How Many Dudes? How to Win with Weak and Low-Tier Units

To win a run using weak units in How Many Dudes?, prioritize flat damage relics over percentage amplifiers, merge cheap duplicates to boost baseline survivability, and cluster your squad into a staggered formation to prevent swarms from flanking your frontline.

Why Flat Damage Outperforms Percentage Scaling

Bottom-tier units struggle in early rounds because they rely on low base damage, short attack ranges, and single-target physical hits. Because their base damage is minimal, percentage damage modifiers provide negligible gains. A percentage increase on an already weak strike fails to alter time-to-kill thresholds against armored enemies.

Flat damage bonuses bypass this limitation by adding fixed damage to every strike regardless of the unit's base stats. Prioritize units with quick attack animations or multi-hit strikes, as each hit applies the full flat bonus. Once flat damage is secured, add attack speed to multiply the frequency of those procs.

Relic Priority	Upgrade Focus	Mechanical Impact on Weak Units
1	Flat Attack Damage	Adds static damage per hit, compensating for poor base stats.
2	Attack Speed	Increases hit rate, triggering flat damage bonuses more often.
3	On-Hit Effects	Adds chain damage or status effects to handle swarm clearing.
4	Armor Penetration	Neutralizes target defenses so low-damage hits register fully.

Drafting and Economy Strategy

Running a low-tier roster requires strict economy management:

Buy duplicate units early. Weak dudes appear frequently at low shop costs. Purchase matching copies to merge them into higher star levels, raising their health pools and baseline damage.
Avoid early rerolls. Do not spend gold searching for rare units. Save your surplus gold to reach peak interest thresholds.
Invest interest in global scaling. Spend excess income on team-wide relics and stat upgrades rather than chasing high-tier carries that do not match your low-tier squad.

Staggered Pocket Positioning

Deploying low-tier units in a flat horizontal line allows swarms to surround and isolate individual units. To concentrate your damage output and control enemy pathing, deploy your team in a tight, tapered wedge:

Vanguard: Place your tankier, higher-health low-tier units at the front point to absorb initial collisions and cluster oncoming enemies.
Midline: Position your fastest-hitting attackers directly behind the vanguard. This allows them to strike bunched targets without taking incoming damage.
Backline: Keep utility units and slower attackers in the rear to provide cleanup without drawing frontline aggro.

Managing Late-Game Bottlenecks

As enemy health pools expand in later rounds, pure physical strikes from low-tier units hit a clear-speed ceiling. If your frontline begins stalling against late-wave bosses or dense swarms, immediately spend your banked gold on armor shred, movement slows, or on-hit status debuffs to prevent your formation from being overwhelmed.