https://forums.eletd.com/Build-lists-t2547.html for basics tutorial(made by holepercent)
http://towerfun.host22.com/Optimizer.html tower placement calculator(made by TowerFun)
There are many game rules combinations that give the final game type in element TD, and also dictate some of the tactics, and make some plays not optimal for certain game modes. I divided them into different categories this rules/options that they affect.
Game modes
1. defense - creeps waves are pre-determined.
- timers between waves is set by spawn rules/timers.
- order of waves determined by wave rules.
2. war - creeps spawn based on what towers you build.
- they spawn indefinitely as long as you/others have a tower
Game maze(map)
1. mazing - there is no maze.
- the creeps follow a certain pre-determined path, starting from point 0 the spawn location to point 1, point 2, point 3, and finally point 4 the exit.(you can see this 3 spots on the map marked by a prop different on every map). this is for the start so they won't run straight from point 0 to 4 and leak in 5 seconds.
but if you build a maze not matter how short or long, they will still try to hit this 4 spots, making room for an interesting tactic to make the longest maze.
- you can build your own maze using a wall(3$ cost) or with your towers that can be part of the maze.
- the creeps have increased movement speed, from +0.2 to +2(non-mazing speed is 4 with no speed buffs witch is 2.5x normal speed).
- interest timer is 20 s.
2. non-mazing(standard) - the maze is pre-build.
- interest timer is 15s(unless you get hero).
- the creeps follow the maze.
- creeps have all speed 4.(unless affected by speed buff 2.5x normal speed every 3 seconds)
Game enhancement
1. hero - you get a customizable hero.
- hero does dmg, has abilities that mimic the ones tower have(eg napalm, money on kill , life on kil).
- creeps have +100% hp in form of a shield. the shield follows the same rules as hp.(does not regenerate unless special conditions, see below)
- hero is stupid, but can be good if build/used/micro properly.(see below)
- interest timer set to 20s.(no matter the mode)
2. no hero - standard game use only towers to kill waves.
- creeps hp and protection affected only by difficulty and team.
Game spawn timers
1. competitive - next wave timer starts as soon as someone kills all creeps in a wave.
- all players have same difficulty.
2. casual - next wave timer starts as soon as last creep in a wave spawns(30 creeps every wave, unless image/undead)
- every player can chose own difficulty
3. race - next wave timer starts as soon as YOU clear your own wave.
- all players same difficulty.
- there is no wave 61, the first to clear wave 60 wins.
4. extreme - same as competitive but only 1 life.
Game wave order
1. normal - normal pre-set wave order, can be found on official site.
2. chaos - waves spawn randomly after first 5 waves.
- this doesn't mean at wave 6 you get 50k hp wave, it means that at next wave you get a random element type/ability for the wave(eg fire fast that should be on later waves but with hp to match wave 6).
- not to be confused with element that you get for your tower.
Game element rules
1. all pick - all can chose what element they get at every 5 levels.
2. all random - all get random elements every 5 levels, but different from each other
3. same random - all get same random elements.
Game difficulty
1. very easy - 10% dmg reduction, 50% hp, least gold per creep. you need 111.11 dmg to kill 100 hp
2. easy - 20 %, 62.5% hp, you need 125 dmg for 100 hp
3. normal - 30%, 70% hp, you need 142.85 dmg for 100 hp
4. hard - 40%, 87.5% hp, you need 166.66 dmg for 100 hp
5. very hard - 50%, 100% hp. most gold per kill. you need 200 dmg to kill 100 hp
- while gold per kill is better the harder the game the difference in the end is not that big, given by the fact that you need less dmg for the easiest difficulty and more dmg for hardest one, making economy bigger for easy mode and smaller for harder mode. also the coefficient is small and it will not be seen until a certain wave.(eg no extra gold for VH if the bounty per creep is 5, until the bonus is 1 at least it won't give you .1-.9$).
- also people are scared of hard, VH, but the towers, and money per wave is designed to be able to easily survive even on VH.
- on very easy you get 1 point per fruit kill, on normal 4 to 1, on VH 7 points per fruit kill. making VH a no-brainer, even tested as long as your are going to leak fruits at some point, you will make more points in VH compared to any other difficulty, with same build, even if the hp and protection % is bigger.
Game teams
1. FFA. free for all - everyone has his own spot on the map.
2. 2 man team - 2 people or 1 on same map spot.
- there are 4 teams max you can chose either one of them if available, and you can chose to solo if there are not enough players(eg 5 players 2 go for same team 3 go for solo)
- to balance the game for 2 players in same spot the waves that spawn for the team have 2x protection, that is: VE 55%, E 60%, N 65%, H 70%, VH 75%.
This are all the game modes category, and all the combinations possible affect the game strategy, your goals, game style.
For example you want to win, be last survivor, get most fruit score(all this legally).
Currently maze is broker in my opinion, is easy to get enough gold, and game mode conditions to make fruits grow to last level(witch is 500k hp on VH, 250k hp on VE, they also get in the end mechanical+healing+fast+revive+image). For non-maze there is no way to run fruits forever no matter what game combos.
Basic strategy/rules.
All game modes
- composite towers(ray and grenade) always sell for 100% $ even after element upgrade.
- they become obsolete really fast. good to support your towers against weak element.
- all elemental towers(periodic also) sell for 75% $, unless you play random witch is 100% $.
- composite towers < 1 element tower(not upgraded) < 2 element tower < 3 element tower < pure towers(periodic + max upgrade 1 element tower).
- you can have max 4 pure/periodic(not counting clones from trickery tower).
- you get 2 gas for pures at 51 and 56 wave. you can buy 2 more for gas once you get lvl 1 each element or lvl 3 for one element.
- early on you want to get fast 3 elements level 1, and upgrade the 1 element to 2 elem to 3 elem. this is best tactics money wise, dmg wise, and also because level 2 and 3 elements are really hard to kill on hard and VH depending on your dmg aoe/single target strong/weak/neutral to that element.
- single elem towers have 4 lvls of upgrade, 2 elem towers have 3 lvls, 3 elem have 2 lvls.
- all single elem towers are not worth upgrading until you can get pure(that means only 2-4 max never get more than lvl 1 single element not worth it).
- all 2 elem towers lvl 2 are weaker than 3 elem towers lvl 1. making the tact to get fast 3 elements better than 2 elements then get those to lvl 2 and 3.(unless you want to play life towers there is not optimal getting 2 elements to level 2 or 3 over getting fast 3 elements)
- 2 elem upgrades are cheaper per upgrade and overall compared to 3 elem upgrades and towers. but until max level the 3 elem make up in dmg per $.
- while max lvl 2 elem towers cost 3150 $ and max lvl 3 elem towers cost 5000 $ and have around same dmg output with different effects, the downside of 2 elem towers is they need 2 elem to lvl 3(you only get 11 elem, and you want to have as many as possible for building the support towers).
- there are 3 support towers that affect towers by IAS, + dmg, cloning, all are double elem towers.(IAS W N, +dmg F E, clone D L)
- there are 8 support towers that affect creeps, 4 increase dmg taken by creeps, 4 slow down the creeps.(4 are nature based triple elem tower, 4 are water based triple elem tower, they use same elements they only swap W with N they are N D F, N D E, N L F, N L E, W D F, W D E, W L F, W L E)
- all support towers are worth having even at lvl 1(for 2 elem towers lvl 3 is max, for 3 elem lvl 2 is max) both cost and dmg effective.
eg: having lvl 1 - 1 clone 1 forge 1 well tower 1.15x1.15x1.15x(no of towers affected at least 1 max 4 per 1 support tower) affecting 2 pure/periodic = 3.04 pures
you get 1 pure dmg for the cost of 500$x 3(cost of lvl 1 2-elem tower)
1.15x1.15x1.15x 4 normal towers(be it 2-elem or 3-elem) = 6.08 towers you get 2.08x 3150$ or 2.08x 5000$ worth in dmg for 3x500$
having only 1 lvl 1 support tower 1.15x 4 towers = 4.6 pure/periodic/2-elem/3-elem
0.6 towers x 11k/3150/5000 = 6.6k$ / 1890$ / 3k$ in dmg for 500 $
you want to have in your elem build at least 2 elem that will make up a support tower that affects towers, and place 1 of them for every 4 dmg towers, all support towers that don't affect creeps can serve 100% of the time 4 dmg towers no matter what upgrade lvl.
Specific game mode strategy
Competitive rush strategy
In competitive the next wave timer starts after one player clears the current wave. This mode is almost always chosen and there is always(99%) a player who overbuilds, overkills, rushes the wave clear. So this tact will help you be the one that leads, puts pressure on the people that are not ready, be sure not to get overrun by other people who rush/overkill/overbuild. This will be a tact out of many, the idea can still apply to many tower type and elem combo, using the same placement rules.
The idea is to place a aoe tower so that it will hit the creeps right where they spawn and have it upgraded to match the wave strength(it will be alot of overkill in the start, but for alter waves will be just enough dmg to kill them fast and less overkill). I use flamethrower F E D placed like this.
Simple tact will kill anyone who is not prepared, doesn't spend enough, tries to get too much economy for interest.
- this tact makes interest almost obsolete because of the length of the game the interest won't be so much worth it/ won't be much in pure numbers.
work in progress... to be continued.
