Bulwark

Tower Defense Game: hold the winter road

0 20 Wave 0 / 10

SAVED

Bulwark

MANNING THE ROAD

About Bulwark

Bulwark is a free 3D tower defense game played in the browser on desktop, phone and tablet. The Kingdom of Hollin sits in a high valley behind one road, and the Rime Clans have come down from the ice fields in deep winter. You are the Marshal of that road. Build towers on the plots beside it, upgrade them, and keep the raiders from reaching the keep.

Two things set it apart from a classic tower defense. Captain Wren Hale fights beside your towers: tap the ground and she walks there, holds raiders on the road, and sounds a Rally Horn or makes a Shield Charge. And your towers weather. Once the snow comes, every tower slowly gathers Wear, firing slower until it freezes, so each break between waves asks whether your gold goes on repairs or on new towers.

How to Play Bulwark

Build: tap or click a glowing plot beside the road and choose a tower. Plots on high ground reach 15% further.

Upgrade, repair and sell: tap a tower to open its ring. Selling returns 70% of what you spent.

Waves: call the next wave when you are ready. Between waves there is a ten-second repair window, and calling the next wave early pays gold.

Hold: you start each map with 20 Hold, and every enemy that reaches the keep costs some: 1 for most, 2 for a Ram Crew, 3 for an Ice Troll, 5 for a boss. Lose all of it and the map is lost, and you can retry from the last wave checkpoint. A win earns one star, two with 12 or more Hold left, three with 18 or more.

Wear: a ring on the snow around a worn tower shows its Wear, amber from 50, red from 80 and ice blue when it is frozen, and tapping the tower gives the number. Repair between waves, or let Wren mend the tower she stands beside.

Keyboard: Tab cycles plots, 1 to 4 build, U upgrades, R repairs, S sells, Q and E use Wren's abilities, Space calls the wave, F doubles the speed, arrow keys or WASD pan, Esc pauses.

Tips

Watch the rings, not just the snow. The ring on the snow around a worn tower (and the five pips above it) turns amber at 50 Wear and red at 80, and goes pale blue when it freezes. A tower in the red is firing at half speed, which is often worth a repair before you spend on a new tower.

Spend the repair window. Repairs only happen between waves, and they cost more the more worn and the higher the tier of the tower, so small repairs every break are cheaper than letting a tower freeze.

Park Wren where she helps twice. Standing beside a worn tower near the road lets her hold raiders and mend that tower at the same time.

Shieldbearers shrug off arrows. Arrows do half damage to them; a Stonethrower's splash does not care about their shields.

Rams go for towers. A ram crew stops to batter the nearest tower and adds Wear with every blow. Splash it, hold it with Wren, or knock it back with Shield Charge.

Time the Rally Horn to a crowd. The horn lasts six seconds and then needs 25 seconds to recover. It speeds every tower within about seven and a half metres of where Wren stands when she blows it, by 30%, so sound it when a group reaches the towers beside her, not at the start of the wave.

Tier 4 is a one-way door. A fully upgraded Archer Loft becomes either a Longbow Gallery, which hits hard and crits at long range, or a Volley Roost, which looses three arrows at a time. The choice cannot be undone for that tower, and both still hit fliers, so pick for the raiders you expect.

Call early when you are ahead. Calling the next wave before the break ends pays two gold for every second left.

Frequently Asked Questions

How does tower weathering work, and when should I repair?

Once snow starts to fall, every tower gathers Wear from 0 to 100. At 50 Wear it fires 25% slower, at 80 half as fast, and at 100 it freezes and stops firing. The ring of pips above each tower shows its Wear. Repair a tower between waves, during the ten-second repair window, for gold that grows with its Wear and tier, or send Captain Wren to stand beside it: she mends it at any time.

What does the Hearthfire tower's warmth do?

A Hearthfire burns enemies and strips the ice armour frost shamans give them. Its warm radius, drawn as a glow on the snow, halves the Wear snow puts on every other tower inside it and melts the snow off their roofs.

How do I move the hero, and what are Rally Horn and Shield Charge?

Tap or click the ground and Captain Wren walks there. She holds up to two enemies on the road and fights them. Rally Horn makes towers near her fire 30% faster for six seconds; Shield Charge is a dash that damages enemies and knocks them back along the road. Both have cooldowns. If she falls she returns at the keep after a short wait.

Which towers can hit Snow Harriers?

Only Archer Lofts, and the Longbow Gallery and Volley Roost they can become, can hit Snow Harriers, which fly straight from the ridge to the keep instead of following the road. Stonethrowers, Watch Halls and Hearthfires cannot reach them, and neither can Captain Wren. Her Rally Horn does help: it makes the Lofts near her fire 30% faster for six seconds.

Does Bulwark save mid-map?

It saves a checkpoint at the start of every break between waves, with your towers, their Wear, your gold and Hold, and Wren's position. Continue on the title screen resumes from the last checkpoint. Leaving in the middle of a wave keeps the checkpoint from before that wave, so a reload never keeps that wave's gold.