tower-defense

Q: How do I install tower-defense?

Run npx skills add https://github.com/gamedev-skills/awesome-gamedev-agent-skills --skill tower-defense in your project. The skills CLI detects the agents you use and copies the skill into the right folder. For Claude Code you can also place the skill folder at ~/.claude/skills/tower-defense/ (personal) or .claude/skills/tower-defense/ (project).

by gamedev-skillsAI & Agents

Build a tower defense: enemies pathing along lanes, wave spawning, towers that auto-target and fire, an economy, and lives. Use for a tower-defense/wave-defense game, or balancing waves and economy.

Installs: 6.3K
Last 24h: +324
Trending rank: #912
Security: Pass

Install

Works with every agent the skills CLI supports.

npx skills add https://github.com/gamedev-skills/awesome-gamedev-agent-skills --skill tower-defense

01
Install
Run the command in your project. The CLI asks which agents to install for.
02
Describe the task
Ask your agent for something this skill covers. It loads tower-defense automatically when relevant.
03
Review the result
The agent follows the SKILL.md steps, scripts and references bundled with the skill.

Security audits

Independent scans of the skill's instructions and bundled files.

Gen Agent Trust Hub PassSAFE ·This skill provides design patterns and pseudocode for building tower defense games. It contains documentation only and does not include any executable code, network requests, or sensitive operations.

Socket PassNo alerts

Snyk PassLOW ·Risk: LOW · No issues

SKILL.md

The instructions your agent reads when the skill is triggered.

Tower Defense

A playbook for tower defense — enemy pathing, wave spawning, tower targeting, and the economy that ties them together. This is a compositional skill: it orchestrates pathing, AI, and UI into a TD loop. It does not re-teach pathfinding; it defines the systems and the balance levers (DPS vs. HP vs. income) that decide whether a TD is tense or trivial.

When to use

Use when building a game where the player places towers that automatically attack waves of enemies following a path, spends earned currency to expand/upgrade, and loses if too many enemies leak through.
Use when designing wave composition/pacing, tower targeting priorities, or the gold economy.

When not to use: the player directly controls a shooter → fps-shooter. Free-form base building with needs → survival-crafting. For the pathfinding algorithm itself, use game-ai.

Core loop

Prepare (place/upgrade towers with current gold) → start the wave → enemies path toward the goal while towers auto-fire → earn gold from kills → survive the wave → repeat against a harder one. The tension is a planning puzzle: is my current DPS enough for what's coming, and can I afford the answer?

Must-have systems

Enemy path — waypoint lanes, or grid + pathfinding for maze TD (refs).
Wave spawner — timed, scripted sequences of enemy types with per-wave scaling.
Towers — range, fire rate, damage, projectile/hitscan, splash; placement validity.
Targeting — per-tower priority (first/last/closest/strongest/weakest) (refs).
Economy — gold from kills + wave bonuses; tower/upgrade costs; sell refund.
Lives / leak — enemies reaching the goal cost lives; 0 = game over.
Wave/prep UI — lives, gold, next-wave preview, start-next-wave control.

Design knobs

Knob	Effect	Notes
Enemy HP growth/wave	upgrade pressure	Geometric ~1.1–1.2× (refs).
Income vs. HP curves	difficulty	Player should almost afford each wave.
Tower DPS / range / cost	tower identity	Cheap+wide vs. expensive+tall.
Targeting priority	optimal placement	Changes play more than raw stats.
Enemy variety	counters one-build wins	Fast / armored / flying / swarm / boss.
Leak penalty	stakes	Cost lives and lost bounty.
Upgrade vs. build economy	strategy depth	Diminishing upgrade returns.
Wave pacing	tension curve	Spike → breather → spike, not monotonic.

Patterns

1. Wave spawner (timed, data-driven)

# Pseudocode. A wave is data: a list of (enemy_type, count, spacing). Spawn over time.
wave = [ ("grunt", 10, 0.5), ("runner", 5, 0.3), ("tank", 2, 1.0) ]

def run_wave(wave):
    for enemy_type, count, spacing in wave:
        for _ in range(count):
            spawn_enemy(enemy_type, at=path[0])   # enter at the path start
            wait(spacing)                          # seconds between spawns (use a timer/coroutine)
    # wave clears when all spawned enemies are dead or have leaked

2. Tower targeting (filter to range, then pick by priority)

# Pseudocode. "First" (furthest along path) is the standard default for stopping leaks.
def acquire_target(tower, enemies, mode="first"):
    in_range = [e for e in enemies if distance(tower.pos, e.pos) <= tower.range]
    if not in_range: return None
    if mode == "first":    return max(in_range, key=lambda e: e.progress)   # furthest along path (stop leaks)
    if mode == "last":     return min(in_range, key=lambda e: e.progress)   # least progress (guard the entrance)
    if mode == "closest":  return min(in_range, key=lambda e: distance(tower.pos, e.pos))
    if mode == "strongest":return max(in_range, key=lambda e: e.hp)         # burn down tanks first
    if mode == "weakest":  return min(in_range, key=lambda e: e.hp)         # secure kills / last-hit bounty
    return in_range[0]

3. "Can this lane hold?" sanity check (DPS vs. HP)

# Pseudocode. One tower's damage to one enemy crossing its range.
tower_dps     = tower.damage * tower.fire_rate
time_in_range = tower.range_coverage_length / enemy.speed
damage_dealt  = tower_dps * time_in_range
# Lane holds if summed damage_dealt from covering towers >= enemy.hp (per enemy). See refs.

Pitfalls / failure modes

Enemy HP scales slower than player income/DPS → game trivializes after a few waves. Tune the HP curve against the income curve (refs).
One dominant tower/strategy → no decisions. Add enemy types that hard-counter builds (armored vs. rapid-fire, flying vs. ground-only) and diminishing upgrade returns.
Maze TD that can fully block the goal → enemies get stuck/softlock. Forbid placements that sever the path for the spawn or for any enemy already walking; recompute paths when towers change (refs §1).
Fast enemies slow down at corners or skip waypoints → per-step movement stops at each waypoint or overshoots it. Carry the leftover distance to the next waypoint (refs §1).
No next-wave telegraph → specials feel random and unfair. Preview upcoming composition.
Per-frame movement unscaled by dt → speed varies with frame rate. Scale steering by dt.
Leaks only cost lives, not gold → leaking is sometimes optimal. Make leaks lose bounty too.
Monotonic difficulty ramp → exhausting. Pace spikes and breathers.

Composition (build it from these skills)

Pathing: game-ai for A*/flow-field/steering; for fixed lanes, simple waypoint following.
Enemy movement: godot-2d-movement (or engine equivalent) to move along the path; unity-navmesh for nav-based pathing.
Map: godot-tilemap / unity-tilemap-2d for the grid/lanes; level-design for map layouts.
Data: godot-resources / unity-scriptableobjects to define towers, enemies, and waves as assets.
UI: game-ui-ux for HUD layout, scaling, and the build menu; godot-ui-control for the concrete widgets (lives, gold, wave preview).
Polish: audio-design for fire/hit/leak sound cues.

References

For path representations (waypoints / A* / flow fields), targeting modes, DPS and economy math, enemy scaling, and wave pacing, read references/balancing.md.

FAQ

What does the tower-defense skill do?

Build a tower defense: enemies pathing along lanes, wave spawning, towers that auto-target and fire, an economy, and lives. Use for a tower-defense/wave-defense game, or balancing waves and economy.

How do I install tower-defense?

Run npx skills add https://github.com/gamedev-skills/awesome-gamedev-agent-skills --skill tower-defense in your project. The skills CLI detects the agents you use and copies the skill into the right folder. For Claude Code you can also place the skill folder at ~/.claude/skills/tower-defense/ (personal) or .claude/skills/tower-defense/ (project).

Which AI agents can use tower-defense?

Any agent that supports the open Agent Skills format (a folder with a SKILL.md file), including Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, GitHub Copilot, Gemini CLI, Windsurf, Cline, OpenCode and more.

Is tower-defense safe to install?

Security partners have reviewed it: Gen Agent Trust Hub passed; Socket passed; Snyk passed. As with any skill, read the SKILL.md and bundled scripts before installing.

Who maintains tower-defense?

It is published by gamedev-skills in gamedev-skills/awesome-gamedev-agent-skills. It has 6,278 recorded installs.