3.0 X-Bow Cycle

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Introduction

3.0 X-Bow Cycle has been dominant in the meta for a long time now. Although it isn't as strong as it used to be, you can still perform exceptionally with it, so long as you are practiced with it and use skill. This guide will help you get started in your journey with 3.0 X-Bow Cycle, and give you some advanced tips for the future.

Deck Information

Deck Created by: DEFECTIVE Gaming

Minimum Recommended King Level: 8

Maximum Recommended King Level: 14

Arena Required: Electro Valley (Wrong?)

Average Elixir Cost: 3 (Wrong?)

More Statistics: Go to Deck Builder

Card Roles

Tower Troop:

Ice Spirit: Your reset card. It provides a 1 second stun while dealing small damage. It resets ramp-up abilities from Inferno-type cards, as well as charges from a Prince, Dark Prince, or Ram Rider. It can deal with swarms, although you will likely take some damage if your Ice Spirit isn't supported.

Skeletons: Your swarm card. Use them on slow hitters, such as Mini P.E.K.K.A., Elite Barbarians, Inferno Dragon, and others.

The Log: Your small spell. Works well low health cards, such as Skeleton Army, Princess, Goblin Barrel, and others. It knocks back all ground units, so it is useful to reset a Prince, Dark Prince, or Ram Rider charge. However, note that Ice Spirit can do this as well.

Archers: One of your two air defense cards. They deal medium damage, but have low health, dying to almost any spell. Good against swarms and medium health units.

Knight: Your mini tank. The Knight is a powerhouse on defense, and can survive in a tough pinch while dealing medium damage.

Tesla: Your main defensive building. Great against win conditions, such as Ram Rider, Balloon, and Electro Giant.

Fireball: Your big spell. Great against large pushes, troops near the Princess Towers, and spell cycling at the end of the game.

X-bow: Your win condition. Good defensively and offensively.

Skills Needed to Succeed

In my opinion, to go from good to top tier with X-Bow, you need to learn how to elixir and card count.

Card Counting

In Clash Royale, after playing a card, you must play four cards to get back to it.

For example, let's say your hand is Skeletons, Ice Spirit, Tesla, and X-Bow. To be shuffled into your deck are, in this order: Fireball, Knight, Archers, and The Log.

You play X-Bow. Now, your hand is Skeletons, Ice Spirit, Tesla, and Fireball. To be shuffled into your deck are, in this order: Knight, Archers, The Log, and X-Bow. You now must play 4 cards to get your X-Bow back into your hand.

You play Skeletons. Now, your hand is Knight, Ice Spirit, Tesla, and Fireball. To be shuffled into your deck are, in this order: Archers, The Log, X-Bow, and Skeletons. You must play 3 cards to get your X-Bow back into your hand.

You play Ice Spirit. Now, your hand is Knight, Archers, Tesla, and Fireball. To be shuffled into your deck are, in this order: The Log, X-Bow, Skeletons, and Ice Spirit. You must play 2 cards to get your X-Bow back into your hand.

You play Fireball. Now, your hand is Knight, Archers, Tesla, and The Log. To be shuffled into your deck are, in this order: X-Bow, Skeletons, Ice Spirit, and Fireball. You must play 1 card to get your X-Bow back into your hand, and now your X-Bow appears in the "next" tab in your bottom left part of the screen.

You play Knight. Now, your hand is X-Bow, Archers, Tesla, and The Log. To be shuffled into your deck are, in this order: Skeletons, Ice Spirit, Fireball, and Knight. Now, you can play X-Bow again.

This is a basic proof that after you play a card, you must play 4 different cards in order to get that original card back into your hand. This information is handy to have in mind while playing.

Upgrade Order

Gold is a challenging resource to get, so here is the upgrade order I suggest.

X-Bow: First on the list is undoubtably your X-Bow. It is your win condition, and if it doesn't have enough health or do enough damage, it won't connect.

Knight: Second, upgrade your Knight. More health means longer lifetime, more distraction, and ultimately, less damage taken on your tower.

Tesla: Third, upgrade your Tesla. More health on it allows it to survive longer against win conditions, while dealing more damage in its short lifetime.

Fireball: Fourth, upgrade your Fireball. More damage will give an advantage in the spell cycle game. If you can, this would be the card to overlevel, because this means it can kill lower level Wizards, Musketeers, Electro Wizards, and others. If you can't, it is still good.

Archers: Fifth, upgrade your Archers. Archers will not die to a same level Log. I put them lower on this list because they are best at killing swarms, and often more damage won't help.

The Log: Sixth, upgrade your Log. This will help in the spell cycle game. However, against many units, a higher level Log often won't make too large of a difference.

Ice Spirit: Seventh, upgrade your Ice Spirit. If it is the same level as a Princess Tower, it will connect. However, on defense, it doesn't make much of a difference.

Skeletons: Finally, upgrade your Skeletons. 5 or 6 damage and HP won't make much of a difference.

To recap, my upgrade order is as follows: X-Bow, Knight, Tesla, Fireball, Archers, The Log, Ice Spirit, and Skeletons.

Cycling

What is "cycling?"

In Clash Royale, cycling is a period of the game where players play cheap cards to get chip damage, while waiting for the opponent to make the first move. It occurs most often at the beginning of the game, but it may occur in the middle of the game when no troops are on the battlefield.

Cycling is a key part of 3.0 X-Bow. After all, a starting offensive move will often be quickly destroyed by your opponent, followed by a counterpush. Your best four cards to cycle are: The Log, Skeletons, Ice Spirit, and Archers. However, since you need 5 cards to cycle indefinitely (one card + 4 other cards to cycle back to the first card), I usually use Knight as my fifth card.

For my Ice Spirit, I usually play it at the bridge. If it is the same level as my opponent's Princess Towers or higher, I know it will provide pressure and deal some chip damage. However, if it is lower level than my opponent's Princess Towers, I support it with Skeletons, so it can connect. I cycle my Log on my opponent's Princess Tower. I cycle my Archers split behind my King Tower. I cycle my Knight behind the King Tower, in the same lane that I used my Log.

Note that once my opponent makes a move, I stop cycling and start preparing for a defense.

Tesla Placements

To lazy to do right now; X-Bow placements is being done.

X-Bow Placements

There are a variety of X-Bow placements for players to use to switch up their strategy according to the matchup they are playing. This area will teach you all of them, the best situations to use them, as well as their pros and cons.

Offensive X-Bow placements

These placements are usable on offense, to damage your opponent's tower from afar. Here, we will go over the three most useful.

Classic X-Bow Placement

This X-Bow placement is the one you want to use 85% of the time. On the left side, it is one tile below the bridge and centered one tile to the left of the bridge. On the right side, it is one tile below the bridge and centered one tile to the right of the bridge. This position allows you to connect your X-Bow, while having space to place supporting troops.

Here are the pros and cons:

Pros:

• Allows you to tuck in a Tesla to support the X-Bow.
• Allows you to place troops in front of the X-Bow to tank.
• Allows you to kite troops away from the range of the X-Bow using a Log/Fireball (will be covered in greater depth in Advanced Info).

Cons:

• A Fireball can hit both the X-Bow and the Tower, although many players don't know this.
• When placed on the first tile from the bridge, a Mega Knight will jump onto the X-Bow if not distracted.

Inverted X-Bow Placement

This X-Bow placement is great against LavaLoon decks. When combined with a Tesla, this placement will pull away a Balloon from its Lava Hound, while still securing some damage. On the left side, it is one tile below the bridge and centered one tile to the RIGHT of the bridge. On the right side, it is one tile below the bridge and centered one tile to the LEFT of the bridge. Combined with Archers and a Tesla, this can kill a LavaLoon push with ease.

Here are the pros and cons:

Pros:

• Allows you to tuck in a Tesla to support the X-Bow, although this usually isn't the purpose of this placement
• Allows you to place troops in front of the X-Bow to tank.
• Seperates a tank & win condition push (ex. LavaLoon) with support of Tesla.

Cons:

• DOES NOT allow you to kite troops away from the range of the X-Bow using a Log/Fireball, since this covers too much of the Arena.
• When placed on the first tile from the bridge, a Mega Knight will jump onto the X-Bow if not distracted.

Center X-Bow Placement

This X-Bow placement is great against decks that lack in ranged units. It is also great when you are trying to attack in the lane where your opponent has already taken your tower. This X-Bow placement may look like the best at first glance, but it has quite a few errors.

Pros:

• Melee units can't hit it, and have to walk all the way around the bridge to the center of the arena to hit the X-Bow.
• When you have lost a tower, this placement allows for it to only be hit from 2 sides, instead of 3 or 4 like other offensive placements.

Cons:

• You can't use a Log to push a unit out of the X-Bow's range, and therefore target the opponent's tower. This is because this X-Bow placement covers almost all of the arena.
• Air units will have an advantage against this placement over other placements, because they can be placed in a way such that they will target the X-Bow and not be targeted by your tower.