon as possible. Keep on sending once you have the level 5 zombies, and move on to phase 2 once you have 15 coins/second.
An alternative strategy allows you to win in less than 5 minutes, but only if done right. You will need the help of your teammates for this. Send zombies, but focus exclusively on upgrading them up to level 5. Hopefully, at one point there will be so many and the enemy team will be overrun.
With some luck, the diamond zombies will queue up in front of the enemy castle and maul it with their green fists.
You should only do this if the opposing team are beginners (and don't have mercy for them), or if you can coordinate the attack proprely with your teammates.
2.
This is the part where you try to win before armageddon. Since it's rare to see a full team of experienced players in the new update, this will make you win 90% of your games in less than 15 minutes. Very good for point grinding.
Pigmen. They are now very good. I would even say they are the new creepers. (Early game rusher) Grind up some EXP with your zombies until you have at least 15 coins/second (25 could work too). Then, unlock pigmen and send a full wave of them (level 1). Watch how far they make it. If they don't get demolished in seconds, upgrade them to the next level, send waves, upgrade to level 3, again and again until you get level 5 pigmen. Each wave should chip away 50 to 100 castle health, maybe even 200. If you are lacking coins, send level 5 zombies to catch up with EXP. You can also look for powerups while your wave cooldown is refreshing.
The reasons the pig zombies are so good:
+Their speed allows them to run past the turrets quickly
+The turrets will also miss them sometimes due to their speed
+Immunity to Inferno, the overpowered potion (and the zeus tower, another popular tower which is somewhat effective, but still nothing compared to the almighty turrets)
+Large health pool to tank the attacks of other lesser towers.
Don't underestimate the pigmen, they have won almost all my games for me.
3.
If you have reached the point where the enemy defence is starting to look like the one I described in my Defence section, (15+ turrets) you can't win.
You can't.
Really, it's impossible.
No matter what you send, your mobs will get torn apart by the turrets.
Your only chance to win before game end is if the Horde comes and the enemy team doesn't know the true power of the inferno potion, or if the wither decides that their turrets are quite menacing. Or just hope for a miracle, maybe a teammate was saving up for diamond giants this whole time and lightning destroys half the enemy turrets.
Actually...
There is still an old strategy which can save you: the cave spider rush. By constantly healing cave spiders with regeneration potions it's possible to win. This must be done with stealth however, since one inferno potion will terminate all of them in 2 seconds. A good moment to do is while you are getting rushed with something which you don't think will make it, since the attention of your adversaries will be on your track. Send a full wave of tier 5 spiders, and throw regeneration potions in front of the group, not in the middle every time you can.. Many desperate games were won this way.
If that fails, just keep throwing down some inferno at the mobs and let the turrets do the rest, there's nothing left to do. Hopefully one of your zombies or pigmen did 1 damage and will make you win at game end. Otherwise it should be a tie, which will still grant you the 55 points you get for winning.
Conclusion
I like and dislike this new update. I like it because it looks very nice, it feels modern now and well made. Some bugs still need to be fixed (such as the ice damage from ice towers being so low it's a joke, or the path 2 turret which is also pure disappointment) but that's understandable, the update is quite recent. It includes some very creative concepts like the landmines, meteors and a nice use of less popular mobs in minigames (shulker and snowman, for example).
I only have one problem with it: it's unbalanced. I'm sure that by changing some numbers, everything will be fixed and who knows, people might even stop asking for classic mode. I understand them, they want variety in their towers, complex and diverse strategies and not a single one true path to victory. But again, make the turrets and inferno decent, but not overpowered like this, buff some other towers like the leach or necromancer (zeus' rage is very average now too) and everything will be better.
(I did not address the fact that it's basically impossible to win if you don't have point unlocks and are opposed to someone who does, especially the path 1 turret).
Until next time,
-Manchot
AS MENTIONNED BY DeDeDestroyed
"That being said, sending T5 witches alongside some T5 skeletons has had success, especially if sent during the Horde. The turrets will focus the skeletons usually, and if they don't you can just throw a regen pot. Wither skeletons are immune to fire (?), and sometimes people don't spot the witches and don't inferno them."
I can confirm this can make you win at armageddon when the enemy team is using inferno potions and 7 turrets or less. Add some regeneration potions into the mix if the enemy has a large supply of turrets. Never send giants.
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