any tips for beginners?

[Fused Zamasu]

I.E. what monkeys to get XP for first, what upgrades to get for those monkeys, what to spend my monkey monkey on, best maps to play to get general XP fast (so I can unlock monkey knowledge) , best monkey knowledge to get first, etc?

[Ninja Zyborg]

you could try looking up tips

[Fused Zamasu]

Originally posted by Ninja Zyborg:

you could try looking up tips

Thank you captain obvious very helpful

[Vivianite]

play on impoppable on any easy map of preference for "xp" on a monkey, use it more than others when you place to delegate xp to them per round. get em all you're going to want more options over specifics, do not freeplay, you get significantly less during it.

for MK: primary tree- free dart/glue +200 starting cash is a solid start
military- wingmonkey for monkey ace (chases whoever is in first), big bloon sabotage reduces HP of MOABs at spawn, military conscription reduces your first military monkey pricing by 66%
magic- mo monkey money for 10% more monkey money across game wins, mana shield up to hard difficulty adds 25 extra lives, recharging 5 per if no leaks on said wave and it isn't at 25.
support- monkey education +xp rate for all monkies, bigger banks adding 2500 more money to generate within them
heroes- empowered heroes, start the game at lv 3 with your hero
powers- don't worry about these until you wrap up the other MK trees first.

[Ackranome]

Originally posted by Ninja Zyborg:

you could try looking up tips

Originally posted by Spongebob Squarepants:

Originally posted by Ninja Zyborg:

you could try looking up tips

Thank you captain obvious very helpful

Congratulations on your promotion from Ninja to Captain.

[MangoTheKing]

Originally posted by Ninja Zyborg:

you could try looking up tips

It is a forum for discussion about the game. What a rude response.

[Ninja Zyborg]

Originally posted by MangoTheKing:

Originally posted by Ninja Zyborg:

you could try looking up tips

It is a forum for discussion about the game. What a rude response.

https://steamcommunity.com/app/960090/guides/?searchText=beginner&browsefilter=trend&requiredtags%5B%5D=-1

[ν]

Originally posted by Spongebob Squarepants:

I.E. what monkeys to get XP for first, what upgrades to get for those monkeys

Farms, druids, heli, snipers, glue, dart monkey, ace.

• Farms will level up naturally, they're important to have when you want to use high tier monkeys.
  
• Druids at 1-3-0 are strong and can speed up rounds by killing bloons at the start, 2-5-0 can handle up to round 99 (probably, or at least it can handle DDTs in the 90s)
  
• Heli at 3-2-0 can solo easy, 4-2-0 medium, 5-2-0 hard (on beginner and maybe int maps)
  
• Snipers are good global damage and have crosspaths for money generation (all paths good)
  
• Glue you can place for free with a MK, 0-2-4 is my favorite path, it completely stunlocks bloons at an affordable price
  
• Dart monkey, don't underestimate these. Ultra-juggernaut is very good and affordable. With an MK you can have 2 crossbow masters that can handle just about everything.
  
• Ace top path can help with moabs, middle path races, and bottom path if you like farming, a 2-0-5 can handle to round 140 or so with camo support (village).
  
• All towers are good so use whatever you like

what to spend my monkey monkey on

Heroes, whatever you like or Sauda, Etienne, and Benjamin. If you don't have Obyn and Gwen those are good too and probably cheaper.

best maps to play to get general XP fast (so I can unlock monkey knowledge)

I wouldn't worry about it, but for grinding XP do an expert map on Easy - Deflation. You have a fixed amount of starting cash so you just place the tower you want to level up and go afk.

best monkey knowledge to get first, etc?

Ones that aren't tower specific or tower specific ones that are really strong. i.e. more starting cash, hero +3 levels, most of the support tree, free starting dart/glue, bloon sabotage in military (bottom), etc.

[HoBoMiKe]

The most important thing for beginners to know is that no matter what you do or how you do it, you'll always be out of money or not have enough money, because Ninja Kiwi thinks making everything in the game expensive equals "balance."

Thus, your mindset should be to play as cheaply as possible.

Placement:

>the placement of your towers is imperative to winning the game; if you don't get your towers just right, they'll miss like 60% of the bloons, no matter how fast the attack speed is. It's critical to pop every single bloon without leaking, because cash is rare in this game. Try to line towers up even on straights so the projectiles cross as much of the track as possible; try to put Boomerangs, Tack Towers, and Ice Towers inside sharp curves; and try to place Bomb towers and Engineers near Overlaps where the slow attack speed has a chance to hit bloons twice or pierce extra. Try to place farms close together, to make gathering bananas easier. Try to place Heroes in the area of the map with the most track coverage (except for Benjamin and Psi, who have unlimited Range) and try to place Spike Factories at the end of the map, where they'll have a chance to ramp up spikes for bloon onslaughts.

Know your Rounds

There are a few important rounds to know.
>Round 24 has the first camo bloon.
>Round 28 and 30 have the first Lead Bloons.
>Round 40 has the first MOAB.
>Rounds 55 and 63 have densely packed Ceramic Rushes; be ready to spend a lot of money on defense here.
>Rounds 76 and 78 have Dense, Regrow ceramic rushes, and 78 has CAMO REGEN CERAMICS. watch out!
>Round 90 has the first DDTs, which are extremely fast, difficult to pop and usually cause players to lose a game.
>Round 100 has a BAD, which isn't hard to kill because it's slow, but because it contains 2 DDTs that can slip by and cost you the game.

Monkey Knowledge

>obtaining the following monkey knowledge ASAP:
Cheaper 'Rangs and Increased Lifespan reduce the cost of Boomerang Monkeys (one of the first unlocks) by $50, and increase the distance Dart Monkey darts can go before disappearing. combined with good placement, this can safe a few $ early round and is a must-have for newer players trying to get the most out of early towers. It's in Primary.
Farm Subsidy reduces the cost of the first farm by $100. Because farms cost an insane amount, this upgrade is critical. it's in Support.
Monkey education will make your towers unlock upgrades faster, permanently. it's in support.
Elite Military Training will boost your Military Monkey XP permanently, and stacks with monkey education. it's in Military.
Ceramic Shock lets snipers briefly slow down ceramic bloons, which can save your bacon in early rounds. it's in Military.
Mo' Monkey Money will permanently boost your Monkey Money income. it's in Magic.
Magic Tricks will make 1-0-1 Magic Monkeys semi-affordable. it's in Magic.

BONUS MONKEY, Extra Cash,Pre-Game Prep, Mana Shield, and Military Conscription take a while to unlock, but these 5 MK points should be your main focus on unlocking as they reduce the catastrophic cost of early-game and help defend against losing.

Farming

the single-most important aspect of this game is knowing how to farm, because most upgrades in this game are either unaffordable before losing, or the game has ended before you could afford the upgrade.

>after you've unlocked BONUS MONKEY! and Farm Subsidy, the two most important upgrades in the game, you'll have to learn how to get the absolute Most out of that free dart Monkey and your Hero while you save up over $1000 to get an expensive farm.

>Buy a Banana farm
>get 2-0-0
>Buy another farm
>get 2-2-0 on #2 farm
>upgrade #1 farm to 2-0-2 to take advantage of the sell price, save up about $800, then sell it; this should get you around $3500.
>upgrade farm #2 to 2-3-0, a Monkey Bank.


>at this point, you'll probably have to start investing $$$ in defense again, because the hero won't be able to keep up; try to buy cheap upgrades on the free dart monkey, and purchase an area-of-effect tower such as a bomb, a glue gunner, or a military Monkey that can deal spread-damage.

>save up around $2500; hopefully by then, your Bank will have about $4,000, which you can withdraw.
>make your farm 2-4-0
>pray to God the ability cools down in time; use it to get $10,000, which you can then either put towards another 2-4-0 farm, or invest it in defenses. Remember that by now, that MOAB is coming up on Round 40, and your defenses may not be able to pop it unless you have Big Bloon Sabotage unlocked.

[ν]

Forgot to mention, Monkey Knowledge is shared in co-op, so you can try that to learn from others and use their knowledge for free.

[Zephyr]

I would say at first to focus on your primary monkeys. Seeing you will be using them for primary only challenges on the easy difficulty, it makes sense to start humbly and level them up, they are cheap and can cover a lot of your bases.
Early on: Dark monkey, the bottom path. Get two levels on others paths, they have their use.
Boomerang monkey: Top part mostly, with 2 levels in others.
Bomb thrower: All upgrade paths are good and useful for different things, there is no wrong pick.
Tack throwers: Top and bottom paths mostly, both have uses for different threats.
Ice monkeys: Top and bottom paths.

Focusing on leveling monkeys is a good goal early on as you tackle low difficulty challenges and maps.

If you want to farm xp, there are some easy ways to do that with deflation mode as you go through clearing that. As for monkey knowledge, I suggest the ones to gain more xp, beelining to more money at start, better farms/income generation, cheaper stuff, and beelining to get a free dart or glue monkey.

I will amend a few things HoboMike said though:
-A lot of times, you can get the best result with just a few upgraded monkeys, instead of placing a lot of them all over the place.
-Wave 59 has lead camo balloons, you absolutely want to remember that, because if you can't strip camo from them, or have someone able to deal with both lead and camo, they will go through.
-I disagree with his farming method. If you have only 40 waves, you don't need any farming, time is too short and you won't get enough return. Farming isn't even necessary for 60 waves most of the time. For 80 or more waves, I would suggest to cover your initial bases, go for a 2-0-0 farm, then an other, then a third while making sure you can deal with all threats(you need to have anti camo and anti lead at waves 24 and 28, although it's not strictly necessary for 24 as it has only one camo balloon which you can let through without too much caring). After that, you upgrade your farms to 2-0-3. That's all you need. By the time you go for 100 waves you won't be a new players anymore and can probably make your own calls. But if you go the distance for money income you can make a monkeyopolis and make it the center of an array of farms with 0-2-4. That's a bit advanced though, no need to bother with it at the start.