Here are some details about game mechanics I found looking through the code.

How difficulty works:

x=what level you are on, 1-25, so first map you play x=1, 2nd map x=2 etc.

nUpgrades=number of random upgrades from the shop that the enemy gets. This is always an integer (whole number), but it can be negative, where upgrades can be removed as well. The difficulty percentage you see in game is calculated from nUpgrades.

For "V. Hard" (all the demon areas only):

nUpgrades = floor(1.6*x) + x - 10, but in this case nUpgrades has a minimum of 25. This means that at level 13 and below, nUpgrades is always 25. At lvl 14, nUpgrades=26, at lvl 15, nUpgrades=29. It increases FAST after lvl 14, my routes finish demons before level 15 because of this. Also note that if you get unlucky with what upgrades they get, for example spear (which they already have +2 of), and armor, they can be almost impossible to beat.

For "Hard" (thareth, orthshire, azzitha, battaka, eastern forest, dead plains, mylen, nartoth):

nUpgrades = floor(1.5*x) + x - 10, note that nUpgrades is negative until level4, where nUpgrades=0 Fighting "Hard" early makes a lot of sense.

For "Medium":

nUpgrades = floor(0.5*x) + x - 10, negative until level 7, where nUpgrades=0, but doesn't increase as fast. At level 15, nUpgrades=12.

For "Easy":

nUpgrades= ceil(-0.5 * x) + x - 10, negative upgrades until level 20.

How money works:

Money is ONLY gained from killing enemy units, the gold value is based on the cost of buying the unit divided by 50. Spears are 5, sword is 12, archers are 10.

I made some calculations on which areas should give the most money by dividing their cost/recharge time, the battle axeman from the northern orcs stand out here giving 18 gold per kill while recharging only every 60 frames (for reference, the game runs at 24 fps and spearmen recharge every 50 frames).

| Soldier name           | Cost / rechargetime          |
|------------------------------------|------------------|
| strSoldiers += "Spearman           | 5                |
| strSoldiers += "Swordsman          | 8.57142857142857 |
| strSoldiers += "Archer             | 7.14285714285714 |
| strSoldiers += "Mage               | 5                |
| strSoldiers += "Mounted Spearman   | 7.77777777777778 |
| strSoldiers += "Halberdier         | 8.33333333333333 |
| strSoldiers += "Mounted Halberdier | 7.33333333333333 |
| strSoldiers += "Scout              | 6.66666666666667 |
| strSoldiers += "Longswordsman      | 7.69230769230769 |
| strSoldiers += "Battle Axeman      | 15               |
| strSoldiers += "Whirler            | 10               |
| strSoldiers += "Axe Thrower        | 8.57142857142857 |
| strSoldiers += "Ranger             | 10.8333333333333 |
| strSoldiers += "Javelin Thrower    | 6.15384615384615 |
| strSoldiers += "Spearmaster        | 9.23076923076923 |
| strSoldiers += "Axeman             | 5                |
| strSoldiers += "Giant Troll        | 8                |
| strSoldiers += "Flailer            | 7.22222222222222 |
| strSoldiers += "King\'s Guard      | 8.88888888888889 |

Decompiled the flash and did some math, also seems to check out with the videos that this is a break point.

I removed/archived glitchless NLL, all the runs submitted there should be available in glitchless anyways. There's also no way to speed the game up by losing lifes, in fact it makes it slower. Another reason to remove it is that occasionally when moderating people also wouldn't upload to both despite fitting both categories, which either means inaccurate leaderboards or some minor moderator work.

If someone is has concerns or even any reason (even minor) why they don't like this please tell me, and i'm sorry.

https://www.speedrun.com/chgj/stats

I remember trading the record multiple times and also remember making improvements over time, the stats graph just doesn't show this. I hope this type of history isn't lost forever... On the old site it used to work properly IIRC.

I wasn't even gonna make this thread but if I try to click the (X) button to cancel it it doesn't let me so the thread goes up

I've got a strat in 3-4 where i go off screen, is it ok if I resize the screen so I can see the ball better?

There's no rule against it here but I know it's a rule in redball and it makes sense to some extent (not all flash players even allow resizing, and the game is clearly not meant to be resized like that). Anyways since there's no rule against it i'll go for it for now (and also cause it's cool o.o), but it should be clarified somewhere in the game rules if allowed or not.

For technical reasons I struggled creating an autosplitter for livesplit for this game.

However, to keep competition fair by removing the difference between fast and slow computers I added optional LRT times. The load times are calculated using the tool https://github.com/milankarman/Unload . The tool works flawlessly for any% no cans, however for any% cans we have the issue of no consistant image being displayed when loading can transitions. This can be fixed by more manual work beyond just downloading the video.

Going forward I'll try to keep the top 3 times updated with LRT for any% no cans, the possibility is there to retime any% cans as well, may do this if times are close. Leaderboards will still be sorted by RTA time for the time being.

Decompiled the .swf using JPEXS and looking through some of the code and such. May be possible to mod an ingame timer and a framerate checker into it.

EXACT ATTACK SPEEDS: framerate of the game is 40 fps, attackspeeds are given in number of frames between attacks.

Dart monkey: 29 (0,725 s) Tack shooter: 55 (1,375s), 40 after upgrade (1s) (note that this means that for glitched runs you should buy the speed upgrades exactly 4 times, each buy decreases time between attacks by 15 frames) Bomb Tower: 55 (1,375s) Super: 2 (0,05 s) (or 20 shots per second!!!)

BULLET SCALE: Long range tacks increases the bulletScale from 100 to 130, so a 30% increase in size.

Bigger bombs increases bulletscale from 100 to 150, a 50% increase in size (not doubled, increased by 50%).

BOMBS HAVE A MAXIMUM PIERCE OF 20. This means that in ideal conditions bombs have equal DPS to a super monkey.

These are just some initial findings, but i'll try to keep it all to this thread. Other things I should be able to figure out but just didn't have the time today:

• bomb explosion hitbox
• round descriptions/bloons per round (I seen the code for this but it's like 140 lines of descriptions, i'll write a parser for it tomorrow and add to the thread)
• pretty much anything else, very open to suggestions on things you want to know about this game (or BTD2 as they are quite similar).

At the time of doing the runs the supernova flash extension was the recommended way by NK to run these games. The NK archives version is slower (I only tested BTD2 which uses the same engine and lags more, dunno exactly how bad that version is for BTD1).

Right now I can't figure out how to play the game with the supernova flash player.

I'd either want more information on how the game can be played with the fastest flash player so I can writeup a guide, or we can discuss adding seperate categories per flash player.

At the time of doing the runs the supernova flash extension was the recommended way by NK to run these games. The NK archives version is significantly slower.

Right now I can't figure out how to play the game with the supernova flash player, maybe there needs to be seperate categories for different players as lag plays a huge role.

I was reading the rules and came across something hilarious to me:

"Using two types of controllers at the same time is not allowed. This means you cannot use keyboard and mouse at the same time with a controller. "

Did this ever come up? What's the history behind this rule? Someone using a keyboard mouse and controller at the same time? Lmao. Does my modded wiimote and nunchuck count as one or two controllers?

This probably loses 2 seconds in any% nocans, reverting to a previous version is probably faster...

I will retime the top runs using https://slashinfty.github.io/yt-frame-timer/ .

Especially for any% cans two players getting the same whole second time might happen. If unsure just use whole seconds, WR runs will be retimed.

Just playing casually, but my swf file says "only available on ninjakiwi.com", I beat all the maps but they still didn't unlock. Anyone got an swf with all the maps unlocked?

Hello, I'm here to propose some new timing rules for when the timing for runs should end.

Why?

Recently there was some discussion about the top 2 runs in BTD1 glitch%, with two runs that were of a very similar time. For the discussion see: https://www.speedrun.com/bloons_tower_defense/thread/aft7e I misstimed my run by timing a local file while youtube seems to introduce some lag, but for fairness sake timing should ofcourse be done by the youtube videos. The problem with ending the timer at "congratulations" is that it fades in, so if the video is blurry, what resolution is used, and how readable the text should be is all pretty much arbitrary choices as anyone who has timed bloons TD runs would know.

The solution?

End the timer on the first frame on which no projectile particles are visible on screen after the last bloon is popped. That's darts, tacks, bomb explosions etc. https://imgur.com/a/y6U2NpM for an example. The downside of this is that sometimes darts will fly for many frames before leaving the screen, but atleast it's objective when time should end.

Hello, I'm here to propose some new timing rules for when the timing for runs should end.

Why?

Recently there was some discussion about the top 2 runs in BTD1 glitch%, with two runs that were of a very similar time. For the discussion see: https://www.speedrun.com/bloons_tower_defense/thread/aft7e I misstimed my run by timing a local file while youtube seems to introduce some lag, but for fairness sake timing should ofcourse be done by the youtube videos. The problem with ending the timer at "congratulations" is that it fades in, so if the video is blurry, what resolution is used, and how readable the text should be is all pretty much arbitrary choices as anyone who has timed bloons TD runs would know.

The solution?

End the timer on the first frame on which no projectile particles are visible on screen after the last bloon is popped. That's darts, tacks, bomb explosions etc. https://imgur.com/a/y6U2NpM for an example. The downside of this is that sometimes darts will fly for many frames before leaving the screen, but atleast it's objective when time should end.

I retimed gerbungis run with a listed time of 13:07.660 just to make sure that we timed it the same way when i now got my faster run of 13:07.180 by watching the video, checking the first frame where the "start round" button was pressed which was at 9.270 seconds and the first frame where any semblence of the congratulations could be seen which was at 13:17.160. This gives a time of 13:07.890 as I see it.

Thoughts?

Just in case anyone is turned off of this game because of the lag, using the SuperNova flash enabler on google chrome speeds this game up massively, almost no lag.

I'm currently using the file at https://dagobah.net/flash/Bloons_TD.swf after some googling.

Is this the correct version of the game? Does flashpoint provide the swf file as well and can someone share it with me? :)

This is just my opinion as of now on when to use the different towers in the game. I am actually unsure of the efficiency of some upgrades but i'll try to go over the upgrades as I understand them. Some of this carries over into the other difficulties but the prices on the towers are different and therefore changes their cost efficiency.

Dart Monkeys: They shoot fast and are the most accurate of the towers, great for picking of bloons travelling alone that survived your AOE damage. Piercing darts is worth it if it will kill 2 bloons 72% of shots. Long range can be worth it in some situations.

Tack shooters: Shoots every 1.5 seconds I think and can pop 5-7 bloons if placed well (placing them not in a corner is not worth it, you'd be better off buying piercing dart monkeys). Can be inaccurate. The faster shooting speeds up shooting by 50%, and costs a little more than 50% of the tower cost but if well placed it's worth it and it's nice that it's cheap. Longer range meh.

Ice Tower: Thought to be useless, and not used in any runs yet, I could see this tower being useful in runs if you can build an army of mainly boomerangs and give them sonic boom and cannons. The upgrades seem useless as you probably just want to stack several of them after eachother in a line and they're expensive.

Cannon: I hate this tower. I don't understand it at all so take what I say with a grain of salt. Extremely inconsistant. I think it can pop 6 bloons in one shot which is not bad but when they are even a little spread out or come from a slightly off angle they can pop anywhere from 0-3. Need at least 2 or 3 for lead balloons in later rounds. Bigger bombs seems just worse than saving for a new bomb tower although if it does allow it to pop say 12 bloons in one hit on a stack it would be amazing, seems really hard to test this out though. Longer range is cheap so worth it if it lets you hit a new part of the map.

Boomerangs: Expensive with multi shot, 745. Extremely good, when he shoots boomerangs into stacks of bloons it will kill 8 bloons and shoots every second. Like a well placed upgraded tack shooter with longer range. Unlike the bomb tower it can pop black bloons. Inacurrate so you need dart monkeys and maybe bomb towers for cleanup.

Super monkey: The high cost alone makes it unattractive to me. Maybe there's a strat where you sell a bunch of towers to buy super monkey quickly. Obviously good but is it better than 4.8 multishot boomerang monkeys? I doubt it. Also doesn't go well with cannons because the darts won't hit the black bloons hiding behind the bigger ones. I've never bought the laser upgrade but maybe it's good.