Strategy:Blastapopoulos (BTD6)

This article was last updated for: version 50.2

Blastapopoulos is a boss that challenges defenses centered around abilities, damage over time and spam strategies by its mechanics.

First, it applies a global Range reduction which in many cases, is irrelevant, but still players should be careful with the positioning of their towers to avoid being out of range from a Village or even being prevented from attacking when placed too far away from the track. It also increases the ability cooldowns of all towers passively and partially resets them during an Overheat, making abilities with long cooldowns like those who produce income or certain Paragon abilities almost impossible to use.

Upon reaching a skull Blastapopoulos surrounds itself with rocks which block line of sight and launches three fireballs targeting the clostest, farthest and most expensive tower in the map reducing the ability of the defense to handle the regular spawns, making them dangerous, specially if an overheat is triggered at the same time. It is also important to remember Blastapopoulos has Purple Bloon immunity and if hit by those attacks (including top path Druid and middle path Mermonkey), even if they have Monkey Intelligence Bureau support.

Ice Monkeys are supposed to counter the heat mechanic, and although they can handle it on Tier 1 and 2, an overheat is rarely dangerous at this stage, and in the later tiers, the heat gained during a skull will be too much for the ice attacks to handle in a reasonable amount of time so it is almost impossible to prevent Blastapopoulos from overheating.

This strategy page only covers dealing with Blastapopoulos itself and not the farming required to afford the defenses; for such guide, consult Strategy:Boss Bloon Event. The tower selection also assumes all challenge modifiers are at standard values.

Normal Blastapopoulos

Blastapopoulos

Tier 1

Blastapopoulos is not much of a threat at this point, so a lot of towers can defeat it, but as its heat bar is pretty low, it is pretty easy to trigger an overheat, so is recommended to have defense in the back of the track to handle any Bloon that can get past the main defense while being stunned.

• 2-0-5 The Tack Zone or 4× 2-0-4 Overdrive and 4-0-0 Embrittlement, Blastapopolous will overheat several times, but still can be defeated before it leaves the Tack Shooter's range.
• 0-5-0 MOAB Eliminator or 2× 0-4-0 MOAB Assassin, spam their abilities, even with increased cooldowns, they can defeat the Boss in most maps.
• 5-2-0 The Blazing Sun, placing it next to the track to reduce the chance of having its line of sight blocked.
• 2-0-5 Elite Defender or 2× 2-0-4 Full Auto Rifle.
• 4-1-0 Aircraft Carrier.
• 2× 1-4-0 Spike Storm or even 1 on longer maps.

• 0-2-5 Crossbow Master.
• 5-0-2 Glaive Lord.
• 3× 0-4-2 Turbo Charge.
• 2× 4-0-2 Maim MOAB.
• 0-4-0 First Strike Capability.
• 2-0-5 Sub Commander or 3× 2-0-4 Armor Piercing Darts.
• 2× 4-2-0 Operation: Dart Storm, Wingmonkey is recommended. 1 can be used with micro or if the defense is in the front so the Ace is not distracted by the regular spawns.
• 2-0-4 Spectre.
• 1-0-4 Comanche Defense. Pursuit distracts the Heli Pilot with the regular spawns so is not recommended.
• 1-0-4 Bloon Area Denial System, target it manually.
• 0-2-3 Dark Knight, X-ray Ultra is recommended so it can see through Pyroclastic Rocks.
• 4-2-0 Plasma Accelerator or 2× 4-X-X Arcane Spike with MIB or Ezili support.
• 6× 0-1-4 Poplust and 4-0-0 Embrittlement.

Tier 2

• 0-5-0 MOAB Eliminator or 4× 0-4-0 MOAB Assassin.
• 2-0-5 Overdrive + 5-0-0 Super Brittle, additional 2-0-4 Overdrive can also be used.
• 2-5-0 Golden Justice.
• 2-0-5 Elite Defender or 2× 2-0-4 Full Auto Rifle.
• 1-5-0 M.A.D.
• 0-1-5 Avatar of Wrath + 5× 1-0-4 Poplust.
• 2-5-0 Carpet of Spikes or 4× 2-4-0 Spike Storm.

• 5-0-2 Inferno Ring, 2× 4-2-0 Plasma Accelerator with MIB or Ezili support.
• 5-0-2 Cripple MOAB.
• 2× 2-4-0 First Strike Capability with a tower that can deal 3,000 damage while the ability recharges to trigger the skull.
• 2-0-5 Sub Commander.
• 5-1-0 Carrier Flagship or 2× 4-1-0 Aircraft Carrier.
• 5-2-0 Sky Shredder, 4× 4-0-2 Operation: Dart Storm or 2× Spectre. If Wingmonkey is used the defense should be in front so the Ace is not distracted by the regular spawns.
• 1-0-5 Comanche Commander.
• 1-0-5 Bloon Exclusion Zone.
• 2-0-4 Dark Champion.

Tier 3

Using buff towers like Permanent Brew, Call to Arms, Overclock (unless using Carpet of Spikes), Homeland Defense, alongside debuffs for the boss like Super Brittle, Glue Storm and Cripple MOAB is recommended.

• Spam strategies (Overdrive, Destroyer, Armor Piercing Darts, Shinobi Tactics, Spike Storm).
• 2-5-0 Golden Justice, using range boosts like Primary Mentoring and Take Aim is recommended.
• 2-0-5 Flying Fortress.
• 1-5-0 M.A.D.
• 5-0-0 Megalodon, 84 power is enough for this tier but max power is recommended.
• Any Paragon.

• 6× 2-4-0 First Strike Capability, even 4× can be used on longer maps, 6 abilities are needed to trigger a skull.
• 5-2-0 Ray of Doom with MIB or Ezili support.
• 5-2-0 Sun Temple with 1-1-1-0 sacrifices, in preparation for a VTSG.
• 2-0-5 Legend of the Night.

Tier 4

A Paragon is recommended at this tier, any Degree 1 will be enough, but Degree 20 is recommended. However, abusing Blastapopoulos slow speed, spam strategies, 1-5-0 M.A.D, and 2-0-5 Legend of the Night can also defeat the boss at this tier.

Tier 5

A single Paragon or VTSG defense is enough most of the time, only using additional defensive towers for the regular spawns and in case of an overheat. Recommended degrees are:

• Apex Plasma Master and Glaive Dominus: Degree 60+. Crucible of Steel and Flame can also be considered at Degree 60+ in maps with loops or long tracks so it can use more Meteor Impact abilities.
• Nautic Siege Core, Navarch of the Seas, Magus Perfectus, Master Builder (with Ezili) or Mega Massive Munitions Factory: Degree 20+.
• Goliath Doomship: Degree 1+.

Elite Blastapopoulos

Elite Blastapopoulos

Tier 1

• 0-5-0 MOAB Eliminator or 3× 0-4-0 MOAB Assassin.
• 2-0-5 Elite Defender or 2× 2-0-4 Full Auto Rifle.
• 2× 2-4-0 First Strike Capability, alternate their abilities for each skull.
• 5-1-0 Carrier Flagship or 2× 4-1-0 Aircraft Carrier.
• 2× 1-4-0 Spike Storm.

• 2× 0-2-5 Crossbow Master.
• 2-0-5 Sub Commander or 3× 2-0-4 Armor Piercing Darts.
• 3× 4-2-0 Operation: Dart Storm, Wingmonkey is recommended. 2 can be used with micro or if the defense is in the front so the Aces are not distracted by the regular spawns.
• 2-0-4 Spectre with defense in the front so the Ace is not distracted by the regular spawns.
• 4-2-0 Plasma Accelerator with MIB or Ezili support.
• 2× 1-0-4 Bloon Area Denial System, target them manually.
• 2× 0-2-3 Dark Knight.

Tier 2

• Spam strategies (Overdrive, Destroyer, Armor Piercing Darts, Shinobi Tactics, Carpet of Spikes) with usual buff and debuff towers).
• 5-2-0 Golden Justice in open maps with range boosts like Primary Mentoring and Take Aim, use one or two additional Bounty Hunters to have higher uptime on the ability.
• 1-5-0 M.A.D.
• 5-0-0 Megalodon, 84 power is enough for this tier but max power is recommended.

• 6× 2-4-0 First Strike Capability use their abilities on groups of 3 with a tower that can deal 3,750 damage while the ability recharges to trigger the skull. 3 can be used on longer maps.
• 2-0-5 Flying Fortress.
• 5-2-0 Ray of Doom.
• 5-2-0 Sun Temple with 1-1-1-0 sacrifices, in preparation for a VTSG.

Tier 3

A primary Paragon, is recommended at this tier, Degree 1 will be enough for Apex Plasma Master and Glaive Dominus, but Degree 20 is recommended specially for Crucible of Steel and Flame on less favorable positions. Spam strategies and max power Megalodon can also defeat this tier depending on the map. If the player can obtain a Degree 40 Dart Paragon, it can be kept to defend Tier 4, otherwise the Paragon should be sold to continue.

Tier 4

A single Paragon defense is still enough for this tier, with Apex Plasma Master needing Degree 40+, Glaive Dominus can also do it at 40+, but needs to keep Blastapopoulos in its range for longer and Crucible of Steel and Flame at Degree 60 and any of the others at Degree 20 except Ascended Shadow (which should not be used at all) or Master Builder without Ezili. Magus requires good mana managment and Master Builder constant Sentry Micro, so is usually easier to go for Submarine or Buccaneer Paragons. This Paragon can be kept for Tier 5. Mega Massive Munitions Factory might also struggle at Degree 20 on short maps as it can't use the Spikeageddon ability as often.

Tier 5

A defense with at least 3 Paragons is recommended to defend Blastapopoulos, recommended degrees are:

• Apex Plasma Master, Crucible of Steel and Flame or Glaive Dominus: Degree 60+.
• Nautic Siege Core, Navarch of the Seas, Magus Perfectus, Mega Massive Munitions Factory or Master Builder with Ezili: Degree 40+.
• Goliath Doomship: Degree 20+.

Ultraboosted VTSG can replace any Paragon. Goliath Doomship can defeat it alone at Degree 60.

Boss Rush

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Tips and recommendations

• Preparing abilities before the boss enters the screen is less effective as Blastapopoulos uses its Overheat ability as soon it enters the screen, however is possible to play around this mechanic by activating abilities like Homeland Defense just before the previous round ends or by using Geraldo's Rejuv Potion.
• Ironically, the best way to play around the Heat mechanic is to outright ignore it, because the towers that are supposed to decrease the heat are far from doing a good job about it because the additional heat gained from the skulls is just too much for the cooling towers to handle, specially in late tiers, to the degree is simply impossible to prevent Blastapopoulos from overheating at all. However, in late tiers, the players should have a secondary defensive option that can handle the Bloons if the overheat happens at the wrong time (ex. Perma-Spike or Spirit of the Forest during Tiers 2-3 and Super Mines for Tiers 4-5).
• Blastapopoulos targets the closest, farthest and most expensive towers on the screen with its fireballs. To optimize the fight, these can be manipulated to some extent so the fireballs are just wasted on irrelevant towers:
  • The fireball targeting the closest tower can be manipulated by placing inexpensive towers like 0-0-0 Dart Monkeys right next to the track and the main attacking towers a little bit further, but not too far away due range reduction and making sure projectiles can still reach the boss during an Overheat.
  • The second fireball targeting the farthest tower is manipulated by placing another inexpensive or non-attacking tower (ex. Banana Farms, Benjamin) in one or more corners very far from the Boss.
  • Manipulating the most expensive tower fireball is a bit more difficult as in a lot of cases is just going to be the same tower that is used as the main attacking tower, but with careful planning it can baited with a Monkeyopolis as it will count the farms it absorbs as part of its value. A Monkeyopolis with a single farm sacrifice (Miniopolis) might be enough for Tier 1. In Tiers 2 or 3 it can be manipulated with another Monkeyopolis with higher sacrifice value or even a support Sun Temple. In the late tiers the value of the Paragons or VTSG will simply be too high to be manipulated, so players must assume they will be targeted, but at that point there should be additional defensive towers to handle the fight so the fireballs become less of an issue.
• Using Take Aim from Bounty Hunters is a good way to recover the range that Blastapopoulos takes away, specially on towers that are affected by magma pools, it is recommended to have several of them for the important attacking towers near a Primary Mentoring or with an Energizer to counter the ability cooldown increase.
• Apex Plasma Master is really efficient at dealing with Blastapopoulos for Elite Tiers 3 and 4, as its Juggernaut balls can bounce off Pyroclastic Rocks dealing large amounts of damage, outclassing Boomerang and Tack Paragon for its price. It is recommended to build it next to the track to minimize the chances that the rocks will fall directly over it, preventing it from attacking.
• Magus Perfectus and Master Builder have a tough matchup against Blastapopoulos, the Wizard Paragon suffers from the range reduction and the higher cooldown on the Metamorphosis ability, making very difficult to use more than once against the boss. Engineer Paragon should be avoided if the player is not using Ezili as the Hero, or the Rubber to Gold's de-purple, because Green, Red and Modified Sentry Paragons have Plasma as its damage type, really reducing their damage output and that is on top of the slower sentry deployment time. Usually Nautic Siege Core and Navarch of the Seas will outperform those Paragons on many situations.
• Players should avoid using Sticky Bomb, Master Bomber and Ascended Shadow because a large part, if not all, of their DPS comes from the Sticky Bombs which will be burned by the Boss before they can detonate, making them useless.
• Ezili Heartstopper ability works on Blastapopoulos to help towers that can't damage Purple Bloons but unlike them, the immunity will be removed until the Boss is defeated or the player leaves the game, on which case the ability can be simply be used again upon returning. This is the only way to reliably help Master Builder Sentries to damage Blastapopoulos.
  • Ezili can't use Heartstopper if all Bloons in the screen are MOAB-Class Bloons.
• Don't use 2-4-0 or 2-5-0 crosspath for Glue Strike or Glue Storm as it will be considered damage over time and Blastapopoulos will remove it.

Gallery

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Trivia

• Although Blastapopoulos is supposed to counter tower spam and damage over time strategies, sometimes they are the optimal choice for Least Cash ranked mode, as those mechanics have found their way into top strategies, like Overdrive spam and The Bloon Solver.