There are, in essence, nine different tower types – three basic towers and six advanced towers. Here, they will be arranged by race.
Den
Base Damage: 20
Base Firerate: 2
Base Range: 2
The Den is the most basic tower. It does moderate damage, has a moderate range, and fires moderately quickly. The Den’s projectile is an arrow, which hits its target instantly. In game terms, the Den is of questionable use – while not a bad tower, neither it nor its upgraded forms is really of any particular use as the keystone of a defence.
The Den can be upgraded at level 4 to an Orcish Den or a Ballista Den.
Orcish Den
New Special Abilities:
Critical Hit
The Orcish Den is upgraded from the Den, and gains a 10% chance that each shot will be a critical hit, doing extra damage to the target. How exactly adding Orcs to a Den that is implied to already have Orcs in it increases your critical hit chance is unclear. The chance of a critical hit increases with each upgrade. At level 7, the Orcish Den becomes a Hunters’ Den, and in addition to the critical hit gains a 30% chance of taking a free shot immediately after it fires.
The Orcish Den is a fine damage-dealing tower, but is still of limited use. If all you have to work with is grass, the Orcish Den is a good choice for fighting in closed corridors. It can also be powerful when working in combination with an Evileye Temple.
Ballista Den
New Special Abilities:
Splash Damage
The Ballista Den is upgraded from the Den, and is a much more sweeping change than the Orcish Den. The Ballista Den’s firerate actually drops – but it makes up for this with a greatly increased range and the ability to do splash damage. The Ballista Den’s primary weakness is that rather than the instantly-hitting arrows of the Den and Orcish Den, it fires slow-moving projectiles which explode on contact with the enemy, doing damage to enemies in close proximity to it as well. It upgrades to the Catapult Den, which can fire three simultaneous projectiles.
The Ballista Den isn’t exactly useful, but it is fun, causing large explosions over a wide range. The Ballista Den is best suited for wide maps where long range is critical.
Crypt
Base Damage: 20
Base Firerate: 3
Base Range: 3
Special Abilities:
Charge 2
The Crypt’s firerate does not apply the same way it does to the other towers – instead, the Crypt generates one charge, up to its limit, each time the firerate period elapses. When an enemy enters the Crypt’s considerable range, it fires all of its available charges at once. The Crypt’s projectiles are homing and will never miss the enemy.
While not the strongest of the basic towers, the Crypt’s long range makes it an invaluable tool – and even more importantly, it can be upgraded to either the Ghost Crypt or the mighty Chilling Crypt.
Ghost Crypt
New Special Abilities:
Mana Drain
The Ghost Crypt is a fairly basic upgrade to the Crypt that gives you an extra mana each time it hits an enemy. Upgraded Ghost Crypts give you more mana, and at level seven it becomes a Haunted Crypt, which has the 25% chance to disarm an enemy, disabling its special abilities, every time it hits.
While the second ability would theoretically be useful against the more irritating enemies, the fact is that mana is plentiful and the Ghost Crypt is not particularly useful as a fighting tower. The most damning aspect of the Ghost Crypt however, is that in order to build one you would have to forego and opportunity to build a...
Chilling Crypt
New Special Abilities:
Fear
The Chilling Crypt upgrades from the Crypt. Every time. I cannot stress this enough. Upgrade all your Crypts to Chilling Crypts. If this walkthrough said absolutely nothing except "Build Chilling Crypts," that would be enough for you to successfully complete the game. Each time the Chilling Crypt hits an enemy, it has a chance to inflict the Fear status effect, which causes the enemy to halt its advance and flee briefly. Higher levels of Crypt have a greater chance of inflicting Fear. At level 7, the Chilling Crypt becomes a Fearful Crypt, which in addition to inflicting Fear has the chance to hit a second enemy every time it attacks.
The Chilling Crypt is, hands down, the single best tower in the game. So long as the terrain allows you to, there is literally no reason to ever build anything else (except for ninja-proofing). The Fear effect is incredibly powerful because it can stall powerful enemies, leaving them in your towers' killing range that much longer.
Temple
Base Damage: 16
Base Firerate: 1
Base Range: 1.5
Special Abilities:
Continuous Fire
The Temple’s rather pathetic range makes it of limited use, with the exception of high ground, but despite this the Temple is still a formidable tower, and one of the few basic towers that is useful even un-upgraded. The Temple shoots a single continuous beam at one enemy in range, tracking the enemy and consistently doing one damage each second. The concept of a firerate does not apply to the Temple.
The Temple is best placed near the entrance to the map, where its ability to shoot new targets rapidly makes it useful for triggering ninja smokebombs. Temples should also be placed on islands of high ground surrounded by narrow roads, where an upgraded Burning Temple can be devastating.
Evileye Temple
New Special Abilities:
Radiance
Just in case you somehow missed the orcs, zombies and demons and still thought we were the good guys, here’s the Eye of Sauron. Enjoy.
The Evileye Temple upgrades from the Temple, and while it works in essentially the same way, any target it is firing at receives the Radiance status effect, which causes it to take extra damage whenever it is shot. At level 7, it becomes the Beholder`s Temple, which causes enemies killed while its beam is focused on them to explode and damage enemies nearby. The Evileye Temple is a good support tower, which can be mixed in with damage-dealing towers to rack up some impressive kills.
Besides this, the Evileye Temple’s main advantage is being an upgraded Temple that isn’t the...
Burning Temple
New Special Abilities:
Scorching Aura
Now, don’t be mistaken here, the Burning Temple is very good, useful tower. The Burning Temple sacrifices the Temple’s continuous fire for the ability to damage every enemy within the Tower’s range at once every time it fires. If the Burning Temple is well placed, this ability can be devastating. At level 7, the Burning Temple becomes a Hellfire Temple, which inflicts the Daze status effect on all enemies it hits, slowing them for four seconds.
The Burning Temple is best placed on an island of high ground, surrounded on all sides by narrow roads – a geographical feature that occurs surprisingly often. In this position, the Burning Temple can lay waste to any enemy trying to get by.
The Burning Temple’s one flaw is that it loses the continuous fire ability that makes a Temple near the map entrance so useful for ninja-trapping. Those Temples should be upgraded to Evileye Temples instead. However, the Burning Temple is not entirely useless for fighting the dreaded ninjas – while an invisible ninja won’t trigger the Burning Temple, it will still take damage if it's in range when something else does.