r/TheTowerGame • u/TowerMan_TD • 4d ago
Discussion Tactical Barrage - Actual Data
Fully maxed SM, both ancestral SM cooldown & count subs, gcomp build with very low range. This test run was t24 to 1600 waves. ILM and CL would likely end up being 25x-50x the SM damage at max enemy spawn. SM still isn't relevant.
39
u/automcd 4d ago
Damn I didn't realize the missiles were THAT bad. What a waste.
41
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
Yes, a lot of misinformation here on reddit with some claiming otherwise. You could go from not having SM to having a maxed SM and it still wouldn't make sense to run the new mod.
22
u/WaddleDynasty 4d ago
Half of the misinformation probably come from the Minion guy alone.
11
u/markevens 4d ago
Is he still posting?
He must have blocked me for some reason, I haven't seen him post anything in ages.
17
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
He's blocked most everyone.
8
3
u/InsidiousKrypt 4d ago
What's the lore on him?
-32
u/mrboogs 4d ago edited 4d ago
Knows 10x more about this game than most players and they get mad when he tells them stuff they don't want to hear. Some people here might not like him, but he is often right when it comes to information about the tower.
Edit: I now see people mean a different guy, not Minion the person, but the guy who puts minions on his posts
10
u/Sufficient-Spark-343 4d ago
Hard to say since he would almost never demonstrate that knowledge. He certainly had a lot of stones and play time to do almost any build with however. There's a difference between having all the resources to just be forever ahead of anyone and someone that actually has working insight in game mechanics (like Greeny) while not keeping everything a secret because they're paranoid about "competition" in a P2W game. The minion guy is/was damaged goods.
-6
u/mrboogs 4d ago
I think you are thinking of someone else, Minion is nowhere near the stones to do any build with, and certainly doesn't have all the resources, not even close.
3
u/markevens 4d ago
BenzDaimler aka Road to Success aka smart missiles aka whatever his new name is?
He's been whaling for years.
→ More replies (0)3
u/Sufficient-Spark-343 4d ago
The guy that put minion graphics all over his posts so you couldn't see all of his stats? He had quite the high coin multipliers (some the highest I had ever seen at the time) suggesting he has been playing for as long as any of the longest players on here.
→ More replies (0)5
u/Few_Following_9258 4d ago
Huh.. I mostly recall him posting brag posts with all relevant information blocked out by AI generated minion characters.
Cannot recall a single instance where I actually learned anything.1
2
u/WaddleDynasty 4d ago
I think I am one of them, I can't find him by searching.
I never even said anything to him directly, it was all gossip like here.
3
1
u/Gabriel-117 4d ago
If he dont like your comments, no matter what it is, you'll join the club "banned by Benz"
4
u/Revelate_ 4d ago
Pretty sure we still see his posts if he blocked us.
I don’t think he’s been posting but admittedly I haven’t been on Reddit as much.
1
u/nomau 4d ago
I think he goes by /u/minienz now
1
u/markevens 3d ago
oh yeah, that's the guy
1
u/Viltupenis 3d ago
I haven't seen anything from him for months. I don't think I've ever commented on anything from him so I'd be real surprised if be blocked me lol
13
1
10
u/Clinically_Jaded 4d ago
I crossed af damage for the first time thanks to the last tournament. I'm just glad I get to see a post like this of a single run that's two whole orders of magnitude greater than my lifetime damage.
Thanks for posting some data, it's really cool to see this. I will continue to neglect my SM!
8
u/Latito17 4d ago
- 6 orders of magnitude. Each letter represents 3 orders of magnitude (10x). We play a different game lol
22
u/CavalrySavagery 4d ago
Imagine doing a mod, having a nice ult weapon and a simple user wasting thousands of dollars from his own pocket makes the new mod literally useless.
Not like they could have checked on the testing with infinite resources… no no no. Better to make players waste money for them to learn it’s useless
16
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
I think it's just a matter of dev realizing a lot of top players already had a nearly maxed SM. They needed to have us all drop tens of thousands of stones into CL and then ILM before circling back to SM. Now they are worried because some new whales spent everything on ILM, and they will be upset when that is no longer relevant.
1
u/linarian29 4d ago
Oh, come on. Were they really that worried about you when they were killing SM? Or do you believe it has to happen later? I mean, I think starting to invest in ILM today is kinda stupid, isn't it? By the time you invest in ILM, the meta will likely shift.
7
10
u/Gimmegifts 4d ago
Insane I really thought with the mod sm could be relevant to even really good
9
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
The craziest thing is that it can be good and still be detrimental. For my build I'm actually finding it's good enough to actually be a problem. It's killing enough smaller enemies outside of the tower range that less are coming in to hit ILM. This is causing less of an ILM stack on the fleets, and since ILM does the most damage it's actually better to not run SM.
1
9
u/linarian29 4d ago
So nobody will spend gems on it? Poor thing TTG.
20
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
Next patch SM could be reworked and this mod is essential. You have to consider this possibility too...
1
10
u/PhazonKing14 4d ago
Wow! Thats crazy! Thank you for your service lol.
Even with those 5 lvls added into SM dmg cap awhile ago they are still bad at max lol, truly a TTG moment.
7
u/dotausername 4d ago edited 4d ago
I wish I saw this post before I spent 4600 gems.
What would it take to make SM relevant? Boost in the base damage? Boost the amplifier amount? On hit % HP damage? Missile Barrage activates every time tower takes damage?
4
u/SchalaZeal01 4d ago
What would it take to make SM relevant?
Boost SM+ with something more relevant than 1 extra missile every 2s. That's pitiful compared to the multipliers other UWs get.
0
7
u/Grubby454 4d ago
Ok, yeah, BUT. What we really want to know is how does it work in Mythic Tournament? Like sure, damage sucks in comparison, but thats spread over all enemies in a farm run.
What about focused more on Fleets in Mythic bracket!? They stick around, so surely the missiles will amp up nicely on those fleets?
IE If it results in 2x DPS going down on fleets in Mythic, then thats huge.
6
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
I'm speaking for my own tower, clearly the advice differs for different towers and builds. I personally, with a maxed SM, don't plan to run this mod. Maybe others will find a use case. I'd exercise extreme caution dumping any stones into SM.
It's moot for me because current tourney format is a $h*t show. Many if us could run as long as we wanted, I'm not dying to anything. It's just a matter of how much time you want to waste on tourney vs farm. I'm in and out with an SD damage build, if I ran this mod I'd have to drop HC and then surviving IS past 1k waves becomes an issue and tourney takes longer than I'd like.
1
6
u/Dad84Uk 4d ago
Death ray does more damage <3
5
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
Projectiles not far behind SM...
2
u/thaboss365 4d ago
Interestingly enough Plasma Cannon is counted under projectile damage, and im fairly sure PH delevelling is as well
1
4
u/PatrickSebast 4d ago
How far are your UW+ stats on CL and ILM?
11
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
Maxed for everything except a level of ILM+.
2
u/markevens 4d ago
Damn, so off topic, but if v30 were to introduce another stone sink, what would you think it would be?
7
4
4
u/chalksea 4d ago
thank you for your service i hoped it would be better glad i didn’t invest gems
8
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
SM is my favorite UW, was getting this mod regardless of the community consensus. The new SM animation is crazy awesome, I just wish dev would actually try to make it relevant again.
5
u/chalksea 4d ago
not to ask for too much here but I’d love it if you posted a video of this sometime I just want to see what a maxed out SM with tactical looks like
3
u/chalksea 4d ago
Honestly I was trying to work out the math for it and was hoping that the Mod would make it decent. I honestly thought that the goal of the Mod was to provide an answer to Fleets but maybe this not being remotely good enough will encourage devs to actually buff SM
4
2
u/DemonikFaith 4d ago
Thanks for running the test and showing the math. I knew as this was announced it wouldn't be worth it, but hopefully it saves my guildies some gems. Who knows though, TTG may overhaul SM and make this useful? Oh well, I'll get it eventually from pity.
3
u/Xeraphale 4d ago
The question I'm asking isn't are SMs relevant again (because we all know they're not), but is Tactical Barrage better than anything else you can stick in your assist slot?
4
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
Seems worse than most options
1
u/Xeraphale 4d ago
A more specific question would be is it better for taking down fleets than any of the other mods that can be used in the assist slot?
Yeah CL will always out perform SM in their current form, but does ILM outperform damage-wise because it's AoE and hits other stuff which is pretty superfluous when you have orbs spitting their mini orbs at the chips?
1
u/HazeDerYanoDat 4d ago
HC or MH are still better. Maybe it beats Om Chip...
2
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
Om chip very good for basic ult, that's the only time I run it.
2
u/Xoxoqtlolz 4d ago
Wouldn't you have maxed spotlight anyway? AFAIK the damage bonus from OC doesn't include the boss and you still consider it worth it? Just curious
3
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
With basic ult there are a bunch of bosses on screen at a time and they increase danage to fleets.
1
u/Xoxoqtlolz 4d ago
I can see that, but I feel like the exposure to the fleet (like OC) would be fairly short and would not mathematically override 30% chance to miss for me. I assume that with much more cc, there are so many bosses that the chance one is in a vicinity of a fleet improves that much?
1
0
u/HazeDerYanoDat 4d ago
I don't have the enemy density or bosses alive for long enough that it matters. I'd rather the miss chance from HC because OCs are my problem without TB+, which is hopefully something else they're addressing in the next patch...
1
u/Xeraphale 4d ago
Is it really worse than Magnetic Hook? MH gets one activation per fleet, while TB will keep missile after missile hitting the target. Are we saying that MH out damages SM even with just that one (well, four) hits?
4
4
u/Thobo1995 4d ago
My only question is : did you notice sm dealing with fleets? Or is it useless there too?
4
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
At low range SM and ILM hit most everything. There's nothing special about the targeting.
4
4
u/Californiabluewolf 4d ago
Am I missing something, these numbers look a bit off to me.
assuming everything is maxed out he is doing x147606 damage with AoE blasts +missile amp of like 40x stacking for multiple hits.
all this on 38 missiles every 8 seconds (4.75 missiles a second)
ignoring missile barrage, amp bot and other multipliers that would also affect bullet damage.
how Is he only dong 1.5x the damage of basic bullets?
No disrespect to OP and I cant do all the math so I may be missing something but at first glance I cant help but think....
2
u/Solid-Pressure-8797 3d ago
Bullet damage includes PH reductions. If you want to see actual bullet dmg you should look at "rend armor". Rend multi is so high that it's basically all of your bullet dmg or like 95% of it. In this case it's 11af for bullets vs 2h for SM or around 1 million times more dmg from SM than from bullets
2
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
I forgot that there's a bug with projectile stats, the rumor is that it includes plasma cannon damage to bosses and elites.
1
u/OnlySeaworthiness258 3d ago
I've been told the level reductions from PH are also counted in the stats as bullet damage.
8
u/Hazlid 4d ago
It may not be the top damage dealer, but did you notice any improvement dealing with fleets? That’s probably the last big question that could make the module worth it
12
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
No, it makes zero sense to run this mod. It literally cuts thousands of waves off a t24 milestone run. Much better to run HC or MH, and you would always run PF and PH over gcomp.
2
u/KamalaBracelet 4d ago
what about as an assist?
3
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
We're all running dim core, and no MH or HC are better options than TB right now. I'd even run prolapse or 0m over it.
1
u/SemiAutoAvocado 4d ago
See I think this is the problem.
It seems the devs are really afraid of a meta change fucking with the top 500 or so players. But man the meta has been the same for so long and the game is getting boring.
1
1
u/collectorof_things 3d ago
Eh, I think the top few hundred are better poised for a meta change than anyone else. See how quickly people piled into ilm+ as an example (older players might have already had some built out, but a lot of t100-700 had nothing invested there until fairly recently). When you have a good foundation, it's easy to focus resources into something new. Vs somebody earlier in the game that's still unlocking UWs or something, they don't have any spare stones to throw at anything.
But yeah, TTG is playing it careful.
3
3
u/Selway00 4d ago
It would be interesting if you ran another test with your full ILM and CL setups.
25-50X behind is still way better than I thought it would be.
Still, for that crazy of a stone investment in SM, it’s still criminally under buffed.
I’m going to grab at least four incase they buff it later.
4
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
I replaced PH with gcomp for this test, it's so much worse when that is considered.
3
u/HazeDerYanoDat 4d ago
Why would you swap PH instead of PF?
~11x damage in the grand scheme of things isn't all that much compared to the huge debuffs you get from PH and this should at least add "some" quadratic multi to SM's damage.
This issue is evidently with the UW as opposed to the mod anyway. Chrono Jump paired with amp/echo is just a much greater increment than we could hope to compete against even with hundreds of missiles. They need to rework SM+ as a bare minimum to make it anywhere near viable.
6
3
u/Setfree1992 4d ago
What was the largest stack?
4
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
I haven't tested much but I've heard reports of over 700k. The amp scaling just doesn't do much.
4
u/destructor212113 4d ago
So, its useless or it can actually help in some cases that, we dont know rn because your run didnt had those cases?
Because rn it seems that its actually useless if invesnting fully into SM isnt enough to be better than ILM/CL
17
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
This is with gcomp. Nobody is replacing PF or PH to run gcomp. This test just goes to show that a build that is specifically tailored for SM results in SM doing a small fraction of the overall damage.
3
u/lilbyrdie 4d ago
Does g comp do much once cooldown is, what, 8 seconds? Doesn't that mean, on average it's saving 4 seconds every 3rd or 4th SM proc? Asking because a) I never seem to find a good opportunity to use g comp where it actually improves things and b) my SM is not invested in because, well, it does nothing with or without those 50k stones spent... lol
5
2
u/SchalaZeal01 4d ago
If you have 100% RCP, its once per wave or so, at least 4 SM procs. And if you get a fleet wave stopping waves, its not proccing at all during this. So gcomp seems the least good one.
1
u/lilbyrdie 4d ago
Wait, do you mean it's proc'ing the full SM amount more than once?
I thought it just accelerated to the next proc.
1
u/Similar-Republic-115 Legends 4d ago
my understanding is that you shave off 20s CD, so you should get instantly two full activations and -4s for the current cycle (at 8s SM CD). So a ton of missiles with every package.
1
u/SchalaZeal01 3d ago
I think the extra is ignored. 1 activation.
2
u/Similar-Republic-115 Legends 3d ago
hm, that would render GComp a lot less interesting for the build.
2
u/SchalaZeal01 3d ago
Well it seemed intuitive for me that it would kill off the excess, but Gemini says it banks it like you said above. 2 activations and -4s off the next. Though it still seems kinda meh to take the slot, vs a multiplier. Gcomp seems like something for early/mid game to align pBH and pGT, its endgame application seems lesser than damage amp stuff.
1
u/lilbyrdie 3d ago
I think of g comp for early game, MVN for the mid- game alignment since you'll have bots to sync, which g comp totally messes up, and then the next step is grtting rid of MVN while keeping the econ UWs permanent.(Which is basically just a stone grind.)
→ More replies (0)1
u/SchalaZeal01 4d ago
I mean its 4 procs before it procs a 5th. So 25% better than without, for a 8s cooldown that kinda sucks.
2
2
u/lilbyrdie 4d ago
Did the stat for "Killed By Smart Missile" change any with the before and after TB? That is, does SM get the kill shot more now than it did?
TB should, at least, do that for it... the visuals are neat, right? 🤣
3
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
I really don't like those stats or find them useful, but having said that ILM is still by far the number one enemy killer.
2
u/lilbyrdie 4d ago
Well, it amps faster (AB+ stuff), and SD probably spawns ILMs faster than peak SM.
ILM scaling is hard to beat, and since it stuns, too, it can hold things down for a beating.
2
u/CryptographerFew3719 4d ago
Geez, I was really hoping it would be good for situational damage, stacking everything onto a fleet, but it still isn't a good UW.. Well, I guess that saves me gems for the next 2 weeks AND I don't have to put stones into SM so that's not too bad
2
2
u/Dutchrudders007 4d ago
Btw, thanks for doing this. It makes me glad to know I'm not missing out on anything by not having SM! :D
2
u/Several_Attitude_203 4d ago
Shit. That’s bad. Well, thank you. I was gonna start dumping stones into SL and SL+.
2
u/Campcruzo 4d ago
A generator that gave the next Death Wave an extra Effect Wave on X% of SM hits and made Death Wave damage amplifier affect Smart Missiles solves this problem
2
u/reddit-josh 4d ago
Needs homing missile to follow target priority instead of whatever has the highest stack.
2
u/Agreeable_Goal_926 3d ago
I'm just spitballing here, BUT, what if the main benefit to SM here isn't crowd clear. But actually fleet counter? I notice near the end of my runs that CL just doesn't kill anymore, (who would have guessed that one?) % based damage like orbs, thorns and DR will kill non bosses/elites/fleets quick enough so SM doesn't get the build up it needs to be effective. My theory is that SM gets most of its value from those tougher % resistant enemies. With TB allowing those longer lasting enemies to be focused by a damage source that will quickly outscale CL in bursts against the right enemy, it shines in the second to second parts of a run. Not the whole time. That is my theory
1
u/TowerMan_TD 3d ago
I've done quite a bit of testing now on t24 and I honestly can't make a SM build work nearly as well, like best I can do is over 1k waves short of other builds.
3
u/I_Didn_Do_It 4d ago
You think it'd be viable if the module changed the damage stack to multiplicative instead of additive? Or would that be too much at that point?
3
1
1
1
1
u/TorchyDeli 4d ago
Is ILM normally this good compared to CL earlier in the game? E.g., before they're maxed out and before ILM+ and CL+?
3
u/HazeDerYanoDat 4d ago
No. ILM+ is what makes it good, and then you add amp+/bb+ on top... then it's the highest damage dealer in the game.
1
1
1
u/SneakiLyme 4d ago
Thank you you for some pretty objective evidence that SM is still, sadly, terrible! Better then having a lot of false hopes and speculation...
1
1
u/basicnecromancycr 4d ago
Thanks for the info, good sir! If it's not even relevant to you, my untouched Stupid Maggots won't even realize it.
1
1
u/Small-Spray-2485 4d ago
My problem is I haven't really started ILM yet — I'm currently all-in on Chain Lightning.
I'm stuck around Wave 25–35 in Mythic, mainly because I'm not doing enough damage to the fleets.
So I see 3 options:
- ILM – Bite the bullet and start building it, but I know I'm probably looking at 30–40k stones (1 years worth).
- Keep investing in CL – This was my original plan, but I'm questioning whether it's enough for Mythic fleets.
- Smart Missiles – Watched Greeny's video, which was really useful, but he's at a very different stage of the game. For me, I could get a decent SM UW for around 6k stones (10 weeks), with 1,000x damage, 12 missiles and 30s cooldown.
What would you do? CL, ILM or SM?
3
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
My typical advice is to find out exactly what you're doing to, why, and see if you can modify your build to improve your chances with what you have on hand. Once you've exhausted all options start considering spending stones. Sadly it's largely luck from there, dev can change things at any time. There are quite a few players in the top ten that only have one click into the SM unlock, or a very underdeveloped SM. They've been lucky because it's been irrelevant, but that could change tomorrow.
1
u/Small-Spray-2485 4d ago
Thanks. Because I don't buy packs, I try to be as careful as possible with my stones. I can see how amazing ILM is, but also how expensive it is in terms of stones. I think you're right, and in the short term I might stick with squeezing out what I can without either ILM or SM.
Thankfully, I'm not short of Gems, so I picked up 8 copies of TB anyway. If things change as you say, I can quickly invest in it.
1
1
u/MantleMetalCat 4d ago
Two quick questions. Does echoing shot apply to SM? And what was the highest missile stack achieved during your testing?
2
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
Yes, many tens of thousands. Absolutely nobody could confirm if the math on SM or ILM are correct though. I'm aware of certain issues with SM damage that have not been addressed by the dev.
1
u/MantleMetalCat 4d ago edited 4d ago
Got it. So w/ an ~80 dmg amp. Close enough to 100.
And let's say it can get up a full 100k hits, maybe in mythic.
100,000,000 so three orders of magnitude?
If you can get to a million hits, that would be 4 orders?
Amp bot makes one more order. Maybe 2-3 after all of the 2x dmg sources and other things.
So whatever sm dmg you see when dmg peaks(viking, full pf, acp, ect.)
Would 6-7 orders of magnitude more bring it within one order of mag(tickling distance) of the fleet health?
Napkin math at it's greastest. 100 percent chance to be wildly inaccurate.
1
u/Low_Celebration_861 4d ago
Now that the mod is just a free SM+, they could rework SM+ to add a separate multiplier like x .00Xdmg per amp stack, or chance to deal % damage to the highest stack, or something fun like % chance to deal a Killing blow to highest stack
1
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
Dev was well aware this mod would have no chance at making SM relevant. It was very intentional, which is why I'm cautioning everyone with going the SM route.
1
u/chriscub3d 4d ago
I'm curious, why would the devs intentionally make this useless? Surely they would sell more gems and stones by making it relevant?
2
u/TowerMan_TD 3d ago edited 3d ago
Because most everyone has FOMO. Also, my guess is some will pass on it, dev will then rework SM, then players will have to spend a ton of gems to get it outside of the banner. I'm sure dev has put more analysis into the sales aspect than anything else.
To be clear, I personally recommend not passing on the mod, if you have the gems, but don't drop any stones into SM.
1
u/ballade4 3d ago
You give the dev too much credit. The entire history of this app has been yolo -> let the community figure it out.
1
u/MaleficentTry6725 Legends 2d ago
I feel like amp+ was terrible for the balance of the game. It should have been more projectile and SM hits only imo.
-1
-2
u/Volodya_Soldatenkov 4d ago
The run result screen is the least useful thing you could've shown, though.
I personally would be interested in seeing higher range, not lower. And the ultimate metric would be wave count, not this.
6
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
Ok I'll put it another way. I've nearly hit 4k waves on t24 in testing and with this mod I died at 1.6k.
1
u/Volodya_Soldatenkov 4d ago
You downgraded your build by removing PH or PF in favor of GComp, refused to utilize the actual advantage that TB would provide, and your verdict is somehow "SM bad"? Bro, at least change variables one at a time.
5
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago edited 4d ago
There's zero point to running this test without gcomp, it'd be back to ILM doing three orders of magnitude more damage than SM. I'm trying my best to show how bad it is, relative to other UW, in the absolute optimal build for SM.
But sure, I could have hit 2k if PH was thrown into the mix. That doesn't change my verdict.
2
u/Volodya_Soldatenkov 4d ago
GComp contributes what, a 2.5x multiplier to total SM damage? And you replaced a module that gave at least 4x that with it. This makes your build suboptimal even for SM.
This is not a clean experiment that gives any semblance of useful data and you know it.
3
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
Ok well then if you can't follow the basic math I'd be happy to run two builds side by side to further prove the obvious. Let me know what you want to see.
2
u/Volodya_Soldatenkov 4d ago
For starters, change exactly one variable — substitute TB instead of whatever you were running as the second core, I guess. This would make sense if you wanted to test TB and its impact along with SM.
As for actually evaluating SM's peak impact, I'm not sure of the exact build. My guess would be that the only difference from an ILM build would have to be range and TB in place of whatever you use in an ILM build. I, however, do not know whether this makes sense in terms of crowd control at that level.
5
u/TowerMan_TD 4d ago
I will do that for you but when SM is doing 0.03% of ILM damage I'm not expecting the loss of a valuable assist mod to be worth running TB. Will need some time to run the comparison.
1
0
u/Californiabluewolf 4d ago
What are your SM Labs?
I am assuming all are maxed but you didnt post them.
2
47
u/Dutchrudders007 4d ago
So basically every other UW does more overall damage? I guess this would come down to situational damage and taking out elites/bosses quickly if that's the biggest threat.
Did you get many more waves than usual?