I though I'd just put this, the best and worst monkeys (according to me) so you understand my judgments. Also, I'll be speaking in Bloons TD language which will be left tier/right tier. So if I say boomerang monkey 0/3 is strong, that means his third upgrade on the right side of the tower defense screen and lower side in the city when being researched.
Ok, now that I've covered that, I can move on to the topic of this post.
Top 5 Monkeys
5. Spike Factory - Honestly, Spike Factory is underrated. Its a very strong unit and produces spike. I have 4 Spike Factories researched at 2/2. In any contested territory or anti-MOAB mission, I max out all 4. Its a good support unit and easily catches any stragglers. Works well with everything apart from Sniper.
4. Boomerang Monkey - Frankly, I don't understand why so many people don't like this monkey. Most YouTubers use Boomerang monkeys but most of my friends don't like him. I mean, he's good, no doubt about it and I really think he can be a main monkey. For beginners, I suggest using more Ninja Monkey but upgrading Boomerang Monkey. Once you upgrade 3/3 for Boomerang (Glaive Ricochet/Bionic Boomer), he becomes seriously OP (Over Powering). But I am saying this again, Boomerang is not for the low levels, Ninja is cheaper. You know what, let's talk more about Ninja. The best combo for Boomerang is to keep him with a Spike Factory and Bomb Tower.
3. Ninja Monkey - Ever since there was a monkey team mission involving Ninja, Dart and Spike Factory (Nike Dactory - My favorite wrecking combo), Ninja has been one of my staples. Even at 0/0, Ninja is amazing. He can pop camo bloons right out of the box, throws shurikens faster than Dart monkey's darts and his upgrades are OP! 1/0 (Ninja Discipline) is ok but the real fun starts at 2/0 (Sharp Shurikens). Paired up with 0/1 (Seeking Shuriken), 1 shuriken can curve by itself and pop 4 bloons. Seasoned veterans will tell you that x/2 (Anything/Distraction), x/3 (Flash Bomb) and x/4 (Sabotage Supply Lines) are good but I prefer the other path. Also, you're not going to be using tier 3 and 4 upgrades anytime soon as they are extremely expensive to research. Ninja works best with a Bomb Tower (which can pop those pesky Lead bloons) and a high level Sniper to take out stragglers.
2. Sniper Monkey - Good old Sniper Monkey. Keep him in a corner and he always finds his bloon. Popping 2 layers without any upgrades is one of his extremely good features but his best features are his upgrades. With 1/1 (Full Metal Jacket(4 layers total and can pop Frozen and Lead) /Faster Firing) are good upgrades to start with. On the left, its upgrades are able to pop more layers as 3/x (Deadly Precision - Can pop 18 layers! Enough to bring down Ceramic) and 4/x (Cripple MOAB - MOAB stops for a short time). On the other side, Sniper is shown as a more versatile monkey who call in a Supply Drop (x/4), fire 3 times faster (Semi Automatic Rifle - x/3) and Night Vision Goggles (Able to detect and shoot camo - x/2). In the end, the Sniper becomes an amazing versatile monkey whose only weakness is hordes of bloons. Due to his versatility, he can be teamed with any monkey.
1. Dartling Gun - This is my favorite monkey, hands down. This is why I really feel crippled and have trouble winning mountain terrain. Its a strong monkey that shoots darts from a Gatling gun. It can be upgraded to either shoot small rockets (Hydra Rocket Pods x/3) or Laser Beams (Laser Cannon 3/x). He destroys everything and anything. Pair him up with some of his team mates and they can wreck MOABs and their children in seconds. Works best with Spike Factories as the Dartlings hold off the bloons while the Spike Factories produce hordes of spikes.'
Honorable Mentions : Dart Monkey (Triple Dart Upgrade is extremely powerful) and Monkey Buccaneer (I couldn't put him because he's only on water)(Monkey Pirates:Can bring down MOAB.
Worst 5 Monkeys
5. Monkey Ace - Monkey Ace is a fighter plane that fires 8 darts wildly every few seconds. Firing wildly means that the Ace rarely hits his targets. But after spending about 10,000 city coins (to upgrade 1/x, 2/x and 3/x), you get Neva Miss Targeting which does as it says. In the city, it occupies three places because of its runway and that''s the only monkey who occupies that much space apart from Super Monkey. Its tier 4 (Specter and Ground Zero) along with Neva Miss Targeting are its only good features. Not too good after all yeah.
4. Super Monkey - For everything everybody says about Super Monkey, he isn't that good. I mean, he's expensive to buy originally, his upgrades are expensive and he's too expensive to use in most fights. Only at 2/x (Plasma Blasts) he can pop Lead and why upgrade his range twice. He is just an expensive, glorified Dart Monkey. The only reason he's 5th and not lower is because of Technological Terror. Even Temple of the Sun God is good but I'm not sacrificing towers.
3. Bloonchipper - Honestly, I don't even have Bloonchipper yet (I've just beat the level) but from what I've seen on YouTube, its pointless. It takes down 1 layer and can't even kill blue. 2 notable exceptions are its ability to take down a MOAB's outer layer fully and leaving all the MOAB's children (You might want to check this. I'm not sure). Same for ceramic. Its pretty useless but I want to unlock it for the coins that I get from finishing the mission. Overall, very bad.
2. Ice Monkey - I totally forgot about this guy. I was thinking so long and hard that I totally forgot Ice Monkey. Its only good feature; it can stop bloons in their tracks. The big disadvantage; frozen bloons can't be hurt by sharp objects. Totally unhelpful. I'll concede that Viral Frost (4/x) is good. However, path 2 is totally unhelpful. Imagine you had a whole host of camo bloons coming through and only 3 2/2 ninjas and a x/4 Ice Monkey (Absolute Zero : Freezes all bloons on screen apart from MOAB class). Your ninjas are throwing shurikens but there are two many of them. You do Absolute Zero. The shurikens can't pop the bloons. Lots of coins wasted. You lose.
1. Tack Shooter - After Ice Monkey, I had my doubts. Could I shame the Tack Shooter worse than the Ice Monkey? Then I came up with a creative argument. See, Ice Monkey actually does some work and freezes bloons. If you have a Bomb Tower or any monkey upgraded enough to pop frozen, then you're good. However, Tack Shooter redefines the meaning of utterly useless. It only works well on circular track portions and how many circles are there on tracks. Few. Very few. If you want, you can go to My Tracks and see.
What do you thing are the Top and Worst 5 Monkeys. Please post in comments below. Thank you and keep on reading.