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For the Engineer Monkey upgrade formerly named "Sentry Paragon", see Sentry Champion.

Upgrade one of your Tier 5 Monkeys into a Paragon! Paragons absorb all Monkeys of their type, including the Tier 5 Monkeys from the other two paths.

The Degree of the Paragon is influenced by how much power is absorbed at the moment of the upgrade.

~ Info Pop-Up for First Paragon Purchase
ParagonIcon

Paragon Icon

Paragons, also known as Tier 6 or 5-5-5 Towers, are the final upgrade tier that was introduced to Bloons TD 6 in Version 27.0. Paragons are meant to be a superpowered upgrade of a tower, borrowing some features from all three upgrade paths of a specific tower to deal enormous damage to all bloon types (including camo), with bonus damage to Extra damage versus Boss Bloons (unspecified damage) boss bloons, and more. As such, they are among the most powerful upgrades in Bloons TD 6.[1]

Towers can only be upgraded to Paragons in normal game modes and Challenge Editor. Unlike the Vengeful True Sun God, Paragons can be obtained in sandbox mode once said Paragon has been created by the player in a regular game. They can also be created in C.H.I.M.P.S.[2]

Only one Paragon of a specific tower may exist at a time (including in co-op), but the sacrificial Tier 5 towers can be rebought after creating the Paragon regardless of gamemode. The number of active Paragons per save in Boss Bloon Events has a varying limit, with the default limit being four. All other game modes have no Paragon limit.

Description[]

Appearance[]

The designs of each Paragon merge visual elements from the three contributing Tier 5 towers, while still retaining a look that is largely independent from any of the sacrificial towers. In addition, the name of the Paragon usually derives from some combination of the constituent Tier 5 towers, though not necessarily. Paragons appear larger in size compared to the base tower (but the footprint is unchanged) and gain more striking adornments every 20 degrees.

General Overview[]

Paragons are created by placing all three Tier 5 Upgrades of a desired tower and upgrading any of the Tier 5 towers to the paragon upgrade. Paragons provide the highest raw power compared to their non-Paragon counterparts. However, Paragons utilize a very distinct system of optimized power, relying on a series of investments, quantitatively high numbers of towers and their upgrades, a high monetary investment, and a large accumulation of pops and/or income (if applicable). Paragons are unable to be affected by most tower interactions. All Paragons have limited interactions that are generally exclusive to them, most notably extra damage to Bosses and absorbing Paragon Power Totems owned by Geraldo.

Paragonsymbol

Monkey Buccaneer upgrade menu button with a Paragon icon next to it

Qwertyxp2000 unlock 2023-01-05 (4)

Navarch of the Seas upgrade reveals only after unlocking all respective Tier 5 upgrades first

If a particular tower type has an available Paragon, the upgrade menu for that tower type will have an icon of a Paragon next to it. To unlock the Paragon upgrade for an eligible tower, all Tier 5 Upgrades for that tower must be unlocked first, alongside sufficient XP to unlock the Paragon upgrade itself. The Paragon upgrade is hidden from view until unlocking all Tier 5 upgrades of that tower type. Once available, however, the Paragon panel is revealed, a purple panel containing a single Paragon icon in the middle. The name of the Paragon reveals itself, and the player may select the icon to view its description, often a "mysterious" ambiguous description. The upgrade portrait for that Paragon remains hidden until finally unlocked.

NavarchOfTheSeasUnlock

Unlocking Navarch of the Seas

After obtaining the unlock for the Paragon, the entire upgrade menu background for that tower type changes from blue to purple permanently. A special Paragon transformation sound effect also plays, alongside the Paragon icon in the upgrade menu opening up and revealing the upgrade portrait for that Paragon. Unlocking the Paragon upgrade for each of the eligible towers is the final milestone to unlocking all upgrades.

NavarchOfTheSeasCreation

Creating the Navarch of the Seas, resulting in Degree 9 with a particular combination of sacrifices

Each Paragon sacrifices all towers of their type, including the required Tier 5 towers, merging them into a single powerful tower via a transformation. Immediately following is an animation consisting of an ascended purple monkey T-posing, followed by blue orbs containing souls (which are the constituent towers to be merged into the singular entity) moving telekinetically toward it, accompanied by the sounds of magic pulling their powers together. After starting a transformation into a Paragon, it takes about three seconds before the transformation finishes. Once fully transformed and summoned, it can be interacted with and can begin attacking. Finally, there is a display of a purple text representing the value of the Paragon's Degree (which ranges between 1 to 100) and a left-adjacent Paragon icon, which appears briefly for visual purposes. When interacted, the Paragon's menu becomes permanently transformed, converting the upgrade menu into a merged purple display of the Paragon's upgrade icon and description, although the pop count will still contain the statistics of the current tower without accounting for its constituent towers. Additionally, the amount of sellback is not merged into the Paragon, only giving back the sellback of the chosen Tier 5 and the Paragon upgrade combined.

ParagonCashSlider

The Paragon cash slider, added in v39.0

Starting from v39.0, Paragons can directly receive a cash injection before being built for more Paragon Power. The amount of cash you can put into it scales with the cost of the Paragon upgrade itself, and also comes with a 5% markup compared to placing down sacrificial non-tier 5 towers.

Paragons can become stronger by having a higher Degree. Having a higher Degree increases many of its base statistics, particularly pierce, attack speed, damage, and ability cooldowns (if applicable). Higher Degrees are obtained by having more towers and upgrades of the same type, more collective pops and/or generated cash, and a greater monetary investment.

List of Paragons[]

As of Version 41.0, there are 8 Towers with Paragon upgrades in the game.

Paragon Description Costs XP Requirements Version Added
Paragon-ApexPlasmaMaster
Apex Plasma Master
Fill the area with Bloon shredding plasma juggernaut balls, leaving nothing behind... Easy: $127,500

Medium: $150,000
Hard: $162,000
Impoppable: $180,000

500,000 XP 27.0
ParagonGlaiveDominus
Glaive Dominus
The Bloons will look upon my Glaives, and they will know fear. Easy: $233,750

Medium: $275,000
Hard: $297,000
Impoppable: $330,000

500,000 XP
Paragon-AscendedShadow
Ascended Shadow
The complete assassin package for dealing with any Bloon threat. Easy: $425,000

Medium: $500,000
Hard: $540,000
Impoppable: $600,000

1,000,000 XP 28.0
Paragon-NavarchOfTheSeas
Navarch of the Seas
The greatest thing ever to float on water. Easy: $467,500

Medium: $550,000
Hard: $594,000
Impoppable: $660,000

500,000 XP 29.0
Paragon-MasterBuilder
Master Builder
Monkey engineering developed to perfection. Creates three Mega Sentries that can build their own sentries. Easy: $552,500

Medium: $650,000
Hard: $702,000
Impoppable: $780,000

750,000 XP 32.0
Paragon-GoliathDoomship
Goliath Doomship
A flying shadow of darkness spells Bloon obliteration. Easy: $765,000

Medium: $900,000
Hard: $972,000
Impoppable: $1,080,000

1,000,000 XP 33.0
Paragon-WizardMagusPerfectus
Magus Perfectus
Only the most perfect Wizard can channel the ancient powers of the beyond. Easy: $637,500

Medium: $750,000
Hard: $810,000
Impoppable: $900,000

500,000 XP 37.0
Paragon-NauticSiegeCore
Nautic Siege Core
Unfathomable range, power, and synergies with all other Monkey Towers and Heroes put all Bloons under assault. Easy: $340,000
Medium: $400,000

Hard: $432,000
Impoppable: $480,000

1,000,000 XP 41.0

Creating a Paragon[]

First, ensure that the Paragon has been unlocked using XP on the tower's upgrade page. Then, a Paragon can be created by having one of each tier 5 tower for a specific monkey on screen, at which point, the upgrade icon for the Paragon will become available on any of the tier 5 towers. Before finalizing the purchase, the player will be prompted to boost the Paragon directly with in-game cash if they want.

Purchasing the upgrade will change the selected tower into the Paragon, while sacrificing every other tower of that type on screen (including those belonging to co-op players). In addition, all Paragon Power Totems will be consumed by that Paragon. Only one Paragon of a specific tower may exist at a time, even in co-op.

Degree and Requirements[]

The following sections contain in-depth formulas unnecessary for most use cases. Read "Main Takeaways" below for the most relevant info

Sacrifice Requirements[]

In addition to cosmetic changes every 20 degrees, higher degree Paragons deal increased damage. The degree is determined by an internal value known as "power", which itself is dependent on total pop count and cash generated, Tier 5 upgrades, non-Tier 5 upgrades, cost, and number of sacrificed towers as follows:

  • Each Tier 5 tower will contribute 6,000 power (for a maximum of 50,000 power), 10,000 power if pre-39.0. Excludes the first three Tier 5 towers.
  • Each non-Tier 5 tower upgrade tier will contribute 100 power (for a maximum of 10,000 power).
  • Every $(Paragon Price/20,000) spent on sacrificed towers or $(Paragon Price*1.05/20,000) manually invested cash will contribute 1 power (for a maximum of 60,000 power, 10,000 if pre-39.0). If pre-39.0, every $25 spent per 1 power, up to $250,000. Excludes the three cheapest tier-5 towers.
  • Every 180 pops or $45 of bonus income achieved by towers will contribute 1 power (for a maximum of 90,000 power). Includes the first three tier-5 towers.
  • Each Paragon Power Totem from Geraldo's Shop contributes 2,000 power (no limit).

The power needed for each degree is determined by the formula below, where D represents the degree of the Paragon:

As a result, there is no unique combination of upgrades, prices, etc. that will place the Paragon at a certain degree, only the total power matters. So, a maximum of 160,000 power is obtainable in single-player (166,000 if using the MasterDoubleCrossIcon Master Double Cross MK), unless Geraldo is the active hero. The maximum power that can be obtained is 210,000 power, achievable in both co-op and single-player, the latter only possible with Geraldo’s Paragon Power Totems, but only 200,000 at max will be used.

Degree To Power Converter[]

Choose a Paragon degree between 1 and 100 and it will convert into an intended Paragon power equivalence in-game. Although this program is only designed to calculate between Degree 1-100, you could try this program to test theoretical analysis for Degrees 101 or higher.

After choosing a Paragon degree, adjust the base statistics (damage, pierce, attack cooldown, and similar attributes) according to those of the Degree 1 Paragon. Currently, this program has an incomplete analysis of bonus damage values, and has yet to incorporate boss-specific total damage.

Note: To use this converter directly, you must use the desktop version of the website. This is because the code was written on JavaScript on MediaWiki:Common.js.

Power To Degree Converter[]

To be added...

Attack Statistics[]

The attack speed, pierce, damage, bonus damage, boss damage, and ability cooldowns scale with degree (represented as D in the formulas below) as follows.

Regular Damage: The regular damage of each attack for all Paragons scales with Degree according to the formula below:

Where "D" is degree and d0 is the Damage of that attack at Degree 1. This can be found on each individual Paragon's page.

Bonus Damage: The bonus damage of each attack (against MOABs, Ceramics, Camos, etc.) scales with degree according to the formula below. Add it to the regular damage to calculate total damage where applicable.

Where "D" is degree and sd0 is the bonus specialized damage (e.g. bonus ceramic damage) of that attack at Degree 1. This can be found on each individual Paragon's page.

Boss Bloon Damage (since Version 39.0): Total Boss Bloon Damage per each degree for each attack can be calculated as follows:

bd0 is the boss bloon bonus damage at Degree 1, and dD and mdD are the Regular Damage and MOAB Damage for each degree as outlined above.

Boss damage multiplier also applies to other extra damage (like Ceramic and Camo).

Elite boss damage is exactly double as normal boss bloon damage.

For boss-specific bonus damage to special properties other than MOAB-class damage and Boss damage:

  • DreadbloonPortrait ImmunityLead Unshielded Dreadbloon (Lead)
  • DreadbloonPortrait ImmunityCeramic Shielded Dreadbloon (Ceramic)
  • PhayzePortrait Camouflaged Phayze (Camo)

  • ld_D = bonus lead damage
  • cd_D = bonus ceramic damage
  • cad_D = bonus camo damage

Boss Bloon Damage (pre-39.0): Total Boss Bloon Damage per each degree for each attack (except DoT effects) can be calculated as follows:

bd0 is the boss bloon bonus damage at Degree 1, and dD and mdD are the Regular Damage and MOAB Damage for each degree as outlined above.

Boss Bloon Damage Over Time (pre-39.0): Total Boss Bloon Damage per each degree for Damage Over Time (DoT) attacks can be calculated as follows:

bd0 is the boss bloon bonus DoT at Degree 1, and dD and mdD are the Regular DoT and MOAB DoT for each degree as outlined above.

Elite Boss Bloon Damage (pre-39.0): Total damage done to Elite Boss Bloons per degree for each attack is ideally equal to twice the Total Boss Damage. However, this only ever applies to Degree 1-19.

Pierce: The pierce of each attack scales with degree according to the following formula:

p0 is the pierce of that attack at Degree 1. This can be found on each individual Paragon's page.

Attack Speed: The delay between attacks shortens with degree according to the formula:

r0 is the delay between attacks at Degree 1. This can be found on each individual Paragon's page.

round(x,1) means rounding x to 1 decimal place.

Ability Cooldown: The delay between each use of an activated ability shortens in the same formula as attack speed. To repeat again:

r0 is the attack cooldown at Degree 1. This can be found on each individual Paragon's page.

round(x,1) means rounding x to 1 decimal place.

Main Takeaways[]

The degree of a Paragon can be increased by purchasing up to 9 extra Tier 5 towers, 100 upgrade tiers (non-T5 towers), $250,000 spent, 16.2 million pops/$4.05 million cash generated, and unlimited power totems in the towers sacrificed. These are listed, generally, in order of easiest to most difficult to achieve. The main takeaways of these equations are that there are diminishing damage returns for higher degree Paragons. So, in general, it is more efficient to go for several mid-tier Paragons, as opposed to one max degree Paragon.

Sacrifice Recommendations[]

Listed are some general guidelines on how to make select 20 degree increment Paragons. Do not need to worry about the power needed unless buying Paragon Power Totems. In general, it is best not to use Paragon Power Totems until all other sacrifice requirements have been maxed out.

Degree 1[]

  • 0 Power Needed.
  • Purchase the first three tier-5 upgrades.

Degree 20[]

v39.0 and later
  • 11,219 Power Needed.
  • Purchase the first three tier-5 upgrades.
  • Follow one of these criteria below.

Criteria:

  1. Have at least 100 upgrade tiers and $(Paragon price/20,000) * 1219 (e.g. $25,800 for Ascended Shadow on Medium) invested in the non-T5 cost sacrifices. Usually, the cheapest way is with 25 tier 2 towers on two paths, but space restrictions may prompt 20 tier 3 or 17 tier 4 towers with a tier 2 crosspath (such as 2-4-0 or 0-4-2 as opposed to 0-4-0).
  2. Use the cash slider to invest $(Paragon price/20,000) * 11219 * 1.05 (e.g. $294,499 for Ascended Shadow on Medium; cost slider should be at least "$794,499" for this example)
Pre-v39.0
  • 11,219 Power Needed.
  • Purchase the first three tier-5 upgrades.
  • Have at least 100 upgrade tiers and $25,800 invested in the non-T5 cost sacrifices. Usually, the cheapest way is with 25 tier 2 towers on two paths, but space restrictions may prompt 20 tier 3 or 17 tier 4 towers with a tier 2 crosspath (such as 2-4-0 or 0-4-2 as opposed to 0-4-0).

Degree 22 (v39.0 Apex Plasma Master + Master Double Cross)[]

Degree 30 (v32.0 Apex Plasma Master + Master Double Cross)[]

Degree 40[]

v39.0 and later
  • 31,891 Power Needed.
  • Purchase the first three tier-5 upgrades.
  • Follow one of these criteria below.

Criteria:

  1. Complete a replication of the pre-v39.0 recommendations but adapted for v39.0.
    • Have at least 17 tier 4 towers with maxed crosspathing (i.e. 2-4-0 or 0-4-2 as opposed to 0-4-0)
    • $(Paragon price/20,000) * 10,000 (e.g. $250,000 for Ascended Shadow on Medium) invested in the non-T5 cost sacrifices.
    • Have 2,040,000 pops (or $510,000 cash generated) achieved across sacrificial towers.
  2. Have at least 100 tiers (e.g. at least 17 Tier 4 towers with maxed crosspathing), and manually invest at least $(Paragon price/20,000) * 21,891 (e.g. $547,275 for Ascended Shadow on Medium) worth of non-T5 towers.
  3. Use the cash slider to invest $(Paragon price/20,000) * 31891 * 1.05 (e.g. $837,139 for Ascended Shadow on Medium; cost slider should be at least "$1,337,139" for this example)
Pre-v39.0
  • 31,891 Power Needed.
  • Purchase the first three tier-5 upgrades.
  • Have at least 17 tier 4 towers with maxed crosspathing (i.e. 2-4-0 or 0-4-2 as opposed to 0-4-0)
  • Have $250,000 invested in the non-T5 cost sacrifices.
  • Have 2,040,000 pops (or $510,000 cash generated) achieved across sacrificial towers.

Degree 60[]

v39.0 and later
  • 67,512 Power Needed.
  • Purchase the first three tier-5 upgrades.
  • Follow one of these criteria below.

Criteria:

  1. Complete a replication of the pre-v39.0 recommendations but adapted for v39.0.
    • Have at least 17 tier 4 towers with maxed crosspathing (i.e. 2-4-0 or 0-4-2 as opposed to 0-4-0)
    • $(Paragon price/20,000) * 10,000 (e.g. $250,000 for Ascended Shadow on Medium) invested in the non-T5 cost sacrifices.
    • Have 8,350,000 pops (or $2,087,500 cash generated) achieved across sacrificial towers.
  2. Have at least 100 tiers (e.g. at least 17 Tier 4 towers with maxed crosspathing), and manually invest at least $(Paragon price/20,000) * 57,512 (e.g. $1,437,800 for Ascended Shadow on Medium) worth of non-T5 towers.
  3. Use the cash slider to invest $(Paragon price/20,000) * 60,000 * 1.05 (e.g. $1,575,000 for Ascended Shadow on Medium; cost slider should be at least "$2,075,000" for this example) and add 4 Paragon Power Totems.
Pre-v39.0
  • 67,512 Power Needed.
  • Purchase the first three tier-5 upgrades.
  • Have at least 17 tier 4 towers with maxed crosspathing (i.e. 2-4-0 or 0-4-2 as opposed to 0-4-0)
  • Have $250,000 invested in the non-T5 cost sacrifices.
  • Have 8,350,000 pops (or $2,087,500 cash generated) achieved across sacrificial towers.

Degree 76 (Old Max without Power Totems)[]

For most Paragons, excluding Apex Plasma Master (max level being 79), Degree 76 was the highest degree possible in single-player mode as surpassing 110,706 power required a 4th Tier 5 tower, which was only possible in co-op. However, the introduction of Geraldo's Paragon Power Totems circumvents this need. Still, the Paragon Power Totem is less efficient than garnering the previous sacrifices. Use the power totem only if going past the max single player degree.

Note: For historic reference, and for BTD6 XBox users (which use the old pre-39.0 Paragon leveling sytem), the following is just a pre-39.0 information about the old max Paragon degree without Co-Op or Geraldo.

Pre-v39.0
  • 107,681 Power Needed (power value: 110,000)
    • 116,923 Power Needed for Degree 79 Apex Plasma Master (power value: 120,000)
  • Purchase the first three Tier 5 upgrades.
  • Have 100 tier-4 or below upgrades distributed among the other sacrificial monkeys, excluding the first three tier 5 towers.
  • Invest at least $250,000 on the sacrificed towers, excluding the first three tier 5 towers.
  • Accumulate 16,200,000 pops (or $4,050,000 cash generated) across all sacrificed towers.

Degree 80[]

v39.0 and later
  • 120,115 Power Needed
  • Purchase the first three tier-5 upgrades.
  • Follow one of these criteria below.

Criteria:

  1. Complete a replication of the pre-v39.0 recommendations but adapted for v39.0.
    • Have at least 17 tier 4 towers with maxed crosspathing (i.e. 2-4-0 or 0-4-2 as opposed to 0-4-0)
    • $(Paragon price/20,000) * 10,000 (e.g. $250,000 for Ascended Shadow on Medium) invested in the non-T5 cost sacrifices.
    • Have 100 tier-4 or below upgrades distributed among the other sacrificial monkeys, excluding the first three tier 5 towers.
    • Accumulate 16,200,000 pops (or $4,050,000 cash generated) across all sacrificed towers.
  2. Have at least 100 tiers (e.g. at least 17 Tier 4 towers with maxed crosspathing), and manually invest at least $(Paragon price/20,000) * 60,000 (e.g. $1,500,000 for Ascended Shadow on Medium) worth of non-T5 towers, and 9,020,700 pops (or $2,255,175 generated).
  3. Use the cash slider to invest $(Paragon price/20,000) * 60,000 * 1.05 (e.g. $1,575,000 for Ascended Shadow on Medium; cost slider should be at least "$2,075,000" for this example) and add 31 Paragon Power Totems.
Pre-v39.0
  • 120,115 Power Needed
  • Purchase the first three Tier 5 upgrades.
  • Have 100 tier-4 or below upgrades distributed among the other sacrificial monkeys, excluding the first three tier 5 towers.
  • Invest at least $250,000 on the sacrificed towers, excluding the first three tier 5 towers.
  • Accumulate 16,200,000 pops (or $4,050,000 cash generated) across all sacrificed towers.
  • Add 6 Paragon Power Totems, or 1 Paragon Power Totem for Apex Plasma Master with MasterDoubleCrossIcon Master Double Cross.

Degree 91 (New Max without Power Totems)[]

As of Version 39.0's changes to the Paragon power system, the new maximum degree is 91 for all paragons except the Apex Plasma Master, which (due to Master Double Cross) can reach a maximum of 92.

  • 159,085 Power Needed (power value: 160,000)
    • 162,991 Power Needed for Degree 92 Apex Plasma Master (power value: 166,000)
  • Purchase the first three Tier 5 upgrades.
  • Have 100 tier-4 or below upgrades distributed among the other sacrificial monkeys, excluding the first three tier 5 towers.
  • Maximize cash sacrifices. Spend as many of the most expensive crosspathed T4 combination as possible. Then spend the rest on the cash slider; at worst, it requires $(Paragon price * 3.15) when creating the Paragon (e.g. $1,575,000 for Ascended Shadow on Medium).
  • Accumulate 16,200,000 pops (or $4,050,000 cash generated) across all sacrificed towers.

Degree 100 (Max)[]

Have as many things below as you can.

v39.0
  • 200,000 Power Needed
  • Purchase the first three Tier 5 upgrades.
  • Have 100 Tier 4 or below upgrades distributed among the other sacrificial monkeys, excluding the first three tier 5 towers. (Note: 4-0-2 counts as 6 Tiers)
  • Maximize cash sacrifices. Spend as many of the most expensive crosspathed T4 combination as possible. Then spend the rest on the cash slider; at worst, it requires $(Paragon price * 3.15) when creating the Paragon (e.g. $1,575,000 for Ascended Shadow on Medium).
  • Accumulate 16,200,000 pops (or $4,050,000 cash generated) across all sacrificed towers.
  • If in single player, Purchase 20 Paragon Power Totems (17 if the player can purchase a second Crossbow Master for Apex Plasma Master).
  • If in co-op, have 3 Additional Co-Op players (or 2 extra players if all have the MasterDoubleCrossIcon Master Double Cross MK) with 7 additional Tier 5 towers.
Pre-v39.0
  • 200,000 Power Needed
  • Purchase the first three Tier 5 upgrades.
  • Have 100 Tier 4 or below upgrades distributed among the other sacrificial monkeys, excluding the first three tier 5 towers. (Note: 4-0-2 counts as 6 Tiers)
  • Invest $250,000 or more cash when creating the Paragon.
  • Accumulate 16,200,000 pops (or $4,050,000 cash generated) across all sacrificed towers.
  • If in single player, Purchase 45 Paragon Power Totems (40 if the player can purchase a second Crossbow Master for Apex Plasma Master).
  • If in co-op, have 3 Additional Co-Op players with 9 additional Tier 5 towers.

Troubleshooting[]

If, after following the guidelines above, the Paragon is not created or reaching the desired degree, ensure the following:

  • If in single player, turn auto start off and wait until the current round is over to buy the Paragon. If the Paragon does not reach the desired degree, quickly back out of the match and buy more totems/other sacrifices.
  • The Paragon has already been placed in a normal gamemode to be unlocked in sandbox mode.
  • The Paragon upgrade has been unlocked in the upgrade menu.
  • There are no other Paragons of that type on screen. Only one of that type is allowed at a time, even in co-op.
  • Discounting effects, such as those provided by Monkey Business, Monkey Commerce, or a Support Temple, are not used to detract from the cost investment.
  • Purchase a maxed crosspath of each Tier 4 tower. e.g. using a 2-4-0 or 0-4-2 tower as opposed to the 0-4-0 version.
    • For example, the most expensive Tier 4 combination possible for Dart Monkey is a 2-4-0, rather than a 0-4-0 or 0-4-2.
  • The minimum pop count and cash generated has been achieved across all sacrificial monkeys. This may be difficult to calculate, as it requires adding up pop count and cash generated with multiplication across many towers. However a good rule of thumb is to wait until at least round 136 to let the sacrificial monkeys accumulate enough pops (unless playing Boss Events or Double HP MOABs).
  • The Paragon limit (in Boss Events etc) has not been reached.

Behavior and Interactions[]

For a full list of all standard tower Interactions, click here.

Paragons behave, in large part, like any other tower. However, they are not able to receive most buffs or participate in most tower interactions. A few of these behavior quirks are listed.

Strategy[]

To best strategize Paragon use, see each tower's individual paragon page. Otherwise, here are some general guidelines.

Summary[]

Paragons combine all three attacks of their constituent Tier 5 towers to deal immense damage to all bloon types. However, the high cost of these upgrades and inability to receive buffs makes them difficult to justify in the presence of cheaper combinations of towers (such as Ultraboost and Flying Fortress). As a result, the main use cases for Paragons, as of now, are during late game and Boss Events.

In any case, use of a Paragon requires a robust farming set up, setup of the sacrificial towers, and time to accumulate pops to maximize damage output.

Tips[]

  • In bosses, it is better to go for a cheap degree 20 paragon than spend excess money on a degree 30. This is because a cheap degree 20 requires only $25,800 cash, but 100 upgrade tiers. Because of this, usually 25 towers with two tier 2 two paths will be used, as they are usually the cheapest per upgrade, but space restrictions may prompt 20 tier 3 or 17 tier 4 towers with a tier 2 crosspath. Sometimes, extra cash spent is necessary to reach degree 20. Some unreleased paragons also have a tier 3 upgrade that is either not significantly more expensive or is even cheaper than their tier 2 equivalent per tier.
  • Paragons can greatly help with getting achievements obtained through Freeplay grinding (Super BAD, Sapper, Impoppable, etc.), especially to minimize lag (Apex Plasma Master excluded).
  • To achieve the most pops for a single tower type, focus on a single Paragon first. Use the most of one tower type. Try the strategies used for the Tier 5 Upgrades of the same tower type, to maximize pops.
  • As most of the RBE is concentrated into the later rounds, it is generally not difficult to get a high total pop count for Paragons in freeplay.
    • Note that round 132 is the first round where the game's cumulative RBE exceeds 16.2 million pop threshold. Waiting until round 136 before upgrading to Paragon should provide enough buffer to achieve the 16,200,000 pops for max degree, assuming the sacrificial towers are responsible for ~80% of all pops until that point. These rounds will occur earlier on Double HP MOABs and Boss Events due to the RBE from Boss Bloons and spawns, so it is always best to confirm by summing manually.
  • Use all Tier 5 upgrades of the same type in order to rack up the most pops and costs, which can be then utilized for a much stronger Paragon. After obtaining all Tier 5 upgrades possible, buy the most expensive possible Tier 4 crosspath.
  • As a rule of thumb when investing for a single high-level Paragon, try aiming for ~$300,000+ total value of a specific tower type and ~17,000,000+ damage count when taking into account the sum of all towers of the same type.
    • The precise monetary and damage count amounts are actually $250,000+ and 16.2M pops, respectively, but aiming for $300K+ and 17M+ pops guarantee that any unexpected miscalculations are negligible.
  • While most paragons are capable of soloing to round 100, they are not viable for popping Golden Bloons, since it will only result in the Golden Bloon rapidly jumping to the end of the track, due to the invulnerability.
  • Using Bloon Debuffing status effects such as the Cripple MOAB, Super Brittle, and Glue Storm are advised. As these are indirect buffs, they are able to increase the damage output of the Paragon. This is particularly impactful for cheap Paragons such as Apex Plasma Master and Glaive Dominus, which typically deal low base damage.
  • Total sellback for a Paragon is actually much less than the usual 70% of the total costs of the Paragon itself and its constituant sacrifices, as these costs do not transfer into the Paragon, only as if purely the chosen Tier 5 upgrade and the Paragon upgrade itself.

General Paragon Power Tips[]

  • In bosses, creating a cheap degree 20 with 25 towers with two tier 2 upgrades is typically more cost efficient than spending the full amount of cash (or max of $250,000 pre-39.0) in sacrifices. Pre-39.0, $25,800 cash and 100 upgrade tiers are enough to reach Degree 20, although limited space may require tier 3's or tier 4's instead.
    • Some Paragons have a greater cash sacrifice max. Expensive lone upgrade costs require more cash sacrifices to reach a similar Paragon degree.
  • Take advantage of buffs to maximize income and pops for a higher power paragon in the lategame. Income buffs such as a Support Sun Temple, Monkey City, and Rubber to Gold will boost the income gained from popping bloons or alternative income, notably useful for Lead to Gold, Pirate Lord, any Banana Farm, and Bloon Trap. Similarly, damage, pierce, and attack speed buffs and debuffs like Embrittlement, Jungle Drums, Berserker Brew, and Overclock help maximize the damage output of a tower.
  • Utilize discounts on towers if aiming for a cost-efficient upgrade. Notably, use Support Temple's discounts on tier 5s used in a Paragon, and Monkey Commerce on expensive towers (notably, Super Monkey, Heli Pilot, or Dartling Gunners).
  • For Boss Bloon Events, disabling the Monkey Knowledge Big Bloon Sabotage can be very helpful to get higher degrees, especially for Tier 5 Bosses.
  • Manually investing the full amount of cash into a Paragon (equal to [Paragon cost * 3.15] on top of the upgrade cost) will result in a Degree 56 Paragon in all cases except the Apex Plasma Master with Master Double Cross, which will be Degree 59.
  • An incomplete list of how the different power sources influence a Paragon's degree:
    • As mentioned above, max manual cash contribution results in a degree 56 Paragon without Master Double Cross, and degree 59 with the MK.
    • Obtaining the maximum amount of pops/cash-generated results in a degree 69 Paragon without Master Double Cross. For Apex Plasma Master with Double Master Cross, this increases to degree 71.
    • Obtaining the maximum amount of tiers and maximum cash contribution results in a degree 61, 64 for Apex Plasma Master with Double Master Cross.
    • Having both maximum pops/cash-generated and maximum cash contribution results in a degree 88 Paragon without Master Double Cross. For Apex Plasma Master with Double Master Cross, this increases to degree 90.
    • With maximum pops/cash-generated, maximum cash contribution and 100 T4-and-under tiers, a degree 91 Paragon will be created without Master Double Cross, and degree 92 with the MK. This is generally the highest power obtainable in single-player without Geraldo.

Comparison to the Vengeful True Sun God[]

Paragons share a number of similarities to the Vengeful True Sun God (VTSG) in terms of function and gameplay mechanics but there are also some differences.

Similarities:[]
  • Both the VTSG and Paragons sacrifice other towers to increase their own power.
  • Both require all three Tier 5 towers of their tower type to be created.
  • Both are considered 5-5-5 towers. This is confirmed by the Victory Callout image for the Paragons, and the internal game files which label the VTSG as a 5-5-5 True Sun God.
  • Only one VTSG and one of each Paragon type are allowed on screen at a time (even in co-op). These are the only towers with such a limit.
  • Both Paragons and the VTSG are at the apex of their tower type, in terms of cost and damage output.
  • Both are Crosspath Hybrids which merge certain elements from their constituent Tier 5s.
Differences:[]
  • VTSG is not available in both Sandbox and C.H.I.M.P.S. but Paragons are (as of Version 39.0 for sandbox mode). This is likely due to Ninja Kiwi wanting to reserve the "rarity" of the VTSG upgrade for the more active gamemodes. [4]
  • VTSG is the only land tower that will stay on an Arctic Wind ice platform after the arctic wind is sold. This may be a reference to its immense power transcending the game mechanics of water placement.
    • Paragons will disappear if placed on a Carrier Flagship being sold. Super Monkeys, and therefore the VTSG, can not be placed on carrier flagships.
  • The constituent Tier 5's of the Paragon can be repurchased. The player cannot purchase the Legend of the Night and The Anti-Bloon once the VTSG is on screen.

Even if there are some differences, paragons may be seen as the "Vengeful True Sun God" analog for each tower.

History[]

Paragons were first teased here on Twitter, at July 1st/2nd, 2021, and were later revealed at July 8th/9th, 2021, here. Another teaser was shown on Facebook on July 15th/16th, 2021, and similarly on Twitter.

The first Paragon to be revealed was the Paragon Dart Monkey, the "Apex Plasma Master", as part of the second teaser for Paragons. The same teaser also features a mysterious language whose letters arrange to form the word "paragon". The second Paragon revealed was a merge for the Boomerang Monkey, the "Glaive Dominus", as seen in the third teaser for Paragons; this teaser features the same mysterious language writing seen in the Dart Monkey Paragon teaser.

Ninja Kiwi confirmed on their 16th July 2021 blog that the There Can Be Only One MK would remain the same. Unlike VTSG, the Super Monkey Paragon is expected to not need Monkey Knowledge, will not require Sacrifices for the Temple and True Sun God upgrades, and can allow The Anti-Bloon and Legend of the Night to be spawned after its own upgrade. Potentially, the VTSG can be summoned after the Super Monkey Paragon is upgraded.

In that blog, when asked whether the Sentry Paragon would receive a name change after the release of Paragons, Ninja Kiwi said "Probably not!" However, the upgrade was later renamed to Sentry Champion in Version 28.0.

Weekly since the release of Version 27.0, Ninja Kiwi has answered several questions regarding Paragons, including their development and some lore about them. Ninja Kiwi's 30th July 2021 blog states that they are working on releasing all Paragons, but they will need time to balance every Paragon before they can officially make any announcement for their releases. Paragons were further revealed on their August 6th 2021 blog, with refinements on what is being developed regarding the Paragons and how each Paragon will be released and dealt with in the future.

On 6th October 2021, Ninja Kiwi teased the Ascended Shadow, as shown on their Twitter page. It was later released in the 28.0 update.

On 4th December 2021, Ninja Kiwi teased the Navarch of the Seas on their Twitter. It was later released in the 29.0 update.

The Engineer Monkey Paragon was announced in Ninja Kiwi's Version 30.0 patch notes as the next Paragon. However, the Version 31.0 preview notes and patch notes did not add that Paragon in that update.

On the June 3rd 2022 blog, Ninja Kiwi confirmed once again that the Engineer Monkey Paragon will be arriving soon, and also confirmed two future Paragons, Monkey Ace Paragon and Wizard Monkey Paragon. These Paragons were released in that order.

On 24th June 2022, Ninja Kiwi teased the Master Builder on their Twitter. It was released in the 32.0 update.

On 29th September 2022, Ninja Kiwi teased the Goliath Doomship on their Twitter. It was later released in the 33.0 update.

On 12th October 2022, Update 33.0 was released, implementing the 3 paragon limit. This change was done to let Ninja Kiwi have more freedom with Paragon design.[5] Because of feedback from the community, Ninja Kiwi considered increasing this limit to 4 to let every player in a 4 player co-op game be able to get one paragon, along with a challenge editor option for paragon limits, in a future update.[6] Upon the release of Version 33.1, the cap was raised to 4.

On 26th October 2022, Ninja Kiwi released a post on r/btd6 titled "Paragon Limit Update", which summarised their future prospects for balancing Paragons, particularly in how they will deal with the Paragon cap. On that post, they stated their intent to remove the Paragon cap in Freeplay and implement a custom Paragon cap in Challenge Editor and Boss Bloon Events. In addition, they promised to make balance changes that would focus on letting Paragons provide direct synergy with each other, such as Navarch of the Seas applying its exclusive Carrier Flagship buffs to Goliath Doomship. Ninja Kiwi followed up their decisions by posting their Version 33.2 patch notes, which confirms the eventual implementation of removing the Paragon cap from base gameplay. It was eventually fully implemented on Version 33.3, with the Paragon Limit only remaining in Boss Bloon Events and Contested Territory.

On 31th May 2023, Ninja Kiwi teased the Magus Perfectus on Twitter. It was released in the 37.0 update.

The Monkey Sub Paragon was announced in Ninja Kiwi's Version 37.0 patch notes as the next paragon. Initially claimed for Version 40.0, Ninja Kiwi delayed its release to next year.

Pgon39 teaser

Paragon 39.0 money slider teaser

Before the release of Version 39.0, Ninja Kiwi posted an announcement on r/btd6 regarding a massive rework to Paragons in Version 39.0. On their post, Ninja Kiwi lists a variety of changes to the Paragon system, including:

  • Reduced bonus Boss damage across all Paragons, not including base damage values of the Paragons. Ninja Kiwi will re-balance Paragons based on the reduction of bonus Boss damage.
  • Direct cash contribution to Paragons via the cash contribution sliders, as an alternative to tower spam
  • Cash contributions maximum value increased to Paragon degrees
  • Cash contribution requirement (per point) reworked: (Amount Spent / 25) → (Amount Spent / (Paragon's Upgrade Cost / 20,000)).
  • Prices for Paragons now come in a range of costs to give better design and player flexibility
  • After being created in any real game each Paragon will unlock itself in sandbox

Rohan Spibo from Ninja Kiwi further elaborated several steps in Paragon balance. He was the author of this post, and also written some comments to users asking queries and commenting about the new reworked Paragons system.

On 1st February 2024, Ninja Kiwi revealed Nautic Siege Core on their 41.0 Update video. It was subsequentially released in that update.

NK Blog reveals[]

Almost every week since Version 27.0, information related to Paragons is answered in the NK Blogs. It may contain an indiscriminate amount of information about them, but the below information is all the information gathered out of the blogs since the release of Paragons.

  • According to Ninja Kiwi's 30th July 2021 blog, all other variants of Paragons will eventually be released but not always on every update, due to the need to balance each and every possible Paragon of the existing towers at the time. In fact, it may take a long time for certain Paragons to be eventually released. Information for all other paragons aside from the first two had not been confirmed as of the release of that blog.
    • Canonically, Paragons do not need abilities as part of their attacks, hence the lack of abilities for Paragons.
      • However, Navarch of the Seas contradicts this, as it has an ability that can instakill BADs.
      • It also should be noted that every paragon since the Navarch has had an ability.
  • According to Ninja Kiwi's August 6th 2021 blog, further information about Paragons has been revealed.
    • Each Paragon is created from merging all of their tower kind into a single being.
    • Paragons will be chosen based on what NK believes "would be best".
    • Blocking Paragons in Challenge Editor is not planned yet but Ninja Kiwi said that blocking any Tier 5 upgrade of a certain tower kind will restrict Paragons of that tower kind.
  • According to Ninja Kiwi's September 17th 2021 blog, Paragons were once planned to be available in Sandbox Mode if used in non-Sandbox gameplay first, but Ninja Kiwi decided not to implement that. This feature was later implemented in Version 39.0.
  • According to Ninja Kiwi's October 29th 2021 blog, all Paragons have the same degree formula. Also, if more Paragons arrive, balance changes will be done to accommodate their increased total power. Paragons were confirmed not to have Insta variants.
  • According to Ninja Kiwi's 3rd June 2022 Blog, the Monkey Ace and the Wizard Monkey Paragon would be released after the Engineer Monkey Paragon in that order. This would be confirmed when the Goliath Doomship released in Version 33.0 and the Magus Perfectus in Version 37.0.
  • According to Ninja Kiwi's 23rd June 2022 blog, Paragons were confirmed to be inspired by the concept of the Wizard Lord back in BTD5.
  • According to Ninja Kiwi's 8th July 2022 blog, XP amounts for all Paragons are based on the Paragons themselves, and decided by Ninja Kiwi according to each one of them.

Achievements[]

GoldContainer
ParagonIconAlt
Apotheosis
FIRST RELEASED: Version 27.0
Description: Upgrade to a Monkey Paragon Tower
Rewards:
InstaRandomTier3
x3
GoldContainer
ParagonIconAlt
Perfect Paragon
FIRST RELEASED: Version 28.0
Description: Paragon of Paragons
Rewards:
BloonjaminsIcon
1000
Notes:

Version History[]

Since the release of Paragons and their placement on Boss Events, Paragons have dominated the meta for beating high-tier Bosses, in comparison to Vengeful True Sun God, which was the only major superpowered DPS option prior to Paragons. Development of new Paragons over time have proven the fate of power creep enveloping themselves, causing older and/or nerfed Paragons to become less popular. This went to the extent that Ninja Kiwi applied a cap on Paragons on all game modes, a controversial decision according to the BTD6 community particularly by diminishing use of Paragons in Freeplay; this change was quickly reverted.

For information specifically relating to individual Paragon types, refer to their respective pages.

27.0
28.0
  • BUFF Added Ascended Shadow (Ninja Monkey Paragon)
  • Change Changed tower notation on Victory Callouts from 6-0-0 to 5-5-5
  • BUFF [Undocumented] Fixed Degrees 1-19 to deal bonus damage to elite bosses.
  • Change [Undocumented] Transformation animation for Paragons has been changed.
  • *Transformation animation now shows a monkey soul at the center of where the Paragon is located at.
  • BUFF [Undocumented] Damage-over-time effects now scale damage with degree counts
29.0
30.0
  • BUFF Paragons with activated abilities will have their ability cooldowns scale by degree using the same formula as attack speed.
32.0
33.0
We’ve set a maximum of 3 per game in 33.0, as we now have a baseline of general purpose DPS paragons and want to move into more synergies and interesting mechanical interactions between them, which become more interesting when choices need to be made
~ Ninja Kiwi
  • BUFF Added Goliath Doomship (Monkey Ace Paragon)
  • NERF Maximum Paragon count is now limited to a maximum of 3
  • NERF Geraldo's Rejuv Potion no longer resets Paragon ability cooldowns
33.1

  • We have heard the clear feedback from the community about this general restriction based on the preview notes and now plan to do the following in future major updates, or minor ones if feasible:
    • Increase the limit to 4, based on feedback about 4 player co-op in particular
    • Include a Content Browser editor function that allows players to set higher limits or unrestricted in player-created Content Browser games
~ Ninja Kiwi, Version 33.0 (not 33.1) patch notes
  • BUFF Maximum Paragon count increased (3 → 4)
33.3
  • BUFF Paragon limit is now removed for all games modes except Boss Bloon Events and Contested Territory, which are left at 4.
37.0
39.0 (Part 1)

It’s not often that we find flaws in Monkey Towers or systems that we’ve spent so much time on, but it does happen, and when it does it causes significant internal discussion because we know “fixing” it will disrupt systems, economies, and balance that players have built strategies around. Leaving things as they are, however, means that we have to build on unstable foundations, and that makes the team feel uneasy about the massive future plans that we have for BTD6. Here’s the full disclosure rundown of the issue we found with Paragons and the changes we’re making and actively balancing.

We found a bug with the Paragon degree formula during development of Update 38 while working on Phayze that meant different Paragons scale differently, mostly regarding Boss damage. Given the impact of this bug on Paragon balance, and with Phayze about to be launched (and balanced around the “bugged” version of the formula), we decided to hold off on any fix so we could properly consider a full re-balance of each Paragon.

In Update 39, we’ve fixed the bug and reviewed related balance, but we’ve also taken time to look at how Paragons are used in general and have made changes to help them shine in other areas of the game beyond Bosses, where many new or less practiced players are trying to use Paragons but either not building economies effectively or not understanding how to secure higher Degree results.

~ Ninja Kiwi, "Paragon System Rework Incoming", first half of the post
  • NERF Paragons bonus damage to Boss Bloons now scales slower, especially Elite Boss damage
  • NERF Extra T5s used for a Paragon are now worth significantly less power (10,000 -> 6,000)
  • BUFF Paragons now can accept a direct cash contribution by using a slider, albeit at a rate of 5% extra cost compared to sacrificial towers.
  • BUFF Cash contribution requirement (per point) reworked to overall give more value
    • Change Formula for Paragon cash contributions changed: (Amount Spent / 25) → (Amount Spent / (Paragon's Upgrade Cost / 20,000))
    • BUFF Maximum power benefits from cash contributions increased (10,000 -> 60,000)
  • BUFF Paragons can now be used in Sandbox, but requires placing a particular Paragon in a normal game first before unlocking its use in Sandbox
39.0 (Part 2; what follows were changes implemented according to update notes)
  • BUFF Paragons now benefit from new Paragon of Power Monkey Knowledge
  • Change Resolved a bug that was benefitting different paragons boss damage by differing amounts
  • BUFF Resolved an issue preventing other Paragon damage bonuses (like Ceramic/Camo) from scaling well with degrees
  • BUFF Paragon Boss damage multiplier each 20 degrees increased from 20% → 25%
  • NERF Paragons no longer accept extra sellback from Favored Trades or Navarch of the Seas.
39.0 (Part 3)
  • Change Paragon limit removed as a default rule in Contested Territory, to minimize clutter in the number of rules
41.0

Quotes[]

In-Game
This action will create a Paragon [tower name]. All other [tower name]s will be destroyed in the process, feeding the Paragon's Power!
~ "Upgrade to Paragon" warning
Ninja Kiwi Blog

What update will the druid paragon come out in? Also, why can't the druid see camo if they are one with nature, shouldn't they be able to tell that there is something artificial there?
We don’t have specific updates scheduled for every paragon but the next 3 planned are Engineer, Ace, and Wizard. We’ll take your question as a vote for Druid, though, and see if that fits for the next Magic category paragon. [...]

~ Ninja Kiwi, 3rd June 2022 blog, referring to announced Paragons

why can't the master builder overclock/ultraboost other towers? was there a fear that it would be to powerful? in that case why not tone down the DPS to give it a support aspect that a lot of people have been wanting a paragon?
Our design goal for Paragons is to create an amazing apex form for each Monkey Tower, which is not always going to be a perfect triple path combination. Absolutely overall power is the primary concern, even with a high price. That said we have heard and many of us agree with points about losing the ability to support other towers, especially from the first Support category Paragon. We’re discussing this internally so stay tuned.

~ Ninja Kiwi, 12th August 2022 blog
Other Social Media

What we set out to achieve

Paragons were introduced at the same time as Bosses as a way to combat the extreme power of Bosses as well as to explore the "what if" question of smashing all 3 tier 5s into one. You've been making fan art of these merges for a long time and the Wizard Lord was one of our favourite things about the special missions in BTD5 so it felt natural to go there. The first two were iconic primary towers, Dart and Boomer, and did TONS OF DAMAGE. What we've learnt since then is that if all your paragons just do TONS OF DAMAGE, it's not a very strategic experience. Not only that, but the further you go in freeplay, the worse performance gets, especially with these crazy projectile heavy weapons of mass bloon-popination.

~ Ninja Kiwi, "Paragon Limit Update"

It’s not often that we find flaws in Monkey Towers or systems that we’ve spent so much time on, but it does happen, and when it does it causes significant internal discussion because we know “fixing” it will disrupt systems, economies, and balance that players have built strategies around. Leaving things as they are, however, means that we have to build on unstable foundations, and that makes the team feel uneasy about the massive future plans that we have for BTD6. Here’s the full disclosure rundown of the issue we found with Paragons and the changes we’re making and actively balancing.

We found a bug with the Paragon degree formula during development of Update 38 while working on Phayze that meant different Paragons scale differently, mostly regarding Boss damage. Given the impact of this bug on Paragon balance, and with Phayze about to be launched (and balanced around the “bugged” version of the formula), we decided to hold off on any fix so we could properly consider a full re-balance of each Paragon.

In Update 39, we’ve fixed the bug and reviewed related balance, but we’ve also taken time to look at how Paragons are used in general and have made changes to help them shine in other areas of the game beyond Bosses, where many new or less practiced players are trying to use Paragons but either not building economies effectively or not understanding how to secure higher Degree results.


Summary of changes:

  • From the fix: A varied amount of Boss Damage has been lost from all Paragons, however these losses have been considered within the context of the overhaul.
  • Co-op power contribution from Bonus T5 towers reduced from max 90,000 > 50,000
  • Extra T5’s (co-op) Multiplier to power contribution reduced from 10,000 > 6,000
  • Maximum cash contribution towards degrees increased from 10,000 > 60,000 points
  • Cash contribution requirement (per point) reworked from (Amount Spent / 25) to > (Amount Spent / (Paragon's Upgrade Cost / 20,000)). TLDR; This means inexpensive paragons (under 500k) will require less cash contribution than before to reach a similar paragon degree, however more expensive ones will also require a higher contribution.
  • Slider added to Paragon confirmation popups to allow the option to directly invest extra cash
  • Prices for Paragons now come in a range of costs to give better design and player flexibility
  • After being created in any real game each Paragon will unlock itself in sandbox

First and perhaps most importantly to the majority of players, we are changing the base cost to build some of the Paragons. As we have added more and more Paragons to the game, it has become increasingly difficult to make varied designs with them as they were so expensive it felt like each one had to demolish pretty much any Bloon or Boss thrown at it. Making low degree Paragons cost less and also increasing the cash absorbed component means the scale of power can vary much more, allowing for interesting in-game tactical decisions.

We’ve felt for a while that boosting your Paragon degree by building tons of tier 4 towers can be onerous or difficult, so we have implemented a direct cash contribution slider for players to skip that part of the formula (though it is slightly less efficient than building up your same-type towers). This cash contribution requirement now scales as a percentage of each paragon’s upgrade cost, meaning cheaper paragons will require less of a cash investment to get high degrees, and more expensive paragons will cost more. The cash component to the Paragon degree formula has also been increased, so cash can play a proportionately larger role in the degree your Paragon achieves when created.

We’ve also heard plenty of people ask to be able to build Paragons in sandbox mode and have added that feature too, with the caveat that you must have first created each Paragon in a normal game before you will be able to create it in sandbox. This achieves an important balance to us of experiencing the “real” Paragon moment in-game, of actually achieving it at any Degree, which then unlocks this ability to experiment more freely.

While we’ll spend the next month balancing and tightening these changes, we know we’ll need to continue to balance it beyond Update 39. Our goal and hope is to bring you solid changes that make the Paragon system more fun and more engaging to more players, while we constantly rebalance the game as we add awesome new features and our incredible community find strategies that blow our minds. Thanks for reading and as always, we appreciate your feedback.

~ The Ninja Kiwi Team

~ Ninja Kiwi, "Paragon System Rework Incoming"

Don't want to give away too much this early as there is still plenty of time for things to potentially change before the update. But we do plan to leave Dart Monkey as the cheapest paragon for now.

It's also very random how much each paragon was impacted by this bug relative to others so it's very tricky theorizing about number changes without feeling them out in practice. For example Ninja Paragon was almost unchanged after the initial bugfix, making it immediately considerably stronger relative to the other paragons, but some others lost half their boss dps before any number changes

~ Rohan Spibo comment, Paragon 39.0 rework post

User:
so if the points for cash contribution have been increased, which degree can you get without getting the pops? So it means getting degrees for ace Paragon will be much harder, and easier for dart and boomerang.

and it also means that you can get higher degree paragons on maps without much space, which is great.

Rohan Spibo:
With cash-only now contributing up to 60k, that much paragon power would get you to almost degree 58

~ Rohan Spibo comment, Paragon 39.0 rework post

User:
Another evidence that NK listens to his community <3 only wish that slider would be equal to T4 spam…

Rohan Spibo:
We feel like it's important to keep that aspect in some capacity because then finding the space to pull off the more efficient strategy is still the best way. This just removes that being the ONLY way to get a good tier paragon. We kind of view it as a, if you place all your towers and sacrifice the towers themselves to making the paragon you should be awarded with more efficiency, but if you have a great eco going and want to just buy your way into some of that power and spend more doing so then that's alright too.

~ Rohan Spibo comment, Paragon 39.0 rework post

  • User: the max is still 200k points, you get 40k less from T5s and 50k more from cash spent, which means that now the number of total (T4 or lower) upgrades doesn't matter at all, right?
  • Rohan Spibo: They will still matter, but they will be a fairly insignificant amount compared to the other contributions
~ Rohan Spibo comment, Paragon 39.0 rework post

Sounds[]

This section contains sounds specific to Paragons in general.

When unlocking a Paragon in the upgrade menu:

After purchasing a Paragon, which starts absorbing constituent towers (pre-??.x):

When receiving the Paragon degree number after transformation:

Generic Paragon upgrade sound (since ??.x):

Gallery[]

All Paragons On Screen[]

Teasers[]

Official artwork[]

Animations[]

Videos[]

Trivia[]

  • The popup for "Paragon Upgrade Enabled!" is triggered upon buying all Tier 5 upgrades of the same tower type for the first time.
  • The option to upgrade a Tier 5 into a Paragon is locked until all Tier 5's of the same tower type are placed on screen. Until then, the upgrade button for the Tier 5 will read "Max Upgrades" as usual.
  • Paragons join the Sun Temple, True Sun God, Monkeyopolis, Adora, and previously Soulbind as a tower that can sacrifice or absorb other towers. Unlike the others mentioned, Paragons can only sacrifice towers of their type.
  • Paragons are some of the most expensive upgrades in the game, with all currently released Paragons ranking within the Top 10:
  • It is technically possible to obtain a paragon in C.H.I.M.P.S mode, though it is incredibly difficult to save up the required cost without income.[7]
  • The Paragon upgrades join Prince of Darkness as being completely new upgrades that were introduced after their base tower was added.
  • Confusingly, Paragons used to not be officially considered 5-5-5 towers, but rather 6-0-0 towers, regardless of which path the paragon upgrade is bought on. This was due the structure of the upgrade path, and notation on the victory card screen. This was changed as of update 28.0.
  • A "paragon" is "someone or something that is the very best", fitting their nature as the very best of the tower they represent.
  • Since update 28.0 fixed Degree 1-19 not dealing double damage to Elite Bosses, the equation for extra boss damage changed. This equation is then simply multiplied by 2 without a bracket, leaving the last term "-bdD" as is. This made all Degree 20+ dealing an extra boss damage bonus worth of damage.
    • It is not yet known if this is intended or not, as the equation just misses a bracket to multiply extra boss damage by 2 cleanly for all Degrees. However, it may also be a mistake-turned-feature to encourage players to aim for at least Degree 20 paragons, especially for elite bosses because this is not yet change in 29.0.
  • Rohan from Ninja Kiwi made an official comment about the cap of 3 Paragons implemented in Version 33.0,[8] which evaluates the entire situation leading to the decision to impose a Paragon limit per game.
  • Sentry Paragon (now known as Sentry Champion) canonically may have contributed in creating Paragons.
  • The 8th July 2023 Bloonarius boss event was the first boss event to impose a 2 paragon limit in a game.

Ninja Kiwi Blogs[]

  • According to Ninja Kiwi's 3rd June 2022 Blog, what determines which tower is going to get a paragon are decided by a vote system.
  • According to Ninja Kiwi's 23rd June 2022 blog, the Wizard Lord in Bloons TD 5 was the inspiration for the concept of Paragons.
  • According to Ninja Kiwi's 1st March 2024 blog, new discoveries of Paragons occur when multiple teams of monkeys create a breakthrough that inspires every team to develop the new Paragon.

References[]

  1. The relative strength of the Paragons has been subject to much debate as many players have pointed out that the lack of buffs and high damage outside of boss events severely mitigates Paragon potential. In fact, some Paragons have been shown to be weaker than buffed combinations of their Tier 5 counterparts. Example: https://youtu.be/nEjtqA125r0?t=793
  2. Though doing so requires saving an exorbitant amount of cash in an extremely income-restricted gamemode.
  3. 27.0 Patch Notes on Reddit
  4. https://ninjakiwi.com/blog/news/173447-what-s-up-at-ninja-kiwi-17th-september-2021
  5. Comment from Rohan of Ninja Kiwi
  6. 33.0 patch notes
  7. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZM-QRvNnmQc

  8. Could reevaluate it in future still, we were worried that the possibilities for many of them to be active at once has and will continue to limit the crazy creativity that we can have when coming up with cool new paragon ideas & interactions.

    It seemed wiser to get on top of this before it became anything of an actual problem & before it would actually take much away from the current game state while still leaving the possibility to look back on this at a later date when there are many more finished paragons and review it then, we unfortunately didn't really expect it to be the concern it is with how few people even make a single paragon in freeplay but we don't want to knee jerk rush to another conclusion after we did spend a long time deciding on what we did.

    ~ Rohan, Ninja Kiwi
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