Bosses and late-wave pushes
Modes run 20 waves on Easy, 30 on Medium and 50 on Insane, and the official badge counts show the cliff is at the start of the ladder, not the end. When a run leaks, note the failing wave, find where enemies crossed, upgrade near the breach before adding units, and move a unit before swapping one.
A match in Alliance Tower Defense is a fixed number of numbered waves — 20 on Easy, 30 on Medium, 40 on Hard, 50 on Insane and 60 on CRAZY, as the in-match counter shows — and the last few waves of every mode are where defenses that looked fine stop working.
How the curve is built
Nothing about the modes suggests a different rule set at the end. What changes is pressure: the same lane, the same units, more of everything, plus the leaders that survive long enough to reach your back line.
Three numbers describe the whole curve, and all three come from the game rather than from a tier list:
| Mode | Waves | Badge holders | Share of Easy clearers |
|---|---|---|---|
| Easy | 20 | 615,739 | 100% |
| Medium | 30 | 227,059 | 36.9% |
| Hard | 40 | 169,541 | 27.5% |
| Insane | 50 | 144,891 | 23.5% |
| CRAZY | 60 | 102,184 | 16.6% |
Read the middle column as the shape of the difficulty. Going from Medium to Insane adds 20 waves for a loss of only about 82,000 badge holders, while going from Easy to Medium alone costs nearly 390,000. In other words the cliff is at the start of the curve, not the end: surviving past Medium means you probably have a team that can go the distance.
The late-wave checklist
When a run starts leaking, work down this list in order rather than changing everything at once.
- Find the failing wave. The counter is on the HUD; note the number. That is your benchmark for the next attempt.
- Look at where the enemies crossed, not at what killed them. A leak is a coverage problem first and a damage problem second.
- Upgrade the unit nearest the breach before adding a new one. Match cash is finite and upgrades are the cheapest way to add stopping power.
- Re-place rather than re-roll. Moving a unit to cover two stretches of path costs nothing and often buys the wave.
- Only then swap a unit. One change per attempt, or you learn nothing.
- Use Auto Skip as a signal. A lane you can't skip safely is a lane that isn't holding.
What to expect past wave 30
Hard runs to 40 waves, Insane to 50 and CRAZY to 60, so the last three rungs all have a marathon phase. Two practical consequences:
- Upgrade economy has to be front-loaded. Cash earned in the first half is what pays for the second half; sitting on a wide, low-level formation through wave 25 leaves you nothing to escalate with.
- Coverage has to survive attrition. A defense that depends on one perfect corner is one reposition away from a wipe. Spread the damage across the lane before the pressure phase starts.
When to walk away from a run
If you have re-placed, upgraded and can't move the failing wave by more than two or three, the run is a team problem, not a tactics problem. Finish the mode you can finish, bank the Coins, and come back with a stronger squad — the ladder is not going anywhere, and Easy at 20 waves remains the fastest way to refill the bank.
Next: Coins, farming and long-term goals, or Badges and completion rates for the full official data set.
