pay to win or time consuming?

[Phantom R]

i feel like im making no progress, is the game slow or just pay to win?

[Waste_of_skin]

Define "progress". Player level, completing maps or higher difficulties, or ...?

Are you stuck on something in particular?

You definitely don't have to pay to win. I guess it might be "time consuming". Obviously, it takes some time. How much is "too much"?

There are some characters that you can unlock as you play that can be a big help, like Commander Cassie.

They also have periodic events that can help. The events have maps that you can complete for extra rewards, like the beacon maps, and then you get a legendary orb (the step above epic) if you complete enough of the maps in the event (which is not difficult to do). They had a "fireworks" event back around July 4th (I started playing during that event), and then another event since then. My guess is that they'll start another before too long.

I assume that you're playing on Steam? The Steam version doesn't have ads, but in the mobile version, you can watch ads (a certain number per day or something) to get gems (the purple things), which you can use to buy items in that little "store", reroll quests, etc.

The thing is, while the Steam version doesn't have that, you can link the mobile version to your Steam profile, and the game will store your profile (game data) in the cloud, so when you're not playing on Steam, you can start the mobile version, have it load your profile from the cloud (to get your data from the Steam version), and then watch some ads to get some gems. Then do the reverse when you start the game on Steam again, to get the updated data (with the extra gems).

At least, I know that you can do that with the Android version, because I did that some early on (I really don't use gems much (mostly a few here and there for rerolls), so I just haven't bothered to do that in a long time). If there's an IOS version, I imagine that that also works with that version.

[Phantom R]

i guess i should have been more descriptive, but i really dont have the brain cells for this at the current moment my apologies. What I find is that im blocked and cannot pogress due to a lack of a good way to upgrade. I cannot progress, but I also dont have anything I can do to earn anything to work my way up to making progress, and every time i fail the game says i should get upgrades i need to pay for. I feel like the ammount of time i need to put into this game is more then other balloon tower defence games, but at the same time the game lacks content and enjoyability as well as a good way to level up, to my understanding unless you join durring an event it can be eifficult to get into the game, and I feel worn out being stuck where i am for the 2 weeks i have been stuck.

[Waste_of_skin]

I haven't played any other Bloons games, so I can't say how this one compares.

Where, exactly, are you "stuck"?

Are you having trouble just completing maps on Normal difficulty?

Are you having trouble with specific maps?

Are you doing (or at least attempting) the daily quests?

You might also look at the achievements (the trophy icon on the right). You get a reward for completing each of those, and some of them are pretty basic (like "dmg X bloons using Y character").

I'm sure that events are not in any way necessary to level up. They probably help (just because of the extra chances to get some special rewards), but I don't know how much difference they really make. But I happened to start playing during an event, so that's the only perspective I have.

[Viziuwski (MVA)]

Firstly you have to beat all maps in all difficulties. Be care to reclaim the chest of the zones. For example when you beat for first time all maps in "Apple thief" in normal mode you get one chest etc.
Daily missions and the random map with the gem are important to level up characters. Once you beat all and get the "Thought Cannon Wand", You can farm orbs and collect shards wth repeated items to craft epic orbs. With epic items maps become so easy.
So After this the only job are events to collect one legendary orb each event and try to farm in Marrtian Games. That is all. The late game is the insane farming phase because is when you can unlock paid content free in martian games.

[nostalgic vampire menace]

You can get through the game by just beating every map on every difficulty you can, doing the highest level quests that you can, doing the red shard maps on the hardest difficulty you can, and saving up all your shards for purple or gold orbs. It's completely possible (and honestly kind of easy) to win without spending any money, just have to be a little patient until you get a good upgrade that will help you snowball. Try doing the hardest difficulties of the easiest adventures to start.

That being said, the game is free, so it's okay to spend at least a little money on it. The purchasable characters are really solid, and come with more maps, so they are a good bet to buy. If you only buy one, I recommend Tuxedo Jake. He's a very good tower.

[Waste_of_skin]

I don't know if you're still playing or interested, but if you haven't already seen, they just started the Halloween event. It's running for the next 24 days. So now's your chance to get some extra items, level-up materials, etc., and (I assume) a legendary orb.

The event maps work like the beacon maps. You can do one every 4 hours, or you can pay some gems (1 gem for every 5 minutes) to play the next one now. If it's less than 5 minutes before the next event (or beacon) map becomes available, it doesn't cost any gems to go ahead and start it.

[wulfster42]

I just started playing about a week ago and yeah, you can totally keep progressing steadily, just by doing maps. I actually am skipping doing a ton of them on normal/hard because it's a waste of time for me now. I will eventually do them all on the last two difficulties, though I may stick to mostly doing impopable at this point.

The martian event did help a bit, I got 10k points and bought 3 epic wish's which gave me some really nice gear. You (seem) to generally get super rare wishe's if you complete an adventure (all the quests in it) on the third difficulty, and I tend to get Epic wish's for completing them on impoppable (not to mention a bunch of wishes doing the impopable quests themselves).

You can also do the beacon quest for a full chest bonus even if you finished that quest already in the past, and...if you want to get the bonus on a higher difficulty level then you currently unlocked, you can do the quest first on that difficulty level (say impopable) and THEN it lets you do it right away as the beacon quest on that level (double the bonuses!!).

Luck is certainly involved, but there is also the in game store that sells items for pretty cheap (only 300 gems for an epic item, less for super rare) that changes regularly and you can get gems pretty fast easy. Also shard all the white and most of the green/blue wishes you get (Eventually you'll get so many you won't need any more green/blue rewards), to get up to 1500 shards asap. If you get the wand that gives wishes if you damage a baloon (Forget the name) that makes getting shards WAY faster as well. I just use the 1500 for the super rare, which has a chance of giving an epic as well (especially if you re-roll.

That helps you get most of the really important stuff pretty fast, or it has for me. I have 2 phoenix wands, I have the item that slows bloons by 30% when near the character (cyro thingy), I have the dive suit for Fin (lets me put him on water/lava and immune to negative effects), and a bunch of other good stuff.

Just been playing a week and still having alot of fun, but I can see an end for me in sight where I have most of everything I really need and I'm powerful enough to do everything already, I won't have motivation to play after that probably. I'm playing on steam so no adds, and I have spent no money, though I may throw them money eventually for tuxedo jake just for kicks and giggles and because the game rocks. He does look pretty awesome and that would probably help me kick but a bit more.

Only other thing I really want at this point is the farmer ally that will collect things for me so I don't have to lol. Gets annoying having to collect all the crap that drops.

[Waste_of_skin]

Originally posted by wulfster42:

I just started playing about a week ago and yeah, you can totally keep progressing steadily, just by doing maps. I actually am skipping doing a ton of them on normal/hard because it's a waste of time for me now. I will eventually do them all on the last two difficulties, though I may stick to mostly doing impopable at this point.

Of course you get that special chest when you complete all of the maps in a set on a certain difficulty, which includes a wish orb (like the epic wish orb for impoppable), so you can get some more stuff by doing those maps on the lower difficulties when you get around to it.

Originally posted by wulfster42:

Luck is certainly involved, but there is also the in game store that sells items for pretty cheap (only 300 gems for an epic item, less for super rare) that changes regularly and you can get gems pretty fast easy.

Most people recommend keeping at least 300 gems on hand, in case the Thought Cannon Wand (TCW - the one that can give you wish orbs) shows up in the store. BTW, the extra reward that you get for keeping the pumpkin safe on the Halloween event maps seems to usually be some gems (25 at Impoppable).

And, if you don't know, you can play on a phone/tablet and link that to your Steam account, and then watch ads on the mobile device to earn some extra gems. I did that some early on.

Originally posted by wulfster42:

Just been playing a week and still having alot of fun, but I can see an end for me in sight where I have most of everything I really need and I'm powerful enough to do everything already, I won't have motivation to play after that probably.

Yeah, it didn't seem like there would be any point in playing more after I beat every map on impoppable, but I'm still playing. But it's a lot more "casual" now. I think I've got at least one of every item through epic (and multiples of many of them), with 7000+ gems and about 50,000 shards, so I'm not "grinding" for anything in the main game. I try to do the quests each day, and sometimes the Halloween event and beacon maps. My characters aren't max level, because I'm just not pushing to get those level-up materials (eg. by doing more beacon maps). The one thing that I could spend more time on is the Martian Games (to get enough crystals for Tuxedo Jake, or maybe Hunter Marceline), but I haven't even attempted one in maybe a week or more, either because I didn't feel like dealing with the rules for that game, or just because if you can get very far, it takes a lot of time (sometimes over an hour), and I just haven't had that much time lately.

FWIW, if you do happen to get a Thought Cannon Wand and you don't have Monkey Farmer (the one that collects things for you), I would definitely consider buying him. I really undervalued him. If I had realized what a "quality of life" upgrade he was, I would have bought him when I got my first TCW. I was lucky and got him from the legendary orb for completing an event a couple of months ago, and he is so helpful. He will supposedly even collect items that are dropped off the screen (when a bloon is destroyed before it enters the screen, which isn't unusual for MOABs when your items and characters are powerful enough).