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BTD6

Converts Lead Bloons to GOLD! Special solvents do extra damage to Lead Bloons, destroying them in one shot and generating cash.
~ In-game description

Lead to Gold is the third upgrade of bottom path for the Alchemist in Bloons TD 6. This upgrade improves its main potion attack, now dealing +9 Lead damage, including DDTs (if granted camo detection) and Dreadbloon's lead layer. Lead Bloons (including fortified) are instakilled, rewarding an additional $50 cash once the lead layer is popped that is added on top of the default cash value ($23 before round 51), for a total of $73 cash per lead before round 51. Popping DDT layers does not reward $50 cash, despite the extra Lead damage.

This upgrade costs $850 on Easy, $1,000 on Medium, $1,080 on Hard, and $1,200 on Impoppable.

Description[]

Appearance[]

The Lead to Gold Alch is almost identical to its predecessor, except its coat and visor are now dark grey and its visor has an additional elliptical shape surrounding it, vaguely similar to a welding mask.

Its upgrade icon depicts it pouring a vial of grey liquid onto a lead plate and turning it gold.

Mechanics[]

Lead to Gold allows the Alchemist to deal +9 extra lead damage, as well as inflict the Lead To Gold (unspecified description) Convert Lead Into Gold status effect onto valid Lead Bloons and their Fortified versions. When hit, a popped Lead automatically generates an extra $50 (or $25 on Half Cash). Starting from Version 23.0, the combination of these two attributes causes a hit Lead to automatically be instakilled. DDTs can be dealt extra damage but do not generate extra money.

Acid pools created by this Alchemist from the Acid Pool upgrade will also trigger the $50 cash reward from popping leads. The same applies to Rubber to Gold, but only works on Leads and does NOT automatically turn other Bloons partially to gold unless the potion directly hits the targeted Bloon.

Targeting Priorities[]

Lead to Gold targets bloons using the standard targeting priorities. It throws lobbing attacks at bloons.

  • 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.

The acid pool attack is locked on Normal, being an on-track attack, and can only activate if there are no bloons nearby or if the offensive potion misses.

Costs[]

Updated as of Version 41.0. 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) $850 $1,000 $1,080 $1,200 -
Total (0-0-3) $2,245 $2,650 $2,860 $3,180 $1,572 $1,855 $2,002 $2,226
Crosspath (1-0-3) $2,455 $2,900 $3,130 $3,480 $1,719 $2,030 $2,191 $2,436
Crosspath (2-0-3) $2,750 $3,250 $3,510 $3,900 $1,925 $2,275 $2,457 $2,730
Crosspath (0-1-3) $2,455 $2,900 $3,130 $3,480 $1,719 $2,030 $2,191 $2,436
Crosspath (0-2-3) $2,860 $3,375 $3,645 $4,050 $2,002 $2,363 $2,552 $2,835

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

Strategy[]

Summary[]

Lead to Gold allows the Alchemist to be able to generate additional income when combating Leads, granting a bonus $50 ($25 on Half Cash) for every Lead Bloon popped on top of its original cash value, and destroying the bloon entirely. As long as the Alchemist's acid touches the Lead Bloon, the Lead will be instakilled and immediately apply the income bonus. Since the entire Lead to Gold costs a little more than a 2-0-0 Banana Farm, the upgrade is best used based on context of the round and the towers behind the Alchemist; too few Leads, and the upgrade is unprofitable, too many towers that can already pop Leads and the Alchemist is unable to profit from the remaining Bloons.

Notes[]

  • The Lead to Gold Alchemist or its subsequent upgrades do not have to make the final pop in order to activate the $50 per lead effect; it just has to damage the Bloon at least once, which is evident for Fortified Leads.[1]
  • Even though Version 19.0 added a separate money counter for almost all towers, it has not been yet implemented for Lead to Gold, Rubber to Gold, Monkey Town (and by extent Monkey City), Pirate Lord, Support Chinook, and Jungle's Bounty. It has yet to be fully implemented for Spirit of the Forest (ability only), and Sun Temple and True Sun God / Vengeful True Sun God with Support sacrifices.
  • Lead to Gold's $50 income per Lead Bloon ($25 on Half Cash) cannot be increased via Monkey City or any other buffs. Double Cash will still work for this.
  • While Benjamin's Bloon Trojan will appear to increase the cash gained per lead to +$58, this is misleading - Bloon Trojan is still a net income loss of $14, as it takes away 22 RBE, and the Lead to Gold also normally earns the cash that normally is earned from popping lead bloons. The actual income from popping a pre-r51 trojaned lead with L2G is $59, since popping the outer lead layer counts as 1 pop.
  • The Lead to Gold's +$50 bonus cannot be boosted by any income buffs at all. Only the standard cash from popping a lead's RBE ($23 by default) can be boosted by towers such as Monkey Town and a support Sun Temple.

Tips[]

  • Place the Alchemist at the beginning of the track so it can attack Lead Bloons first before the other towers even get a chance to detect them.
  • Providing camo detection is beneficial for late-game rounds that feature Camo Leads.
  • In Magic Monkeys Only games, it can be considered as the primary Lead popping source to be both reliable, profitable and having little competition when using other Magic Monkeys with proper upgrades. However, the one game mode where Lead to Gold shines the brightest is on Apopalypse, where dense groups of Leads are bound to appear often. In some cases, it can be even more profitable than using Banana Farms.
  • Try to avoid towers that already pop Lead Bloons, especially those who have splash damage and/or attack quite quickly. Problematic towers include Bomb Shooters especially Cluster Bombs, Super Monkeys with at least Plasma Blasts, and Obyn Greenfoot. Certain stall towers may also be problematic, including MOAB Shove's missiles and the 4-2-0 Maim MOAB's shrapnel.
  • In normal gameplay, the best game mode to use Lead to Gold in is Apopalypse Mode. In the late stages of gameplay, Lead Bloons become more and more common, allowing you to make a lot of money with just a Lead to Gold Alchemist. Be sure to give the tower camo detection, as almost all late-game Lead Bloons will have camo properties. If possible, also give the Alchemist extra attack speed, so that it does not miss any Lead Bloons.
  • In terms of crosspathing, a 1-0-3 Alchemist is preferred since it will allow the bigger splash radius of Larger Potions to affect more leads at once, ensuring that the alchemist can profit from as many leads as possible. 2-0-3 would actually go against what Lead to Gold is supposed to do, as this would now allow any tower to pop leads from any tower, with no additional income, provided that said tower is in range of the Alchemist. If that is not the case, then it is just a waste of money.
  • Dreadbloon: Armored Behemoth's custom rounds turns all Zebras into Leads, resulting in a lot of Lead Bloons appearing, making this upgrade very, very worthwhile, since each lead bloon before Round 51 is worth $73 ($23 base cash + $50 from l2g) if the Lead to Gold Alchemist damages it.
  • Round 63 is where Lead to Gold can shine as a defensive tower. Since the purpose of the leads is to create a diversion so the Ceramic clusters can rush in, having that diversion be destroyed, frees other towers to attack Ceramics. Recommended towers for synergy in this round include multiple Bloon Traps and/or Jungle's Bounties (without Hard Thorns). The former pairs especially nicely given that Leads would've exhausted the traps before they could catch Ceramics. The latter as well, since having them target Ceramics with their vines is more beneficial than on Leads.

Earnings[]

Lead to Gold is only effective on rounds with Lead Bloons. On Easy, it takes 17 Lead Bloons to earn back the cost of the upgrade. Medium takes 20, Hard takes 22 (44 on Half Cash mode), and Impoppable takes 24. Below is a table listing all of the rounds with Lead Bloons, how many are in each round, and the maximum possible earnings from each round. Note that these earnings are on top of the default cash per pop, so before Round 51, each Lead actually gives $73, making Lead to Gold a bit more than a 3x cash multiplier against Leads.

Standard Round Earnings[]

Round Maximum Bonus Money Earned Cumulative Earnings Number of Leads per round
28 $300 $300 6 Lead
30 $450 $750 9 Lead
37 $750 $1,500 15 Lead
38 $700 $2,200 14 Lead
45 $200 $2,400 4 Fortified Lead
50 $400 $2,800 8 Fortified Lead
59 $2,500* $5,300 50 Lead Camo
63 $3,750 $9,050 75 Lead
69 $2,000 $11,050 40 Fortified Lead
75 $1,400 $12,450 14 Leads, 14 Fortified Lead
90 $2,500* $14,950 50 Fortified Lead Camo Regrow
95 $12,500* $27,450 250 Fortified Lead Camo Regrow
105 $1,250 $29,950 25 Fortified Lead
117 $12,500 $42,450 250 Lead
122 $3,750 $46,200 75 Fortified Lead
126 $50* $46,250 1 Fortified Camo Regrow Lead
129 $3,850* $50,300 77 Fortified Camo Lead
163 Random Random Random Leads (Bloons may have Fortified, Regrow, or Camo)

*The money earned on these rounds may only be obtained if the Alchemist is given Camo detection by another tower, or the camo properties are stripped without popping the Bloons with upgrades such as Shimmer or Submerge and Support.

Alternate Bloon Rounds Earnings[]

Round Maximum Bonus Money Earned Cumulative Earnings Number of Leads per round
10 $100 $100 2 Lead
23 $200 $300 4 Lead
24 $50* $350 1 Lead Camo
28 $300 $650 6 Lead Regrow
30 $450* $1,100 9 Lead Camo
37 $900 $2,000 18 Lead
38 $700 $2,700 14 Lead
44 $500 $3,200 10 Fortified Lead
45 $200 $3,400 4 Fortified Lead
48 $750 $4,150 15 Fortified Lead Regrow
50 $400 $4,550 8 Fortified Lead Regrow
59 $2,500* $7,050 50 Lead Camo Regrow
61 $400 $7,450 8 Fortified Lead
62 $750* $8,200 15 Fortified Lead Camo Regrow
75 $28,200 $36,400 550 Lead, 14 Fortified Lead

*The money earned on these rounds may only be obtained if the Alchemist is given Camo detection by another tower, or the camo properties are stripped without popping the Bloons with upgrades such as Shimmer or Submerge and Support.

Dreadbloon Earnings[]

During events that involve Dreadbloon, all naturally occurring Zebras change into Leads and all naturally occurring Leads become Fortified. In addition, multiple rounds (namely Rounds 39, 40, 43, 49, 60, 80, in the case of presence of Leads) throughout the entire boss battle are partially or completely changed. Note that because the cash shown from popping a lead is added on top of the cash from popping it normally; each lead is actually worth $73 total before round 51, making this worth purchasing in conjunction with Bloon Trap, which only has double the cash from caught bloons.

The following include all rounds including Rounds up to Round 140 (even though Lead to Gold farming becomes irrelevant beyond Round 80+ for Bosses in general):

Round Maximum Bonus Money Earned Cumulative Earnings Number of Leads per round
26 $200 $200 4 Lead
28 $300 $500 6 Fortified Lead
30 $450 $950 9 Fortified Lead
31 $500 $1,450 8 Lead, 2 Regrow Lead
34 $300 $1,750 6 Lead
37 $1,250 $3,000 10 Lead, 15 Fortified Lead
38 $1,200 $4,200 10 Lead, 14 Fortified Lead
39 $1,600 $5,800 20 Lead, 12 Fortified Lead
41 $3,000 $8,800 60 Lead
43 $500 $9,300 10 Fortified Lead
44 $2,500 $11,800 50 Lead
45 $200 $12,000 4 Fortified Lead
49 $1500 $13,500 20 Lead, 10 Regrow Fortified Lead
50 $400 $13,900 8 Fortified Lead
59 $2,500* $16,400 50 Lead Camo
60 $2,000 $18,400 40 Fortified Lead
61 $7,500 $25,900 150 Regrow Lead
63 $3,750 $29,650 75 Lead
65 $5,000 $34,650 100 Lead
69 $2,000 $36,650 40 Fortified Lead
75 $1,400 $38,050 14 Lead, 14 Fortified Lead
80 $1,400 $39,450 14 Lead, 14 Fortified Lead
90 $2,500* $41,950 50 Fortified Lead Camo Regrow
95 $12,500* $54,450 250 Fortified Lead Camo Regrow
105 $1,250 $55,700 25 Fortified Lead
117 $12,500 $68,200 250 Lead
122 $3,750 $71,950 75 Fortified Lead
126 $50* $72,000 1 Fortified Camo Regrow Lead
129 $3,850* $75,850 77 Fortified Camo Lead

*The money earned on these rounds may only be obtained if the Alchemist is given Camo detection by another tower, or the camo properties are stripped without popping the Bloons with upgrades such as Shimmer or Submerge and Support.

Version History[]

While still popular on Apopalypse, in that large quantities of Leads that spawn there that can outweigh income gain over even conventional farming, Lead to Gold has been given bonus lead damage to make it more useful at neutralizing the presence of Leads. Lead to Gold now sees increased usage in Dreadbloon events because the custom rounds against that boss turn all Zebras into Lead bloons.

23.0
Lead to Gold hasn't been a competitive 3rd tier outside of special game modes and challenges, so we've added some more uniqueness by allowing it to truly live up to its description and deal enough damage to instantly 'convert' a Lead Bloon, children layers and all, also carrying on some value here in the later game by allowing this bonus to deal extra against DDTs as well.
~ Ninja Kiwi
  • BUFF Lead to Gold now deals +9 damage to Lead Bloons and visible D.D.T.s.
24.0
  • Change Also added "[...] Special solvents do extra damage to Lead Bloons, destroying them in one shot and generating cash." to the description.
34.0
  • [Bug] Lead to Gold does not apply its lead damage bonus to Dreadbloon's lead layer.
35.0
  • BUFF [Bug Fix] Now does bonus damage to Dreadbloon’s Lead layer.

Gallery[]

Official artwork[]

Assets[]

Trivia[]

  • The upgrade is a reference to alchemy and the Philosopher's Stone, which turns base metals into precious gold, as seen with how the upgrade works.
    • Alchemy is the ancient protoscience of transforming and purifying materials, often to create gold. However alchemy is far from scientific, as many of its core tenets and goals are simply nonsensical.
    • Scientists have tried and actually achieved turning lead into gold, by the use of nuclear transmutation. By using a particle accelerator, protons and electrons can be removed from lead (atomic number 82) to create gold (atomic number 79) by matching its charge. However, the energy released from transforming stable lead would make the process impractical.[Source?]
  • There was a bug in Version 23.0 where adding Path 2 upgrades to Lead to Gold causes it to not receive the lead damage buff. This was fixed in Version 23.1.
  • In the in-game code, there are sound effects named LeadToGold01.wav through to LeadToGold05.wav. These were instead used for Rubber to Gold's goldifying sound effects.

References[]


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