Card Battles Guide: Getting From Good To Better

Overview

If you want to improve at Card Battles, this is the guide for you. For players who have unlocked most cards and want up their game.EDIT: Most of this information is probably redundant due to the addition of powers. Nevertheless, this should be a good reference for those who are still interested.

Intro

Hi, I’m 995fym. I play way too many card battles. If you also like card battles even though it hasn’t been updated in >2 years, here is some information that I hope helps you in your quest to be the very best. Please note that the introduction of battle powers change the meta greatly and that the tier lists are subjective and meant for a version of the game >2 years ago. But I hope that this is still a good starting point if you want to get better at this game.

Deck Strategy

You have a limited amount of cards to bring with you, 15 to be exact. Sadly, you can’t bring every tower, bloon send, and power card onto the battlefield, but you can engineer your deck to reduce the effects of randomness and to give you enough options to deal with most situations.

• It doesn’t matter what balance you use, as long as you have eco, defense, and a kill option.
• Pick cards that will be usable in the games that you play, and that have a lot of value.
• Think about a card’s offense, defense, cost, and eco before you choose it.

Here’s the deck that I use for late game. I got this from naturespirit. Overall a really solid deck. Swap out 3-0 tack for 1-1 boat and Juggerlanche for 4-0 sub on water maps. 2-3 super can be swapped with 4-2 heli or 0-4 ace based on preference.

I’ll put up other decks soon…

Good Cards

These cards are mostly ranked by their usefulness and the frequency at which they appear. Keep in mind that this list is subjective.

Expect to see at least one of these cards in every match.

• 0-0 Spike: an excellent eco card. Tower is useless.
• 2-0 Boomer: an excellent eco card. Tower is useless except for small amounts of leads. Bloon send can foil a weak starting defense
• 3-0 Tack: a good eco card and excellent early game defense.
• 1-2 Dart: the eco card with the highest return. The defense is ok.
• 4-0 Dart: your camo lead popper. The lead send is good if they don’t have a lead popper. Also shreds through midgame rushes with some help.
• 1-1 Wizard: a strong early game defense card because of the fireball. The yellow send is just to scare your opponent.
• Juggerlanche: in case your towers can’t handle everything. Strong midgame defense card.
• 1-4 ninja: A rather expensive but strong rush, but it’s the ability that’s worth it.
• 3-1 dartling: the Lazord Cannon! Defends almost all mid-game rushes and single MOABs with little help, and will shred BFBs with help. Also the prime target of Kidnap.
• 2-0 Farm: you have to be patient, but since farm eco outpaces bloon eco in the short run, you’ll get them mad monies in no time. Even better, it’s like stashing money into a bank account: you can sell it at any time. Good for maps with lots of room for farms.
• Tax: keep an eye on your opponent’s status and leech off their income. Good from early mid game onwards.
• 0-3 dart: 2-3 dart, but much cheaper, which is awesome. OK bloon send.
• 3-0 boomer: an early game pressure send with good eco to boot. Group bloon damage if you need it too.
• 4-2 Ninja: another linchpin on maps where Laser Cannon has no good spots. Camo leads are a good send as well. However, it is weaker than the Laser Cannon and will need some help.
• 4-2 dartling: Expensive late game card. Pops stuff with ease. The ZOMG send is GG, unless your opponent successfully counter-rushes. If your opponent defends this, the game will probably drag on a lot longer.
• 4-1 sniper: The tower will help stall singular blimps but the selling point is the BFBs. They come out on round 19 and are extremely cheap compared to the other BFB sends. Will end most games against weaker players. Use as your strongest rush for mid-length maps. Just be sure you can defend counterrushes if you send the BFBs.
• 3-0 farm: to use this card effectively you need to survive on bloon eco for early to mid game. Nevertheless this will get you lots of monies fast and if you are going for late game this is a better option than 2-0 farm. Slightly less safe because you lose more money to sell it but overall a strong eco option.

More map and strategy dependent.

• 0-4 ace: an excellent late game card, because Ground Zero is amazing. The pinks are amazing for eco too. However, going super late game can be difficult if you don’t have other towers that can deal lots of damage, like 4-2 dart.
• 3-0 bomb: Splash damage if you need it. Gives less eco than 3-0 boomer but can be used as a Temple sacrifice.
• 2-4 Tack: you’re probably going to use the camo regen zebras instead, but the ability is cool if you don’t have Juggerlanche. Mid game kill card against weaker players.
• 1-1 Buccaneer: excellent defense card. However, the bloon send, while usable, is not the best, and it’s a water tower.
• 4-0 Sub: another linchpin if there’s water. The camo regen lead send can be scary. Does not handle ceramics well.
• 2-3 super: Late game defense. Pops stuff with ease. The BFB send is strong.
  1-1 dartling: expensive and is not an eco send, but can handle a suprising amount of bloons. Lead send if you need it.

A little more situational.

• 3-1 Spike: the tower is trash, but that massive zebra rush is not. Mid game kill card against weaker opponents. Can be used to jam up mid-late game AI rounds.
• 3-2 Ice: Even though it’s a good tower, you’re probably not going to use it, because 10 affordable MOABs is scary to defend. Mid game kill card against weaker players. Can be used as a Temple sacrifice.
• 0-0 Dart: only the best tower in the game :P. The cheapest bloon send that sends out a good amount of bloons and has excellent eco for its cost. Useless as defense.
• 2-3 Dart: a strong early to mid game defense card, although rather expensive for early game. The bloon send isn’t too shabby either. It usually won’t kill but it will probably force a defensive option.
• 4-0 farm: Need to go really late game? This card is for you! The ZOMG can be used in a pinch, and the tower itself will help you get mad money really quickly. This is a good card to use as your strongest rush, so as long as you can defend late game, because the income from the farm can fuel infinite ZOMGs from the send. However, at late game you’ll probably have enough money to finance all operations anyways, so this might be a waste of a card slot if you can get enough eco.
• 2-2 ninja: the tower is weak, but the yellow send is good eco and can kill.
• 0-0 village: the tower does nothing. However, the yellow send is good eco and can kill. (2-2 ninja and 0-0 village are basically interchangeable)
• 1-3 ninja: an ok mid game defense tower. The flash bang helps buy time for bloon rushes but is more of an assist tower. If you think you can pull it off, the regen yellows can force a reaction and eat a lot of lives.
• 2-1 engineer: an excellent early game defense tower. However, the tower and its bloon send are rather expensive.
• 4-2 engineer: The tower is not the best. Although the Bloon Trap can help with money, the white bloon send is a better choice and a decent rush card. While it gives a big eco boost and can deal damage, you better be sure you can defend mid game after spending all that money.
• 1-3 wizard: the tower is trash, but regen camo ceramos are a super beefy mid game rush. Definitely not cheap to send or defend.
• 2-3 farm: the returns from the bank are not immediately obvious, but if you are patient this can pay off a lot. Just be careful of Kidnap because you won’t be able to get the stashed money.
• 2-4 dart: Super Funky Man Club! The tower can be used to beef up your dart monkeys and handle late game with some help. The BFB send is fairly decent as well. You’re going to have to bring some more friends, I mean dart monkeys, into your deck, but dart monkey has a pretty strong card set.
• 1-0 Engineer: good early game defense and excellent eco card. However, this tower can’t defend alone.
• 2-3 bomb: Late game defense, but the MOAB is the selling point. It’s cheap to send and is the earliest MOAB rush. Can force a reaction and even kill. However, this should not be your strongest kill card.
• 2-3 Boomer: an ok early mid game defense card, but the bloon send gives good eco and can kill weaker players.
• 2-3 sniper: Regen blacks are ok. This tower can handle mid-game rounds to the early late game rounds with some help. If your opponent rushes you you’re going to need some help due to sniper’s single targetting.
• 2-2 wizard: 4-0 dart is better, but maybe you want to use this on certain maps that don’t have lots of straight lines. One advantage is that unlike 4-0 dart, you can get away with this as your only camo defense on round 17 assuming your opponent doesn’t send you anything. However, 4-0 dart is better at popping ceramics.
• 4-2 heli: Late game defense. Pops stuff with ease. However, 2-3 super is generally better. Use this for maps that have ample space (A-Game for example)
• 4-2 super: believe it or not, $100000 is achievable provided you get enough eco. Grab some towers for sacrifices, build a temple or two, and you’re good. If they don’t die, expect the game to last much longer.
• 1-0 Sub: in case you need more eco.
• 2-0 Glue: in case you need more eco.

Bad Cards

These cards require a bit more thinking to use. Use them at your own risk.

• 1-1 ace: regen whites are an ok rush card, but the tower is weak. This card is also expensive.
• 0-0 farm: use this for short maps. You can farm and keep up the rush pressure. Not much use outside of that.
• 2-0 chipper: handles small groups of ceramics very well. The bloon send is not shabby either. However, it lacks grouped popping power, and there are better eco cards out there.
• 0-4 engineer: The eco loss for 2 ZOMGs is very high, but is quite cheap. In a pinch, you can Overclock some 2-3 supers or other strong towers to pop MOAB rushes. Otherwise pretty hard to use.
• Kidnap: stealing the tower that would defend the rush you sent usually seals the deal, but good players know to carry multiple towers to replace kidnapped ones.
• 2-3 sub: the tower is ok at defense, and the camo zebras are an ok rush. Not a bad card, but not a good card either.
• 2-2 glue: a bad tower, but the bloon send is the selling point. This is the earliest camo rush card, and most opponents will have little camo detection to deal with these bloons. Rather easily defeated by some 2-3 or 4-0 darts or a 2-2 wizard however.
• Bounty: a good late game eco card, but farms are more useful.
• 1-4 spike: use this for short maps where the spikes are going to be more effective. Be careful that AI leads don’t soak them up. The send is ok.
• 2-2 super: the same as 3-2 ice but more expensive.
• 2-1 sub: Maybe for some water maps, and that blue send is ok. But generally speaking Buccaneer is better.
• 2-1 bomb: the pink send is ok, and so is the tower, but 3-0 bomb has better utility.
• 1-3 buccaneer: the pink send is ok, but for a camo lead popping tower, it doesn’t pack much punch. Maybe you could bring this for a water map.
• 2-4 phoenix: camo blacks are ok, but this tower is expensive. Phoenix won’t help with mid-game rushes unless you have a lot of money.
• 2-2 ice: round 8 is a little late to send spaced whites, since you can send spaced blacks on round 5. Defense is ok.
• 1-1 dartling: can deal with small amounts of stongish bloons but struggles against grouped bloons. Rather expensive, and the lead send is weak.
• 2-1 spike: A trash tower. Regen leads are a good rush, but for $500 more you can make them camo. (4-0 sub)
• 4-0 ace: Can pop bloons at a high rate, but so can 3-2 dartling. Camo rainbows are ok, but camo regen zebras (Blade Maelstrom) are better.
• 2-2 mortar: Burny Stuff, but where’s the Signal Flare? The regen rainbows are also spaced, making them easier to pop in this case.
• 4-2 bomb; regen rainbows are strong, but this card is really expensive.
• Purge: turns weird bloons into normal bloons, but you probably want to turn weird bloons into no bloons. (Juggerlanche) If you have a bunch of bloon shredders that can’t detect camo and you want to try to get away with no camo defense, maybe you want this card.
• 0-0 bomb: 3-0 boomer has more utility and 1-1 wizard has more popping power. However, if you want to save cards, this card can let you do both.

Bad cards. Unless you have a specific strategy in mind, don’t use these..

• 3-1 mortar: 2-3 Boomer is better. Without Burny stuff, this tower can’t handle high level bloons. The blue send also lacks the aggression of 2-3’s green send. However, the blue send is cheaper.
• 0-4 mortar: the yellow send is ok, but the ability is not so much. This card would be better if it was a 0-3 mortar. By the time you can afford this, you probably already have towers that can defend camos (Laser Cannon).
• 4-2 glue: An ok tower, but unlike the 2-2, there’s alternatives for the camo regen pinks (Blade Maelstrom).
• 1-1 ninja: The cheapest camo detector, but camos never come alone. Use 1-0 engineer, 1-2 dart for the send, 2-3 dart for the camo.
• 2-4 boat: Can bring down single MOABs and BFBs, but you usually have to pop more than one. A cheap MOAB send, but the eco loss is crippling compared to the number of MOABs sent. 3-2 ice is better.
• Monkey Chill: slows opponent’s tower attack speed, but why not go for something more guaranteed, like Kidnap? However, if you’re going to go late game, this can be used to sorta counter against Sabotage (1-4 Ninja)
• 2-1 sniper: regen leads are ok, but the tower is not.
• 1-3 dartling: the tower is bad and the rush is too late. Use 2-3 bomb or Laser Cannon
• 3-0 wizard: single BFB is ok and so is the defense, but you probably should be using a different card.
• 4-2 chipper: can handle single MOABs and has a decent regen zebra rush. However, it’s a rather expensive card. Additionally, this can’t attack ZOMGS 🙁

You should almost never use these cards. (“Almost” is the key word here)

• Chain Lightning: zaps small bloons and only small bloons. It’s like having a tiny lightning wizard, I mean game loser with you.
• 4-2 boomer: camo whites are ok, but this tower is expensive. Use a Laser Cannon
• 1-2 sub: the tower is ok, but grouped leads are a weak send. Use 1-1 dartling
• 3-1 buccaneer: Weak tower and send for its cost.
• 1-1 village: not too much tactical value. Rainbows are outshadowed by mass zebras.
• 4-0 tack: good mid game defense, but can’t detect camos. Rainbows are outshadowed by mass zebras.
• 2-2 village: Radar Scanner, but must be paired up with another tower. A really expensive option. 1-3 Wizard’s send is better.
• 2-4 village: Call to Arms is useful and so are the BFBs, but you’re going to need a lot of high powered towers to take full advantage of this card.
• 3-0 downdraft: terrible tower. Good bloon send, but 1-3 Wizard has a stronger send.
• 0-0 super: Use 4-2 ninja.
• 0-0 Tack: 2-1 engineer, 1-2 dart
• 3-2 cleansing foam: Cleansing Foam is generally unreliable. Use a different tower for camo lead popping power. Use 2-3 sniper if you want the regen blacks.

Differences Between Cards and Assault

While the basic strategy for Card Battles is mostly the same as Assault, there are many major differences.

• More options for towers: a variety of defensive options.
• Less options for bloons: a lower variety of offensive options. Harder to layer bloons.
• Powerful cards are a big investment to make.
• You can’t upgrade towers, which means deck building for late game will make you more vulnerable to early game, and vice versa.
• Options are always limited: you won’t always have the right cards at the right time.
• Discarding cards costs money and time, and cards is luck based. Usually you won’t find a card that you just discarded, but sometimes this isn’t the case.
• On the flip side(heh), cards are usually more powerful than their assault counterparts.
• You will want to try and discard cards in a way that makes you lose the least amount of money.
• Tower spam is more limited since you have to refind towers you just placed down.
• Hopefully you won’t have to survive long enough to ability spam, but it’s much harder to do so without stockpiling ability towers.
• POWER CARDS. More on that later.

• Farms help save up for big purchases and provide financial security. This is more of a deal in Card Battles since you have to spend lots of money at once to get strong towers.
• I don’t recommend full farm eco. While this gives you more slots for towers, you have much less income flexibility and you lose out on bloon attacks.
• Each farm has its own merits. 3-0 is slightly better than 2-0 due to the ceramics but otherwise they are the best farms. Take 2-0 if you are going mostly farms, 3-0 if you are going eco. 4-0 can be used as your strongest card provided you strike early enough, but should be used sparingly. 0-0 will actually pay itself off after 2 turns (plus the money you get from selling) so you can place it down! Use this for extra bloon pressure or need another eco send. 2-3 is not a good card, but can serve as an alternate source of eco for longer maps.
• W
• Each farm has its own merits. (To be updated)

• You will have to make an investment every time you rush, so do it if you are sure that it will seal the deal or at least take a big chunk of lives off to your opponent.
• Don’t overextend your rushes.
• If you just defended a rush and you think that they’re going to rush again, hit them with a counter-rush, but you usually don’t want sell the tower(s) that you used to defend their rush. Chances are it’s probably a linchpin, both of which are probably your main defenders that you can’t afford to lose.
• Some eco cards can be used to rush, but most kill rush cards won’t get you much money back.
• Going all in is very risky, especially in this mode.

Power Cards

Obviously another big difference between Cards and Assault is Power Cards, which makes Cards a lot more unpredictable.

Chain Lightning is an inferior version of Juggerlanche. Best for neutralizing rushes smaller than a few zebras, but is pointless against rainbows and higher and regen bloons. You should use Juggerlanche instead.

Tax will let you steal your enemy’s money and check their eco. There’s not much you can do if it’s used against you. Not really worth it before round 5-6 except to stall your opponent’s farm, since it’s initially a net loss if you use it. Wait until you think your income and their income together will exceed $750.

• This can take a big chunk out of your opponent’s wallet if they have a high bloon income, and gets increasingly more useful the later the game, even if your opponent has farms.
• Although not practical, you can tell if they send a rush that knocks their eco down.

Juggerlanche will stop your opponent’s rushes flat, unless you face regen or rainbows and higher, in which case you’re gonna need a few more towers to pop the remains, especially if they’re MOABs. Don’t rely on this card. Hopefully you will never have to use this card, but you never know…

• Best used in mid to mid-late game, since it’s too expensive to use early on, too weak for MOABs.
• If you think the natural bloons are going to get you, Juggerlanche can help you a lot.

Kidnap is not cheap, and should be used to assist mid/mid late game rushes after a boost or when a single strong tower (usually a Laser Cannon, Bloonjitsu, or Reactor Sub, which I call linchpins) is placed down.

• Decks with Juggerlanche and multiple defense cards/linchpins are much harder to take down. Best to use this card against an unprepared opponent.
• Send in the rush when you have enough money for Kidnap afterwards and their defense looks weak. If they didn’t place a linchpin beforehand or don’t place one down during the rush, you win :P.
• If they had one or did place down a linchpin, steal their tower and you win :P.
• But you can do better than that. If the rush is beefy enough, wait until they boost then steal their tower, so that their boost is a waste.
• 4-2 tack, 1-3 Wizard, and 3-2 Ice are the best rush pairs, since these rushes are very difficult to pop. If possible, let them pop a few layers first before stealing their tower so that the faster children will get to the exit before they respond.
• BFBs might work, if you kidnap after they turn into MOABs.
• If you’re really confident, you can use this card early with a green/yellow/pink/black rush. However, your best chances at using this card are in the Juggerlanche rounds
• The strategy here is fairly deep, so I’ll save that for a later section.

Bounty is an interesting eco card. You’ll need to pop at least 250 bloons for the cash earned to make this card a good eco card. A weak eco in early game and hard to profit off of until you enter late game, since you’ll have to pop a lot of bloons for this to be worth it. Furthermore, this is a purely eco card, which limits your offensive and defensive options. But if you have a lot of bloons, this can easily generate a ton of money for you.

Monkey Chill is a rather strange offensive card. Generally not worth using since Kidnap is better for a cheaper cost. Pairs well with regen bloons if you choose to use this.

Purge reduces most expensive rushes into their normal bloon counterparts. However, bloons are still bloons, and you will definitely need help popping the resulting bloons. Doesn’t help against normal bloons and MOABs, which means that it usually doesn’t help. While you could try and get away without camo detection, your opponent probably has enough attack options to punish you. Juggerlanche is more reliable, but you can use this card for some weird strategies.

Kidnap/Linchpin Strategy

• Laser Cannon, Bloonjitsu, Nuclear Sub (the linchpin)
• 2-0 Farm (Optional)
• Tax (Optional)
• 1-4 Ninja (Optional)
• Juggernaut/2-2 Wizard (I use Juggernaut, but if you’re a Wizard guy…)
• Juggerlanche (Optional)

• Rake in mad eco and buy one of these linchpins to save you some grief (rounds 11-18 to be precise), unless you opponent gets you before/after you place it down (more on that later). Definitely a late game strategy, because you can defend anything with enough skill. Laser Cannon is the best overall choice, but Bloonjitsu and Nuclear Sub can work depending on the map.
• Even if you bought Nuclear Sub, you’re going to need another camo lead option, like Juggernaut. Although Juggernaut is much better overall, if camo leads are going to ruin your day, Lightning Wizard is more consistent at popping those, since the camo lead sends in Card Battles are quite small. Even better that regen bloons will be less of a problem since you have a linchpin already.
• This strategy is weak against rush MOABs, so the Sabotage will help out while you defend or counter rush.

• Any strong rush, but 1-3 Wizard and 3-2 Ice are the best
• Kidnap (The anti-linchpin)
• Enough said on how to do it.

• Linchpin: bring the optional cards if you think your opponent will use the Anti. In the dangerous rounds, try and keep at least one linchpin and Juggerlanche in your hand at all times. Add Sabotage if it’s round 19+. Try to have one more linchpin on the field than you really need. It doesn’t really matter whether you boost the first or the second tower, because if you boost too early, it’s wasted if the linchpin is Kidnapped, and if you boost too late, the bloons will get through, whether the linchpin is Kidnapped or not.
• Anti: you need to try and make your attack as guaranteed as possible, because if your opponent defends it, you will have wasted a lot of cash. Try and time your Kidnap for the boost. If you can force your opponent to boost in early game, try to guess when they’ll boost again.
• Linchpin: if you defend their rush, you’re going to be in good shape for a while, unless their rush was less than $3000. However, consider putting down some more defense or saving resources in case they try again.
• Anti: if your rush was beaten, you don’t have many options, since just rushing again probably won’t work against their newly placed linchpin. Hope that you don’t have to defend against a counter rush. If they don’t rush you, and they didn’t put down more defense, then think about trying again, unless it’s MOAB territory.
• Both: if the rush is defended, it will be a scramble to see who can get the linchpin or the anti first. Go as fast as possible when discarding cards. A lot of the strategy here is timing your plays right and guessing your opponent’s reaction. These strategies are both high risk, high reward if you can pull them off.

Who says you can’t combine both Kidnap and the Linchpin in one deck? Going for the versatility, however, will probably limit you to early to mid-late game.

Club Modes

Because of the weirdness of these modes, the card tier list gets thrown out of the window. More to be added soon.

• Obviously you don’t know what deck you are going to get, so hope for something good.
• Since you both have the same starting hand, how you trash your unusable cards will heavily affect the first few rounds.
• There is one deck that appears more frequently than others. I’ll post it here soon.

• Because you can have more defensive options, Card Battles Bananza is more interesting.
• You can actually build a max temple!
• Tax is extremely useful, since you can make a profit right off the bat.

• Some of the meme cards actually become useful in this mode because their sends come out early.
• Kidnap is absurdly useful because you can just take away your opponent’s boosted towers.

• If you want to rush your opponent, bring a linchpin to defend against your own send.
• Bounty will work on your bloon sends too. Maybe you want to bring it?
• Don’t bother bringing farms. Bloon eco is much more profitable.
• Basically Bananza in disguise, prepare for late game.

• A lot more luck dependent than Assault, since whoever has the better opening hand will have a strong advantage. Probably a good idea to play for early game.

The End

Thank you for taking the time to read this guide. Please only reply comments and suggestions related to this guide.

I’ll be updating this guide over time. I plan on rewriting most of the strategy section and adding sample decks.

Author: 995fym