Monkey Buccaneer (BTDB2)/Strategies/Countermeasures

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The Monkey Buccaneer is a long-range water tower. It is not as powerful as they are in BTD6, given the new competitive circumstances, but they are quite the middle ground powerful tower in this game as of currently, making it somewhat of a challenge to fight against a Buccaneer user. Buccaneer's general weakness is grouped bloons, so try to overwhelm the opponent before they can afford the better grouped-popping Buccaneer upgrades.

General

Attributes	Monkey Buccaneer countermeasures
Role	Monkey Buccaneer is a long-range grouped and spaced bloon popper. It's mostly the main form of DPS but can provide support to other towers. Carrier Flagship provides buffs to water towers and Aces, while Trade Empire provides buffs and synergies with other merchantmen and Central Market respectively offering a support role this way.
Attack Speed	Base attack speed isn't the best, but top path in particular massively increases attack speed for the Monkey Buccaneer. Aircraft Carrier planes attack very quickly. Favored Trades also increase attack speed.
Damage	There are many ways to increase the damage in all three paths of the Monkey Buccaneer whether it be new attacks or improved attacks. Double shot, like the Ninja upgrade of the same name, increases the damage of the Monkey Buccaneer by adding a second dart attack to its main attack. Grape Shot and Hot Shot add five projectiles occasionally to the Monkey Buccaneer, whose fire rate is determined by attack speed. The Aircraft Carrier's planes shoot missiles that only target MOAB class bloons for a hefty amount of damage. Damage increases for the planes with its next upgrade. Cannon ship adds a cannon that shoots cannonballs that add to the overall DPS to Cannon Ship. Pirate Lord can instakill all non-BAD MOAB Class bloons. Trade Empire buffs upper path 3 upgrades to deal additional damage to regular bloons, ceramic bloons, and MOAB-class bloons for all of their attacks.
Pierce	Generally speaking, Monkey Buccaneer has poor pierce.
Range	Disregarding towers that have infinite range, the Monkey Buccaneer has the highest range of an un-upgraded tower.
Support	Monkey Buccaneers have two buffing options available: Carrier Flagship, which increases the attack speed of all water towers and Monkey Aces on-screen, and Trade Empire, which increases cash earned by up to 20 other merchantmen.
Power	Overall, Monkey Buccaneer has a respectable early-game and mid-game, though starts to fall very slightly in the Late-game.

Upgrade-specific

Path 1

Upgrade	Monkey Buccaneer countermeasures
Faster Shooting	Increases attack speed by 33% allowing Buccaneers to shoot grapes and darts more often. This upgrade is preferred if you have the Grape Shot upgrade.
Double Shot	Double Shot allows Buccaneers to shoot 2 darts at once and 10 grapes if paired with Grape Shot. This increases the overall DPS of Buccaneer allowing it to better handle early-game bloons.
Destroyer	The Destroyer upgrade gives the Buccaneer x5 attack speed, allowing it to shoot grapes and darts rapidly. Destroyers in well placed spots can break through multiple MOABs without support. 3/0/2 Buccaneers are not preferred as there are better camo popping power on different paths and towers. Long Range doesn't aid this path compared to Grape Shot.
Aircraft Carrier	Aircraft Carrier upgrade gives the Buccaneer 3 mini-planes that shoot anti-MOAB missiles every 3 seconds, rapidly shoot forward darts when bloons are in direct sight, and shoot 8 radial darts. The mini-planes allow the Buccaneer to deal with 1-2 BFBs if placed in well spots. 4/0/2 are not preferred as it loses a lot of damage without the Grape Shot Upgrade and this path only grants the mini-fighter planes to target camo bloons.
Carrier Flagship	Carrier Flagship upgrade gives an attack speed buff to all water-based towers and Monkey Aces by 18%. Carrier Flagship also upgrades the pini-planes to pop all bloon types except for camo, unless given camo by Crow's Nest. The Mini-Planes' anti-MOAB missiles have been buffed and will now shoot them out quicker. The Carrier Flagship grants the Buccaneer two platforms which allows for two small or medium sized towers. The platforms allow towers to see over obstacles, but Carrier Flagship shouldn't be exclusively bought for this. Unless your current layout is Submarine Monkey and Buccaneer Monkey oriented or are in a map with decent water placement, this upgrade typically isn't worth it.

Path 2

Upgrade	Monkey Buccaneer countermeasures
Grape Shot	Slightly better grouped popping power, but still remains relatively weak. Keep up pressure against the opponent if this is their only defense.
Hot Shot	An opponent will usually buy Hot Shot in itself to discourage Lead sends or to synergize with Ice Monkeys. However, it still has low pierce and also can no longer damage Purple Bloons.
Cannon Ship	Cannon Ship adds an explosive cannon that can attack both sides. Very powerful for a cheap price for handling grouped rushes, with cross paths from the other paths providing solid benefits to the tower
Monkey Pirates	Adds two cannons on each side of the Ship and ability that hooks in a MOAB, BFB, or DDT, whichever is the strongest. Note that camo detection is NOT needed when trying to hook in a DDT. As with all insta-kill abilities, the Hook ability does not care whether or not the Blimp is fortified or not. as such, when facing Monkey Pirates, sending unfortified blimps may not only be more efficient, but Monkey Pirates or other towers may destroy the blimp too quickly and disable the ability for that blimp. The money gained from this can be increased with Rubber to Gold.
Pirate Lord	Pirate Lord adds attack speed, doubles cash gained from blimps compared to being popped normally, adds three hooks (two of which are required to pull a ZOMG), and has a limit to 1 ZOMG pull per round, regardless of buying-and-reselling. Being a mix of DPS and Insta-kills, it may destroy the higher HP blimps too quickly for its hook ability and cause a long stream of lower-value, faster MOABs to overwhelm the tower. Because of this, send long streams of Fortified BFBs to overwhelm it or take advantage of the '1 ZOMG pull per round' limit by sending large amounts of ZOMG, forcing the other player to rely on other towers for ZOMG DPS.

Path 3

Upgrade	Monkey Buccaneer countermeasures
Long Range	Increases it's already large range.
Crow's Nest	Crow's nest allows this tower to detect camo bloons. Sometimes a stepping stone for Merchantman, but can be useful as a crosspath for Cannon Ship.
Merchantman	What differs this from other money-making towers besides Banana Farm is that its income is 'end-of-round' based income with a burst of money when a new round starts and that fact that it has direct synergy with Central Market, with combining the two towers for a large increase in cash per round. This means that it's important to kill the player before Merchantman has a chance to pay itself off. This is more so the case since it's not only cheaper but also produces more compared to BTD6.
Favored Trades	Favored Trades provides +10% sellback for all towers in range, similar to Banana Salvage for Banana Farm, has increased attack speed, and generates more money per round. The extra sellback comes very much in use for buy-and-resell strategies, as less cash is being lost in the buying and selling of that tower.
Trade Empire	Trade Empire itself makes even more cash, buffs the 'end-of-round' cash for both Merchantman and Favored Trades, buffs all damage by +1 from all attacks to all bloons types for all upper path 3 Monkey Buccaneer upgrades and any cross paths along with it, with an additional +1 for a total of +2 damage to ceramic and MOAB-class bloons.

Crosspath-specific

Crosspath	Monkey Buccaneer countermeasures
2-1(2)-0	Double Shot with Grape (Hot) Shot doubles not only the main projectiles but also the grapes, vastly increasing it's grouped popping power.

Synergy-specific

First	Second	Monkey Buccaneer countermeasures
Merchantman (and it's subsequent upgrades)	Central Market	Copying the Central Market synergy countermeasures: Central Market buffs Merchantman to produce an additional 10% end-of-round cash.

Other Advice

• If you see the opponent's Monkey Buccaneers having their respective unique cosmetics, the opponent has unlocked all upgrades for Buccaneer. In that case, prepare for all possible upgrades.
• Remember, Monkey Buccaneer can shoot on both sides of itself, essentially doubling it's DPS when bloons are surrounding it. Watch the Buccaneer's placement to see if this will benefit it in a meaningful way.

See also

• Monkey Buccaneer Strategies
  • General Strategy
  • Optimization Strategy
  • Countermeasures Strategy

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