Single tower too strong? What am I missing?

[Sloom]

I haven't been playing terribly long ( currently on NG+3), but it seems like I do best when I just push for a single tower, which is kinda boring. I have a few different openers, but it seems far too strong to just invest into one tower type. Getting stream lined banners is very strong, and pivoting or adding to your tower pool waters down your banner pick and pushes you away from utilizing upgrades you've already gone for. Also pivoting off of your first built tower and giving up the banner feels bad. If there was a way to reroll the first few banners you pick up later in the run, it would be nice.

Obviously there is a lot of utility from frost towers, weakness towers, etc. But in my experience that utility is beaten in by a sledgehammer by just continuing to build what you already have buffs for, and buffing what you've already built. The one exception is when you finallllly get to the mixed banner, but getting there is a slog (and maybe not always possible? the mechanic is unclear as I've done multiple runs with 2 tower types with the required amount of banners and I just never get offered a mixed banner).

That being said. my strongest finishes have my top towers doing 20kish dps, and others are doing tens of millions (although maybe this is starts from people who continued to endless?)... so maybe I'm just overlooking something. If I am it's not very apparent.

[Stunforge | Basti]

Actually our goal in balancing was that we get around the same damage output when you build single target or multi target builds. We did not want to force you into playing what you need to, but what you want to. So if you enjoy easy arrow only runs because it just is fun to beat up some Orcs, thats fine, if you wanna brain out prism builds with the runestone tower and build synergies with fusions? Sure go for it! We dont want to force people into builds but rather let them explore what works best for them. You should play the game, the game should not play you :D

Hope you have great fun with the game anyway!

[NixBoxDone]

Single tower is really good to start with, but the other towers are going to rapidly become cheaper.
Come round 20 you'll be able to build 25 arrow towers while waiting to build one more prism tower.
The trick is to get your first tower to decent DPS and then build other types that offer a combo and do something to help the first tower.
Prism and frost for the slow and DPS aura, arrow and mortar for single and multi-target damage, etc. tt.
Building two towers from the get-go is possible though, so long as they're not competing for the same resource. I. e. arrow tower is wood, mortar is stone - using up the stone won't stop you from building more arrows.
You don't NEED to pick the off-tower banner unless it does something you genuinely want, so it's not even necessarily a big DPS drop for your primary tower.

[Jhonny Derp]

Its funny I have no idea what is actually the best, and have never bothered to actually go ask people or check the discord for more information on it. So all of my games have been ONLY arrow towers or only lightning towers, I managed to beat 30 with only arrow, and made it to like 38 with only lightning. I do not however quite understand how to manage to get a 2nd tower to even get remotely close to competing with my primary tower (Arrow or lightning) regardless of the 2nd one I start, and I can never even manage to start the 2nd tower until wave 25+ because otherwise after 2 waves of building another tower the enemies start pushing to far lol.

[NixBoxDone]

Originally posted by Jhonny Derp:

Its funny I have no idea what is actually the best, and have never bothered to actually go ask people or check the discord for more information on it. So all of my games have been ONLY arrow towers or only lightning towers, I managed to beat 30 with only arrow, and made it to like 38 with only lightning. I do not however quite understand how to manage to get a 2nd tower to even get remotely close to competing with my primary tower (Arrow or lightning) regardless of the 2nd one I start, and I can never even manage to start the 2nd tower until wave 25+ because otherwise after 2 waves of building another tower the enemies start pushing to far lol.

The trick usually isn't to have it do as much as your primary. It's to have it do something that helps your primary.
I. e. get arrow towers specifically for the bleed heal reduction or frost towers to slow the enemy for your DPS tower or shadow towers to reduce the armor, block and increase damage taken.
Sniper towers to specifically snipe barrier/spawner minions so your DPS towers can AoE them down.
That sorta stuff.
Getting two towers to do the same or more DPS than concentrating on one seems like a tough challenge given that a lot of stuff gets better the more you have and prime tower locations with good modifiers aren't unlimited.

It also helps to pick a second tower that uses a resource the first doesn't care about. That way you can use the free income of that resource from outposts and building upgrades to build those without impeding your main tower.

[Sloom]

Originally posted by Stunforge | Basti:

Actually our goal in balancing was that we get around the same damage output when you build single target or multi target builds. We did not want to force you into playing what you need to, but what you want to. So if you enjoy easy arrow only runs because it just is fun to beat up some Orcs, thats fine, if you wanna brain out prism builds with the runestone tower and build synergies with fusions? Sure go for it! We dont want to force people into builds but rather let them explore what works best for them. You should play the game, the game should not play you :D

Hope you have great fun with the game anyway!

That makes sense. I would just say (assuming it was perfectly balanced) the added complexity/difficulty of using multiple towers makes it difficult to approach. If the idea is that you're just playing around in a sandbox as you see fit that's awesome.

The leaderboard center screen after every match made me feel stressed (You won, but not as much as everyone else! Doesn't truly feel like a "victory" screen). It made me feel like I wasn't playing "properly" to get a better score (rather than building 10,000 arrow towers, which was a blast btw). But if I'm thinking of it more as the challenge of just getting victory by whatever means necessary, it's more fun.

Just as a random example, when I finish a Slay the Spire run, the victory screen always feels good. I didn't feel pushed to try and win while hitting X, Y, or Z metrics ; or get compared to other peoples runs (unless of course you're playing for specific challenges or leaderboards).

A lot of complaining... but games great btw. <3

[Stunforge | Basti]

Originally posted by Sloom:

Originally posted by Stunforge | Basti:

Actually our goal in balancing was that we get around the same damage output when you build single target or multi target builds. We did not want to force you into playing what you need to, but what you want to. So if you enjoy easy arrow only runs because it just is fun to beat up some Orcs, thats fine, if you wanna brain out prism builds with the runestone tower and build synergies with fusions? Sure go for it! We dont want to force people into builds but rather let them explore what works best for them. You should play the game, the game should not play you :D

Hope you have great fun with the game anyway!

That makes sense. I would just say (assuming it was perfectly balanced) the added complexity/difficulty of using multiple towers makes it difficult to approach. If the idea is that you're just playing around in a sandbox as you see fit that's awesome.

The leaderboard center screen after every match made me feel stressed (You won, but not as much as everyone else! Doesn't truly feel like a "victory" screen). It made me feel like I wasn't playing "properly" to get a better score (rather than building 10,000 arrow towers, which was a blast btw). But if I'm thinking of it more as the challenge of just getting victory by whatever means necessary, it's more fun.

Just as a random example, when I finish a Slay the Spire run, the victory screen always feels good. I didn't feel pushed to try and win while hitting X, Y, or Z metrics ; or get compared to other peoples runs (unless of course you're playing for specific challenges or leaderboards).

A lot of complaining... but games great btw. <3

hahah no worries! totally get your idea behind it, well the endless mode was implemented because the community wanted it from the beginning, the real endgoal in my eyes are the ascendecy levels, you can there brain a lot more and every ascendecy level will change how you play the game by alot due to its debuffs coming with every level.

Thats why endless aswell seems to lag a little bit more here still, but were on it and will implement some performance boosts in the near future.

Ofcourse every tower works on its own (maybe frost has the worst time here tho :D) but ofcourse the synergies and aswell the effect of leveraging the inflation not only on 1 tower makes dual tower approaches probably the most strongest right now. So im not saying one thing might be as strong as the other, but you can for sure beat the game with everything, atleast in normal mode! :)

[Jhonny Derp]

Originally posted by NixBoxDone:

Originally posted by Jhonny Derp:

Its funny I have no idea what is actually the best, and have never bothered to actually go ask people or check the discord for more information on it. So all of my games have been ONLY arrow towers or only lightning towers, I managed to beat 30 with only arrow, and made it to like 38 with only lightning. I do not however quite understand how to manage to get a 2nd tower to even get remotely close to competing with my primary tower (Arrow or lightning) regardless of the 2nd one I start, and I can never even manage to start the 2nd tower until wave 25+ because otherwise after 2 waves of building another tower the enemies start pushing to far lol.

The trick usually isn't to have it do as much as your primary. It's to have it do something that helps your primary.
I. e. get arrow towers specifically for the bleed heal reduction or frost towers to slow the enemy for your DPS tower or shadow towers to reduce the armor, block and increase damage taken.
Sniper towers to specifically snipe barrier/spawner minions so your DPS towers can AoE them down.
That sorta stuff.
Getting two towers to do the same or more DPS than concentrating on one seems like a tough challenge given that a lot of stuff gets better the more you have and prime tower locations with good modifiers aren't unlimited.

It also helps to pick a second tower that uses a resource the first doesn't care about. That way you can use the free income of that resource from outposts and building upgrades to build those without impeding your main tower.

Sure all of that makes sense to me and has made sense. The real issue is trying to figure out how to make my strat work on both sides of the coin Economy/Towers. I said compete with my primary tower when I probably should have said more of, if I do ARROW ONLY for instance, there is never a point where I EVER feel comfortable enough with the dps output to where I could add a 2nd tower in, and start working on it.

[NixBoxDone]

Originally posted by Jhonny Derp:

Originally posted by NixBoxDone:

The trick usually isn't to have it do as much as your primary. It's to have it do something that helps your primary.
I. e. get arrow towers specifically for the bleed heal reduction or frost towers to slow the enemy for your DPS tower or shadow towers to reduce the armor, block and increase damage taken.
Sniper towers to specifically snipe barrier/spawner minions so your DPS towers can AoE them down.
That sorta stuff.
Getting two towers to do the same or more DPS than concentrating on one seems like a tough challenge given that a lot of stuff gets better the more you have and prime tower locations with good modifiers aren't unlimited.

It also helps to pick a second tower that uses a resource the first doesn't care about. That way you can use the free income of that resource from outposts and building upgrades to build those without impeding your main tower.

Sure all of that makes sense to me and has made sense. The real issue is trying to figure out how to make my strat work on both sides of the coin Economy/Towers. I said compete with my primary tower when I probably should have said more of, if I do ARROW ONLY for instance, there is never a point where I EVER feel comfortable enough with the dps output to where I could add a 2nd tower in, and start working on it.

Frost tower only takes stone, though, so it's not really competing with anything after you build the statue.
Upgrade the statue and it's not even competing much for banners - only one out of three will even have a chance to show one for the other tower.
DPS is irrelevant on it since you want it for the slow and the stacking increased damage taken aura.
I feel like half the reason you're struggling to deviate from arrow tower is because you leave so much extra utility off the table that you need every extra damage per second you can just to keep up.

If arrow only is stagnating for you, experimenting isn't a loss - if you hadn't experimented, you would've hit the same wall regardless - if you do, you might find something that lets you pass it.

[Jhonny Derp]

Originally posted by NixBoxDone:

Originally posted by Jhonny Derp:

Sure all of that makes sense to me and has made sense. The real issue is trying to figure out how to make my strat work on both sides of the coin Economy/Towers. I said compete with my primary tower when I probably should have said more of, if I do ARROW ONLY for instance, there is never a point where I EVER feel comfortable enough with the dps output to where I could add a 2nd tower in, and start working on it.

Frost tower only takes stone, though, so it's not really competing with anything after you build the statue.
Upgrade the statue and it's not even competing much for banners - only one out of three will even have a chance to show one for the other tower.
DPS is irrelevant on it since you want it for the slow and the stacking increased damage taken aura.
I feel like half the reason you're struggling to deviate from arrow tower is because you leave so much extra utility off the table that you need every extra damage per second you can just to keep up.

If arrow only is stagnating for you, experimenting isn't a loss - if you hadn't experimented, you would've hit the same wall regardless - if you do, you might find something that lets you pass it.

to be fair every time i hit a wall with arrow tower I managed to pass it, up to 34. have made it to 39 with only lightning. I also haven't ever tried to use the mortar tower with the arrow tower since I NEVER used the mortar not even before the beta, and only just found out that its the tower that GOES with arrow lol ive tried every combo with arrow other than that and shadow currently

[NixBoxDone]

Originally posted by Jhonny Derp:

Originally posted by NixBoxDone:

Frost tower only takes stone, though, so it's not really competing with anything after you build the statue.
Upgrade the statue and it's not even competing much for banners - only one out of three will even have a chance to show one for the other tower.
DPS is irrelevant on it since you want it for the slow and the stacking increased damage taken aura.
I feel like half the reason you're struggling to deviate from arrow tower is because you leave so much extra utility off the table that you need every extra damage per second you can just to keep up.

If arrow only is stagnating for you, experimenting isn't a loss - if you hadn't experimented, you would've hit the same wall regardless - if you do, you might find something that lets you pass it.

to be fair every time i hit a wall with arrow tower I managed to pass it, up to 34. have made it to 39 with only lightning. I also haven't ever tried to use the mortar tower with the arrow tower since I NEVER used the mortar not even before the beta, and only just found out that its the tower that GOES with arrow lol ive tried every combo with arrow other than that and shadow currently

Those two go best with arrow though!
That's like trying every combination with bread except peanut butter and jelly. >_<

[Jhonny Derp]

Originally posted by NixBoxDone:

Originally posted by Jhonny Derp:

to be fair every time i hit a wall with arrow tower I managed to pass it, up to 34. have made it to 39 with only lightning. I also haven't ever tried to use the mortar tower with the arrow tower since I NEVER used the mortar not even before the beta, and only just found out that its the tower that GOES with arrow lol ive tried every combo with arrow other than that and shadow currently

Those two go best with arrow though!
That's like trying every combination with bread except peanut butter and jelly. >_<

LMFAO, yeah i mean i get that, but the mortar tower was so bad pre demo i just never thought that it would fuse with arrow to begin with. And shadow I have literally never used. In order to really TEST everything, it takes several runs with the same idea in mind, so unless you go scrolling for answers or go on discord and find out what the best runs were done with, its tough to actually manage to test everything and find what works lol

[NixBoxDone]

The update for the burning ground and the stuff that amplifies status effects based on stacks already present are really, really good.
You can also get an upgrade that gives them massive range so you can place them so 20 or 30 can hit the same spot at the same time.

Shadow tower is equally good, they natively apply a "more damage taken" debuff, if they kill something they can debuff high health enemies to take even more damage and their debuff can reduce armor and block, making less of your arrow towers go to waste.

Feel ya on the blind spot though, haven't even touched the chain lightning towers yet. That's probably my next run!

[Mirodin333]

Personally I think that the thing really pushing single towers and not going for multiple is in the end limited banners.

A banner for my main prism tower will always be better than a banner for something else. So I just go prisms all the way.

My idea to fix it would be diminishing returns on banners. The more you pick a certain upgrade, the less power you get.

Or banner % caps, but thats too limiting imo.

[Jhonny Derp]

Yeah im going to have to try them now, I love arrow tower for some reason lol. As to the lighting towers . Ill put it to you this way, I was on arrow towers stuck at wave 29 for about 12 runs, I swapped to lightning towers and made it to 36 on my first try (only tower).

[Erikkustrife]

Originally posted by Jhonny Derp:

Yeah im going to have to try them now, I love arrow tower for some reason lol. As to the lighting towers . Ill put it to you this way, I was on arrow towers stuck at wave 29 for about 12 runs, I swapped to lightning towers and made it to 36 on my first try (only tower).

the lighting arrow tower combo makes it so that either lighting towers propagate bleed or that arrow towers bounce. i got to wave 39 using this.