Cannonball Clash

Cannonball Clash is a tower defence on a beach. Pirate ships sail down the screen toward your port and your cannons fire at them. Clear the first 10 waves to defend the island and bank a bonus, then the endless waves begin: the same ships come back with more hull every wave, and nobody clears them all. How deep you get is the whole leaderboard.

Where to find it

Play at Cannonball Clash in the Games hub. The button in the bottom corner of the map switches to full screen; on phones it fills the screen, on desktop it uses the browser's real full-screen mode.

How a run works

1. Build phase. Before the first ship sails you start with 200 gold and 6 empty slots along the coast. Tap a slot to pick a cannon (each type shows its range while you choose), then press Start Wave 1. Nothing spawns until you do.
2. Waves. Cannons fire on their own at the nearest ship in range. Tap a cannon and then a ship for focused fire — 1.5x damage, and it ignores range. Sunk ships pay gold straight away, and you can buy or upgrade mid-wave too.
3. Between waves you are back in the build phase: buy cannons on empty slots, or tap a cannon you own to upgrade it. Every cannon climbs to Lv10 (see Upgrades below).
4. Lives. A ship that reaches the port line costs a life. You have 3 for the whole run, and when the last one goes the run ends and your score is submitted automatically, including the ships you sank in that final wave.
5. Bank run. From the build phase after any cleared wave you can stop deliberately and keep everything. It exists so a long run does not have to be thrown away when you need to leave — closing the page mid-run is the one thing that forfeits.

Ships

• Sloop — 2 HP, pays 10 gold when sunk.
• Brigantine — 4 HP, pays 20 gold when sunk.
• Galleon — 8 HP, pays 35 gold when sunk.
• Ghost Ship — 20 HP, pays 80 gold when sunk.

Cannons

• Iron Cannon (50 gold) — balanced damage and range.
• Fire Cannon (80 gold) — sets ships burning for damage over time.
• Chain Shot (80 gold) — slows whatever it hits.
• Grapeshot (100 gold) — splash damage to every ship near the hit.

Upgrades

Tap a cannon you own and the picker shows its level, its tier, the perks it already has and what the next level unlocks. Each level adds damage, rate of fire and range: a Lv3 cannon deals 60% more per shot and fires 40% faster than a fresh one, and a Lv10 cannon deals 235% more, fires 110% faster and reaches 65% further. Burn and slow last longer with level too. Levels have tiers, shown on the slot badge: Veteran from Lv4, Master from Lv7, Legendary from Lv10.

Every cannon type gains two perks at Lv5 and Lv8 that stay for the rest of the run:

• Iron Cannon — Lv5 Heavy Shot (+25% damage); Lv8 Rapid Reload (20% faster reload).
• Fire Cannon — Lv5 Deep Burn (Burn deals 50% more); Lv8 Wildfire (Burn lasts 50% longer).
• Chain Shot — Lv5 Anchor Chain (Slows ships to 35%); Lv8 Tangle (Slow lasts 50% longer).
• Grapeshot — Lv5 Wide Spread (+30% splash radius); Lv8 Dense Shot (Full damage across the whole splash).

Each level costs more than the last, in gold:

A full coast of Lv10 cannons costs more gold than any run pays out, so the interesting decision is which cannons to push. A couple of Legendary Fire Cannons in the middle slots beat six Veterans spread thin.

Endless waves

Wave 10 is the last authored wave. After it, the pirates keep coming in a rotation of fast floods, slow walls and Ghost Ship fleets. Endless ships start at 115% hull and gain about 12% more every wave while paying the same gold, so your income flattens as their hull climbs. Even a coast of Legendary cannons eventually cannot sink them fast enough; the run is meant to end. Expect a strong board to fall somewhere in the twenties. The server accepts no clear past wave 33, the point where even six Legendary Fire Cannons run out of firepower.

What you earn

• 5 MPC for every campaign wave you clear (waves 1 to 10).
• 2 MPC for every ship you sink during the campaign.
• +50 MPC for clearing wave 10. This is banked the moment the wave ends, so pushing on into the endless waves can never cost you.
• 6 MPC for every endless wave you clear. Endless ships do not pay per kill.

Payouts run from 5 to 270 MPC; the cap is reached around wave 20. Coin boosts, the featured-game multiplier and your active pet's happiness are applied on top of whatever you earn.

Plays and your pet

• You get 3 runs a day rather than the usual 5, reset at midnight MPT. VIP members get 5.
• Your active pet earns 15 XP plus 2 per wave cleared (up to 75), and +5 happiness.

Trophy

Cannonball Clash's all-time record in The Trophy Case is the most waves cleared, with ships sunk as the tiebreak. Every ten-wave clear from before the endless waves counts as 10, so the old record stands and can only be beaten by going deeper.

Good habits

1. Never start wave 1 empty. Two Iron Cannons on the middle slots cover most of the map and leave gold for a third; the ships in the first waves are fast and you cannot buy your way out once they are past you.
2. Mix cannon types. Chain Shot buys time on the slow galleons, Fire Cannons melt Ghost Ships, Grapeshot punishes the packed floods. A coast of six identical cannons gets found out by whichever endless shape it is weak to.
3. Upgrade the cannons that are already firing. Range grows with level, so a Lv3 cannon in a good slot beats a new Lv1 in a bad one. Past wave 10, pour the gold into two or three cannons rather than six: the Lv5 and Lv8 perks are where the real jumps are.
4. Bank a good run. After wave 10 every extra wave is worth a little; the trophy is worth more than the coins, so keep going while you are winning, and bank when you are not.

Related pages

• Games
• Loop Defense
• The Trophy Case
• How to Earn MPC