Element TD, from the Warcraft III map to Element TD 2

Of the versions on sale, only Element TD 2 lets you build your own maze, through a paid expansion. It runs on Windows through Steam; the developer also lists Linux through Proton (Element Studios' press page). Element TD, on Steam and on phones, lists four modes (Random, Chaos, Rush and God) and no mazing.

Which Element TD to play today

Prices were read from the UK and US store pages on 1 November 2026.

Start with a free version if you play on a phone: Element TD Lite on iPhone, Element TD Free on Android. Both listings show in-app purchases, but neither says what they unlock or what the free game leaves out, so try it before paying for Element TD. Every Element TD listing, phone or Steam, gives 5 maps; Element TD 2 has 26.

On a PC, buy Element TD 2 rather than the cheaper Element TD on Steam, because it has 59 towers to 44, a campaign and the Mazing Expansion. Add the expansion only for mazing. With both, a PC player has mazing covered and needs no other game for it. If you only want the Warcraft III map, none of these is it. Element TD 4.3 was posted on the official forum in May 2010, and we haven't checked whether it runs on today's Warcraft III.

How you earned elements in the Warcraft III map

The map counts its waves as levels. Elements came from the summoning centre, where you summoned elementals, and each element had three tiers (the team's guide, first posted in 2008).

In Pick mode you chose which elementals to summon. Random mode chose for you, under rules the map's team confirmed on the official forum in October 2008. Each pick was one of seven equal chances, one for each of the six elements and one for an interest upgrade, until you held two interest upgrades. A tier 2 elemental couldn't arrive before level 25, and a tier 3 not before level 45. If the map picked an element you already held at tier 3, you got an extra essence instead.

How dual and triple towers worked

The six elements were Light, Darkness, Water, Fire, Nature and Earth. Alongside arrow and cannon towers, the map had six single-element towers, 15 dual towers and 20 triple towers, according to the team's guide. Six elements make 15 pairs and 20 trios, and the guide's six-element build list names a tower for each one. Magic needs Fire and Darkness, Hydro needs Water and Earth, and Flesh Golem needs Water, Nature and Earth (the guide's build lists).

Fewer elements open fewer towers. Four elements make 6 pairs and 4 trios, five make 10 of each, and six make all 35.

The guide splits towers into damage towers and support towers. Support covers slows (Muck, Roots, Windstorm, Nova), armour reduction (Corrosion, Enchantment), extra damage taken (Polar, Voodoo), towers that boost other towers (Well, Blacksmith) and Trickery, which clones other towers. The guide says slows make creeps clump, which makes area damage stronger. Its first two build groups are named after slows: the roots and muck builds, then the nova and windstorm builds.

How the six elements counter each other

Each element deals double damage to one element and half damage to another, and the six form a loop (team guide):

Waves carried elements too, so a build with one damage element had waves it hit for half damage. The guide's fix is a second element to cover the first one's weak spot. Its example puts 75% of the damage in Fire and 25% in Darkness. That deals 175% to Nature waves, 87.5% to Water and Light waves, and 80% to non-elemental waves.

The guide doesn't give figures for a pair split evenly, so this table is our arithmetic from its chart, with damage split half and half. "Two steps apart" means two rows apart in the chart above.

No even pair leaves any wave at 50%, because no two elements are weak to the same element. Pick two elements two steps apart. They give the same average with only one weak wave.

A trio can cover itself completely. The guide names two trios that cover each other in a circle, Earth, Darkness and Fire, and Nature, Light and Water. With damage split evenly across one trio, it gives 100% to your own trio's elements, 116.7% to the other trio's and 80% to non-elemental waves. Read against the chart, that means no elemental wave gets less than full damage. Element TD 2 keeps the idea: its Steam page still tells you to plan around each element's strengths and weaknesses and the elements of the waves coming next.

How mazing arrived in Element TD

Mazing means placing towers to build the creeps' route yourself; our mazing guide covers it.

The team guide for the Warcraft III map marks tower spots by numpad position along the creeps' path. It separates 2-pass areas, where creeps pass the same towers twice, from long-pass areas, which give your towers only one chance to kill the creeps. Towers that deal their damage in an area around themselves, such as Nova and Quaker, belong at long-pass spots.

The StarCraft II version added mazing as an optional mode. WindStrike, a designer on the team's forum, described it in 2013: "Mazing Mode gets rid of the standard labyrinth and allows you to build your own around various checkpoints." Few public games turned it on, WindStrike added.

In Element TD 2's Mazing Expansion, you place towers on Blockers set on the enemy path, which forces enemies to change route. Each map has its own boundaries, the Blocker tiles are free, and the mode works in single player and multiplayer.

Flash Element TD, the browser game

Flash Element TD is a browser game by David Scott, released in January 2007 (Wikipedia; GIGAZINE reviewed it on 12 January 2007). Element Studios' timeline doesn't list it. It shared the map's name but had three elements, not six, and a fixed route. You built towers "on the grass around the maze", in the words of its Newgrounds page.

GIGAZINE's review gives the basics. You started with 40 gold and three towers: Arrow, Cannon and Air. Cannon hit only ground creeps, and Air hit only flyers. Every 7 levels you got wood, which bought water, fire or earth towers or raised your income. The Newgrounds description adds interest at the end of each round on gold in the bank, and says that keeping as much gold banked as possible is how you get a high score.

Gamasutra reported on 18 November 2008 that Desktop Tower Defense had passed 70 million downloads and that Scott's Flash Element TD had doubled that.

Playing it now is harder. Adobe blocked Flash content from running in Flash Player from 12 January 2021. The Newgrounds page is still up, with more than 815,000 views, but we haven't checked whether the game runs there.

Element TD 2 and the line of versions before it

After Warcraft III, Element Studios' own timeline runs to StarCraft II (June 2011), Dota 2 (February 2016), mobile (June 2016) and Element TD 2 (February 2020). The phone listings still carry a "© 2006 Evan Hatampour" line (App Store), and Element Studios' press page names Hatampour as its founder.

Element TD 2 entered early access on Steam on 28 February 2020 (Steam). It has six elements. Its waves end in an endless boss, and co-op takes up to 8 players. Its competitive modes are an 8-player free-for-all and 1v1 ranked. Steam says the original mod was downloaded over 5 million times across Warcraft III, StarCraft II and Dota 2.

For another Warcraft III tower defence map, see our guide to Wintermaul Wars.