Ace Pilot

Ace Pilot

ARTICLE

GALLERY

HISTORY

"Flies in a circular path, shooting enemies in its line of fire and dropping bombs."

―Store Description

"Rain fire from above!"

―Former Store Description

Description

The Ace Pilot is an intermediate tower that can be bought for 3,500. Unlike other ground towers, the attacking unit of the Ace Pilot, the plane, is an air unit.

The Ace Pilot will circle around the runway. At Level 2+, this can be changed to a figure eight. With its Toggle Reverse ability, it is possible to reverse its flight path. The Ace Pilot is armed with a pair of machine guns on each wing at the base and will shoot any enemy within its patrol radius. At Levels 2–5, the aircraft will periodically drop a bomb directly where the targeted enemy was last, exploding and damaging any enemies caught in the explosion. The explosion is separated into two spheres. Enemies in the inner sphere will be dealt 100% of the stated damage, while damage in the outer sphere decreases linearly by distance from the edge of the inner sphere to the edge of the outer sphere. Since its bombs deal splash damage, they ignore defense, dealing full damage to the enemies with defense. These bombs can also damage Lead enemies. Due to it being an air-based tower, it is immune to stuns, and because it is not a humanoid tower, it is also immune to debuffs that appear as icons on the tower. Additionally, because it is an air-based tower, it can detect Flying enemies.

At Level 4+, the Ace Pilot will also give nearby towers hidden detection, giving towers without hidden detection, like the Ranger, the ability to detect Hidden enemies. Its machine guns are then replaced by a single autocannon, granting it higher damage and firerate. The Ace Pilot boasts a high DPS, but its limiting range and inconsistent circling cripple its full potential. Therefore, in most situations, it does not operate at the highest DPS most of the time.

The Ace Pilot has a placement limit of eight per player.

Upgrades

Level 1 - Greased Guns - $200
+1 Damage Sell Price changes to $250

Level 2 - Bombs away! - $350
+Figure8 Flight Path •10 Damage •4 Bomb Cooldown •2.5 Explosion Range Sell Price changes to $366

Level 3 - Aerial Ace - $1,850
+1 Damage +0.5 Range 0.208 > 0.108 Firerate •20 Damage •4 Bomb Cooldown •2.5 Explosion Range Sell Price changes to $983

Level 4 - Spy plane - $3,200
+0.5 Range +3 Damage +Hidden Detection Grants Hidden Detection to nearby towers •7 Range •30 Damage •2 Bomb Cooldown •2.75 Explosion Range Sell Price changes to $2,050

Level 5 - The Surging Sky - $8,000
+1 Range +7 Damage 35% speed increase •40 Damage •1.5 Bomb Cooldown •3 Explosion Range Sell Price changes to $4,716

Ability

Toggle Reverse
Level 0+ 8s Cooldown Flies the opposite direction.

Stats Table

To see all the previous statistics of this tower, see the history page, while for the statistics without the Firerate Bug, visit the Firerate Bug page.

Level	Total Price	Normal Damage	Splash Damage[2]	Firerate	Bomb Cooldown[3]	Range	Explosion Range	Hidden Det. Range	Speed Multiplier	DPS[4]	Cost Efficiency
0	$550	2	N/A	0.208	N/A	7.5	N/A	N/A	1	9.62	$57.17
1	$750	3	N/A	0.208	N/A	7.5	N/A	N/A	1	14.42	$52.01
2	$1,100	3	10	0.208	4	7.5	2.5	N/A	1	16.92[5]	$65.01
3	$2,950	4	20	0.108	4	8	2.5	N/A	1	42.04[6]	$70.17
4	$6,150	7	30	0.108	2	8.5	2.75	7	1	79.81[7]	$77.81
5	$14,150	14	40	0.108	1.5	9.5	3	7	1.35	156.26[8]	$90.55

Skins

To see all the upgrades of a skin, see the gallery page.

Skin	Green	Red	Yellow	Aerial Ace
Rarity	Common	Common	Common	Common
Daily Store Cost	1,250	1,250	1,250	1,250
Obtained From	Basic Skincrate	Basic Skincrate	Basic Skincrate	Basic Skincrate
Skin	Purple	Navy	Pumpkin	Easter
Rarity	Common	Rare	Event	Legendary
Daily Store Cost	1,250	2,000	N/A	N/A
Obtained From	Basic Skincrate	Basic Skincrate	Pumpkin Skincrate	Ducky Revenge Regular Battle Pass

Strategy

• Place this tower where it can be used to its full potential. This primarily involves placing it at turns.
  • Placing it on a straight path is not recommended, as it will not shoot as often.
  • As the Ace Pilot flies clockwise, placing it so it covers a counterclockwise path turn will mean it has a greater chance of attacking an enemy.
    • The first roundabout on Wrecked Battlefield is a good example of this.
    • You can also place it on a clockwise path and use the Toggle Reverse ability to make it fly counterclockwise, having the same effect.
• When changing flight paths, the Ace Pilot will complete the previous flight path first before switching to the new flight path.
• The DJ Booth can significantly increase its attack radius.
  • However, the DJ Booth does not increase the Ace Pilot's flying radius.
• Try not to focus solely on Ace Pilots.
  • This is because faster enemies may walk right past the Ace Pilot without being damaged. If you want reliable defense, then a Minigunner or Cowboy could be a more reliable option.
• The Commander cannot decrease the firerate of the bombs. However, it can decrease the firerate of the guns.
  • Damage buffs due to a bug can only increase the damage of bombs, making the Mercenary Base much less effective.
• Unlike the Pursuit, the Ace Pilot does not stop to hover over an area whenever an enemy enters its range.
  • This means that the Ace Pilot is unlikely to be attacking all the time, reducing the effectiveness of the tower.
• In Hardcore mode, the Ace Pilot can be used as an effective way to deal with flying, lead and enemies with defense that appear early on during the game, such as the Lead, Hefty and Balloon.
• The bombs that the Ace Pilot drops are a good way to clear out hordes of weaker enemies, like the Abnormal or Slow, while also dealing additional damage to higher health enemies, like the Abnormal Boss.
  • The Ace Pilot's bombs completely ignore defense, dealing full damage to enemies with defense. Because of this, it can be useful against hordes of enemies with defense that appear early on during the game, like Heavies, Abnormal Bosses or Hefties.
  • While the bomb is aimed directly at the target, it may miss the enemy as it takes a little while for the bomb to land.
    • At Level 5, the missile has a faster projectile speed, so is less likely to miss the enemy's intended target.
• At Level 4+, the Ace Pilot gives nearby towers hidden detection for towers that do not have it, such as the Ranger.
  • Towers are only granted hidden detection if they are within the radius of the runway, which is quite small.
    • This radius cannot be increased by the DJ Booth.

Trivia

• It is stated by BelowNatural that the Ace Pilot was based on the Monkey Ace from the Bloons Tower Defense series.
  • However, its main method of distributing damage and the fact that it gives hidden detection are similar to those of the Aviator from Tower Battles.
• The Ace Pilot used to share its Level 2 icon with the Mortar's Level 4 icon but upside down.
• This is the first tower to able to give other towers hidden detection, with the second being the Firework Technician.
• Strangely, the Soul Stealer and Void Reaver can still spawn a Soul from the Ace Pilot, despite not being a humanoid tower.
• The model of the Ace Pilot may lag behind the actual tower, making it look like it attacks enemies that are out of its range.
• On Level 2 and 5, the Ace Pilot upgrade names have capitalization errors.
  • Additionally, there are two spaces between "Aerial" and "Ace" in the Level 3 upgrade name instead of one.
• The Level 5 upgrade name, "The Surging Sky" is a reference to a fake leak of the Level 6 Ace Pilot upgrade.

Update History

For previous cosmetic variations, see the gallery page.

Notes