Key takeaways
- Rerolling a Common or Rare orb. The ceiling is too low for the gems to matter.
- Putting a damage orb on a farm unit. Income units want cash or range, not damage.
- Assuming range extends splash. It extends reach, not the area of effect, so short-range AoE units gain less than the number suggests.
- Treating orbs as a substitute for upgrades or evolution. They multiply on top of those, so skipping upgrades to save for an orb is backwards.
- Hoarding unequipped orbs. An orb in inventory is a stat you paid for and are not using.
- Chasing rarity over roll value. Check the actual bonus percentage, not just the colour of the border.
- Never checking the stat panel after equipping. A few seconds of verification catches a mismatched orb before it costs you a run.
In ASTD, the orbs worth chasing are high-rarity damage orbs for your meta DPS units and high-rarity range orbs for long-range snipers and farm units — everything below that is filler you slot into starter towers until something better drops. Orb bonuses in All Star Tower Defense are percentage-based, so the same orb that turns a top-tier unit into a monster does almost nothing on a low base-stat starter. If you remember only one rule, make it this: match the orb’s stat to the unit’s strongest base stat, and never spend gems rerolling a Common orb.
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Quick comparison: the orb families worth your gems
Orbs in ASTD are grouped into a handful of stat families, and each family rolls a bonus value inside a band set by its rarity. The table below covers every family currently in the game, with the bonus range you can realistically expect from a high roll in that rarity tier.
| Orb (family + rarity) | Best for | Typical bonus at a high roll | Drop source | Reroll cost band |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mythic Damage Orb | Meta single-target DPS units | +30–40% damage | Top-band orb summons, limited event shops | Highest gem band |
| Mythic Range Orb | Long-range snipers, farm/income units | +20–25% range | Top-band summons, boss and raid drops | Highest gem band |
| Legendary Hybrid Orb (damage + range) | Mid-game all-rounders with one slot | +18–22% damage, +10–14% range | Mid-tier summons, event shops | Mid-to-high band |
| Legendary Attack Speed / Cooldown Orb | Units with long cooldowns or slow attack cycles | +15–20% attack speed or −15–25% cooldown | Mid-tier summons, boss drops | Mid band |
| Epic Cash / Income Orb | Farm units, early-game economy | +15–25% cash generation | Standard summons, wave and milestone rewards | Low-to-mid band |
| Rare / Common Damage or Range Orb | Starter towers only | +8–15% in the boosted stat | Starter rewards, standard summons | Low — not worth rerolling |
One caveat worth stating plainly: orb names, drop pools and bonus bands get adjusted between updates, so treat the numbers above as the current baseline from the in-game orb index rather than a permanent constant. The tier logic below holds even when the exact percentages move.
How orbs actually work in ASTD
An orb is an equippable item that applies a percentage modifier to one or more of a unit’s base stats while it stays equipped — it is not a flat addition and it is not a replacement for upgrades or evolutions.
- Read the unit’s base stats before you touch an orb. Because the bonus is a percentage, the unit’s base damage or base range is the multiplier. A unit with 100 base damage gains 35 damage from a 35% orb; a unit with 20 base damage gains 7. That single comparison decides more of your orb value than any rarity tier.
- Equip the orb, then open the unit’s stat panel and check the delta. The reason to verify rather than assume is that the panel applies every multiplier in order — upgrades, evolution, and orb — so the visible gain is not always the headline number on the orb.
- Only reroll if the orb’s rarity justifies the gem cost. A max-rolled Epic often beats a low-rolled Legendary in the same stat, so rerolling the Epic is usually the cheaper path to a better result.
- Lock the orb in and move to the next unit. An orb sitting unequipped in your inventory contributes exactly nothing, which is the single most common way players waste good drops.
Orb tier list, ranked by what the bonus actually does
| Tier | Orb | Damage bonus | Range bonus | Best on | Main trade-off |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| S | Mythic Damage Orb | +30–40% | — | Meta single-target DPS | Wasted slot on anything with low base damage |
| S | Mythic Range Orb | — | +20–25% | Long-range snipers, farm units | No damage gain; weak on short-range AoE units |
| A | Legendary Hybrid Orb | +18–22% | +10–14% | Mid-game all-rounders | Never the best in either stat |
| A | Legendary Attack Speed / Cooldown Orb | Indirect | — | Long-cooldown ability units | Raises throughput, not damage numbers — easy to underrate |
| B | Epic Cash / Income Orb | — | — | Farm units | Zero combat value once economy is solved |
| C | Common / Rare Damage or Range Orb | +8–15% | +8–15% | Starter towers | Cheap to get and cheap to outgrow |
S-Tier: the two orbs that define a build
A high-rolled Mythic Damage Orb is the correct answer for any unit whose job is deleting a single strong enemy, and a high-rolled Mythic Range Orb is the correct answer for units that already have the longest reach on your board or that you keep alive purely for income. These suit players who already have one or two meta units carrying their runs. The trade-off is opportunity cost: committing a top-band orb to a filler unit locks that value away until you can re-equip it.
A-Tier: hybrids and cooldown orbs
Legendary Hybrid Orbs suit players who are still filling out a roster and want one orb that is never dead weight, and Legendary Attack Speed or Cooldown Orbs suit ability-reliant units whose real damage comes from uptime rather than raw numbers. Neither is a mistake to equip. The trade-off is that a hybrid will lose a straight comparison against a specialist orb in the same stat, and cooldown orbs look unimpressive on a stat panel even when they are carrying your damage output.
B-Tier: cash and income orbs
An Epic Cash Orb on a farm unit is the highest-value early-game orb in the game, because extra economy compounds into everything else you buy for the rest of the run. It suits accounts with weak rosters and long farming phases. The trade-off is that it does nothing in combat, so the moment your economy is solved it becomes a placeholder.
C-Tier: common and rare orbs
These exist to fill empty slots on starter towers and to be sold or replaced. They suit brand-new accounts that have nothing else. The trade-off is obvious — an 8–15% bonus on a low base stat is a rounding error once you own anything better, which is exactly why rerolling them is a waste of gems.
Meta units versus starter towers: which orb goes where
| Your situation | Orb to chase first | Why | Skip for now |
|---|---|---|---|
| New account, no meta units | Epic Cash / Income Orb on your farm unit | A 15–25% economy boost funds every other purchase in the run | Mythic damage orbs |
| One meta DPS unit, filler everywhere else | Mythic Damage Orb on that unit | Percentage bonuses scale off its already-high base damage | Range orbs on the same unit |
| Full meta team, weak economy | Mythic Range Orb on the longest-range unit or your farm unit | Range keeps income and chip damage safe from repositioning | Hybrid orbs |
| Ability-reliant carries with long cooldowns | Legendary Attack Speed / Cooldown Orb | Uptime is the real damage limiter on these units | Common damage orbs |
| Limited gems, one orb slot to fill | Highest-rolled Epic you already own | A max Epic beats a low Legendary in the same stat | Rerolling anything below Legendary |
Reroll costs and drop sources: the real price of a good roll
Rerolling is where most players lose value, so it is worth doing the arithmetic before you tap the button. Assume a top-band reroll costs roughly 250 gems and that a top bonus band lands about one time in ten — a reasonable estimate from community-compiled reroll logs, not a published rate. That puts the expected cost of a single keeper at about 2,500 gems. If your passive income from daily rewards and event play is around 150 gems a day, you are looking at roughly 17 days of saving for one good roll.
Compare that to the alternative: orbs from summons and boss drops cost you nothing beyond the attempt, and the drop source already sets the rarity band before the roll even happens. In practice, farming the source you want and rerolling only within the top rarity band is cheaper than rerolling a mid-tier orb you already own. Where orbs come from, roughly in order of how good the average pull is: limited event shops and top-band summons, boss and raid drops, mid-tier summons, standard summons, and starter or milestone rewards last.
Mistakes that quietly waste orbs and gems
- Rerolling a Common or Rare orb. The ceiling is too low for the gems to matter.
- Putting a damage orb on a farm unit. Income units want cash or range, not damage.
- Assuming range extends splash. It extends reach, not the area of effect, so short-range AoE units gain less than the number suggests.
- Treating orbs as a substitute for upgrades or evolution. They multiply on top of those, so skipping upgrades to save for an orb is backwards.
- Hoarding unequipped orbs. An orb in inventory is a stat you paid for and are not using.
- Chasing rarity over roll value. Check the actual bonus percentage, not just the colour of the border.
- Never checking the stat panel after equipping. A few seconds of verification catches a mismatched orb before it costs you a run.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best orb in ASTD?
For raw combat value, a high-rolled Mythic Damage Orb on a meta single-target DPS unit is the strongest single slot in the game, with a high-rolled Mythic Range Orb close behind for long-range and income units. The “best” orb depends entirely on what you are equipping it to, because the bonus is a percentage of that unit’s base stat. An orb that is S-tier on one unit can be near-worthless on another.
Do orb bonuses stack with unit upgrades and evolutions?
Yes. Orb bonuses apply on top of upgrade and evolution multipliers rather than replacing them, which is why a fully upgraded meta unit gains far more absolute value from the same orb than a starter tower does. That stacking behaviour is the main reason the tier list above separates orbs by the unit they suit rather than by rarity alone.
Is it worth rerolling a Legendary orb?
Sometimes, but only if it is already in the stat family you need and the current roll is in the bottom part of its band. A low-rolled Legendary in the wrong stat is a worse investment than a max-rolled Epic in the right one. If you are saving toward a top-band reroll, expect to spend a few thousand gems for a keeper.
Which orb should I put on a starter tower?
Whatever Common or Rare orb you already have, matched to the stat the tower actually uses — damage on a damage tower, range on a range tower. Do not spend gems improving these orbs, because the unit’s low base stats cap how much a percentage bonus can give you. Save the good orbs for the unit that carries your runs.
How do I get orbs without spending gems?
Standard and mid-tier orb summons, boss and raid drops, event shops, and daily or milestone rewards all hand out orbs without a direct gem purchase. The trade-off is that the lower-tier sources are weighted toward lower rarity bands, so the average pull is weaker. Farming event shops during limited windows tends to give the best average result for free-to-play accounts.
Can you remove or swap an orb once it is equipped?
Orbs are equippable items, so they can be moved between units rather than being permanently consumed — which is why committing a top-band orb to a filler unit is a temporary loss rather than a permanent one. Check the current build’s equip rules in-game before you plan around swapping, since the developer has adjusted orb handling between updates.
