Pierce

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Map buff icon for Pierce in BTD6

Pierce is the maximum number of Bloons that a single projectile can collide with. Most projectiles disappear if all of their pierce is consumed. All projectiles have a pierce stat, though it does not serve a function for certain projectiles, such as collectables.

Prior to Bloons TD 5, a projectile's pierce was determined solely by its base pierce and any pierce modifiers from upgrades. BTD5 introduced the Monkey Fort upgrade for the Monkey Village, which increases the pierce of other towers. In some games, external pierce modifiers (such as buffs, Specialty Buildings in Bloons TD 5, and equipment in Bloons Adventure Time TD) behave differently from pierce modifiers provided by upgrades.

Pierce is commonly referred to as "popping power" in in-game text, especially prior to Bloons TD 6, though this term has other meanings depending on context.

Mechanics

Expiration

Most projectiles expire immediately upon consuming all pierce. Certain projectiles have effects that trigger when they run out of pierce (such as a bomb projectile spawning an explosion projectile). Some projectiles do not expire when they run out of pierce (such as most area-of-effect style projectiles), though they become unable to collide with any more Bloons if they have zero pierce remaining.

Pierce penalty

A pierce penalty is a property of some projectiles in Bloons TD 6 and Bloons TD Battles 2 that causes them to consume more than 1 pierce on contact. This usually only applies to specific Bloon types (for example, Bloon Master Alchemist's shrink potion has 200 pierce, but each MOAB-Class Bloon consumes extra pierce, as a way of limiting its effectiveness against them). A few projectiles, like Hydra Rocket Pods's missiles, consume extra pierce on contact with any Bloon type, as a way of making them benefit less from flat pierce buffs.

Pierce cap

Starting in Bloons TD 5, some projectiles have a limit to the amount of pierce they can gain from external pierce modifiers. This is usually done for projectiles that spawn other projectiles on contact with the first Bloon (such as bombs that spawn explosions), and is usually equal to the projectile's unmodified pierce.

In some cases, for balance reasons, pierce limits are applied to certain or all projectiles from an attack that produces additional attacks. For example, in BTD6, Bouncing Bullet's shrapnel from the main shot and each bounce can benefit from pierce buffs, but not the bullet itself. In BTD6 and Battles 2, the shards from Ice Shards have a pierce limit, but not for the freeze wave that would create the shards.

In the mobile versions of Bloons TD 5 and Bloons Monkey City, most projectiles that spawn other projectiles do not have pierce caps, causing them to spawn projectiles more than once when given pierce buffs. For example, Hydra Rocket Pods's missiles can spawn multiple explosions, and Glaive Ricochet's glaives can spawn multiple ricocheting glaives. Most of these occurrences are fixed in the mobile version of Bloons TD Battles, though the Temple Of The Monkey God's missile attack still has this issue.

List of external pierce modifiers

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Bloons TD 5

Source	Applies to	Modifier
Dartling Ammo Dump tier 4	Dartling Guns	+1
MIB Call To Arms ability	Towers in range	+50%
Monkey Fort	Towers in range	+1
Monkey Lab (Popping Power category)	All towers	+100%
Spikes R Us tier 4	Spike Factories	+50%
Tack Awesomizer	Bloonberry Bushes, Road Spikes, Spike Factories, Tack Shooters	+100%
Tack Research Center tier 3 and 4	Tack Shooters	+1

Bloons TD Battles

• Monkey Fort

Bloons Monkey City

• Monkey Fort
• Monkey Knowledge
• Special Items

Bloons TD 6

• Sun Temple and True Sun God Support sacrifices (sacrifice Tier 5+)
• Brew from Berserker Brew, Stronger Stimulant, and Permanent Brew
• Abyss Dweller, Abyssal Warrior, and Lord of the Abyss
• The Final Harmonic's Trance buff (Magic towers only)
• Primary Training, Primary Mentoring, and Primary Expertise (Primary towers only)
• Call to Arms ability
• Striker Jones level 8+ local buff
• Certain Artifacts

Bloons TD Battles 2

• Berserker Brew