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The Golden Eagle's huge talons make it an expert at grabbing large numbers of Bloons at once. At beast max Beast Power the Golden Eagle can grab lowest tiers of MOAB.
~ In-game description

Golden Eagle is the third upgrade of Path 3 for the Beast Handler in Bloons TD 6. It transforms the Horned Owl into a Golden Eagle, which picks many more Bloons and consumes less pierce on Ceramics and targetable Leads (if lead-popping is present). At maximum power, it can pick up to a single MOAB. As an airborne creature, the Beast Handler requires nearby track to position the Golden Eagle directly above nearby bloons. Max Beast Power increases from 6 to 24 and base power is now 8, additionally increasing the maximum contributing Beast Handlers for this beast from 3 to 16.

Golden Eagle improves on the Horned Owl's capability to move stronger bloons by reducing the amount of pierce that Lead Bloon and Ceramic Bloons consume from 2 to 1 and 6 to 2 respectively, and pierce consumption of heavier bloons rounds up instead of down (i.e. leftover pierce below pierce consumption will allow pickup of an additional heavy bloon). It also increases the base pierce to 30, attack cooldown of the base attack reduced to 0.6s instead of 0.7s, and constantly damages grabbed bloons every 0.5s instead of 1.0s. Damage increases at a ratio of 1 damage every 8 power, and pierce increases at a ratio of 15 pierce every 4 power, both values rounded down. Attack cooldown reduces linearly at a ratio of 0.28s every 16 power. Caught bloons will only spawn one child.

At max beast power, it has 90 pierce and 3 damage, and attacks every 0.32 seconds, and can now pick up a single MOAB. However, picking up MOABs consume an arbitrarily high pierce (1090 to be precise), preventing any practical way to pick more than one MOAB at a time, and reduce flight speed to 70% of the original. Each grab from a maxed Golden Eagle can pick up to 45 Ceramics or 1 MOAB.

This upgrade costs $1,800 on Easy, $2,120 on Medium, $2,290 on Hard, and $2,545 on Impoppable.

Description[]

Overview[]

Beastbird overview (3)

Golden Eagle and its handler

The Golden Eagle replaces the Owl for a yellow-brown Golden Eagle. The Beast Handler itself now wears a crown with three golden feathers, alongside a green shirt with brown belts and leaf-like designs on the circular neck protector, which is now green.

Geaglefront1

Golden Eagle

The Golden Eagle attempts to grab any bloon up to a Ceramic with its claws every 0.6 seconds with a flight speed of 110 and base pierce of 15, and if caught, moves bloons to the designated point. The Golden Eagle will continue to chase the targeted bloon until it successfully grabs it or it leaves the map. Bloons caught by the grab will take additional damage every 0.5 seconds equivalent to its base attack's damage value. Lead Bloons now only consume 1 pierce, although it still cannot pop leads by default, and Ceramic Bloons consume 2 pierce instead of 6.

Unlike Blowback Blowback (unspecified blowback variant) effects, any bloons moved by any bird, including the Golden Eagle, will retain Freeze Freeze (standard bloons, unspecified alt variants) and Glue Standard Glue (unspecified alt effect variant) effects.

Each level of beast power reduces the attack cooldown by 0.0175s, gains extra pierce, and +1 damage is added every 8 additional power, for a total of 90 pierce and 3 damage at max power. When merged with other Beast Handlers, the Golden Eagle can grab bloons within all merged Beast Handler's ranges. In addition, it is able to move bloons on multi-lane maps to a different track, and if its designated point is an intersection, then bloons will be moved to a random track in that intersection.

Targeting Priorities[]

As an upgraded Beast Handler, the Golden Eagle Handler controls a flying beast. It controls a Golden Eagle. The beast of the Golden Eagle can be merged from weaker-tier flying beasts to add energy, empowering the Golden Eagle via a network of other Beast Handlers. Alternatively, it can be merged into stronger-tier flying beasts to transfer energy, empowering the stronger flying beast in the process. This system utilises the Merge button to select a valid Beast Handler given sufficient energy capacity.

The Golden Eagle follows along the lanes in a semi-Pursuit targeting, similarly to Etienne’s drones, and adheres to standard targeting priorities.

  • First: Targets the first bloon visible within its range.
  • Last: Targets the last bloon visible within its range.
  • Close: Targets the closest bloon visible within its range.
  • Strong: Targets the strongest bloon visible within its range.

Aside from the standard four targeting priorities (First, Last, Close, Strong), a Golden Eagle Beast Handler also has a special targeting button that allows it to select a point anywhere on the track (via the "Target Bird" button). Their bird will attempt to drag any Bloons it attacks towards that position.

Any Beast Handlers who have merged their birds into a Golden Eagle or above will also "share" their targeting ranges, in a similar manner to Advanced Intel. The bird will be able to attack Bloons in all merged Handlers' ranges, and the "Target Bird" reticle can be placed along any valid track location in any of their ranges.

Full Popology[]

Statistics[]

Updated as of Version 44.2

Base Stats
  • Handler:
    • Passive type, automatically places a Golden Eagle beast on valid lanes within 60 range. Golden Eagle flies above valid lanes and gains access to Grab and Peck. Can reposition the reticle of the Golden Eagle manually; Golden Eagle initiates Grab towards this location, otherwise uses Peck. Flight speed of 110 units per second and doubles while flying towards the target.
  • Grab:
    • Zone, sharp type, can move within 60 range, 25 radius, 0.6s attack cooldown, 1 damage, +1 Regrow damage (2 Regrow damage), 30 pierce (consumption: Ceramics = 2). Drags affected targets to a new location and deals the same damage every 0.5s, bloon targets cannot be re-moved until repositioned, but can be targeted by other attacks. Caught bloons will only spawn one child. Cannot target MOABs and above (BFBs and above if max power), and cannot target Leads unless given lead-popping. Max power can target MOABs but consume 45 pierce and flies at 70% speed.
  • Peck:
    • Zone, sharp type, can move within 60 range, 25 radius, 0.6s attack cooldown, 1 damage, +1 Regrow damage (2 Regrow damage), 30 pierce (consumption: Ceramics = 2). Cannot target MOABs and above (BFBs and above if max power), and cannot target Leads unless given lead-popping. Max power can target MOABs but consume 1090 pierce and flies at 70% speed.
Crosspathing interactions

Unlike the majority of towers in BTD6, the Beast Handler does not benefit from crosspathing. Each path spawns or upgrades a beast, rather than directly affecting the other crosspaths.

Merging interactions
  • Default Power: 8
  • Min Power: 8
  • Max Power: 24
  • Bonus Stat Changes: Damage increases by 1 every 8 power, pierce increases by 15 every 4 power. At the default 8 power, starts with 1 damage and 30 pierce. Starts with 80 flight speed. At max power, can pick up and damage MOABs.
    • Equations: Where p is power, floor() function is rounding down, and ceil() function is rounding up:
      • Grab:
        • Damage: 1 + floor([p-8] * 1/8)
        • Pierce: 30+floor((p-8) * 60/16)
        • Attack cooldown: 1-(p-8)/16*0.52
        • Flight speed: 80 + 40 * (p-8)/16
    • Default Power (8, grab): 1 damage, +1 Regrow damage, 30 pierce (max for extra consumptions: 15 Ceramics).
    • Max Power (24, grab): Damage increased to 3, pierce increased to 90 (max for extra consumptions: 45 Ceramics, 1 MOAB).
Benefits from Beast Power (Grab)
Beast Power Pierce Damage Attack Speed Other
8 30 1 (+1 Regrow) 1.0s Picks up to 15 Ceramics. Flight speed of 80.0.
9 33 1 (+1 Regrow) 0.9675s Picks up to 17 Ceramics. Flight speed of 82.5.
10 37 1 (+1 Regrow) 0.935s Picks up to 19 Ceramics. Flight speed of 85.0.
11 41 1 (+1 Regrow) 0.9025s Picks up to 21 Ceramics. Flight speed of 87.5.
12 45 1 (+1 Regrow) 0.87s Picks up to 23 Ceramics. Flight speed of 90.0.
13 48 1 (+1 Regrow) 0.8375s Picks up to 24 Ceramics. Flight speed of 92.5.
14 52 1 (+1 Regrow) 0.805s Picks up to 26 Ceramics. Flight speed of 95.0.
15 56 1 (+1 Regrow) 0.7725s Picks up to 28 Ceramics. Flight speed of 97.5.
16 60 2 (+1 Regrow) 0.74s Picks up to 30 Ceramics. Flight speed of 100.0.
17 63 2 (+1 Regrow) 0.7075s Picks up to 32 Ceramics. Flight speed of 102.5.
18 67 2 (+1 Regrow) 0.675s Picks up to 34 Ceramics. Flight speed of 105.0.
19 71 2 (+1 Regrow) 0.6425s Picks up to 36 Ceramics. Flight speed of 107.5.
20 75 2 (+1 Regrow) 0.61s Picks up to 38 Ceramics. Flight speed of 110.0.
21 78 2 (+1 Regrow) 0.5775s Picks up to 39 Ceramics. Flight speed of 112.5.
22 82 2 (+1 Regrow) 0.545s Picks up to 41 Ceramics. Flight speed of 115.0.
23 86 2 (+1 Regrow) 0.5125s Picks up to 43 Ceramics. Flight speed of 117.5.
24 90 3 (+1 Regrow) 0.48s Can pick up MOABs. Picks up to 45 Ceramics, 1 MOABs. Flight speed of 120.0.

Attack Interactions[]

See also: Attack Interactions/Bloons TD 6/Support
Updated as of Version 37.3


  • Peck:
    • Sharp Type (pops Black, White, Purple) Sharp
    • Also affects Camo Bloons Camo Detection
    • Melee (Creates an attack within close range via melee means) Melee
    • Cannot Target Leads Cannot Target Leads
    • Target Bloon(s) (unspecified types of bloons targeting, and quantity) Target Bloon
    • Extra damage to Regrow Bloons (+1) Extra Damage to Regrows
  • Grab:
    • Sharp Type (pops Black, White, Purple) Sharp
    • Also affects Camo Bloons Camo Detection
    • Melee (Creates an attack within close range via melee means) Melee
    • Cannot Target Leads Cannot Target Leads
    • Target Bloon(s) (unspecified types of bloons targeting, and quantity) Target Bloon
    • Extra damage to Regrow Bloons (+1) Extra Damage to Regrows

Costs[]

Note: This section does not take into account Beast Handler merges.
Updated as of Version 49.0. Listed prices exclude external buffs, any sacrifices, and Monkey Knowledge.
[Module | Data] Purchase Sell
Costs Easy Medium Hard Impoppable Easy Medium Hard Impoppable
Upgrade (X-X-3) $1,800 $2,120 $2,290 $2,545 -
Total (0-0-3) $2,900 $3,420 $3,695 $4,105 $2,030 $2,394 $2,587 $2,874
Crosspath (1-0-3) $3,035 $3,580 $3,865 $4,295 $2,125 $2,506 $2,706 $3,007
Crosspath (2-0-3) $3,725 $4,390 $4,740 $5,265 $2,608 $3,073 $3,318 $3,686
Crosspath (0-1-3) $3,050 $3,595 $3,885 $4,315 $2,135 $2,517 $2,720 $3,021
Crosspath (0-2-3) $3,755 $4,425 $4,780 $5,310 $2,629 $3,098 $3,346 $3,717

This upgrade's prices (or included crosspath's prices) are affected by the following MK: Better Sell Deals

Strategy[]

Summary[]

Golden Eagle excels as a localized ranged bloon crowd control. It improves on the pickup utility of Horned Owl into a bloon-picking expertise, and becomes even stronger in the late-game. With enough power and intel from contributing Bird Handlers, Golden Eagle is a decent alternative to Downdraft with more pierce but much more damage, making it suitable for mid-game damage and Ceramic crowd control even in the late-game. The max-powered Golden Eagle serves more of a MOAB crowd control, being uniquely able to do small damage while picking up the affected MOABs, comparable to a MOAB Shove, in addition to reliable damage and pickup of Bloons.

Compared to previous tiers and the next upgrade, Giant Condor, the Golden Eagle is best suited for the mid-game, to pick large quantities of Bloons at once, or stall out a single MOAB at max power. It has the advantage of full discounts from Monkey Commerce, and multiple Golden Eagles are generally more reliable for picking up Bloons compared to Condor, and they can be used to cheap merges for the Condor. However, in the late-game, the Golden Eagles alone have less of an impact in the late-game, where MOAB-class Bloons become commonplace. Multiple non-maxed Golden Eagles still are more effective than Condor at picking up small isolated groups of Super Ceramics, albeit not as effective as other options.

Tips[]

  • It may help to have several lower-tier Bird Handlers with at least Gyrfalcon to use as merges, which build up ranged intel in addition to cheap power gains.
  • One Monkey Commerce discounted maxed Golden Eagle is cheaper than a raw Giant Condor, but a tad more expensive without any discounts. Unless needing to pick up stronger blimps, the multiple Golden Eagle setup is more effective as a gradual progression.
  • Note that Golden Eagle's increased pierce consumption versus Ceramics doesn't impede the capability to grab another heavy bloon with insufficient pierce.
    • 8/24 Golden Eagle can grab up to 15 Ceramics per pickup, while a 9/24 picks up to 17 Ceramics, despite having only 33 pierce.
    • 23/24 Golden Eagle has barely enough pierce to pick up all of the third wave of Round 63's Ceramics at once, picking up all 42 Ceramics, as it would be able to pick up to 43 Ceramics but with some leftover pierce.
    • 24/24 Golden Eagle can grab up to one MOAB per pickup, which is the maximum number of MOABs it can grab up per pickup. Likewise, it picks up to 45 Ceramics; a single 24/24 Golden Eagle should be enough to pick up Round 63's Ceramics with little trouble.
  • Because any bloon being picked up by a bird leaves behind only 1 child, pairing a Golden Eagle with basically any DPS tower allows it to delete large clumps of bloons at a time for very cheap, most notably against Round 49 and MOAB insides.
  • Versus Round 63, a 24/24 Golden Eagle is better than upgrading into a Giant Condor in terms of picking up Ceramics, due to the much higher attack speed of that Golden Eagle. Likewise, 24/24 Golden Eagle is better than Giant Condor for mid-game Bloon damage, attacking faster than a similar degree Condor for a lower cost.
  • Excluding discounts, to get a maxed Golden Eagle, 16 Gyrfalcons (Medium cost: $6,880) will efficiently obtain these costs.
  • In terms of crosspaths for natural progression of the tower, most use cases would use 0-2-3 to utilise the Adasaurus to chip down stronger Bloons in the saveup to Golden Eagle, as its earlier tier birds deal little damage in comparison, and the Piranha and Barracuda both have rather low pierce, though the Barracuda does add an extra source of knockback.
  • Targeting First is usually the best for Golden Eagle, although for the 24/24 Golden Eagle it is usually best set on Strong to maximize the MOAB pickup and utilize the comparatively high damage to Ceramics and below.
  • Against Round 40, the Golden Eagle is able to pick up all four Ceramics innards of the MOAB at once, regardless of tier of Golden Eagle.
  • Since there is no practical way to make Golden Eagle pick more than one MOAB at a time, the maxed Golden Eagle is best used just to stall the MOABs during the 40s and 50s rounds.
  • Sometimes the 23/24 Golden Eagle is enough of a benefit if needing just bloon pickup and none of the MOAB pickup.
  • A single non-merged Golden Eagle on each lane can be used on Round 63 to stall out portions of the Ceramic waves into a focused location, provided that other towers don't damage them before the Golden Eagle has time to pick them up. On single-entrance maps, multiple non-merged Golden Eagles may be required.

Version History[]

Balance Changes[]

Golden Eagle was considered one of the worst Beast Handler T3's when first released, alongside the Great White, but soon after acquiring MOAB pickup it soared as one of the best. However, Version 42.0 had severely weakened the formerly superpowered long-ranged DPS damage-and-pickup tower, and Version 43.0 removed any practical capability to pick up more than one MOAB so that Condor will remain the true focus of MOAB-class pickups, at the compensation of more efficient ordinary bloon pickup.

36.0
  • Released
  • [Bug]: 00x Beast Handler does not benefit from Sharpening Stone whatsoever
37.0
As our newest tower to be added to BTD6, we went over feedback for every path and made a large number of adjustments addressing a variety of points.
~ Ninja Kiwi
  • BUFF Golden Eagle now deals +1 Regrow damage on top of the new damage buff
  • BUFF Golden Eagle base pierce increased 12 → 15
  • BUFF Golden Eagle grab range increased 24 → 30
  • BUFF Golden Eagle ceramic extra pierce consume reduced +3 → +1
  • BUFF Golden Eagle at max tier can now grab MOABs. Picking up a MOAB consumes +14 pierce.
  • NERF [undocumented] Golden Eagle can no longer accept the Overclock or Ultraboost buffs.
    • Note: Ninja Kiwi incorrectly addressed "5-x-x & x-5-x Beast handler paths are now overclockable", which implies that beasts from Paths 1 and 2 can be buffed from Overclock; from testing, the actual balance change is that birds no longer accept Overclock or Ultraboost buffs, and previously all Beast Handlers could accept the Overclock buff properly and pass them to their beasts, just now water beasts can accept the buff better by increasing rate of the splash. This also affects Ultraboost.
40.0
[...] Max merged Golden Eagle gaining the ability to grab MOABs made sense at the time although the the pierce and penalties as they were at the time that meant it jumped up from grabbing no MOABs to suddenly 3 MOABs at a time which seemed too far, so the pierce penalty on MOABs is being increased at the T3 so that this reduces from 3 to 2 MOABs at a time.
~ Ninja Kiwi
  • NERF Golden Eagle MOAB pierce penalty increased (+14 → +29). Giant Condor MOAB pierce penalty unchanged at +14.
41.0
[...] Bottom path birds up to T3 are also just a little too good for the cost and are all going up about 5% with Condor's price being reduced to compensate.
~ Ninja Kiwi
  • NERF Golden Eagle price increased from $3000 to $3150
    • Total price increase is +$205 due to Gyrfalcon (+$10) and Horned Owl (+$45)
42.0
When first creating Beast Handler we balanced the T1-3 upgrade costs with a goal of creating a decision point between spending free playable space to save on cash or spending more cash to save on playable space. However in practice though some people have come on board with spending their playable space as a resource for more power; actual interest is much more divided between maximizing cost efficiency of these merges or simply using different towers. Given that spam of lower tier handlers already comes with the advantage of allowing them to be repositioned over a larger area, we’re changing our approach with a full cost rebalance across most T1-3 upgrades for exactly equal cost per point of merged beast power, instead leaving the nuance around understanding higher value merges & footprint advantage to depend more on discounts.
~ Ninja Kiwi
  • NERF Golden Eagle MOAB pierce penalty increased from +29 to +44
  • NERF Golden Eagle damage decreased, base value decreased (2 → 1) and maximum value decreased (6 → 3). Does not affect Giant Condor, which remains at base 2 damage and max 6 damage.
    • NERF Golden Eagle base damage reduced (2 → 1)
    • NERF Golden Eagle damage bonus from merges decreased (+4 → +2)
43.0
In going over our large list of price changes for Beast Handler’s lower tiers in 42 this change was received very positively, however we did not realize that in making this change we killed off all chance of dual-beast handlers being used as a round 1 starting option for under $650 in hard modes – So we gotta do that math all over again and convert it for difficulty, painful 😀 All T1 beast prices changed to allow 110 & 101 beast handler combos to be placed for under $650 in hard mode, all T2 & T3 prices shifted around to keep these same cost ratios.
~ Ninja Kiwi
  • BUFF Golden Eagle cost reduced from $3150 to $2120
    • Total price decrease is $1130, due to Gyrfalcon (-$20) and Horned Owl (-$80).
Golden Eagle has stood out more than Condor against MOABs which has felt very wrong, last update it was nerfed against MOABs and now we are playing with the pierce & penalties to improve Golden Eagle further against non-MOAB-Class targets and for Condor more help with lower MOABs.
~ Ninja Kiwi
  • BUFF Golden Eagle min power pierce increased from 15 to 30, max power pierce increased from 45 to 90, and bonus pierce from merges increased from 30 to 60. Does not affect Giant Condor, which remains identical to the new Golden Eagle.
  • NERF Golden Eagle pierce penalty versus MOABs increased from +44 to an arbitrarily high number (+1089), to prevent ever picking more than one MOAB at a time. Does not affect Giant Condor (+14).
  • NERF Golden Eagle attack cooldown reduction from merges reduced from 0.28679625s to 0.28s. Max power attack cooldown increased from 0.3132s to 0.32s.
45.0
Bottoms will now move slower but speed up as more beasts are merged into them, likewise they will attack slower at first but faster through their merges. This should add more merge value to lower tier birds while overall nerfing to the base level for currently overpowered higher tiers.
~ Ninja Kiwi
  • NERF Golden Eagle flight speed reduced from 110 to 80.
  • BUFF Golden Eagle flight speed bonuses from merges increased from +0 to +40. New max-powered flight speed is 120.
  • NERF Golden Eagle attack cooldown increased at all beast power stages
    • NERF Golden Eagle min power attack cooldown increased from 0.6s to 1s
    • NERF Golden Eagle max power attack cooldown increased from 0.32s to 0.48s
Base handler's beast range felt too high starting off when considering the tower is built around sharing range between multiple Handlers so this range is being reduced.
~ Ninja Kiwi
  • NERF Golden Eagle handling range decreased from 60 to 50.

Bug Fixes and General Changes[]

37.0
  • Change Description also added "At beast max Beast Power the Golden Eagle can grab lowest tiers of MOAB."

Extra Notes (Version History)[]

  • Version 41.0 slightly adjusted the efficiency of 0-0-3 Golden Eagle for merges, due to price adjustments to all its previous upgrades and itself.
    • Medium: $4345 → $4550; 543.12500 / 1 power → 568.75 / 1 power
  • Version 42.0 did not adjust the efficiency of 0-0-3 Golden Eagle for merges, due to price adjustments to all its previous upgrades but not itself summing to just the same result, with price adjustments to and from Gyrfalcon and Horned Owl. However, Golden Eagle's optimal merge costs have been changed, as a result of Gyrfalcon being less cost-efficient than Horned Owl for cost per power.
    • Medium: $4550; 568.75 / 1 power
  • Version 43.0 slightly adjusted the efficiency of 0-0-3 Golden Eagle for merges, due to price adjustments to all its previous upgrades and itself.
    • Medium: $4550 → $3420; 568.75 / 1 power → 427.5 / 1 power

Sounds[]

When upgrading to Golden Eagle:

Gallery[]

Golden Eagle power increments[]

Power Appearances[]

Official artwork[]

Trivia[]

  • Golden Eagle is the most expensive T3 Beast Handler by both upgrade cost and cumulative costs.