Hidden Wave

Hidden Wave

Current • Legacy

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 <title source="title1">
   <default>Hidden Wave</default>
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</image> <label>Triumph Rewards</label> <group collapse="open"> <header>Music</header>

<format>Wave 41

File:(Official) Tower Defense Simulator OST - Eye Of The Swarm

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File:Quote.png

"GREETINGS PLAYER.
YOU HAVE PROVED YOURSELF QUITE SKILLFUL SO FAR...
BUT HOW SKILLFUL DO YOU THINK YOU ACTUALLY ARE?"

―??? dialogue at Wave 41

Description

The Hidden Wave is a secret wave that can only be accessed in Fallen mode.

Players need to disable "Skills Enabled" from the Gameplay Settings first to enable Hidden Wave.

After voting for Fallen mode, one player must type "120", "1" and "1009" in the game chat. A shriek and screen darkening will accompany each message. After the last number is typed out, the map will become permanently discolored. The base health needs to be reduced to 1, and on Wave 40, the Fallen King must be defeated in under 60 seconds, which will cause a quicker death animation to play, with the Fallen King smashing the ground and fleeing with its sword. Using Consumables on Wave 40 will cause the Hidden Wave not to be activated.

After defeating the Fallen King under 60 seconds, the next wave will appear as Wave 41. After the Wave 41 timer ends, the players will begin floating in mid-air, and the screen will become a strong purple static background. An unknown narrator simply known in the game as ??? will address the player. After the Commander's dialogue, the game abruptly pauses and displays a false disconnect message with defeating the Fallen King as the reason on a pitch-black background. As the fake error message glitches, it flashes back to the game. The Awakened Fallen King will spawn in, and the Wave ??? begins, giving all players Cash$50,000.

During the course of the wave, purple fog and dark purple particles will cover the entire map, with bright trails flying around. The wave text becomes glitched in a similar fashion to the Glitchy Nametag.

Rewards

Triumph rewards are based on the difficulty of the map. First time triumph also have their rewards increased by Gem 100. The rewards for each difficulty are:

Difficulty	Rewards
	Regular	First Triumph
Very Easy	Gem 50, Experience 250 EXP & Tower Experience 185 EXP	Gem 150, Experience 250 EXP & Tower Experience 185 EXP
Easy	Gem 75, Experience 250 EXP & Tower Experience 185 EXP	Gem 175, Experience 250 EXP & Tower Experience 185 EXP
Normal	Gem 100, Experience 250 EXP & Tower Experience 185 EXP	Gem 200, Experience 250 EXP & Tower Experience 185 EXP
Hard	Gem 125, Experience 250 EXP & Tower Experience 185 EXP	Gem 225, Experience 250 EXP & Tower Experience 185 EXP
Insane	Gem 150, Experience 250 EXP & Tower Experience 185 EXP	Gem 250, Experience 250 EXP & Tower Experience 185 EXP

The reward for the first 50 players who beat Hidden Wave was the Triumphant Hacker skin.

Triumphing Hidden Wave will give out an additional reward, which can be a crate, consumable or ticket. They are meant to be guaranteed, though due to a bug this does not always happen. These items are:

• Common (47.39%)
  • Time Scale Ticket Time Scale Ticket (2-4)
  • Revive Ticket Revive Ticket (2-3)
  • Spin Ticket Spin Ticket (2-3)
  • Low Grade Crate
  • Barricade (2-4)
  • Supply Drop (2-4)
• Uncommon (28.44%)
  • Cooldown Flag (2-4)
  • Range Flag (2-4)
  • Damage Flag (2-4)
  • Mid Grade Crate
• Rare (18.96%)
  • High Grade Crate
  • Napalm Strike (2-3)
  • Blizzard Bomb (2-3)
• Legendary (4.74%)
  • Nuke
• Custom (0.47%)
  • Molten Monster

Losing during the Hidden Wave gives Coin 850 and Experience 200 EXP.

Achievements

There is one badge and achievement which can be gotten in the Hidden Wave. They are:

???

✔ OBTAINABLE

File:HiddenBadge3.png

No description available

92,259 players earned this

Awakened (tH3 GL1tcH)

✔ OBTAINABLE

File:RewardsScroll.png

Complete the Fallen Hidden wave

---

Rewards:
Coin 2,000, Gem 150 & 1x High Grade Crate

players earned this

First Players to Triumph

The first 50 players to beat the Hidden Wave received the Triumphant skin for the Hacker tower. Initially, it was the first 40 people, but due to controversy over the first eight people to beat it, as their teams included Quality Assurance Testers who did not partake in Hidden Wave testing, it was expanded to 48 and then to 50 as the last team went over the 48 threshold.

• The first team to triumph was SoupedGun, WikiaColors, Acolytra and JustSomeMemeLord, who beat it at 23:01 UTC on the 3rd of August 2024, exactly 29 hours after the Hidden Wave was re-added. Their triumph can be found here.
• The second team to triumph was Stew_Fox, Isaac3523, RealNeoru and StefsLogic, who beat it at 23:40 UTC on the 3rd of August 2024. A short clip of the match can be found here.
• The third team to triumph was 5ouls, Penguin_Dud, Dank_Memez620 and CrazRexx, who beat it at 01:05 UTC on the 4th of August 2024. Their triumph can be found here.
• The fourth team to triumph was nilask7, Mario_koo, ANAS503 and Eggrypted, who beat it at 01:21 UTC on the 4th of August 2024. Their triumph can be found here.
• The fifth team to triumph was kirillplayPRO37, Kirito28940, sdashef20 and Romangamer2009r, who beat it at 01:56 UTC on the 4th of August 2024.
• The sixth team to triumph was omphalotropism, 010pls and two people who already beat the Hidden Wave, who beat it at 01:56 UTC on the 4th of August 2024.
  • The other two players who beat the Hidden Wave for a second time are not currently known.
• The seventh team to triumph was Springfn, SansPlayDespacito2, agente3xtreme and Badmaster997, who beat it at 01:56 UTC on the 4th of August 2024.
• The eighth team to triumph was zizonSoomin, act2papy, RVY110 and DSN947, who beat it at 01:57 UTC on the 4th of August 2024.
• The ninth team to triumph was goofsterSecondComing, oerbon145, crizblu and Sobtastix, who beat it at 01:59 UTC on the 4th of August 2024.
• The tenth team to triumph was Falox006, XtrULLooR21alt, ERROR4596 and ValenR3895, who beat it at 02:02 UTC on the 4th of August 2024.
• The eleventh team to triumph was MCRRCQF199, XIZIAPD, zxcva1234567 and yingyitaoo, who beat it at 02:02 UTC on the 4th of August 2024. Their triumph can be found here.
• The twelfth team to triumph was Adamlazowy0817, SpacingHarbor58, evanboyzero and RayphiasArx, who beat it at 02:04 UTC on the 4th of August 2024.
• The thirteenth and final team to triumph was Megalodon016, IJNYamato12, xXXCOOLCODYXXx and GreenyOfTheColorLime, who beat it at 02:07 UTC on the 4th of August 2024. Their triumph can be found here.

• The first team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
  The first team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
• The second team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
  The second team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
• The third team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
  The third team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
• The fourth team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
  The fourth team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
• The fifth team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
  The fifth team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
• The tenth team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
  The tenth team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
• The eleventh team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
  The eleventh team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
• The thirteenth and final team to triumph the Hidden Wave.
  The thirteenth and final team to triumph the Hidden Wave.

Enemies/Wave Structure

Enemies

File:FallenShield.png	File:FallenHonorGuard.png	File:FallenTank.png	File:ModernFallenGuardian.png
Fallen Shield 10+ Total	Fallen Honor Guard 4 Total	Fallen Tank 16 Total	Fallen Guardian 7 Total
File:Fallen giant.png	File:CorruptedFallenAnim2.png	File:Breaker4Fallen.png	File:Breaker3Fallen.png
Fallen Giant 15+ Total	Corrupted Fallen 45 Total	Breaker4 30 Total	Breaker3 90 Total
File:Breaker2Fallen.png	File:BreakerFallen.png	File:FallenHeroRework.png	File:FallenSquire.png
Breaker2 90 Total	Breaker 90 Total	Fallen Hero 13+ Total	Fallen Squire 2 Total
File:ModernTemplar.png	File:AwakenedFallenKing.png	File:NecroticSkeleton.png	File:FallenSummoner.png
Warden 2 Total	Awakened Fallen King 1 Total	Necrotic Skeleton N/A Total	Fallen Summoner 2 Total
File:Possesed armor.png	File:FallenAngel.png	File:Fallen rusher.png
Possessed Armor N/A Total	Fallen Angel 15 Total	Fallen Rusher 12 Total

Wave Structure

The waves in the Hidden Wave cannot be skipped. They follow these timings:

Waves	Wave Timer
41	1:00
???	∞

Wave	Dialogue		Enemy Type & Amount
41	File:ShadowLordExoUnknownNarratorNeutral.gif	GREETINGS PLAYER.	4x Fallen Shield (Aggro, Bloated), 1x Fallen Honor Guard (Health Regen), 4x Fallen Tank (Bloated), 4x Fallen Guardian (Bloated, Stun Immune), 1x Fallen Tank (Bloated, Health Regen), 5x Fallen Giant (Bloated, Health Regen), 25x Corrupted Fallen (Bloated), 20x Breaker4 (Bloated), 6x Fallen Hero (Bloated), 2x Fallen Squire (Tank, Bloated)
	File:ShadowLordExoUnknownNarratorNeutral.gif	YOU HAVE PROVED YOURSELF QUITE SKILLFUL SO FAR..
	File:ShadowLordExoUnknownNarratorNeutral.gif	BUT HOW SKILLFUL DO YOU THINK YOU ACTUALLY ARE?
	File:REWCommanderAggressive.gif	Wh. What is happening???
???	File:ShadowLordExoUnknownNarratorNeutral.gif	AWAKEN.	1x Fallen Honor Guard (Health Regen), 1x Warden (Bloated, Health Regen), 1x Awakened Fallen King, 1x Fallen Honor Guard, 5x Fallen Tank (Nimble, Bloated), 1x Fallen Guardian (Nimble, Bloated), 4x Fallen Shield (Nimble, Aggro, Bloated), 1x Fallen Honor Guard (Health Regen), 5x Fallen Tank (Nimble, Bloated), 20x Corrupted Fallen (Bloated, Nimble), 3x Fallen Hero (Nimble, Bloated), 1x Fallen Summoner (Bloated, Nimble), 1x Fallen Summoner (Bloated), 5x Fallen Giant (Health Regen, Nimble, Bloated), 15x Fallen Angel (Nimble, Bloated), 12x Fallen Rusher (Nimble, Bloated), 2x Fallen Shield (Aggro, Nimble, Bloated), 1x Warden (Bloated, Health Regen), 5x Fallen Giant (Health Regen, Nimble, Bloated), 10x Breaker4 (Nimble, Bloated), 1x Fallen Tank (Health Regen, Bloated, Nimble), 4x Fallen Hero (Nimble, Bloated), 2x Fallen Guardian (Bloated, Stun Immune)

Strategy

Activating Hidden Wave

• To activate the Hidden Wave, everyone must disable Skills.
• One player must type the numbers "120", "1" and "1009" in the game chat. If done correctly, a glitch effect will cover the screen and play some noise for a short period of time following each number.
  • The three messages must be sent separately for it to work.
  • The numbers must be typed out after Fallen has been selected; otherwise, it will not work.
  • It will not work after the game is lost, or restarted.
• Make sure you plan ahead in order to get your base health down to 1.
  • If you bring the Medic, do not place it down before Wave 40, as it will heal your base.
    • If you used the Glass modifier, you can ignore this step as Glass prevents over-heal.
  • Preferably, you should try to get your base to 1 health within the first 2 waves.
  • If you have the Glass modifier unlocked, you can apply it to instantly have 1 base health, eliminating one major step.
• As you need to kill the Fallen King in under 60 seconds, high DPS towers are required, such as the Accelerator, Engineer, Turret and Ranger.
  • Setting these towers to Strongest may also be preferable to kill the Fallen King under 60 seconds.
    • Alternatively, you can use Saboteur’s Aggressive Toxins ability if you do not want to switch your towers’ targetings.
  • You may use towers that can slow down groups of enemies, such as Electroshocker and Cryomancer, set these towers to Last to stall the group of enemies so that the high DPS towers can focus more on the Fallen King.
    • You may also use Freezer as its Frost Grenade ability can be quite effective against the crowds of enemies.
  • You must not use consumables on Wave 40, but you are allowed to use consumables before Wave 40, exactly at the 5-second Pre-wave 40 timer. Therefore, you may place down a Damage Flag and Cooldown Flag right before Wave 40 in order to quickly kill it.
    • If you restart the match after losing the Hidden Wave, the consumables tab will disappear, so you will not be able to use consumables. If you still want to use consumables, leave the game and start another match.

Triumphing Hidden Wave

• You are unable to use any Consumables during the Hidden Wave.
• Before the Hidden Wave starts, all Farms should be sold as they do not generate any more money and also take up tower slots. High DPS towers should replace the Farms.
  • This should be done on Wave 40.
• When the Hidden Wave starts, the Awakened Fallen King spawns, giving all players Cash$50,000. The money should be used to ensure you have the maximum amount of towers allowed and all to their maximum level.
• Make sure to bring many DPS towers with Flying detection due to the many Fallen Angels that spawn in the Hidden Wave.
• Be aware that your screen will shake a lot during the Hidden Wave. This will cause significant trouble in chaining the Commander's ability (without keybinds), managing the Medic and moving your towers.
  • You can disable screen shaking in the settings to prevent this from happening; however, your camera will still constantly zoom in and out.
• High DPS towers are required to kill the high health enemies that appear in the Hidden Wave.
• You can use the Gatling Gun to primarily focus on the Awakened Fallen King and have other towers take care of the enemy hordes.
• Towers that can slow down groups of enemies, such as the Tesla and Cryomancer, are needed to stall the massive horde of high health enemies that appear, especially the Nimble Bloated Fallen Tanks.
• The Medic is highly recommended as there are a lot of enemies that can stun your towers.
• It is strongly advised that you play on a long map, such as Fungi Island, Wrecked Battlefield or Summer Castle.
• Due to the large number of enemies, you will need to move towers as they can get out of range; be sure to strategize ahead of time.
  • This can be mitigated by using the Ranger, Pursuit and Gatling Gun due to their extremely large range.
  • Towers such as Ranger, Pursuit and Gatling Gun are great choices to take down the Awakened Fallen King as the Awakened Fallen King will constantly stun, making towers such as the Golden Minigunner become unreliable during the Hidden Wave, though the Medic can help mitigate this issue.
• If you have the Molten Monster consumable, you can use it before wave 40 starts to spawn a Molten Monster to help clear out threatening enemies, such as the Nimble Bloated Fallen Tanks, and since it moves extremely slowly it likely will not reach the entrance before the Hidden Wave starts.

Trivia

• The ??? narrator uses the same model as 1x1x1x1 from The Classic Event, except that it has a completely black body.
  • However, these two narrators are not the same character.
  • The same character appeared in the portal in Failed Gateway, which was meant to head to the Nil Zone. This likely means that ??? is meant to be Lord Exo.
• The first three lines of dialogue from the ??? narrator is the exact same as the text used on the Legacy Hidden Wave.
• Multiple clues were left in the lobbies for players to find and figure out how to activate the new Hidden Wave.
  • The first clue was a speech bubble with squares (representing 0s) and diamonds (representing 1s) shown on the screen of the Hardcore mode override computer, which when translated from binary would show the word "TIME". This hinted at having to say the time required to activate the legacy Hidden Wave that being 1,009 seconds.
    • The number of squares and diamonds was originally misunderstood to also be a hint, that being number 32 being important to activating the Hidden Wave. This, however, was not actually true, later turning into a meme which was acknowledged by developers, even gaining its own cosmetics like the 32 sticker.
    • This hint can still be found in-game.
  • The second clue was a speech bubble with a wave in it that could be found on the dock in the survival Matchmaking intermission lobby. This hinted at having to say the wave displayed while the legacy Hidden Wave was active, that being 1.
  • The third clue was a speech bubble with a stopwatch in it that could be found behind BelowNatural's statue. This hinted at having to say 120, which was included in the legacy Hidden Wave's timer, which also at the time happened to have a stopwatch at the end due to the UI used at the time.
  • The fourth clue was a broken red heart that could be found inside the roof of the survival elevator room. This hinted at having to have base health set to 1 before activating the Hidden Wave.
  • Some additional clues were also left for the Hidden Wave, though they were not a part of the lobbies.
    • In the v1.27.0 update log, the number of waves listed had a question mark at the end, hinting towards the Hidden Wave being re-added.
    • On Wave 40 of Fallen mode, the Commander's last line is "TAKE HIM OUT QUICKLY!", which may have been a hint on the last step to trigger the Hidden Wave, that being killing the Fallen King in less than 60 seconds.
• There is an unused Verge of Death badge which was supposed to be awarded by triumphing with 1 base health left on Fallen Mode, which is similar to one of the requirements for activating the Hidden Wave.
• Until v1.27.2, when triumphing the Hidden Wave, the game announced the names of everyone that was in the triumph match globally with the following message: [Server] Player has triumphed and defeated the Awakened Fallen King!
  • It would announce each player in a separate message.
• The ??? narrator's dialogue on Wave 41 reuses the text that appeared upon activating the Legacy Hidden Wave.
  • The music that plays during this is also a based on the Legacy Hidden Wave intro, although it is technically part of the Awakened Fallen King's theme.
• The Hidden Wave is one of the few ways to get Gem Gems before reaching Level 50, however, there is little use to them other than purchasing the Brawler, as every other item that can be bought with that currency requires at least Level 50 to do so.
• The animation that plays when Wave 41 finishes and when ??? addresses the player is the same as the animation that plays during the map switching event on Krampus Frosthold.

Update History

For the legacy version of the Hidden Wave, see this page.

• 2 August 2024 - v1.27.0
  • Hidden Wave added.
  • Bug: Eye Of The Swarm does not play on Wave 41.
  • Bug: Losing the Hidden Wave does not give the triumph bonuses from Wave 40 being beaten, despite the Hidden Wave requiring Wave 40 to be beaten.
• 6 August 2024 - v1.27.2
  • Triumphing the Hidden Wave no longer makes a global notification appear in chat.
  • Bugfix: Eye Of The Swarm now plays on Wave 41.
• 9 August 2024 - v1.27.5
  • Wave structure changed.
• 9 August 2024 - v1.27.6a
  • Wave structure changed.
• 21 August 2024 - v1.28.0
  • Wave structure changed.
  • Rewards are now based on the map's difficulty.
    • Now gives Coin Coins instead of Gem 50.
    • Very Easy gives Coin 800.
    • Easy gives Coin 900.
    • Normal gives Coin 1,000.
    • Hard gives Coin 1,100.
    • Insane gives Coin 1,200.
    • Triumph bonus is applied, boosting the base rewards by Coin 100.
    • First time triumph bonus removed.
  • Bug: Kick pop up has a broken leave button.
• 27 August 2024 - v1.28.7
  • Rewards changed.
    • Now gives Gem Gems instead of Coin Coins.
    • Very Easy changed from Coin 800 to Gem 50.
    • Easy changed from Coin 900 to Gem 75.
    • Normal changed from Coin 1,000 to Gem 100.
    • Hard changed from Coin 1,100 to Gem 125.
    • Insane changed from Coin 1,200 to Gem 150.
    • First time triumph bonus re-added, increased from Gem 50 to Gem 100.
• 25 September 2024 - v1.33.0
  • Experience EXP rewards doubled due to the Fallen mode having its Experience EXP rewards increased.
• 23 October 2024 - v1.37.0
  • Bug: Hidden Wave lighting is broken, being very purple during it and making the entire map dark after it.
  • Bug: Kick pop up no longer appears.
• 25 October 2024 - v1.38.0
  • Bugfix: Lighting is now correct.
  • Bugfix: Kick pop up now appears again, with its leave button also now appearing.
• 16 December 2024 - v1.46.0
  • Bug: Wave 41 no longer changes the wave number to 41.
  • Bug: Hidden Wave cannot be activated in Sandbox.
• 16 April 2025 - v1.61.0
  • Bug: Triumphing Fallen after restarting a lost Hidden Wave match allows the player to gain the Hidden Wave rewards for just triumphing Fallen mode, including badges and achievements.
• 28 May 2025 - v1.65.0
  • Hidden Wave is now disabled when a player has the Skills setting activated.
• 11 June 2025 - v1.67.0
  • First 50 players who triumphed the Hidden Wave will now give the Triumphant Hacker skin.
  • Hidden Wave has been disabled.
  • Bug: Triumphing Hidden Wave after meeting the requirements can either give the Hidden Wave triumph rewards or prevent the match from ending.
  • Bug: Hidden Wave can sometimes still be activated.
• 18 June 2025 - v1.67.6
  • Hidden Wave can now be activated.
  • Bugfix: Triumphing the Hidden Wave now actually activates it rather than breaking in various ways.
• 28 January 2026 - v1.84.0
  • Bug: When the Awakened Fallen King spawns in, the cash reward is now just Cash$50,000 instead of Cash$2,000,000.
• 5 June 2026 - v2.0.0
  • Now gives Tower Experience 185 EXP upon triumph due to changes in Fallen mode.

Notes