# Your First Ten Waves

> Beginner guide to Blockade Brigade: where to build your first Cannon Towers, why bends and hills matter, what comes before wave ten and what to research.

- Page: https://blockadebrigade.com/strategies/first-ten-waves
- Site: Blockade Brigade, a tower defense game for Windows PC (https://blockadebrigade.com/)
- Last updated: 2026-10-20
- Text generated: 2026-11-02 07:36 UTC

The first ten waves teach you the game. Lose a few lives here and you will feel it at wave thirty.

- **150** gold to start (before research)
- **20** lives: one lost for each enemy that gets through, more for bosses
- **50** gold for a Cannon Tower, the only tower that needs no research
- **60** power from the base: fifteen new Cannons' worth

### Start with the Cannon

The [Cannon Tower](https://blockadebrigade.com/towers/cannon) costs 50 gold, needs no research, and hits both ground and air. It is the tower you can always afford, and it never goes out of date: it upgrades all the way to level 10. Your 150 starting gold buys three.

- Where to build
- **Build on a bend.** A tower on the inside of a curve sees the path twice: on the way in and on the way out. Same gold, twice the shots.
- **Build high.** Every level of height adds 8% damage and half a tile of range. A Cannon on a hill 3 high does 24% more damage than the same Cannon on the flat. See [Terrain is a weapon](https://blockadebrigade.com/strategies/terrain).
- **Build near the entrance, not the base.** A tower by the base only gets a go at what everything else missed.
- **Upgrade before you spread.** Two well-placed, upgraded Cannons beat five scattered ones.
- **Changed your mind?** Selling a tower in the first 15 seconds after you place it gives every coin back. After that you get 75%.

### What turns up before wave ten

A new kind of enemy joins almost every wave. In the order they first appear:

- [Tin Trooper](https://blockadebrigade.com/enemies/tin_trooper) from wave 1: the standard enemy, 100 health, in packs.
- [Raptor](https://blockadebrigade.com/enemies/raptor) from wave 2: twice the Tin Trooper's speed, half its health. Spread your damage along the path so it cannot sprint past one tower.
- [Tank](https://blockadebrigade.com/enemies/tank) from wave 3: slow, 300 health and armour. Your first hint that the Cannon struggles against armour.
- [Razorwing](https://blockadebrigade.com/enemies/razorwing) and [Drone](https://blockadebrigade.com/enemies/drone) from wave 4: they fly. Ground-only towers cannot touch them, so keep some towers that hit air. Drones arm up as the waves go on.
- [Hexguard](https://blockadebrigade.com/enemies/hexguard) and [Bug](https://blockadebrigade.com/enemies/bug) from wave 5: the Hexguard's hex shield has to come down before its health does; the Bug is a small, quick flyer that grows stronger in later waves.
- [Clanker](https://blockadebrigade.com/enemies/clanker) and [Inferno](https://blockadebrigade.com/enemies/inferno) from wave 6: the Clanker is small, slow and very well plated (yes, that one). The Inferno shrugs off slows and freezes and protects the enemies near it from them too.
- [Spider](https://blockadebrigade.com/enemies/spider) from wave 7: quick, and it skitters about unpredictably.
- [Heavy Knight](https://blockadebrigade.com/enemies/heavy_knight) from wave 8: 400 health behind heavy armour. Its plates break off as its armour goes.
- [UFO](https://blockadebrigade.com/enemies/ufo) from wave 9: a shielded flyer that turns armour plates lying on the path into new Clankers, and drops aliens when it dies.
- [Giant Worm](https://blockadebrigade.com/enemies/giant_worm) from wave 10: the first boss. Read [Worm, Blimp, Mech](https://blockadebrigade.com/strategies/bosses) before it arrives.

### Your next two towers

Every tower but the Cannon and the Power Plant is unlocked in Research with XP, which your kills earn. The two cheapest are worth getting first:

[Cold Snap](https://blockadebrigade.com/towers/cold_snap) (75 gold, 50 XP to research) slows everything it hits, ground and air, and its critical hits freeze. It does little damage itself: its job is to keep enemies in front of your other towers for longer. Put it where the path enters your killing ground. It also cools hot guns in its range (see [Power and heat](https://blockadebrigade.com/strategies/power-and-heat)).

[Acid Tower](https://blockadebrigade.com/towers/acid) (120 gold, 75 XP to research) sprays several hoses at once and melts health. Ground only, and best where the path curves and enemies bunch up, which is exactly where Cold Snap leaves them.

The Clanker says

New here? The towers are the pointy ones.

### Pick your cards

After every wave you choose one of three reward cards. Early on, a gold card or a stat card for the Cannon you built first is a safe pick. You start with 6 rerolls: keep a few for later waves, when the cards are worth more. More in [Gold, Miners and reward cards](https://blockadebrigade.com/strategies/economy).

### Checklist for wave ten

1. At least two towers that hit air.
2. A Cold Snap at the front of your defence.
3. Your best guns on the highest ground you can reach.
4. Something for the armour coming next: read [Armour, shields and flyers](https://blockadebrigade.com/strategies/armour-shields-flyers).

[← All guides](https://blockadebrigade.com/strategies) [Next: Terrain is a weapon →](https://blockadebrigade.com/strategies/terrain)

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About the whole site: https://blockadebrigade.com/llms.txt