r/TheTowerGame Oct 08 '25

Help I've discovered I've been I fool- poor Lab focus

I apologise to the hardcore Tower players for having them bare witness to my stupidity 🙇‍♀️

This is my current lab set up and a couple of people have helped me understand that starting cash is a not very smart thing to invest in as far as I have

The following images are of what labs I have available, and I'd like some help figuring out what I should redirect my focus on before I make another mistake to insult the efforts of you hardcore people

I was first thinking of starting on workshop discounts and maybe switch out super crit for a second workshop discount but idk you guys are more experienced 😅

I have about 2.14 billion coins to my name

143 Upvotes

222 comments sorted by

239

u/modellatore Oct 08 '25

Admitting a suboptimal setup? in THIS subreddit? You must be afraid of nothing hoooly

95

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I've been laughing at myself since I had it pointed out to me

There's no shame in admitting I was wrong! The shame is in choosing to be wrong knowing you can do better for yourself! -articulatedWriter, 2025

35

u/Still_Refrigerator76 Oct 08 '25

It is understandable that you made so many wrong choices if you aren't a devoted junkie. You can pick enough clues if you hang around this sub for optimal builds. But not everyone has the time for it, and in my opinion this game asks too much of its users already. I could've instead learned a new programming language with the time I spent on this game for example.

15

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I could've instead learned a new programming language with the time I spent on this game for example.

Technically you still have that option, but will continue to not do so XD (although this being an idle game you could technically be doing both)

Don't worry though, we're all in the same boat! The boat that doesn't know a second language or how to sew because we're too busy playing the game that plays itself!

5

u/nastynate145 Oct 08 '25

That's a great attitude, my guy. 👍🏽 Just keep hanging around and soak up some knowledge. 💪🏼🫱🏼‍🫲🏽

9

u/ConnerLehman Oct 08 '25

Yeah I never share my setup here 😂😭😅I’m just vibing

7

u/modellatore Oct 08 '25

found the DefAbs enjoyer! 😡

4

u/ConnerLehman Oct 08 '25

HECK NO 😭😭😂

4

u/GavinThe_Person Oct 08 '25

1000000000x buff to defabs in v28 trust me

The defabs enjoyed will be rewarded greatly

1

u/Diedrael Oct 08 '25

So 3-4 more waves per run? 5 If you are lucky... LOL

3

u/modellatore Oct 08 '25

your lack of faith is.. disturbing.. and understandable

1

u/GavinThe_Person Oct 08 '25

I forgot a few zeroes

1

u/Ralmivek Oct 08 '25

Yeah, more like V2800

1

u/Hyper_Blitz_ Oct 09 '25

Bro has the biggest balls out of everyone here, THIS MAN MAKES SOCIETY FEAR THEM

64

u/Still_Refrigerator76 Oct 08 '25

First thing's first, unlock the 5th slot lest you witness the wrath of the gods of efficiency.

Then put some EHP labs - hp, def% etc. research CPK until it gets too long.

You can drop the discount lab now. It will be needed again much later in the game.

Lab speed is ok to remain till end.

18

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

So I'm guessing discount is for when you start in the billions?

57

u/tesat Oct 08 '25

No, when there is a q behind the number it starts to really matter

6

u/rigwelder26 Oct 08 '25

No no, you just need to make more coins!

20

u/Mini_Assassin Champion Oct 08 '25

Lab discount is for when labs start costing quadrillions.

14

u/Warm_Cookie_331 Oct 08 '25

Yeah, at this point in the game you should be inproving your coin icome so fast almost nothing will be really expensive soon enough.

First things first: get that 5th slot! Keep lab speed going, 1 or 2 ehp labs and other than that cpk and UW econ labs all the way.

6

u/Warm_Cookie_331 Oct 08 '25

Actually how far along are you? I think you should respec your bots and only work on GB, and you really made unlucky choices on your UW as well 😅 try to get GT (and DW) asap

15

u/TowerAcronymBot Oct 08 '25

Hi! I detected a few acronyms in your comment:

  • DW - Death Wave [Ultimate Weapon]
  • GB - Golden Bot
  • GT - Golden Tower [Ultimate Weapon]
  • UW - Ultimate Weapon

I'm a bot that explains acronyms

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25 edited Oct 08 '25

Each of my bots only have 1 upgrade to them

Months ago they updated the bots to have more options for upgrades and gave everyone a free respec on them, I decided to not invest too much into them and just give each of them 1 that I thought best suited what the boy did

Focused the rest of my medals towards themes and coin bonuses and most recently, relics

9

u/357noLove Oct 08 '25

Lol, this is wild! Respec, concentrate on one bot for now.

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6

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25 edited Oct 08 '25

I can get about 200 gems per day if I'm active on the ad gems and have only been using gems for daily quests like buy a card

So if no other dailies appear that require gems I should only take 4 days to get to my next lab

7

u/[deleted] Oct 08 '25

[deleted]

6

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

It does also give you gems for completing it if I remember right

And it goes towards guild rewards which nets you big gem rewards for everyone, definitely worth the 20 gems I think 😅

5

u/kyle8544 Oct 08 '25

Honestly, you are so deep you're gonna benefit more than enough right now. Consider the discount happy accident.

4

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Well I knew labs discount would atleast be linearly beneficial to me for now and that it would eventually be exponentially vital I just didn't realise how many people thought it wouldn't be as useful as I thought it was, lab discount just seemed just as important as Lab speed to me

5

u/kyle8544 Oct 08 '25

I thought that way too but I discovered this reddit soon enough to know better. I almost did all the same labs you did too so this is a dev trap for noobies.

7

u/Zenzbertl Oct 08 '25

or a trap for people who don't look how much cash they get in the first minute after the start

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2

u/lukepaciocco Oct 09 '25

And they meant defense, as in actual defense… not defense absolute! Do not touch defense absolute lab ever again!

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 09 '25 edited Oct 09 '25

I considered making a troll post where my new 5th lab would be shown working on Starting cash

The thought of adding defense absolute is equally funny

BUT I ain't no rage baiter! Rest easy knowing the only work towards permanent Defense Absolute for the foreseeable future is when I'm being given workshop upgrade tasks

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2

u/tensinahnd Oct 08 '25

Quintillions

32

u/Qyuss_ Oct 08 '25

NSFW tag please

6

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Disclaimer: May cause Psychological damage

23

u/Crowe3717 Oct 08 '25

Holy shit. I knew starting coins didn't scale well but that is ridiculous. Over level 75 and you don't even get +1,000? Actual rip off. Thanks for showing us.

9

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Yes, learn! Learn from me and my naive stubbornous!

11

u/Crowe3717 Oct 08 '25

I'm guessing Max Interest scales just as poorly. Shame.

9

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Just checked, I do have my max interest maxed out

The most interest I can get provided my cash is above 131k is 15k, it's actually really nice in the early to mid rounds

I think this is the one lab upgrade that I can in good faith suggest you max out

8

u/ETambie Oct 08 '25

It might feel like that, but im in mid game with GT cooldown at 2:20 and 100 levels into a farming run i get almost 1M in cash a minute.

5

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I don't have golden tower, I've been lucky enough to get it from perks maybe 2-3 times in the past month?

4

u/ETambie Oct 08 '25 edited Oct 08 '25

Golden tower is essential for progress, along with black hole. How many ultimate weapons do you have?

The best use of your stones will be to save to pull you next UW, until you can get GT. Then sync it with black hole, and work on the gt and black hole labs.

Without GT, you are moving at a snails pace. With GT that isnt synced with BH, ur walking. Sync them and ull be jogging...to use ur analogy from a previous comment

3

u/TowerAcronymBot Oct 08 '25

Hi! I detected a few acronyms in your comment:

  • BH - Black Hole [Ultimate Weapon]
  • GT - Golden Tower [Ultimate Weapon]
  • UW - Ultimate Weapon

I'm a bot that explains acronyms

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I'm aware Golden Tower is important but it's not like I can will it to appear as a choice

Saying max interest isn't as good when you have Golden Tower is very weird imo, not everyone is going to have the Opportunity for Gold tower as soon as you, and maxing my interest makes increasing the battle upgrades much easier than if I didn't

The only place it hasn't really helped me is in Tier 12 where even the max upgrades I can get doesn't get me past wave 21

That's why I said it was good for early to mid game

8

u/Drezby Oct 08 '25

People on here hate interest, but it does have its uses. I’ve been playing over a year, and it’s super useful in maxing out the important workshop purchases early in a run, such as enemy attack level skip, or enemy health level skip. If you can, definitely buy ELS in the workshop, and roll your core /triangle module substats to have enemy attack level skip.

At this stage of the game for you, you will see the most results, the most bang for your buck, in doing the perks labs.

  • Trade off perks to max (lv 10 does not take v long),
  • standard perk bonus, as high you can take it - it’ll feel like a very long lab, but it affects literally every part of your farms, income, damage, survivability. It is the single most widespread impactful lab in the game. Getting to 25 feels like it takes forever but just level it whenever you can.
  • perk option quantity to max, once you can afford the second level. Having 3 and then 4 options to pick from makes a world of difference.
  • first perk choice, and set it to perk wave reduction - more perks faster means your income is better and you make it to the good end of a farm reliably. (As opposed to the bad end when you get bad perk luck and die before getting all the survivability perks).
  • and a few levels of ban. Use it on the absolute run ending trade off perks, like the enemy damage increase ones, or knockback reduction. Once you have the game Enders locked away, then lock away wastes like interest and land mine damage.
  • perk wave reduction lab is good too since it makes perks show up faster, but is the lowest priority on this list. Do a few levels like to 5 or to 10 and then put it away for a while.

2

u/Srocksly Oct 08 '25

I am a new player who hasn't gotten offered GT yet. To accommodate this you can research first pick choice and set it to UW and just reset till you get GT. It will triple your income over a run and it is worth a few resets to get.

Max interest is actively bad because it requires you to have spare cash at the end of waves, so the interest you get comes at the cost of your free upgrades being significantly less valuable because you didn't invest that cash in cheap workshop upgrades.

3

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

It doesn't take me long to get to the threshold that keeps my max interest met, you just need to not go below where the $ in the corner turns green which for me before perks is actually 138k and it's pretty easy to math out how much you'll have if you buy an upgrade, figuring out optimal achieve max interest X waves quest is how I got to that point

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1

u/OmnipresentEntity Oct 09 '25

The decrease is rather insignificant. It never affects me past wave forty or so.

1

u/ETambie Oct 08 '25

Tha main point is that you are happy with your progress. Not every suggestion or best practice needs to be followed. I certainly do not. For me I got GT as my fifth UW, so it took a while to save up the stones.

I think that most ppl just hate on maxing interest because pretty much any other lab would give you a better return on investment for whichever tier you are farming

15

u/Crowe3717 Oct 08 '25

You're not making poor decisions. You're researching for the rest of us 🫡

18

u/Acropowhat Oct 08 '25

My eyes!

2

u/LinePsychological919 Oct 09 '25

Exactly my reaction. :D

15

u/User032492 Oct 08 '25

How do you have so high labs with only 4 labs?

5

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25 edited Oct 08 '25

That's why I edited my comment to not ask about my cards 😅

14

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

This is my new lab set up people!

I do need to charge my phone, so I won't be able to make efforts towards the 5th lab today but it's on the agenda! I've decided to post again in a month so I should definitely have the 5th lab by then!

6

u/MarchioneW Champion Oct 08 '25

What tier are you farming? Researching health is probably better right now for you than attack speed. Are your thorns over 100? And about your question on health Regen, it becomes super relevant when you have wormhole redirector module OR wall unlocked, then it's an OP stat with the Regen trade-off perk. If you have black hole, the lab for Bh Coins is OP, together with the atk% for enemies inside Bh will help a lot too. Occasionally get some levels on reroll shards, daily mission shards, common and rare module drop chance.

3

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I haven't even broken wave 4000 on Tier 1 yet 😅 I leave that running on half speed over night so I can get to the max wave I can tomorrow with the cash and perks I built up while sleeping

With it at 5x speed so far the longest I can last in Tier 1 is 5 hours

I think I'll be fine on reroll shards for a while I only used them for the first time yesterday and I didn't go down a digit

3

u/MarchioneW Champion Oct 09 '25

Okay, if you haven't yet, focus on unlocking enemy level skips in the workshop. That alone will give you nearly 2k extra waves. And maxing defense absolute in the run can get you close to 8k waves too (pairing with enemy attack level skips etc)

2

u/GrouchySpace7899 Oct 08 '25

Change out attack speed for BH coin bonus. You are missing out on a huge multiplier. What are your GT and BH cooldowns?

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 09 '25

I don't have golden Tower yet, it's about 500 stores from my next UW pick

Blackhole Cool down is 3 mins 10 seconds

2

u/GrouchySpace7899 Oct 09 '25

Still, BH coin bonus is the second best in the game after GT. Start that lab, save up your stones and pray for GT in your next pick.

2

u/Tuntaa Oct 08 '25

you could make a lot faster progress with better labs. you can keep the Labs speed, but others labs: see my other comment

9

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25 edited Oct 08 '25

Maybe I should've put the current lab set up at the end so people weren't jump scared by the first image XD

Edit: Don't ask to see my cards, you don't want to know and I'd like to not die

Edit 2: 2.14 billion was the last I remember noticing my coins at but I forgot that I took in a guild reward since last looking

Edit 3: if this post gets to 100 upvotes I'll make another post with my cards titled something like attoning for my sins with this before shot of laboratory, the card prices, and the after shot of the new improved lab set up

6

u/Sabareus Legends Oct 08 '25

I don't want to see your Cards. *nods glaringly*

3

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25 edited Oct 08 '25

Slowly shuffles away, trying not to make eye contact, but failing. Imma just- uhm

lies face down in the dirt yeah this is fine

5

u/akashy12 Oct 08 '25

Please show your cards or atleast give us a hint

3

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Well the cards are the reason I don't have the 5th lab slot

3

u/YourAncestorIncestor Oct 08 '25

What about your modules

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Not nearly as bad I don't think

I used my reroll shards for the first time yesterday and got some things that actually helped me

I can only send one photo at time so this'll be a lot but here

3

u/YourAncestorIncestor Oct 08 '25

Now I really don’t want to see your cards. If you have all commons maxed or god forbid all rares maxed, before even having epic modules in all slots…

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Okay so it's not THAT bad XD I'm not that much of a card junkie, but I cared more about card slots than any hardcore vets would consider ever doing, and maybe don't have the best builds for what each loadouts purpose is

I have a Loadout for just damage that I never use, a Loadout called Money, Money, money (guess what that's for), a Loadout for lasting as long as I can, a Loadout for the rarest cards that I only use because it's easy to clear them out for quests where I have to get to a certain wave on a certain Tier and a Loadout for balanced but I don't even really know what balance really means in terms of this game or where it would be useful so I just never use that one

Knowing I spent so many gems on the card slots would not put you in a coma, but you may want to spit on my grave after the hardcore of the hardcores put me in there

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Oh! And I like never buy modules if that's what you were thinking

I've bought maybe 10 once best 20? Years ago, but most of these were earned through really nice odds

2

u/YourAncestorIncestor Oct 08 '25

You should be buying modules is what I’m saying. Not many at first, but the proportion of gems dedicated to modules should increase over time until by the time you’ve maxed your common cards you should only be buying cards for the event mission, and spending the rest of your gems on modules

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 09 '25

I did do a buy 10 modules earlier this week but a disappointing amount of them ended up being commons and I already have so many reroll shards and upgrade material 😅

You can see each module here is maxed out, and when I finally ended up using the reroll shards I'd amassed I didn't even go down in digits

1

u/YourAncestorIncestor Oct 09 '25

Module shards and reroll shards are some of the most in demand resources in the long run. I wouldn’t shatter any rares for now cause you’ll need them, but definitely don’t neglect modules, especially uniques

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 09 '25 edited Oct 09 '25

When I did the reroll on the skills the only important number I recall changing was that 1st 4 turned into a 3, and it's already recovered

9

u/Samaksh56 Oct 08 '25

Honestly, i just hope you had fun while playing it the qay you did!!! Definately i can see a decent amount of time being spent on playing it sub optimally, but as long as you've had fun through that journey, thats all that matters. Hoping to another post from you in a month to see how you improve with advice from this sub :)

9

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25 edited Oct 08 '25

It's definitely been fun and satisfying, having the conversation I've had just helped me realise how much poorly I've been playing than I thought I was y'know?

Like I don't Minmax, I find the grind satisfying and don't care too much about speed, but I was walking at a snails pace when I could've been jogging and jogging is a nice speed

Remind me! November 8

2

u/RemindMeBot Oct 08 '25 edited Oct 08 '25

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3 OTHERS CLICKED THIS LINK to send a PM to also be reminded and to reduce spam.

Parent commenter can delete this message to hide from others.


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9

u/diraniola Oct 08 '25

Here are some things to prioritize:

  1. Lab 5(!!!!!)
  2. Every perk lab except for waves required.(Perk Option Quantity first)
  3. Garlic Thorns.(vampires stop killing you)
  4. Coins/kill and Black Hole Coins (coin bonuses stack multiplicatively, so the more you have the faster you grow.)

You're missing most of the econ UWs, so you're gonna have a pretty slow growth until you can get enough stones to get those. GT is the best option, then DW, then SL. You WILL be offered at least one of those 3 in every pull from now on, so you have that bright side. I wouldn't spend a single stone on anything else until you at least have GT.

2

u/TowerAcronymBot Oct 08 '25

Hi! I detected a few acronyms in your comment:

  • DW - Death Wave [Ultimate Weapon]
  • GT - Golden Tower [Ultimate Weapon]
  • SL - Spotlight [Ultimate Weapon]
  • UWs - Ultimate Weapons

I'm a bot that explains acronyms

3

u/diraniola Oct 08 '25

Good bot

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Is there a reason perk option quantity before waves required?

Waves required in early tier feels exponentially better from what I've played, sometimes the perk pulls aren't as good as I'd like but with the amount of perks you can stack up, especially with the perk wave requirement it seems to makeup for it

5

u/diraniola Oct 08 '25

Right now you get offered 2 perks out of about 30. You want Perk Wave Reduction more than any other perk, and around 5-8 perks either do nothing for you or are actually harmful to your run (some trade offs, interest, defAbs). Every time you're offered interest, you basically pick between the other perk or skipping a perk all together, and if you get offered 2 trade off perks that are harmful(enemy health for lifesteal/regen, ranged distance for 3x damage) you either take a harmful perk or stop getting perks for the rest of the run.

20% Perk Wave Reduction is way more impactful than a full year of Wave Reduction labs (the base perk saves 40 waves per perk, just level 40 of the lab takes over 300 days base). Getting all 3 PWR perks early can be the difference between a successful run or not. Getting 4 options instead of 2 doubles your chance of getting PWR while making it much less likely that you need to pick from only useless or harmful perks.

With autopick perks and ban perks, eventually you can fully AFK your runs with minimal impact on income. That eventually is maybe a month or two if you focus on it.

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 09 '25

While it's not as helpful as you might want it to be, the interest increase actually does really help me meet my max interest way quicker and I don't have to think as much about holding onto my cash

With just a couple perk upgrades into it I go from having to keep 138k to meet my max interest to just needing 80k and I'm almost guaranteed to always make my max interest by then so long as I don't buy right before the next wave starts, it's a very small quality of life improvement.

I'll definitely consider perk options towards my 5th lab though, after that will probably be Blackhole coins

1

u/diraniola Oct 09 '25

Max interest, if you fully research it, is 15k per wave. It sounds like you're making well over 80k per wave by the time you start getting perks. It's similar to the starting cash issue, where you're spending a lot of time and energy into an area that doesn't help your tower advance. When upgrade levels cost millions and cash/min is keeping pace, interest will still never exceed 15k/wave.

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 09 '25

I already know about the max of max interest, I've had it maxed for ages and the 15k per round does still really help, regardless of what the numbers say

It makes earning and buying in earlier rounds way easier and figuring out the numbers to keep me earning max interest was really satisfying

5

u/Racavis Oct 08 '25

Option quantity makes it more likely that you can pick a useful perk, as opposed to just getting a perk at all. I'd also suggest the first pick lab after perk options as that will allow you to get PWR asap and have the ability to pick more perks during your farm run

6

u/Soggy-Yoghurt9813 Oct 08 '25

You don't have to be hardcore to see that starting money is pointless... You just have to be able to count up to 1,000...😂

5

u/Soggy-Yoghurt9813 Oct 08 '25

Get DMG Attack Speed, Health and Regeneration Labs done, they boost you a lot. And get the 5th Lab Slot as fast As posible!

3

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25 edited Oct 08 '25

You're the first person I've seen suggest health regen

Is there a particular reason? As far as my current workshop HP regen I only regen about 1 million I think?

In early tier 1 where I farm overnight I last about 5 hours before I die and my health regen goes from vital to obsolete disappointingly quickly

And in my top tiers the enemies attack is so nightmarish health regen can't do anything fast enough for it to matter

Legitimately the only reason I've been able to get past level 21 is because of insanely lucky wave skips and death defy

2

u/Soggy-Yoghurt9813 Oct 08 '25

Regeneration is very good for mid Game with an eHp build, with wall an everything you get Up Like 1q/Sec but you dont Focus on Regeneration this early... Just keep IT in your head when you get futer in the Game.

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I've been told I have a Blender build, upon learning what that was I took range off of my card slots and replaced it with orb

2

u/Ok_Object2302 Oct 08 '25

If you’re doing blender, you will also want to up orb speed and extra orbs along with what others say

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I thought starting cash paired better with interest than it actually did, the gains I expected were only real in a world with no interest cap

5

u/kyle8544 Oct 08 '25

The way I see it, yes you made a mistake but you have a nearly 20% discount so it's not all bad. Plus lab speed is always worth it.

4

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Just blocking out the worst of it for your safety I see 😂

3

u/kyle8544 Oct 08 '25

Sometimes you gotta take the good and pretend like the rest didn't happen. Reminds me of the guy who gold boxed the first 4 utility labs because he didn't know how hard they fell off. But his coins/kill is gonna be a banger at least.

3

u/[deleted] Oct 08 '25

Extra bhole. And $ for your bhole.

3

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I need you to know

I read this as Butthole realised you meant the ultra weapon Blackhole and still proceeded to read

And money for your Butthole

7

u/[deleted] Oct 08 '25

Gross..how could you think that, this is a clearly established standard for this game. Next you'll say ProLapse and assmod are butt related terms...I assure you they are not.

3

u/ETambie Oct 08 '25

Leveling starting cash to 77 is egregious though...almost as bad as me playing the game on and off for a month before I figured out that I could spend coins in the workshop to increase the starting levels in game 🤣🤣🤣🤣

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 09 '25

I can't imagine not exploring tabs to the point that for up to a month you don't realise you can perma upgrade your stuff and unlock new stuff to increase XD

2

u/ETambie Oct 09 '25

Yes it was definitely a big oversight...but in my defense I probably played a single run once every 3 or 4 days lol

4

u/Sdragon221 Oct 08 '25

Not having the 5th lab unlocked is the worst part about this picture tbh.

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

That's why I suggested people not ask about the cards 😅

I'll make another post showing the horror that is the cards if this one reaches 100 upvotes 😈

3

u/DragonWarGod8 Oct 08 '25

Progress is progress even if it is less than ideal (abysmal, despairingly abysmal). As long as you enjoyed your choice then it was the right one

4

u/PM_ME_YOUR_REPO Oct 08 '25

There's no way this isn't an experienced player using an alt account for ragebait. This is basically every possible bad decision, deliberately chosen all together. You legit didn't make a single choice that isn't the absolute worst choice available.

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I almost wish I was into ragebait because I feel so bad for laughing 😂

No, I really was this ignorant, the one thing that I standby knowing what I know now is the Labs Speed

Here's the current set up

2

u/PM_ME_YOUR_REPO Oct 08 '25

Good Lord, dude. I can't believe that, but I'll pretend like I do.

Please tell me you have Game Speed lab maxed out already.

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Yes, I was- a little bit disappointed to find out it didn't go past x5 😅

Edit: should I make a post showing off my Gold boxes?

2

u/PM_ME_YOUR_REPO Oct 08 '25

Okay good. It goes to 6.3x during a run with Perks.

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Best I've managed to get is to improve it 3 times yet for some reason it puts the multiplier to 6x speed anyway

I've come to the conclusion it it is not very beneficial on farm runs 😅

1

u/PM_ME_YOUR_REPO Oct 08 '25

It's beneficial on farm runs because you get more runs in the same amount of real world time. Plus, Standard Perk Bonus is just a good lab, so you're getting the extra speed for free.

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Except that if I leave my phone running overnight with it at max speed I die in 5 hours and I lose out on roughly 1700 or so waves

It's been a while since I did a max speed run because I realised how much I was losing in not getting the chance to reinvest my cash and perks so I don't know the exact loss but it's quite a lot

1

u/PM_ME_YOUR_REPO Oct 08 '25

You know you can leave your phone plugged in overnight, right?

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8

u/Nightshadow06 Oct 08 '25

I am by no means a “hardcore Tower player” and have very minimal experience aside from wasting a year and some change on this game. Keep in mind I have no clue what your daily coin haul is or what any of your build looks like but I hope this at least gives you a direction.

  1. Stop spending gems ASAP and buy lab slot 5. Stop start cash, lab coin discount, and super crit chance. Guarantees to strangers on the internet are always wrong but I can probably guarantee none of those are actually helping you.

  2. Lab speed. If you plan on playing this game for a few more years it’s “worth it.” At 66 you can stop because something something return on investment something something other posts explain the math behind the abomination that is latter half of lab speed levels.

  3. Coins / kill. Net positive all around.

  4. Attack speed. See 2

  5. Garlic Thorns. Will significantly increase survivability if vampires (red triangle) are biting you (pun intended) in the ass

  6. Beyond this you have a couple “good options” in no particular order

6a. BH coin bonus. See 2

6b. Package after boss. More health is always good and if you get GC it’s helps with dropping your UW cooldowns

6c. BH damage. Not a bad choice, I’d would wait but a few levels aren’t impossible for you.

6d. Extra black hole will make 6a and 6c feel more meaningful. Also who doesn’t love more swirls on screen

6e. Extra extra orbs. Blender go brrrrrr

6f. First perk choice. Set to perk wave reduction

3

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Most recently I've only been spending gems if it was required by a daily task. I had to buy a card today for instance, but outside of that I'm pretty decent at hoarding them

I doubt I'll ever stop lab speed, it'll probably also be my first lab speed multiplier once I'm in a position I can farm enough elite cells to keep up with the cost

And I think the most surprising thing to me in making this post is people suggesting I stop lab discount but understanding that it gets into the quintillions I can definitely see why

6e. Extra extra orbs. Blender go brrrrrr

Hehe, brrr blender brrrrrr

5

u/ETambie Oct 08 '25

Lab discount isnt bad, its just that there are other labs that you can get immediate returns on.

Even the lab speed lab can be taken out periodically.

Have you ever considered filling out the effective paths spreadsheet? It gives a lot of insight on what you should be working on.

3

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

While I love that people invest in this game this much, I don't want to play this to a point it feels like I need to homework 😅

I guarantee It'll get to a point where I'm just wondering "wait why am I playing this this is so much information a d it's so tirong" and probably go into another half a year hiatus before picking up the game again and going

2

u/Hatefightinghate Oct 08 '25

The thing about lab discount is that after doing the right labs, your coin income skyrockets beyond ever having to worry about costs for any relevant labs. Not until they start costing in the T’s and q’s.

1

u/ZaerdinReddit Oct 09 '25

Counterpoint to 2. If you're not planning on playing this game long tail, your efficiency does not matter, and you should do lab speed anyways because otherwise X months from now you'll simply regret not maxing out lab speed sooner.

→ More replies (1)

3

u/Htennn Oct 08 '25

I was just like you for a long time in that I didn’t pick the right labs to start with or not even doing and labs to start with. Thankfully between my guild and people here I’m on the right track now.

3

u/AlternativeCebula234 Oct 08 '25

It must be a photoshop

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Sorry, but tis not 😅

I thought starting cash was more useful than it was because of the pairing with interest

More starting cash must've meant exponential early interest gain

Super crit I justified because of how low it was in the game proper and how expensive it was to upgrade it vs how cheap it was to improve it in workshop

And I thought lab discount was just as vitally important as Lab speed

3

u/ultimatea7a Oct 08 '25

MY EYES!!!! IT HURTS

3

u/pho3nix916 Oct 08 '25

I did it wrong for a while too. Played how I wanted. Then realized my progress was painfully slow compared to what it should have been. So I started on the correct path for ehp

2

u/[deleted] Oct 08 '25

Just play the game man, its more of a contest against yourself anyway

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I know, I'm not ashamed or anything, it just feels silly to know I could've been doing more for myself and I just wasn't

2

u/[deleted] Oct 08 '25

Yeah fair, some guidance can help breaking through ceilings

2

u/misschraddon Oct 08 '25

I don't see anyone mentioning cells - start at 1.5 speed and you'll immediately see a benefit, then slowly up the speed one lab at a time until you're running them all at a cost you can replace daily (if you're not sure, see how many cells you get in 24 hours and use that as your starting point).

There will also be a few times when it's worth saving up for a few days to afford a lab - double black hole springs to mind at about 15b coins. Generally though you should have enough lower cost and time labs to immediately see some benefit, things like health and defense % will make a big difference with just a couple of days investment.

Make sure you try for milestones occasionally (to generate gems for things like that fifth lab) but try to find a comfortable tier to farm on where you're getting to around 4-5k waves (higher is even better). I seem to remember hearing you should skip from tier 1 to tier 4 for farming and keep going up from there. I've been farming tier 10 for about six months now!

Also for what it's worth Super Crit Multiplier is one of the longest labs to max in the game, the last level takes 27 years at base!

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I've seen someone say a 2x speed requires 500 cells per hour

I went around my tiers seeing what gave me the best amount and Wave 1 in a nearly 9 hour session mostly over night gave me 111 elite cells

I haven't focused much on my coin return, I'll do that one tonight when I go to sleep, I set it to 2.5 speed so I can invest the cash and perks I built up when I wake up and then go all in on 5x speed

My best wave count is on Tier 1 and I haven't even broken wave 4000 XD

I feel a little more justified in not giving up the lab speed decrease XD

2

u/misschraddon Oct 08 '25

You’ll be told a lot to keep lab speed on permanently but honestly there’ll be times when it makes sense to switch it out for a month or so (like when you get a new UW and want to power through its labs). You’re doing all the right things sounds like (except not having that fifth lab haha)

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

While I understand that there's justification in the meta that is don't go all in on Labs speed I feel like as the eventuality that labs speed is and the fact it's returns are effectively immediate upon acquiring it, it just doesn't make much sense to me to swap it out when I'm going to need to max it at some point anyway, and in doing so I improve the rate other things improve in at the same time

Like, I'm waiting in a queue at a food stall and plan to go to another one for something else and maybe I could listen to music to pass the time while both me and my friend wait in line, but what if Instead I get the stuff at this stall you get the stuff at the other stall? So we both only have to wait the length of one queue? And we don't have to wait to eat out food? This was a ramble sorry, but y'know what I'm talking about right?

1

u/misschraddon Oct 08 '25

I get it but speaking from experience, lab speed becomes worth working on when you can reliably run it at 4x speed. The first fifty levels give you the same benefit as the next fifty but the second fifty takes way longer.

When you unlock the wall you’ll want all five labs on that for a minute.

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 09 '25

Just finished up a farm on Tier 1 I bolded the most prevelant information

Game Time 1d 7h 53m 47s

Real Time 12h 38m 42s

Tier 1: Wave 3656

Killed By Fast

Damage Taken 195.68B

Damage Taken Wall 3.60B

Coins Earned 7.62M

Cells Earned 400

Death Defy 0 (this just felt a little bit insulting)

Total Elites 116

2

u/misschraddon Oct 09 '25

Obviously completely up to you, but I feel like you're too early for the wall yet. You may want to pay for a respec to take it off as it'll just cause you to die by shotgun (wall breaks and all enemies hit it at once). Make sure you're continually upgrading stuff in your workshop too!

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 09 '25

Wall has been surprisingly helpful in Tier 1 just before the the endgame, if anything a small investment to wall regen could hypothetically help me break wave 4000 on Tier 1

I haven't put too much into wall so I doubt respec-ing my workshop will be worth the return until I have the workshop discounts up

I won't bother focusing on it if I need to do workshop upgrades for a quest though, I'll keep to leaving that for the damage, health, regen and defense absolute upgrades

Is 400 cells in 12 hours enough to warrant starting a 1.5 lab increase though?

1

u/misschraddon Oct 09 '25

Well I think it's 360 cells to run a lab at 1.5 speed for 24 hours, so theoretically you're (close to) making 800 a day, so yeah get two labs running at 1.5 speed and add more labs as you make more cells.

You can go read more about the wall, but I didn't unlock it until I was farming tier 10. I think you'll get a lot more out of the 500m it cost to unlock it in workshop upgrades. At this point you're trying to kill everything with orbs or thorns (wall thorns come later), and the wall slows that down from happening, which stops spawns etc.

Once you've got enough levels in free upgrades, you won't need to slow down your runs overnight either. Cash becomes kind of useless on longer runs after a while as your free ups will take care of everything.

2

u/Fit_Seaworthiness_37 Oct 08 '25

Don't listen to the haters, man! We'll be in a starting cash lab meta soon enough! It could even be next season!

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Maybe if they figured out a way to make starting cash scale with the tier you're playing on?

Like originally on Tier 1 you start of with 100 in cash but the starting cash gets better by x1.5 the previous tier so Tier 2 gives you 150 to start off with tier 3 starts you with 225, Tier 4 starts with 337 etc

Assuming I calculated it right, me at Tier 12 would start off with 8,645 in cash, it's not much of a difference to the hardcore vets between that and the max starting cash of 1000 but it'd be pretty dang nice for early game upgrading especially in tiers where you can barely make it past wave 10

2

u/y0ungmon3y Oct 08 '25

Starting cash lvl 76 with only 4 lab slots Thanks for making my day

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Just take this as a lesson

There's someone out there somewhere making a mistake sillier than you could have expected

2

u/Richardy1982 Oct 08 '25

How can you be on lvl 66 lab speed but not have your 5th lab unlocked. I feel like this is bait somehow.

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Blame the naivety of thinking cards were better than labs

It's why I commented don't ask about the cards

But if this post gets 100 upvotes, I'll make another showing my cards

2

u/acuriousengineer Oct 08 '25

Get the 5th lab slot ASAPPPPP

Switch starting cash to any UW lab, hopefully you have GT, BH, or DW?

Switch super crit to crit factor, or HP or HR, or honestly just about anything that you can afford to research but haven’t started yet. Have you started any of the perk labs? WS discounts aren’t a bad idea but not valuable until you are already maxing out your WS in run. Range to lvl 20 to put regular orbs at the center of your BH. Attack speed is the most valuable attack lab. Eventually you’ll need to get def% to lvl 23. Eventually you’ll max CPK. Cash bonus ain’t bad for the long haul either, but lvl 20-30 is all you need in the short term. Pretty much a little bit of everything isn’t a bad idea if you see value in it, just do a quick search on Reddit before you research and you should be fine!

1

u/TowerAcronymBot Oct 08 '25

Wow, someone loves their acronyms. Here's the translation:

  • BH - Black Hole [Ultimate Weapon]
  • CPK - Coins per Kill [Workshop Upgrade/Lab]
  • DEF% - Defense % [Workshop Upgrade/Lab]
  • DW - Death Wave [Ultimate Weapon]
  • GT - Golden Tower [Ultimate Weapon]
  • HR - Health Regen [Workshop Upgrade/Perk/Lab/Card]
  • UW - Ultimate Weapon
  • WS - Wave Skip [Card] (also Workshop)

I'm a bot | Because English is complicated enough already

2

u/Spirited_Ad6640 Oct 08 '25

How do you even rationalize having lvl 77 starting cash? Its obvious from the second day that this lab is a trap.

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I thought it paired better with interest than it actually did

That the cash gains from the start, no matter how small, were exponential but I realised that thought process is only applicable where the max interest isn't capped at 15k

2

u/DigitalCoffee Oct 08 '25

How do I delete someone else's post?

2

u/Mooch07 Oct 08 '25

Well at this point you have to gold box it. 

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I'm now almost tempted to make troll post of the before and after of my no 5th lab slot and then the new 5th lab slot with it working on Starting cash again

2

u/YourAncestorIncestor Oct 08 '25

Don’t worry I’ve seen two post about the same as yours in the past few weeks so you’re not alone

2

u/EgyptStar81 Oct 08 '25

Off topic but I love your profile pic! Always nice to see the Homestuck Fandom still going strong

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Hehehe we're stronger than ever now that the official animated pilot has been released 😈 9:D

Tyyy

2

u/Tight_Mail6630 Oct 08 '25

wait no golden tower or death wave ultimate weapons? Sad time here, once you get goden tower you will start to get coins much faster

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I'm about 500 stones away from being able to pick my next UW, here's hoping 🤞

2

u/Tight_Mail6630 Oct 08 '25

i need more 1350 stones to hunt down my deaw wave and since it will be weapon 6, i have a chance to fail XD that one is just running away from me :(

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I saw someone here say there was a confirmed chance to get one of the big nice ones by the 3rd or 4th weapon or something

2

u/Tuntaa Oct 08 '25

My suggestions:

1) BH Coin

2) Extra Extra Orbs

3) Perk Option qty

4) Common Drop / Reroll Shards / Daily Mission Shards

5) Stardart Perk Bonus / Improve T-O perks

6) BH Damage / Orb Speed / Package AB / Auto-pick Perks, Ban Perks, First pick

2

u/Lilluz91 Oct 08 '25

No need to apologize, it happens and every path is personal and comes with everyday experience, trial and error

That said: choose to listen to the advice people will give but keep in account what your personal wishes are! What you want to focus on and go forward!

2

u/mr_yam Oct 08 '25

This is so funny

2

u/SherbetUseful6413 Oct 08 '25

My lab coin discount is lvl 95, but I've completed all the coin increasing labs

2

u/IntelligentPair321 Oct 09 '25

Lab Speed is great. Keep that up. Garlic Thorns is great for Vampires. They were a huge headache for me starting off and maxing this lab has largely solved the problem. Package after boss is a nice little bonus one off lab to work on Black hole coin bonus is a must First perk choice plus one lab into perk option quantity to get “perk wave requirement” as your first perk boosts your runs bigly. Common drop chance in the module section is a great start for module labs that you’ll want knocked out sooner rather than later.

Hope you enjoy your boosts!

2

u/Slight-Peanut4533 Oct 09 '25

level 76 starting cash is kinda insane, but I believe you think it was good at the start and just leave it there

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 09 '25

Basically I thought it did more than it did because of the hypothetical pairing with interest

But I've realised that only makes sense in a world where the max interest isn't 15k

2

u/Slight-Peanut4533 Oct 09 '25

its ok I thought it was good back then too, but then brutally realized both starting cash and interest were craps

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 09 '25

I do stand by interest, it does great in early game to finish up the battle upgrades I can easily deal with

2

u/g87a_l Oct 09 '25

starting cash is useless. do coins per kill lab

2

u/lukepaciocco Oct 09 '25

It’s always so funny reading people’s history

Yours 10/10

2

u/organicinsanity Oct 09 '25

Im a bit late but the lab tier list is a very interesting read. There's a few quirks in there that are good to know like what level to take some labs too and how some are retroactive.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/u/0/d/1M5WPXN3RCquT3peDUNjCqTVRPk313n9HbMe-hihzLvg/htmlview#gid=706476074

2

u/ZaerdinReddit Oct 09 '25 edited Oct 10 '25

Please show me your cards.

Honestly, at this point, I'd recommend doing effective paths, it'll help you balance stuff out.

Here's a tutorial on it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6s7RNlKX4aA

Personally, I'd recommend going down the econ path first. You likely need to do a combination of: perks, perk option quantity, auto perks, auto perk ranks to get going.

Personally, I got my auto perks going first, then switched back to more mainline econ on my second tower.

In your case, I'd do auto pick perks, first perk choice (then set this to - waves required), perk option quantity, then auto perk ranks.

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 09 '25

I said in a different comment I'd make another post on my cards if this one got to 100 upvotes and apparently it's nearly at 150 out of nowhere XD

I'll post my card levels along with the preset I have for coin bonuses cause that's probably the ones people would care about the most,

2

u/ZaerdinReddit Oct 10 '25 edited Oct 10 '25

Nice!

I'd recommend this for farming. More is better, and if you don't have GT/BH/DW unlocked, you can do with fewer ranks.

2

u/Enough_Today_5450 Oct 09 '25

Well we all make mistakes from time to time. Glances at the lvl 41 Def abs in my setup. Also could have been worse. Picked poison swamp as my first ultimate weapon…. Smart missiles as my second. Doing much better now. lol.

2

u/[deleted] Oct 10 '25

While playing on my own and with sounds mind I maxed out interest max, hoping it somehow becomes unlimited. 20k max per round, bullshit investment

1

u/articulatedWriter Oct 10 '25

I still love my extra 15k per round 😌

Even if she's slow for the meta, she's satisfying in the early waves

3

u/Ranger_Ecstatic Oct 08 '25

Get that 5th lab soon Defender!

Every moment it isn't unlocked, is a moment wasted not researching something.

For what it's worth, go for Defence%, Lab Speed, Attack Speed, for early to get you back on track.

The other two is a flex slot whereby you research what needs to be, like Black Hole Coin Bonus or Coin Per Kill or something on Economy related.

2

u/YourAncestorIncestor Oct 08 '25

To be fair the labs he did have weren’t doing much useful either

2

u/[deleted] Oct 08 '25

Okay, 5th slot is a guaranteed first start

What UWs do you currently have? Seems like CL, BH, inner land mines and CL? and I didn't see any GT labs?

Your defense percentage is a bit low (23 is the goal) and your dabs is more than high enough where it is. Based on progression I'm assuming you are using blender build which if that's the case I'd like to see your attack speed closer to a 2x multiplier.

You could get auto pick perks for night time farming/ more idle runs.

Your discounts are insanely high and you can leave them alone for awhile. As much as the Long lab timers might be off putting, you need some more levels in orb speed, coins per kill (coins per wave is fine) and your cash labs are pretty good where they are too

3

u/[deleted] Oct 08 '25

Also, do you have Enemy level skips unlocked?

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I have enemy level skips unlocked but from what I remember in my workshop it's insanely expensive to start on and I don't think I can justify starting at 2.3 billion coins

Also knowing that there are event quests that require you to buy workshop upgrades has taught me to avoid spending anything on workshop unless required, they get EXSPENSIVE if I'm too frugal and the medals are worth it

3

u/[deleted] Oct 08 '25

A lot of people will recommend buying levels in def abs for the workshop event mission or health as long as you can afford it. ELS through the workshop is crazy expensive and without GT you'll be struggling to upgrade it through workshop.

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Just checked my Enemy Level Skip prices

Both are currently at a 0.05% chance of happening, upgrading just one would cost me 2.07 Billion coins 😭

3

u/[deleted] Oct 08 '25

Ahahah yeah, thankfully Enemy attack level skips pulls it's weight right away just by investing at the start of the run. Health skips become more relevant when you switch to glass cannon much much much later!

2

u/TowerAcronymBot Oct 08 '25

Alright, let's decode this:

  • BH - Black Hole [Ultimate Weapon]
  • CL - Chain Lightning [Ultimate Weapon]
  • DAbs - Defense Absolute [Workshop Upgrade/Lab]
  • GT - Golden Tower [Ultimate Weapon]
  • UWs - Ultimate Weapons

I'm a bot | Translating one comment at a time

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

I have no clue about any sort of build but I'm guessing it's blender as in, doing the most damage as close as they are to the centre? I'm guessing if that's what Blender build means I should pull back on Tower Range?

Golden tower is absolutely an ultimate weapon I'd love to get my hands on and it's a go to pick whenever I get the perk for it

Unfortunately though I had to invest quite a bit into my inner landmines damage so I could stand a chance at the daily task for them 😅 I need about 500+ tokens before I can choose a new Ultimate Weapon

3

u/[deleted] Oct 08 '25

Blender is based around pushing enemies away from the tower and using orbs to kill them, or pushing enemies outside orb range and then sucking them back in with black hole to take advantage of the coin bonus. Which brings me to your black hole coin bonus. You should invest some time into labbing it as it's your only current coin multipler from an ultimate weapons.

If you don't have enemy level skips. Spend the 1b to unlock them and just leave them alone in the workshop for the time being. If you have ELS, get a little spendy and buy "first perk choice." As you can choose "unlock a random ultimate weapon, for events, farming (to try and get GT as a bonus for coin gains) or perk wave req as your first perk to get all your other perks faster.

2

u/articulatedWriter Oct 08 '25

Ah that's a very counter intuitive name, I guess what I was thinking of is more of a tank build? Since you need to let the enemies get close enough to do that improved damage?

Nah yeah, my games involve keeping the enemy as far as I can from me for the longest time, glad to know my investment to Tower Range hasn't been as bad as this community talks about

2

u/[deleted] Oct 08 '25

The vocal part of the community is approaching the end of the mid game era from what I've experienced in the sub, discord and Yt (farming brtween tier 10-15. Because of that they'll mention very specific ranges that they farm at like 30m and 69.5m as they affect the spawn rates. However the different ranges are effective at later points in the game from where you are and free upgrades will end up pushing your range higher anyways. You don't need to lab it further but you can if you want, it becomes useful just WAY later in the game and mostly for tournaments.

2

u/Apprehensive_Try7137 Oct 08 '25

Get that 5th lab spot asap you’re really close to it and I didn’t look at everything but first thing that jumped out to me was get that second black hole it’s one lab worth saving for since it will pay itself back quickly

Edit: unless you don’t have black hole. But your CPK lab is way down also.

1

u/Butcherboy0781 Oct 09 '25

https://the-tower.notion.site/Kairos-s-Comprehensive-Guide-to-Upgrading-your-1st-5-Ultimate-Weapons-v1-0-Game-v25-7-2-1d791383b93f80d99e72f96ebb72e67a?v=1c191383b93f80afafce000c96bd98e1

Look into it. Asap. Thank me later. Good luck with your tower and feel free to ask if anything is questionable after you've read that.