Countryball Defenders beginner’s guide

A battle happens on a lawn (or salt pans, or snow, or a running track: every country has its own ground). Your wall runs across the bottom, with three spots on it for your balls. The locals, balls from the country you are visiting, hop down in waves. When they reach the wall, they bonk it. If the wall falls, you lose. Survive the waves and bonk the champion: the moment it falls, its army runs home and you win.

You never aim. Your balls attack on their own, each with its own weapon. Your job is to make the choices: which ball goes on the wall, which one grows and which skill it learns.

1. Pick ur ball. The battle opens with three balls from your deck. Pick one and it starts bonking by itself.
2. Bonk for XP. Every bonk fills the XP bar. A full bar means LEVEL UP: three cards appear and the battle waits for you.
3. Survive the waves. The top of the screen shows the wave count. Harder stages bring more waves.
4. Beat the champion. The last wave brings the country’s champion. Bonk it into space to win.

Stars

Each stage gives up to three stars, depending on how much of your wall is left: keep at least 80% for three stars and 45% for two. Stars fill the three star chests of each leg on the map, and they open new chapters of the story.

Handy buttons

x2 speeds the battle up. From stage 12, AUTO picks your cards for you, and the battle never stops to wait. Lost anyway? You can revive once per battle with gems: duct tape puts your wall back up and pushes the locals away from it.

Every level-up shows three cards. Pick one and the battle goes on. Here is what can turn up:

Don’t like the three cards? Tap New cards to draw three more. You get two rerolls per battle, and the Lucky Dice upgrade adds more.

Every ball has three skills:

• Skill 1, the attack. On from the moment the ball joins the wall.
• Skill 2, the twist. Adds a trick of its own. Brazil’s football bounces more, India passes a burning hot chili from ball to ball, and China leaves every ball it bonks behind as a brick the others have to chew through.
• Skill 3, the ultimate. A big move that fires on its own timer, roughly every 10 to 20 seconds depending on the ball.

Take Poland. Its attack, Can Into Space, fires a homemade rocket at the ball nearest your wall. Its twist, Cluster Rocket, rains mini rockets around each blast. Its ultimate, MEGA ROCKET, drops a giant rocket on the thickest crowd.

Skills 2 and 3 open as a ball grows in your squad: its twist at squad Lv 10 and its ultimate at Lv 15. In battle, a purple card teaches the twist and a gold card the ultimate, and each grows to level 3. Keep leveling and they start stronger: at Lv 15 the twist starts at level 2, and at Lv 20 the twist starts at level 3 and the ultimate at level 2.

Some skills play tricks instead of hitting: Andorra opens a SALE stall that the locals stop to shop at, and Spain’s SIESTA puts the whole lawn to sleep for a moment. Japan’s Kawaii Ninja makes every ball on the wall reload faster, and that brings ultimates around sooner too. Every ball’s skills are on the balls page.

Every stage ends with a champion: the country’s boss ball in its national hat, throwing the same weapon its ball uses. Poland’s champion wears hussar wings and fires rockets; the UK’s wears a royal guard bearskin and throws tea.

Champions know two tricks each, picked from over 70. They call helpers, heal with a tea break, hide in tall grass, flip a coin to become untouchable, stick a fizzing bomb on your wall, lay eggs that hatch into more balls, or lasso a ball right off your wall. They attack your wall in their own way too: some throw a boomerang that comes back, some throw twice, and some skip throwing and just pound the ground. The first champions go easy, with one trick and a plain throw. The big ones at the end of a leg switch tricks and attacks halfway through the fight, so stay sharp.

• Every country is one stage. Win it for the first time and that country’s ball joins your squad. Already have that ball? You get 10 of its cards instead.
• Every fifth stage ends a leg of the tour with a bigger champion, and every 10th stage adds one extra wave.
• Stages 201 to 205 are the finale: Russia, India, China, the USA, and then a twist.
• Hell 205 is the Moon. It calls tiny balls and heals itself. It is very angry.

The Great Ball Tour visits 205 countries, one per stage. Five countries make a leg, one chapter of the map with three star chests, and every act of the tour brings a new kind of local:

• Small Beginnings (1–25): tiny balls in a hurry, and splitters that pop apart when bonked, each country its own way.
• Sun, Sea and Shields (26–50): shields. The first hit just bounces off, and some countries’ shields grow back or cover their friends.
• Run, Ball, Run (51–75): sprinters that dash at your wall.
• Things Are Thrown (76–100): throwers that stop short and throw at your wall.
• Under and Over (101–125): divers and diggers, out of reach until they pop up. On water stages they dive under with a splash, and on stone floors they tunnel.
• Doctors Everywhere (126–150): medics that heal their friends, and some even stand fallen friends back up.
• The Drums Are Coming (151–175): drummers that pump up their friends: faster feet, harder hits, or nerves that shrug off stuns.
• All at Once (176–200): all of the above, together.
• The Grand Finale (201–205): the biggest balls on Earth. And one more.

Every country adds its own habit on top: Monaco’s tiny rich balls come in pairs, the UK’s locals queue politely, Egypt’s mummies get back up, Japan’s ninjas blink forward. And every kind of local comes in country flavours: one country’s big balls munch their friends, the next one’s back up and ram your wall. A new flavour gets its own little card the first time you meet it. Read the locals, then pick your balls. All 205 stops are on the balls page.

Your wall is your health bar. Between battles, the Base turns coins into upgrades that help in every battle. It opens after stage 4.

• Bonk Gym. All your balls hit harder.
• More Bricks. A bigger wall.
• Better Mortar. The wall takes less damage.
• Duct Tape Stash. Fixes the wall every wave.
• Medal Polish. More XP per bonk. More XP means more level-ups.
• Tax Collector. More coins per battle.
• Lucky Dice. More card rerolls.

Push an upgrade far enough and it unlocks a perk too. At Lv 10, Bonk Gym makes hits on stunned, frozen or sleepy balls land 25% harder, and Medal Polish starts every battle with a free level-up card.

Your deck is five balls. A battle’s first pick shows three of them, and NEW BALL cards bring in the rest. You start with Poland, the UK and Brazil. Monaco joins after stage 1, San Marino after stage 2, and so on: a new ball after every stage you clear, close to your squad’s level, so your deck fills up fast.

Each ball levels from Lv 1 to Lv 20 with cards and coins, and every level makes it hit harder. Cards come from winning stages (for the balls in your deck), from champions, the Summit, quests, the calendar and the Bonk Pass.

Summon a ball you already have at the Summit and it turns into 7 wild cards. Wild cards level any ball: a ball spends its own cards first, then wild ones.

Build a team with roles

• Crowd damage: Poland’s rocket, Italy’s pizza, India’s curry, Mexico’s piñata.
• Lines and lanes: the USA’s eagle sweeps the busiest row, Australia’s boomerang and Nepal’s snowball fly up a whole lane, Brazil’s football bounces from ball to ball.
• Big targets: the UK’s tea finds the biggest ball, and Peru’s llama spit makes it take more damage.
• Control: France stuns, Canada slows, Norway pushes back, Nepal freezes, Egypt wraps, and Portugal’s rooster scares the front group back up the lawn.
• Support: Japan speeds up everyone’s reload, China heals and toughens the wall, Monaco makes battles pay more coins.

New features open one at a time as you clear Normal stages, each with a short guide, so the game never dumps everything on you at once.

After stage	What opens
2	Squad: level up your balls
3	The story: a comic, one chapter at a time
4	Base: upgrades for every battle
5	The Summit: summon balls
6	The Swiss Vault
7	Daily quests
8	Ranks, chat and friends
9	The Bonk Pass
10	Hell mode
11	The Hall of Fame
12	Auto battle
13	The Solar Trial

• Daily gift: one tap a day on the calendar. Day 7 brings Canada, day 14 of the 30-day tour brings South Korea, and a missed day just waits.
• Daily quests: three a day; finish all three for a bonus.
• Swiss Vault: Switzerland keeps coins for you while you are away, up to 12 hours’ worth.
• The Summit: a free summon every day.
• Sweeps: replay any 3-star stage instantly, 10 times a day.
• Bonk Pass: battles, quests and the daily gift all give pass XP.
• Rank prizes: yesterday’s place on the Stars, Likes and Looks boards pays a prize. Grab it before it goes.
• Likes: 3 a day, each for someone new. Give them to players whose balls or looks u love.
• The Hall of Fame: every time someone beats a stage first, u get a small thank-you in gems. Claim it there.
• The Solar Trial: a new world every day. Go as far as u can for the day’s ranking.

After Normal stage 13 the tour leaves Earth. The Solar Trial is an endless run against one world of the solar system, a new one each day: the Sun, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, then round again. The waves never end and keep getting tougher. Your score is the wave you reach.

Every world brings its own four kinds of local and its own boss with a signature trick. A new kind gets a little card the first time you meet it, so read it. Some tips: wait for King Sol to go dim before your big hits, stun Speedy Hermes before he skips time, don’t fix your wall during Lady Sulfur’s acid rain, and save blasts for when Big Jove pulls everyone into one lane.

Your best run goes on the day’s ranking. When the day ends, everyone who cleared a wave gets a prize, and the higher you placed, the bigger it is. It waits for you the next day. Wall about to fall? You can revive up to 3 times in one run, and each roll of duct tape costs twice the gems of the last one.

1. Fill all three wall spots early. Three balls bonk more than one.
2. Grow the same ball. When in doubt, pick the card that makes a ball on your wall stronger.
3. Learn the ultimate. Once a ball reaches squad Lv 15, gold ULTIMATE! cards turn up for it. Take them.
4. Mind the wall. Under half? Duct Tape. Three stars need 80% of it.
5. Read the locals. Egypt’s mummies get back up, Japan’s ninjas blink forward, and the UK’s balls queue politely at your wall.
6. Buy Bonk Gym first, then More Bricks.
7. Use x2 on easy stages, and AUTO from stage 12 when you just want to watch.
8. Collect every day: the calendar, the Swiss Vault, quests, the free summon and your rank prizes.
9. Go back for stars. Three-star stages fill star chests and can be swept.
10. Stuck? Level up your deck, swap in a ball that counters the locals, and try again. The tour waits for you.