Introduction
The Researcher is our first cash shot tower. Don't be fooled - this will be very different from the Cowboy. The Researcher would do absolutely no damage to enemies it 'fires' at, though it would make money off them all the same. This alone makes it a lot more similar to the Farm, landing it in a middle ground between the two.
Read this post explaining this series of tower ideas if you haven't yet:
https://tds.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000000242848
Expanding TDS' Economy | FandomIntroduction TDS only has three economy towers,…tds.fandom.com
Read this post revisiting the Researcher after being given feedback:
https://tds.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000000242879
Design and Balance
Just like the Cowboy, it would generate cash on a per-shot basis, a set amount per shot. Where this differs from the Cowboy is that it would only be cashed in at the end of the wave. This tower would be more early and mid game centered, and have its efficiency taper off slightly in the late game, though it is still quite strong, especially due to the sheer number of enemies that are sent out in the late game.
The lack of damage is a unique spin on the Cowboy, encouraging unorthodox play even more, like placing towers further back so they do less damage, or stalling enemies. This would come into play the most for the early game, but this also means you can't rely on the Researcher like you can with the Cowboy for defense - you need to use a different tower, or have your teammates defend.
Specifics
It would very likely have a low placement limit, and its range would not be large. It would also gain Hidden Detection with an upgrade. I won't add any extra mechanics to it or make it affect enemies at any level - it shouldn't be a particularly complicated tower. If I gave it a slow firerate early on, it would easily miss large sums of money and be pretty inconsistent, so it will have a fast firerate from the start, and have this trend continue throughout its upgrades - besides, I have a concept for another tower like it that fires slowly.
