Monarch Butterfly
Floaty and slow to turn, but everything it eats counts for more.
Uncommon bugs unlock with XP you earn playing online, or with coins. The game shows how to get each one.
Passive: Nectar Diet
+18% food value everywhere, −6% top speed.
A passive is always on: you never fire it and it never runs out. It is what the Monarch Butterfly does that no other bug does quite the same way.
Stats
Stats are multipliers on the standard bug, which is ×1.00 in everything (the game shows them as percentages: ×1.14 is 114%). Turn is Agility in the game. For Boost drain, lower is cheaper.
| Stat | Monarch Butterfly | Compared with the standard bug |
|---|---|---|
| Speed | ×0.94 | 6% slower |
| Turn | ×0.86 | turns 14% slower |
| Bulk | ×1.02 | 2% thicker |
| Growth | ×1.18 | 18% more from food |
| Boost | ×0.94 | boosts 6% slower |
| Boost drain | ×1.05 | boosting costs 5% more |
| Spawn mass | 18 | the standard |
Power-ups
Every bug has 5 power-up slots. The Monarch Butterfly can carry 7 of the game's 18 power-ups: the 5 core ones every bug carries, and 2 more that its traits from the real animal allow. Its traits are flier and gardener.
Hyperdash
Instantly teleport 420u forward; for 0.4s only the wall can kill you.
From its flier trait.
Nectar Bloom
For 10s every mouthful is worth double and you regenerate 6 mass per second.
From its gardener trait.
Core power-ups: Nitro Wings, Molt Husks, Phase Shift, Pheromone Call, Shockwave.
How bots play it
Bots fill every seat no player is using. A bot playing the Monarch Butterfly plays it as a Skittish. Jumpy: the widest berth around bodies, the earliest flight and quick evasive boosts; it fires defensive power-ups early.
Other skittish bugs: Grasshopper, Mosquito, Tsetse Fly, Cockroach, Firefly, Luna Moth.
Skins
The Monarch Butterfly has 7 skins. A skin changes only how it looks, never how it plays. See them in the full skin gallery.
Monarch Gold
A migration's worth of gold leaf: golden-orange wings with black markings.
Blue Morpho
The blue morpho of the rainforest: shimmering sky-blue wings marked in deep navy.
Cabbage White
Chalk-white wings with sooty veins and black forewing spots over a charcoal body. It's the garden's most familiar butterfly, Pieris rapae, green eyes included.
Bluebottle Swallowtail
Turquoise wings edged in ink-black on a near-black body, with a dab of red, after the Common Bluebottle (Graphium sarpedon).
Purple Emperor
Violet wings with white borders and white eyespot rings, plus gold accents. It's after Apatura iris, the canopy butterfly collectors call His Majesty.
Poinsettia Butterfly
Poinsettia-red wings edged and veined in gold, with gold spots on every pane and an evergreen body.
Black Cat Butterfly
Jet-black wings rimmed in cat-eye yellow, glowing like a black cat on a Halloween fence.
The real animal
The Monarch Butterfly in buggs.io is based on Danaus plexippus, and its traits come from what the real animal does. Read about it on Wikipedia.