Bloons TD Battles 2/Strategies/Early Unlocks

In Bloons TD Battles 2, a new player will need to quickly rush to get the most powerful T3 upgrades as soon as possible. The purpose of this page is to guide players towards the milestone of achieving the stage of the game where the "best" Tier 3 upgrades can be unlocked. Starting from Version 1.0.6 (at least upcoming), players in Red Bloon Camp and Yellow Stadium are restricted up to Tier 3 upgrades.

General Strategy
Playing more games is key, as obvious as it sounds. This helps progress levels for upgrades faster.

You get double XP if you win, and you also get double XP again if you watch an advertisement (watching advertisements only applies to mobile). With VIP access, which can only be bought with in-app purchases, it gives 4x XP, to which adding a watched advertisement increments it to 5x.

Rough calculation on this Reddit link shows that there is a significant grindfest for full unlocks. For now, don't worry about getting all highest tiers; just make sure to get enough XP to reach Tier 3. Reaching Tier 3 on the majority of towers is the goal for this Early Unlocks page.

Also, importantly, no Battle Points, Monkey Money, or Trophies will be earned if losing on a super early round. So intentional death games is not a valid strategy for earning anything other than Tower XP.

Try to optimise your loadout pre-game and your defence in-game to defeat all kinds of bloons such as: regen bloons, camo bloons, moab class, fortified bloons, grouped bloons, leads, black and whites, purples, and more.

Heroes and Towers
The best strategy here for defense is to revolve the tower loadout based on the hero. Each hero has their own advantages and disadvantages that will help out as the game goes on. Offensive strength is one aspect to view, but there's also base cost and buffing potential. At this stage, assume all heroes available are just Quincy and Gwendolin.

Quincy is the cheapest hero possible and only one that can be started in a single game, except Obyn (who requires Monkey Money to unlock). He is good at cleaning up bloons, or just defending against bloons coming from the natural end. He also gains camo detection as he levels up. He best pairs with those that are effective against grouped bloons, such as Bomb. You also want to get something that's good against spaced bloons too, as he is not the best against spaced bloons, to which Tack works well here.

Gwendolin is more expensive than Quincy, has shorter range, but much stronger against grouped bloons. Still not the best against very early rushes, but much harder to get overwhelmed by such rushes. Pair with something that beats Purples, especially Tack Shooters.

Important Towers
With the gathered Monkey Money, use it to unlock new towers. Heroes are very expensive, so it's mainly just Quincy or Gwen for heroes. '''Focus on buying towers first with the Monkey Money. Cosmetics should be prioritized later at all costs.'''

The below table is a recommendations table, ordered by recommended priority to start focusing on unlocking with Tower XP:

Important Upgrades
Applies to upgrades up to Tier 3. Mostly focusing on Primary, Military, and Magic categories.

Note that Tier 2 upgrades are unlocked by default. These tables will cover the best upgrades, for Tier 1, 2, and 3.

Tier 3
The following Tier 3 upgrades are the recommended options, and are ordered by recommendation of unlock order.

Rushes
The best defense is described in terms of offense. The spirit of the game is a battle. You want to fight against your opponent, not befriend them. Go hard on them. Find their weak spots.

Most players will start off with a very small subset of towers and heroes. Dart, Tack, and Bomb will be the first towers to unlock. And for heroes, expect either Quincy or Gwen. Certain other towers, usually of Primary, Military, or Magic, will be the selection of towers unlocked by players. The aim here is to find a weakness around the limited selection of towers and their upgrades.

There are two different types of rushes, grouped and spaced. Grouped rushes are marked with multiple bloons next to each other. Spaced rushes are marked with just a single bloon. Grouped rushes consist of multiple weak bloons, but spaced rushes consist of stronger but more spaced out bloons. Grouped rushes also send quicker than spaced rushes and generally give more eco overall. To optimize choosing between types of rushes, look for what the opponent's side feels like. Is it too vulnerable? Rush with strong rushes. Is it too safe? Spend more on defense or just send weak grouped bloons.

The first rush available that will also be quite effective is Reds, which both boosts eco very early quite efficiently while also forcing the opponent to buy extra defenses, usually either a Bomb or multiple Tacks. Also make sure you have a defense against Reds yourself. Save some money. Spaced Blues are also decent if the player opts for Bomb, as the opponent may get too used to grouped rushes that they'd possibly miss out on fighting off early grouped rushes.

Spaced Yellows can be used to overwhelm an opponent who is bad against spaced bloons. Other spaced bloon options can be used to harass the opponent against certain weak spots, such as White weaknesses against Ice Monkeys, Black weaknesses against Bomb Shooters, and so on.

As more and more rushes get unlocked the further the rounds go, you'll need to adjust to the heat of the battle. Look for the list of rushes on the opposite side of the screen to explore these rushes. As a general rule of thumb, Blacks and Zebras beat Bombs, Whites and Zebras beat Ice, Purples beat Gwendolin, and Leads beat Quincy. However, some players may have additional defenses that specifically counteract these principles. Use proper judgement to determine what occasions rushing specific bloon types is appropriate, and try to form a solid pattern based on what succeeds. Also bear in mind that some players may have bought Tier 3 upgrades already, so be careful, especially Crossbow, Hot Shots (Tack), Cluster Bombs, Cannon Ship, Dragon's Breath, and Berserker Brew.

Note that bloon modifiers are not yet unlocked in Red Bloon Camp, the default arena. You will not need to worry about Regrows, Camos, or Fortified until going above Red Bloon Camp. If you do surpass it, make sure to unlock the important camo upgrades. Enhanced Eyesight is unlocked by default but very inefficient. Find more versatile options that can handle varieties of bloon types. More importantly, find the decamo options, which includes Submerge and Support, Shimmer, and Signal Flare. 0-2-2 Wall of Fire (Wizard) works well against Camo Leads but not Camo Purples. Advanced Intel is decent when paired with Quincy if stuck at Tier 2, making 2-0-2 and 2-2-0 work well against all bloon types.

Popular rushes effective at killing opponents often include:


 * R11 Grouped Purples/Zebras Send zebras first since they have a lot of RBE, follow up with purple which are faster, to break wall of fire and generally stack more bloons in the same area.
 * R12 Camo Grouped Purple/Zebra. A good followup to a round 11 rush if your opponent doesn't have good camo detection.
 * R14 Grouped Rainbows
 * R16 Grouped Ceramics

Towards the end-game, just go for Grouped Ceramics and go all in. Surviving till MOAB-class bloons is too risky. BFBs almost certainly are death; go immediately send a BFB if surpassing the unlock for BFBs.

If the battle somehow gets to Round 25 and neither player has sent each other a fatal BFB or ZOMG rush, then the first person to send a boosted DDT on Round 26 wins basically automatically, as neither player will have any reasonable way to pop it in time. Make sure to activate your boost just before Round 25 ends to ensure your DDT is boosted as soon as it spawns. Prepare to send the DDT, which will replace the slot previously occupied by grouped MOAB sends. If you have Super Monkey, place a 0-0-2 (0-0-1 if you can reliably and permanantly decamo the DDT, such as with Shimmer or Counter-Espionage) as Knockback can slow the DDT and make it easier for your DDT to get through before your opponent's does, even if the Super Monkey cannot damage it. If you suspect of see your opponent trying to defend the DDT's before round 26 hits, such as methods described below, save up $5200 to send a fortified one, which requires about twice the firepower to take down, something your opponent will not have even with a boost.

If you somehow intend to defend the DDT, only Super Monkey can viably defend it at 2-2-2 unlocks, requiring 3 2-0-2 Supers with a Monkey Boost to defend standard DDTs and twice that number if your opponent fortifies them. DBreath Wizards can also do it (6 0-3-2 Wizards) if you unlocked it before Shimmer, though unlocking in this order is not recommended.

Specific Rush Weaknesses
Quincy strategies are usually weak against grouped rushes. For early-game, be super aggressive with grouped rushes until confident that the opponent can counter those early grouped rushes, and then try opt for spaced rushes if it also looks like they are weak on spaced rushes, like Spaced Yellows. For mid-game, opt for Grouped Zebras, Grouped Rainbows, and Grouped Ceramics.

Gwendolin strategies tend to be grouped bloon advantageous, but still vulnerable to Purples. Here, it is best to just send eco bloons until there is the option to send Grouped Purples. Go all in with sending Grouped Purples once the round comes. Grouped Ceramics can work too, but less effective than against Quincy strategies.