Great White

[Source]

Great White is the third upgrade of Path 1 for the Beast Handler in Bloons TD 6. The Barracuda transforms to a Great White, which drags bloons into the water and creating literal splash damage to nearby bloons as it drags the first target, and slows down all targets it hits including Leads. As a water-dweller, the Beast Handler requires water to place a Great White. As a Tier 3 Beast Handler, default power increases by 5, from 3 to 8, and maximum power increases from 6 to 24, additionally increasing the maximum contributing Beast Handlers for this beast from 3 to 16. It also increases attack range (from 30 to 40) The splash damage can receive increased rate from all external buffs and aquatic beast merges.

Instead of simply lunging onto bloons repetitively, the Great White now drags bloons into the water, up to Ceramics, capped at 500,000 RBE on the latched target to "instakill" it, and additionally dealing 12 splash damage onto up to 10 nearby bloons at a constant rate. At base power, the rate of splashes is 0.55s from a base rate of 1.1x cooldown. Stronger bloons take more time to pull in the bloon, increasing the duration of the splash attacks. Attack speed buffs do not affect how fast the Great White can drag bloons into the water, but does affect the rate of splash damage, both of which applies to all higher tiers. If it cannot insta-kill the target, it instead latches on to it and bites its target for 5 seconds, for up to 9 ticks of damage, inflicting up to 108 damage to its affected target(s), and slowing the latched target at 60% speed compared to the splash. Additionally, Great White's attacks can now pop Leads (including DDTs, if visible), and even longer-lasting knockback with higher power.

The speed of the "instakill" attack does not increase with more power, but the damage increases by 3 per 2 power and pierce increases by a ratio of of 9 pierce every 8 power, rounded down. Knockback duration is initially 0.2s at minimum power, and increases at a ratio of an extra 0.0125s per 1 power. Great White starts off with a 1.1x attack cooldown multiplier, scaling linearly downwards up to a -0.38x cooldown multiplier, in intervals of -0.02375x, down to 0.72x.

At maximum power, it can "instakill" MOABs down into the depths, the knockback duration increases to 0.4 seconds, damage increases to 36 and pierce increased to 30. The rate of the splash attack reduces down to 0.36s at max power; more specifically, a 0.72x cooldown multiplier (-0.38x cooldown reduction) at max power, compared to 1.1x cooldown multiplier at minimum power.

This upgrade costs $1,710 on Easy, $2,010 on Medium, $2,170 on Hard, and $2,410 on Impoppable.

Description

Overview

The Great White Handler handles a new beast, the Great White Shark, instead of a Barracuda. Additionally, its pants are baggier and secured at the calves, wears jandals with blue toe grips and brown bases, and wears a purple bandana over his mouth. The starfish and barnacle on the left side of his head remains, as is the four-pointed pink starfish on the right side of his head. He also carries a lantern on his right hand. The fish hook he holds is similar to his preceding Barracuda upgrade except with more rope wrapping rotations. His hair is larger and smoother, and only has hair locks pointing streamlined backwards (instead of having two front hair locks coming out of the headband).

The Great White is a great white shark with multiple scars on his fins and eyes in addition to some torn areas on its fins, and appears wrathful in its small yellow eyes inside the blackness of inside the eye sockets. It also has barnacles attached to its head. Wrapped around the shark's torso are ropes.

Great White gains more range in addition to changing its attacks entirely. Instead of just leaping in and out, the Great White pulls in the targeted bloon up to Ceramic (or up to MOAB at 24/24 power), instantly killing the target (up to 500,000 RBE) and creating splash damage centered at the shark as the bloon gets pulled into the water. Additionally, the Great White deals much more damage, and the splash damage knocks bloons backwards. Latched targets get slowed down drastically if they cannot be taken down by the takedown.

Targeting Priorities

As an upgraded Beast Handler, the Great White Handler controls an aquatic beast. It controls a Great White. The Great White can be merged from weaker-tier aquatic beasts to add energy, empowering the Great White via a network of other Beast Handlers. Alternatively, it can be merged into stronger-tier aquatic beasts to transfer energy, empowering the stronger aquatic beast in the process. This system utilises the Merge button to select a valid Beast Handler given sufficient energy capacity.

The Beast has multiple styles of attack that follow basic targeting priorities.

• First: Targets the first bloon visible within its range.
• Last: Targets the last bloon visible within its range.
• Close: Targets the closest bloon visible within its range.
• Strong: Targets the strongest bloon visible within its range.

Additionally, the beast has a button "Place Beast" that places the beast and repositions it anywhere within valid water placement of the Beast Handler. Any contributing Beast Handlers will also grant range that allows repositioning of that beast, as long as they 1) are merged directly into the main handler and 2) have some part of their range overlap with the main handler.

Full Popology

Statistics

Updated as of Version 43.3

Base Stats

• Great White:
  • Projectile, normal type, 40 range, 1.1s, 1 impact. Spends 0.4s to jump to the target and creates a splash, which applies a 0.2s knockback to damaged non-blimp bloons that moves bloons at -150% speed, -125% speed if Ceramic or Lead. Great White attempts to calculate for Takedown. While latching on a bloon, creates a regular Splash centered at the Great White. Latches up to 5 seconds before disappearing. Target being latched moves at 60% speed if can't be instantly killed, including MOAB-class bloons, which is calculated after knockback.
• Takedown:
  • Triggered from Great White, instakill, normal type, only targets up to Ceramics, spend (√lifelost + 2 (if the bloon is lead) + 1)/4 seconds to take down a bloon.
• Splash:
  • Burst, normal type, 10 blast radius, 0.55s attack cooldown, 12 damage, 10 pierce. Applies a 0.2s knockback to damaged non-blimp bloons that moves bloons at -150% speed, -125% speed if Ceramic or Lead.

Crosspathing interactions

Unlike the majority of towers in BTD6, the Beast Handler does not benefit from crosspathing. Each path spawns or upgrades a beast, rather than directly affecting the other crosspaths.

Merging interactions

• Default Power: 8
• Min Power: 8
• Max Power: 24
• Bonus Stat Changes: Damage increases by 3 every 2 power, pierce increases by 5 every 4 power. At the default 8 power, starts with 12 damage and 10 pierce. Can apply Takedown on MOABs for 1s at max power.
  • Equations: Where p is power, floor() function is rounding down, and ceil() function is rounding up:
    • Damage (grapple and splash): floor(3p/2)
    • Pierce (grapple and splash): floor(5p/4)
    • Splash cooldown: 0.645-19p/1600
  • Default Power (8, grapple and splash): 12 damage, 10 pierce.
  • Max Power (24, grapple and splash): Damage increased to 36, pierce increased to 30.

Attack Interactions

See also: Attack Interactions/Bloons TD 6/Support

Updated as of Version 38.3

WIP This section is yet to be updated... Interactions relating to how it grabs onto bloons may need some tweaking; currently only know a couple of really noticeable elements

• Place Fish:
  • Passive
  • Deploy Beast
• Merge Into:
  • Passive
  • Target Tower(s) (Target: own Great White, other 3+-x-x handlers)
  • Merge
• Merge From:
  • Passive
  • Target Tower(s) (Target: own Great White, other fish handlers up to 3-x-x)
  • Merge
• Great White:
  • Normal
  • Latch To Bloon
  • Extra Damage (12)
  • Knockback (-40%, on top of splash)
• Great White Takedown:
  • Normal
  • Target Bloon
  • Latch To Bloon
  • Extra Damage (500,000)
• Great White Takedown (max power):
  • Normal
  • Latch To Bloon
  • Extra Damage (500,000)
  • Targets up to MOAB
• Great White Splash:
  • Normal
  • Extra Damage (12)
  • Knockback (-150% Bloon, -125% Lead/Ceramic)

Costs

Note: This section does not take into account Beast Handler merges.

Updated as of Version 46.0. Listed prices exclude external buffs, any sacrifices, and Monkey Knowledge.

This upgrade's prices (or included crosspath's prices) are affected by the following MK: Better Sell Deals

Strategy

Summary

Great White offers extra knockback onto stronger bloon types including MOAB-class, supporting the defense with a limited amount of single-target instakills alongside some collateral and a slight amount of MOAB-class knockback. However, it is quite expensive for what it offers and doesn't do much damage to higher-tier blimps. It has a situational amount of group-popping power through its recurring splash attack while slowly pulling bloons into the water; this adds collateral damage as it grapples stronger targets at the same time.

When compared to Barracuda, Great White has a greater weakness against large amounts of Fast Bloons, because its latching and splash attacks aren't fast enough to catch the fast-moving Yellows and Pinks. However, the Great White is better at supporting a stable defense against singular targets such as MOABs and can act as collateral damage versus Ceramics. While the Great White is more reliant on cleanup from other towers, the Great White packs a punch against powerful waves of bloons. Great White offers high but inconsistent DPS suited best for mid-game stages (R40-79).

Tips

• A low degree Great White can serve as an effective Round 40 band-aid, slowing the MOAB down, dealing decent damage, and doing very good versus the insides. Merging to degree 12/24 allows its thrashes to oneshot Ceramics.
• Try to make use of Strong targeting to let the Great White take advantage of the stronger bloons. The knockback inflicted on a singular blimp can act as a cheaper Knockback Super Monkey that only affects a single target.
• Speed buffs are helpful for Great White's splash attack to hit more often.
• Even though crosspathing doesn't have specific interactions with the Great White, 3-2-0 Great White is generally better, since the Adasaurus can be used to break apart faster-moving bloons into manageable pieces. 3-0-2 could be helpful for picking up small amounts of Camos, though the shark doesn't gain camo detection that way.
  • Because the Shark has good synergies with birds, getting rid of large RBE while the birds pick up whatever is left, having multiple Beast Handlers with top-and-bottom hybrid crosspaths is a good choice.
• Merging the tower to max degree is recommended, as one-shotting blue MOABs is a very big power increase, along with the standard damage increases.
  • If budget is VERY tight (like on round 40), degree 12 lets its thrashes to oneshot Ceramics, 19/24 for Fortified Ceramics. However, degree 24 is not very expensive and is much more powerful, so still try to aim for that.
• The tower's incredibly fast MOAB instakill speed is a double edged sword. While it does make it very efficient at taking down single MOABs, it does not spend enough time out of the water to destroy nearby MOABs. The increased time to instakill a ceramic allows it to destroy multiple MOABs at once with its thrash attack, making it more favorable. However, not every round has ceramics that the great white can easily target.

Version History

Balance Changes

Bug Fixes and General Changes

This section is incomplete. You can help by expanding it.

Extra Notes (Version History)

Bugs

Current

• None (so far)

Patched

• [36.0] Great White appeared to do far too much damage than was intended. While seemingly viewed as an overtuned balance change by most of the BTD6 community, Ninja Kiwi patched it as a bug in 36.1.
• [37.0] Great White at max tier may attack far too quickly when paired with speed buffs. This might be related to recent balance changes of it. Patched in 37.2.
• [36.0] Great White sometimes may permanently apply knockback effects on current layers of MOAB-class bloons even after recently unlatching from them. Patched in 37.0.

Sounds

When upgrading to Great White:

• [???]

When relocating Great White:

• [splashing]

Gallery

Not enough images! There are not enough images on this page to sufficiently complete this page or section. You can help by uploading some images related to the article's subject(s). In particular, this article needs: Damage value info, knockback effect comparisons on Super Ceramics by power, etc., and also knockback comparison on Test Bloons.

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Crosspathing (Top: Path 2, Bottom: Path 3)

Crosspathing prior to fixing some missing eyebrows

Shark pulling a Ceramic and inflicting splash damage

Shark splash damage dealing 4 damage

Shark pulling a Lead Bloon

Maxed Shark pulling a MOAB

Shark knocking back a single MOAB among a group of MOABs

8 damage Shark (pre-43.0)

Great White splash damage centered on shark, with the 10 radius hitting a number of knocked back Ceramics

Great White going back to water if intended target to grab is already popped

Great White going back to water if intended target to grab is already popped, but as a pow

Power Appearances

8/24 power Shark

16/24 power Shark

24/24 power Shark

Official artwork

Upgrade portrait

Upgrade icon

Instamonkey icon

Trivia

• Great White had two separate bugs that made it attack far quicker than intended. The first one, in version 36, happened when the beast did not instakill a moab, whereas the second bug, in version 37, was simply when the beast was at high degrees.
• Great White is the cheapest tower able to impede the movement of a MOAB-class bloon.