Miner

"The Miner can burrow his way underground and appear anywhere in the Arena. It's not magic, it's a shovel.​"

Summary

 * The Miner is unlocked from the Builder's Workshop (Arena 6).
 * He is a single target, melee troop with high hitpoints and moderate damage.
 * A Miner card costs 3 Elixir to deploy.
 * The Miner is the only troop that can be deployed anywhere on the Arena.
 * The Miner appears to be a joyous digger whose face is dirt scathed probably due to his profile as a miner. He has a bright red nose, a shovel, and a black helmet with a candle on it.

Strategy

 * Due to his ability to be placed anywhere, the Miner can be used for surprise attacks.
 * He deals 60% less damage to Crown Towers, so it's recommended not to use him on them.
 * However, he can act as a surprise tank. A Miner backed up by high DPS troops such as Goblins or Minions is a cheap way to deal immense damage.
 * Use Miners to destroy enemy buildings when they are distracted. He is also a great counter to spawners.
 * You can also support your pushes by deploying the Miner next to your troops.
 * The Miner can take out squishy but powerful troops such as the Princess or Musketeer that are protected by a tank.
 * Being a single-target troop, the Miner is very weak against a small swarm of troops, such as Skeletons, which distract the Miner and prevent him from attacking nearby buildings.
 * Pairing up the Miner and Hog Rider is a great choice for a push, however it is vulnerable to air troops, such as Minions, and is also easily stopped by Barbarians.

Trivia

 * The Miner was added to the game on 3/5/16 with the May Update.
 * On 18/5/16, a Balance Update increased the Miner's hitpoints by 6%, and decreased it's deploy time to 0.7 seconds (from 1 second).
 * The latter was unmentioned in any change notes.
 * Supercell has stated the latter change to be unintentional.
 * It is the only Troop card that can be placed anywhere on the Arena.
 * The Goblin Barrel can deploy Goblins anywhere on the Arena too. However the difference is that the Goblin Barrel is a spell. Note that the Goblin Barrel flies over everything, so your opponent can easily see it coming, while with the Miner, it is harder to predict its destination.
 * It is the only troop to deal reduced damage to Crown Towers.
 * When the Miner is digging to his desired location, the dirt in the arena is uprooted even if the arena is not made of dirt or the Miner is going over a bridge.
 * It is unknown how the Miner digs through the river.
 * Also, when the Miner digs through his desired location, if he unknowingly digs under a place where troops are standing, the troops above it will move aside. This uprooting of the dirt can re-aggro troops as it pushes them aside, effectively switching targets. However, this is not substantially used as it is hard to predict miner movement.
 * The Miner has inferior hitpoints and DPS (especially against Crown Towers) compared to a Knight that is 8 levels higher than the Miner. The two main advantages of the Miner over the Knight are unlimited placement area and a slightly faster movement speed.
 * The main disadvantage is that the Knight can be upgraded more often because of it being a common card. Miner is a legendary, so it can hardly even upgrade that easily. This isn't a really bad disadvantage though.
 * The Miner is one of two troops that inspired a troop in Clash of Clans, the other one being the Baby Dragon. However, both are slightly different from their Clash counterparts in both looks and abilities.

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