Modern Hog Cycle

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Introduction

Hog earthquake has been a popular deck ever since earthquake was released. This deck is a variant of hog earthquake that was popular in late 2023 and early 2024. I main this deck. Credits to Atomic for help.

This deck relies around cycling hog rider and earthquakes to chip a tower down, while cycle cards can defend efficiently for a positive elixir trade. The cycle cards give lots of value if used right. This deck is very F2P friendly, filled with only commons and rares and a single, heavily level independent legendary spell.

Deck Information

Deck Created by: DartDartPopper

Minimum Recommended King Level: 10

Maximum Recommended King Level: 15

Arena Required: Spooky Town (Wrong?)

Average Elixir Cost: 2.8 (Wrong?)

More Statistics: Go to Deck Builder

Card Roles

Knight: Your mini-tank. He acts as a damage sponge, taking hits but he can also counter a wide range of cards too. This should be your first slot Evolution.

Firecracker: Your damage dealer. She damages from afar and is a huge part of your defense, you have to protect her from troops at all costs. This should be your second slot Evolution.

Hog Rider: Your win condition. Can also he used in defense but only situational. Use him to start of the game or counterpushing with leftover defending troops.

Goblins: Your swarm. It helps in distracting single target tank busters while also dealing damage. This card is more useful in defense rather than offense.

Ice Spirit: Your cycle card. Use this on defense. It can be used to chip the tower or reset some units. This should not be your evolution unless you don't have evo knight or evo firecracker.

Tesla: Your building. It can help clear up many small swarms, distract and counter win conditions while also acting like a damage dealer. Use this mainly to clear big win conditions while firecracker kills the swarms.

Earthquake: Your offensive spell. It helps clear defensive buildings and small swarms for your hog rider but it can be used defensively, but it is not recommended.

The Log: Your small spell, cleaning up swarms, knocking back units, there are a lot of uses, can be used offensively and defensively.

Strategy

Starting Plays (from best to worst)

• Ice spirit at the bridge, use this unless your opponent has cannoneer or dagger Duchess.
• Hog at the bridge, useful to revealing your opponent's deck.
• Log at the bridge. You might be facing logbait so only do this when you can quickly cycle to goblins.
• Knight on the back, if you are facing mega knight on the bridge, kite him to your knight or activate your King Tower.
• Tesla in the middle, useful if you want to cycle to a second one
• Goblins, Goblins is a useful defensive card and should be used as a counter to your opponent's plays.

• Firecracker. She can defend a variety of cards and give tons of value, so don't use her as your first play
• Earthquake on the tower, don't use this or you will be punished hardly by elixir pump or x-bow decks.

In-depth Card Uses

Knight

Knight is your mini tank. He can help tank hits and take down a lot of cards.

Effectively countering the Little Prince

Place the knight on the blue tile to counter little Prince even if he uses his ability.

Imagine your opponent has a counterpushing little prince, you should place the knight on the blue tile. Many players will blindly activate his ability. However, with this placement, the guardian will knock the knight outwards instead of back, and the knight will still target the little Prince and the guardian will target the knight instead of the tower and they have just wasted 3 elixir.

Firecracker

If you are new to this deck, the biggest tip I can give is to PROTECT HER AS IF YOU WOULD LOSE THE GAME IF SHE DIES. I know sometimes the enemy will use a spell to take her out, and I know sometimes you have to give her up, but in many scenarios this is key. If protected, she can squeeze a LOT of value, hiding in your territory while damaging pushes.

Piercing Damage

Firecracker can pierce from the bridge, unlike bowler and executioner, use this as a combo with your hog rider, the pierce damage can be extremely annoying for your opponent.

Hog Rider

Hog rider is your win condition. It is mainly used for offense. However, sometimes he can be used for kiting fast troops.

Auto Pig Push

There is a small part of the river at the edges of the map, outside the river. You can place your hog rider to jump over it, and it will bypass many buildings.

Distracting troops with Hog Rider

Hog rider can be used to distract troops thanks to his jump ability. For example, when a PEKKA has crossed the bridge, place hog rider at the river to kite the PEKKA a backwards and threaten to damage the tower.

Hog rider can also distract a mega knight. When the mega knight is charging his jump, place a hog rider at the river and the mega knight will jump at the hog, but the hog will be mid-air and will take no damage. You can use this even before the mega knight jumps.

Credits to 2.6 hog document for this place hog rider on red tile when mega knight is on the grey tile for the optimal distraction.

Hog in the back

It seems really weird, but sometimes pro players would play hog rider in the back. This will help against the hog EQ mirror and other cycle decks. It is also a main way to punish a blind rocket on the tower. You will hog rider in the back to have enough time to cycle to another one and have a double hog rider push. Usually, they will use a building. The first hog will damage the building so that after you earthquake it, it will be destroyed so the second hog will go for the tower. Meanwhile, you opponent needs to cycle more cards to get back to their building. If they try to act smart and place a swarm at the bridge, then place a firecracker. If they place a high DPS like Mini PEKKA, place goblins in front of the hog.

This is also essential to beat drill cycle.

Ice Spirit

One of your cycle cards. Although it only costs 1 elixir, the ice spirit can provide loads of value with good use. It can freeze and distract, doesn’t sound much but it is.

A trick with hog rider and ice spirit

Hog:red tile, Ice spirit: blue tile

By placing the ice spirit on the blue tile and immediately placing the hog rider on the red tile, they will go in a way that allows them to bypass tornado. The ice spirit will push the hog rider out of the tornado radius. Extremely helpful against decks that rely on tornado to counter hog rider.

Fully countering the Magic Archer

Place the ice spirit in the blue tile while the magic archer is in the cyan area.

Combining Ice Spirit + Goblins to heavily damage a lone electro giant

Suppose your opponent plays Electro Giant at the bridge first play. What do you do? While you could Tesla, there is a better option. You can goblins, quickly followed by an ice spirit to deal massive damage to the elector giant. At the same time, rush firecracker + hog opposite lane to deal heavy damage to the Princess tower. You will still take damage from the electro giant, but you have a large lead in damage opposite lane. Against an electro giant + bowler push, knight to distract the bowler then ice spirit + goblins if your Tesla is not in cycle.

Tesla

Placements

Placements

Credits to Daryll7673 for sending me a replay for the map. Assume that the troops are coming on the left side only. Just mirror it for the right side.

• Red (4-3) is standard. It will pull most win conditions.
• Pink (2-3) is the hog placement. It will pull all hog riders even when auto-pig pushed.
• Green (0-3) is the anti-spell. It prevents earthquake, lightning and poison from hitting both the Princess tower and the Tesla.
• Purple is the alternative anti-earthquake. It is more risky and should be only done once per match. It only avoids standard earthquake placement.
• Gray (3-2) is the anti-balloon/skeleton barrel. Balloon/skeleton barrel placed at the edge will not bypass this.
• Orange outline (5-3) is the risky placement. It pulls giant, goblin giant and golem but you have to place it reactively.
• Blue (5-1) is the risky Lava Hound placement. It will pull lava hound placed at the back but will not pull certain lava hound placements.
• Dark green outline (5-0) is the safe lava hound placement, it will pull all lava hound.
• Yellow (0-0) is the "anti-logbait" placement. It is used against logbait where there is no need to pull win conditions. It can take out Princess at the bridge, help clear goblin gangs and even snipe poorly placed buildings.

Getting more value out of leftover teslas

So imagine you placed a Tesla which helped defend your opponents PEKKA Witch push. It has lots of HP leftover. You can place hog in the same lane as the Tesla, and your Tesla will help deal with counterpushing troops.

Earthquake

Earthquake is your big spell. It will make short work of buildings, paving the way for hog. This will also quickly wipe out skeletons while the total damage of the spell can kill goblins. It also has a slow effect which can be very useful.

Using earthquake like a fireball or rocket

You can earthquake troops deployed at the back to chip the tower. This is very safe because earthquake only costs 3 elixir.

Combining earthquake with The Log

Earthquake (246 total) paired with the log (290) deals 536 damage. Notably, here are the cards this combination can kill.

• Magic Archer
• Mother Witch
• Zappies.
• Every ground troop royal delivery can kill. Such as:
  • Evolved Firecracker
  • Evolved Archers

Misc

Defending against the Evolved Battle Ram

When you see an evolved battle ram, you have to counter with either ice spirit to stop its charge THEN goblins followed by log to knock back the barbarians or tesla + ice spirit.

Matchups

Logbait

In general, save your log for the goblin barrel. Other bait win conditions can be neutralise with Tesla.

Classic Logbait

This deck is still really popular. You will always want to save the log for the barrel, except when they do an extremely obvious tricky barrel, you can goblins to defend it then log another of their bait cards. Respond to princesses at the bridge with anti logbait teslas. You can send some hogs too. You will get damage by repeatedly defending their push and earthquake cycling, getting them to rocket your tower. After they rocket your tower, play hog in the back, and you will break through their defenses and land a few hits.

However, a good logbait player will play Inferno tower in the anti-eq position and have rocket in hand for your next hog instead of their bait cards because you'll probably pre-log. If both players play perfectly, logbait usually wins the matchup.

Guards Bait

Pretty much the same thing. Firecracker can take out the guards as the shrapnel will pierce through the shields of the guards.

Prince Bait

While Prince bait doesn’t have a good counter to hog + eq, it makes up for it with massive offensive pressure. Rascals + Prince push is surprisingly hard to defend. You should be more conservative in single elixir, trying to make sure your elixir bar is always at least 3M except when your opponent makes a large push. Counter rascals + prince + dart goblin with a log and knight and use goblins to defend their barrel. You will take damage, but you will be up a bit of elixir, so hog on offense. Hopefully your firecracker should be alive, if not you have to eq. However, the best option is to prevent the push. If they rascals at the back, hog opposite lane, and earthquake if you have enough elixir. DO NOT EQ IN SINGLE!!! This will force out a Prince. Then, firecracker the rascals and defend the prince with goblins and then knight.

Mighty Miner Goblin Barrel Bait

Mighty miner gives them a three-card cycle. They WILL outcycle your log forcing you to play goblins and they can also play their goblin barrel in front of the tower so your goblins cannot effectively surround them. They can also easily defend your hog pushes with anti-eq building placement (usually cannon + another troop to push hog) and will rocket cycle you out. They will beat you IF they play perfectly. However, almost people I have faced play this suboptimally. They panic when facing a Hog+ FC and EQ push, not knowing the anti EQ cannon placement. You should apply as much pressure as possible to have a chance of them making a mistake defending a hog.

Mighty Miner Recruits Bait

This matchup is a hard counter (10-90) especially if they have arrows, the only thing you can do is stack firecrackers so they cannot freely arrows them. But if they have fireball it's a 40-60

Graveyard

Against graveyard decks, a useful tip to know is that firecracker behind king tower can be an annoying defense against graveyard. They can’t get rid of her without activating king tower and she will wipe out a lot of the skeletons.

Splashyard

Splashyard is not as unwinnable as a matchup as some might think, but it is tough and you will have to play perfectly for the entire game. The trick is to always bridgeblock the tank! You will have to block the tank so they can’t graveyard, allowing you to use an offensive earthquake. Additionally, right after dropping a tank at the bridge, splashyard players will automatically graveyard right after usually. So if you block the tank, that leaves an untanked graveyard. Don’t ignore it, an ignored untanked graveyard still deals lots of damage. Usually, they won’t graveyard poison in single. If it happens though, immediately launch a counterpush with hog and then firecracker soon after. This will be very hard to defend, and will often take tower. However, in double elixir, it becomes much harder. Again, bridgeblock any tanks.

Now let’s talk about offense. They usually have 2 hog answers, tombstone and tornado. If they make no mistakes, then can defend perfectly but you can pressure them to make mistakes. Try to outcycle their tornado and earthquake their tombstones. This will cause them to freak out and you will land a few hits. However, this is more harder than it looks, so you actually have to bridgeblock tanks with hog rider sometimes! This will force out a tornado or a tombstone. You want them to tornado, so you can cycle to another hog and earthquake the building afterwards.

However, in double elixir, they can graveyard + poison without being prone to a counterpush. Lets assume they forcibly tank the graveyard with a barbarian barrel. You have to earthquake on defense, but that is because they have a tank. That is why, BRIDGEBLOCK THE TANKS! You should also use a Tesla touching the Princess tower too, helping against graveyard and countering an untanked one.

A good splashyard player will place their tombstone in the anti-eq position not allowing you to eq the building and the tower, and them place another troop to full counter your hog. It is also rather hard to defend a gy without taking dmg and you can't always bridgeblock cause you really only have knight for ground and tesla for air and using hog sometimes sets you back too far in elixir to defend properly. They can bait you to waste elixir and bridgeblock and then when they know you're low on elixir they'll push in gy + posion and you can't defend.

If they have evolved Valkyrie, try to pull it into the center and try and get a king activation with the tornado effect, if you succeed, you might be able to win, if you fail, well, you wasted a bunch of elixir so I highly doubt you win...

Overall this is a tough matchup, but not unwinnable.

Freezeyard

This matchup is SUPER ANNOYING. They also have the MOST ANNOYING troops to block up the lane with, AND nado. GY + freeze can only be fully countered with eq + log preventing your spell cycle and they may still get dmg because rng. Play as aggressive as opponent allows you to without being punished, and defend their gy + freeze for a chance to win if you get a good dmg lead early on.

You actually have matchup IF they lack a building. This is because you can actually easily outcycle their Tornado. It is vital to stack as many firecrackers as possible as they often lack a good removal for it. You should take out the graveyard with EQ and Log, mentioned earlier.

Drill

This matchup really depends on their big spell (if any) and how well you can defend against their drill. First, identify their support cards. If they have troops such as evo firecracker or wall breakers this means drill bridgespam, or if have the classic exe golden knight nado, this means that if you place a mini-tank to defend against their drill they'll play a combination of evo firecracker nado, exe nado or gk nado to get additional tower dmg, If they have mini-tank, another building, and big spell, they usually have drill cycle. They'll defend most of the game and go in for drill + their big spell (usually fireball but sometimes posion or rocket) in double and triple elixir.

Against bridgespam, predicting the firecracker at the bridge is KEY. You'll often use tesla to do the trick but you also might have wasted it their drill or wall breakers. For normal firecracker you can use log + ice spirit, goblins surround or knight, and for evo you can use ice spirit to tank + goblins or knight. Track when they get to their evo firecracker because they'll mainly use her to get a lot of damage from the bridge and they can tornado everything away from the firecracker, so tesla is key here.

Against nado, you either force them to play it to defend your hog (usually their best counter to it), or waste it on offense (hopefully) and push with hog. Chances are, if they don't have nado in cycle, they'll play goblins + log to full counter (which you can pre-log or eq) or play a mini-tank and take at least 2-3 hog shots. Be careful if they have a champion cuz a three-card cycle is quite scary and you might not have the right hand to defend their drill.

Against drill cycle, pray they don't have a champion (usually little prince) because they WILL outcycle your counters to drill and easily defend your hog with their building in the anti-eq placement (usually tesla), and depending on their other cards, you might be able to get firecracker chip or catch them low on elixir if they push too aggressively in single, but if they have tesla, little prince, and royal delivery, you can quit the game cause you're not winning that matchup especially if they're a good player.

However, if you spam hogs behind the king tower to the side where they are attacking, you might have a chance to win. The point is to discourage them from placing drill, since the drill will only get one hit when you also use the log. While this seems like a noob tactic, they cannot ignore the hog at the back, in fact it’s the outcycle trick, allowing you to slowly build up pressure until their building is out of cycle or they make a mistake.

There are a couple of ways to defend against a drill:

The most reliable way is to wait right before the first goblin spawns and then log, then ice spirit to full counter, and vice versa.

Other ways include using a knight (if you predict where it is), tesla (if you predict where it is), and goblins. EQ isn't a very effective counter cause you'll still take some damage and the first goblin will do damage.

It really depends on how well the opponent plays, cause if they know what they're doing, chances are, you lose.

LavaLoon

Most lavaloon decks contain tombstone, evo barbarians and miner as their ground units. Tombstone is easily countered by eq or a hog shot + log and firecracker can easily deal with barbs. If they lava the back in single, immediately push hog opposite (hopefully you figured out what they have to counter your hog so you can react accordingly, if tombstone eq or log, if barbs wait until they cross bridge then use log/knight/goblins) and set up a firecracker at the back towards the lava. You'll want to cycle back to another one in case they spell it down or use a miner (PROTECT HER). Use tesla in the lava placement (see above) and distract any support units such as mega minion and inferno dragon with goblins and ice spirit; skeleton dragons, baby dragon, flying machine (to name a few) with knight. Make sure to also tank the lava pups as well.

Matchup really depends on their removal to your firecracker and tesla, if they have arrows fireball you have a losing matchup, if they have fireball zap (classical) they can fireball your firecracker but have no way to kill your tesla (DO NOT ALLOW THEM TO HIT BOTH YOUR FIRECRACKER AND TESLA) and you'll be able to cycle back to another one if needed. It also depends on how well the opponent defends your hogs and how well you pressure.

The matchup can go either way depending on how well they know the matchup.

Electro Giant

Usually runs a 3 elixir building (cannon/tombstone) as well as tornado. However, they have a relatively slow cycle + you can knight in front of hog so they are forced to take a hog shot or miss the nado completely, and eq easily deals with their building. Most e-giant decks run bowler (hog only gets one shot if they have king activated) and lightning for your tesla (anti-lightning/eq placement, but you can pull an e-giant even farther meaning that you can place your tesla slightly in the opposite lane and it'll pull). Space out your firecracker, tesla, and knight so the lightning can't hit all of them and track their hog counters so you know whether to quickly cycle to another one (nado) or eq (building). WARNING: IF YOU PLACE YOUR TESLA AT THE RIVER THEY CAN SNIPE IT WITH A CANNON. Offense shouldn't be a problem, but if you mess up on defense and allowed them to get a healthy e-giant on tower you're screwed.

[OLD META] Electro Giant Recruits [Yes this was a meta deck]

In top ladder you have matchup, but practically it’s annoying. If you unknowingly put Tesla against recruits, they can egiant the bridge and you’re fucked. However, if you identify the deck and not get tricked, it’s in your favour but it’s easy to mess up. They are really heavy (4.5 elixir) with only one hog counter. They also have to fireball your firecracker, so you can split the firecracker and Tesla and the electro giant will either never make it or your firecracker gets so much value on recruits, bowler, mother witch and inferno dragon.

Goblin Giant Beatdown

Goblin Giant Sparky

Hog cycle has a really good matchup against this if they only have one way to take out firecracker (Zap + Rage, Arrows, Lightning). You may be surprised. If they play a sparky att he back, firecracker behind your king tower same lane and THEN hog + ice spirit at the bridge opposite lane. This is so you can cycle back to another firecracker faster. Hog will definitely land at least one hit, if they defend it. It would land more if they ignore it. Then, earthquake and log their push to slow it down and distract the sparky with your other cards (preferably not goblins, they are useful for the goblin giant) and maybe knight. If they take out your firecracker with spells, quickly cycle to another one, while using a Tesla to distract the goblin giant (if they have lightning, space out your Tesla and firecracker). Then, if they sparky in their stronger side, repeat the process. But if they cycle sparky at the weaker side where you landed the hog hit, place firecracker, then earthquake it, and just defend. Repeat this until you win.

[OLD META] Goblin Giant Bowler/Mega Knight

Luckily for you, these decks do not carry arrows, meaning your firecracker and goblins get a lot of value. You should push with hog rider + ice spirit. The ice spirit would help distract the fisherman if they ignore it, and these decks have fisherman.

For defense, the key is to distract the bowler/mega knight with knight, then take out the goblin giant with tesla + goblins.

Royal Giant

This matchup is extremely annoying. They can easily get a double royal giant push in double elixir, and you can’t respond with double Tesla because of the lifetime, while countering your hogs constantly with fisherman. It is also very hard to counter evolved royal Giant if they have their big spell in hand. (TBA)

Hog Cycle

Fireball

You have matchup vs 2.6, because you can avoid their fireball on your tesla easily and you can easily eq their fragile building (cannon). Try to not get outcycled because that is the only way the opponent can win. You may hog the back if they are smart with their anti-eq cannons and pre-log their skeletons and ice spirit. Track when they get their evo skeletons, because that + ice spirit/log can full counter, so you should be prepared to eq or log.

X-Bow

2.9/3.0

This matchup is pretty easy. You can repeatedly earthquake their x-bow setups. Whenever they place an offensive x bow (at the bridge. If they place it at the Center place knight then wait then Tesla the river), you should place a knight 1 tile in front of your tower troop, wait 2 seconds for them to place their mini tank, then firecracker to splash onto the set up and annoy them. If they don’t place a mini tank, take the x bow out with a Tesla.

Once they try to snipe your firecracker with Tesla, earthquake the setup then play hog rider, causing them to panic and guaranteeing damage. Repeat this until you win.

However, do NOT consider this a free win, since if you face a good x-bow player, you may lose, and you lose if you overcommit.

Icebow

There is absolutely no way you can outcycle both their tesla and tornado, and even if you somehow manage to do so they have rocket, knight/ice wiz/skeletons/log spam and your hog still gets no hits...

That is if they don't mess up and play the matchup perfectly. Defending every single hog with either tesla or tornado. But if they miss one tesla or tornado (if you put knight in front of hog) that might just give you enough damage to outmatch their rocket.

Pumpbow

If you can lose this matchup, congratulations! You have a skill issue!

Golem

Classic Golem

Classic golem decks are not very hard. They don’t have a good answer to hog rider other than Mini PEKKA, and their removal for firecracker is….lightning. (TBA)

Golem Pump

If they run golem pump, you are in for a rough time. Earthquake every pump you see, and whenever they golem in the back, send a hog rider + ice spirit push but do not add anything else to stop yourself from overcommitting. Before that, firecracker behind your king tower same lane as the golem. If they tornado your hog, that is good because now they don’t have a direct removal for firecracker. You should use goblins and knight to create a wall for your firecracker, distracting the electro dragon. However, if they lumberjack, knight in the middle and quickly cycle to another firecracker but hold on to it until they tornado your firecracker into their push. You can try to respond with Tesla at the river after placing the firecracker in double elixir to try and cycle to another one.

Chances are, they'll run evo barbs or evo knight. If they don't have nado in hand they'll most likely use barbs to counter your hog so throw a firecracker behind your hog to kill off the barbs and deal chip on their tower. Protect with a knight/ice spirit if you can, or goblins in they try to barbarian barrel. Killing the e-drag is key, as this card will chain on your entire defense, and removing it makes the golem push rather easy to defend.

Annoying Cards to face

Inferno tower: This building is generally a pain in the ass. Due to its stupidly high hp, it fully counters Hog + EQ without any other cards. It’s also the most popular building in midladder. You can try to break through it with hog in the back, ice spirit, or maybe knight+hog. Additionally, you can spell cycle it out.

Evolved Royal Giant: For this hog deck, this guy is a shithead. You have to take it down with Knight + Tesla, and it can knock back your knight + goblins and break through Tesla. If you are struggling with it, try the mighty miner variant with bomb tower over Tesla. Mighty miner is not knocked back by the royal giant recoil and bomb tower has more health than Tesla.

Midladder Guide

Here is the guide for all of you between arena 15-19.

Most players suck within this range but can catch you off guard because they run the weirdest of decks. If you come across another player running a meta deck, be prepared to go deep into overtime as they are most likely better than their midladder counterparts.

It is very important to save your firecracker and tesla, knight should also be saved if you do not have tesla + ice spirit in hand. Safe starting plays in midladder include:

Goblins bridge or split at the back

Log at the bridge (be careful of logbait)

Ice spirit at the bridge (only if it's the same level as their crown tower)

Knight at the back if you have tesla + ice spirit in hand

Eq if you really want to, but I don't advise it.

Hog can usually defend most of the random decks midladder players make, tesla + firecracker + knight can pretty much defend anything unless they have removal to your firecracker. They also often lack FULL counters to your hog, you'll often see skarmy and mini pekka as full counters (midladder players don't place the mini pekka correctly so expect to get a hit). React accordingly and predict if they do the same defense again and again. DO NOT OVERCOMMIT IN SINGLE ESPECIALLY IF YOU'RE UNDERLEVELED, the chances of you taking a tower in single is slim compared to the opponent's. (More to be added)

Levelling Priority

• Firecracker: It is important that she survives the log.
• Knight (if evolved): Knight is not level dependent, but evolved knight is very powerful and you want him to be leveled up to maximise his effectiveness.
• Goblins: It is important that they survive small spells other than barbarian barrels and log.
• Ice spirit: Not as important, but it is helpful for it to be able to chip the tower.
• Hog rider: No major interactions, but it is your win condition and one level can mean an extra hit on the tower.
• EQ: Underleveled EQ cannot oneshot skeletons.
• Tesla: Ensure it one shots goblins, but cannot one shot a spirit if one lvl under.
• Log: Ensure it one shots goblins, and loggables (princess, dart gob, rascal girls) or else you'll have a hard time.

Dealing with Mega Knight

Mega knight has a very high usage in midladder so you should be able to learn how to counter it.

Firstly, you can kite it to the king tower with any combination of Tesla, ice spirit and goblins. You can block off its support troops with knight. This will work a lot of the time, and is useful to know. An alternative way is to place a knight then place goblins/Tesla/firecracker to take the mega knight out, which is less risky. If you want to only use knight, place him in the middle, as although the mega knight will jump, both Princess towers will target the mega knight.

Substitution (or how to make your own hog deck)

If you want to change the cards, then you can! Here is how to make your own hog deck. A hog deck consists of:

• Cheap swarm
• Utility cycle
• The log
• Hog
• Ranged DPS
• Win condition defense
• High HP
• Big spell

A cheap swarm is well… a cheap swarm:

• Skeletons: The classical. It can be used in many ways and costs only one elixir.
• Goblins: If you are new the hog cycle, goblins are easier to use. Since they were buffed to 4 goblins, goblins went from shit to really good.
• Guards: With the recent buff, guards have become very powerful, being unable to be taken out by arrows. This makes the guards an option too.
• Goblin Gang: Goblin Gang can be used as a backup answer to air cards like Balloon. However, the deck lacks any other bait cards so it will be easily logged.

Utility cycle is mainly a spirit, but can also be others:

• Ice spirit: Classical. It is used to stun but also as a distraction.
• Electro spirit: Deals less damage and stuns for shorter than the ice spirit, but in exchange can be used in more scenarios than ice spirit, notably easily countering a skeleton barrel.
• Fire spirit: Ever since the rework, fire spirit is viable as it cannot be ignored or it will do a fireball's worth of damage to the tower. Good for chip damage. It also has a larger area, which can be helpful in low ladder where skeleton army is very popular.
• Royal delivery: This is interesting… not that cheap but can be used to defend against a wide range of cards, and has many uses. It’s also fun to use and makes balloon matchups easier.
• Giant Snowball: Can knock troops out of the way, useful for hog.
• Evolved Bomber: This guy is weird and very niche, but was once overpowered as fuck.
• Bats: While it makes your cycle a bit awkward, bats provide additional air defense. And sometimes the value they can get is insane.

The log. If you haven’t unlocked it yet, there is one replacement. The giant snowball

Giant snowball is extremely level independent (as long as it can oneshot spear goblins and tower shot+snowball kills goblins it’s fine.) and can be useful for knocking troops out of the way for hog. For example. If your opponent uses mini PEKKA to counter hog, you can prediction snowball the middle between the hog and the tower (where mini PEKKA is placed to fully counter hog) and knock it back. If they don’t do anything the hog will land several hits.

Hog is your win condition, but there are 2 hogs:

• Hog rider: More reliable because fireball isn’t a secondary answer to it.
• Royal hogs: Agaist some decks it’s harder to counter.

Ranged DPS is very necessary. It must target air too:

• Musketeer: Again, classical. It can survive a fireball and arrows, making it better against air decks.
• Firecracker: This costs less, does splash, and provides lots of value easily. The drawback? Being easily taken out by spells.
• Archers Evo: Archers Evo are strong, so this is viable.
• Archer Queen: She’s the most smashable of the options 🥵🥵🥵🥵 (also, she has a powerful ability + 3 card cycle)
• Little Prince: The newest champion, providing a cheap 3 card cycle, can survive fireball, has a small spell, and a mini tank, all in one card!
• Mother Witch: If you have cannoneer leveled up, pair it with mother witch, for just 2 slots you get free wins vs gy and giant and have a good matchup spread. However, her lack of dps can hurt. But cannoneer compensates for that.
• Wizard Evo: Wizard splash without dying to arrows makes him very strong in some matchups, flipping the script on them such as Elixir golem. The Evo wizard requires only 1 cycle to get to, so with this deck’s fast cycle, you’ll get him A LOT.

Win condition defense is almost always a building, but you can use mini PEKKA in specific variants:

• Cannon is classical, and it is the cheapest of the options.
• Tesla: costs more, but can target air and is very hard to snipe.
• Bomb tower: It deals splash damage and has lots of HP.
• Mortar is much more offensive and makes it have more reliable matchups, as you have a second win condition. Can be clunky to use on defense though, since high health is all it offers
• Inferno tower: Bruh wth… it has a FUCK TON OF HP, tanking a rocket at full HP and because of its ridiculous HP it fully counters royal hogs. Also, it obviously melts tanks, but at a high price.
• Mini PEKKA is niche but usable. An example of a hog cycle deck using mini PEKKA is this

High HP is meant to absorb damage:

• Ice Golem. The classic damage sponge, and it’s death damage can wipe out swarms.
• Knight: Costs more than the ice golem, but can fight back.
• Valkyrie: Does splash damage, which means she has better offensive synergy than the hog. Also sma-
• Mighty Miner: Easy to use because of its ramp up damage, tearing apart tanks.
• Giant skeleton: The second most expensive of the options. While it is inflexible, giant skeleton + hog + eq is a migrane to defend against.
• Monk: Can be viable after the recent health buff. You destroy sparky and giant graveyard, while monk+hog can be very punishing if the defender messes up.
• Evo PEKKA: Really only viable because it is op but it’s getting nerfed so idk

Big spell:

• Fireball. The classical. Deals lots of damage and generally good overall.
• Earthquake: In exchange for less damage and no damage against air, it rips buildings.
• Poison: Your offense will be much weaker since you can’t break through buildings, but poison offers many benefits. The first being that it is good in the meta. It kills little prince and is the best spell against graveyard, although you still take chip. Additionally, it kills many things earthquake cannot kill, and has a larger radius than fireball. It is also good to deny swarms, and swarm spam decks such as Egolem + SK + NW.
• Lightning: The heaviest option, hog lightning tears apart defenses.