New Hog Trifecta Control

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Introduction

Hello everyone. Remember me? The person who created a guide for their deck that was so long it was at the top of the Battle Decks page for like two years? I have come back from the dead (as of August 21, 2021) to present to you my new and improved Hog Trifecta deck. It's shifted from a faster cycle to a defensive control playstyle, and it's brought me success many times in ladder matches, challenges, and Clan Wars. This guide is a bit long, so please refer to the Table of Contents for the sections that are of interest to you.

Deck Information

Deck Created by: BattlerMaster

Minimum Recommended King Level: 9

Maximum Recommended King Level: 13

Arena Required: Spooky Town (Wrong?)

Average Elixir Cost: 3.6 (Wrong?)

More Statistics: Go to Deck Builder

Card Roles

Hog Rider: Your classic win condition. Everyone knows what to do when playing Hog – catch your opponent off-guard with this fast-moving, tower-targeting mini-tank.

Valkyrie: A health sponge with a powerful 360-degree swing. An insanely useful defensive card that is often very powerful on a counter-attack.

Musketeer: Air-targeting long-range support card. One of the most useful defensive cards that pairs very well with the Valkyrie or Hog Rider when used in a counter-attack. Also doubles as a high-damage secondary tank killer.

Inferno Tower: The primary tank killer and the only tank puller in the deck. While easily overwhelmed on its own, this card paired with any other defensive troop creates a nigh unbeatable brick wall with their high DPS and defensive capabilities.

Ice Wizard: A card that is useful for almost any situation. Slows troops when defending your towers or on the enemy side when attacking. Ice Wizard's attack has a small area of effect, so the card provides a very strong defensive utility that can be annoying to play against.

Guards: Swarm card that has very few hard counters due to its shield mechanic. Amazing defensive card against single target, slow-hitting troops. Provides a sizable meat shield for a counterattack.

The Log: One of the strongest, most consistent spells in the game. Capable of stopping swarms and slowing down any ground push by pushing all units it hits backward. Useful for many defensive situations.

Freeze: Your surprise tactic – works best when your opponent doesn't expect it. Can be used offensively to get a Hog Rider, Valkyrie, or Musketeer extra hits on a tower, or defensively with Valkyrie to easily destroy large pushes.

Foreword

Much of the concepts and details of this deck are shared with my previous guide, Deck:Hog Trifecta Control-Cycle. I use similar language from there as well. I've put a link to it for the sake of clarity, as well as general conciseness. Unfortunately, that deck is slightly out-of-date due to the change with the Fire Spirit card, but it doesn't hurt to check the page out for some general strategy tips, as well as if you need help with any of the jargon I use.

I genuinely appreciate the praise I received for putting so much effort into a single battle deck page. I hope that this one will be better in terms of organization and coherence – my language skills have definitely improved over the course of the few years I've been gone. Thank you for reading this and visiting my Battle Deck page.

Strategy

Note that this strategy is for 1v1 battles with no modifiers. This format is the most optimal for this type of deck.

Early Game

• This is a control deck, not a cycle deck. One wrong move can, and will, punish you. it is therefore optimal to play as passively as possible in the early game. The safest opening cards are Musketeer or Ice Wizard due to their medium movespeed (they can stay on your side longer) and relatively low elixir commitment. These cards should be played directly behind the King Tower. If you are used to waiting for your opponent to make the first move, make sure you are prepared to defend against anything.
• Focus on countering your opponent's cards. This deck uses four primarily defensive troops to ensure that most cards and card combinations (bar win conditions) will rarely hit your tower in single elixir. Try to go for positive elixir trades – defending with less elixir than your opponent used to attack.
• Figure out your opponent's win condition. It may be helpful to memorize the most commonly used deck archetypes like Lava Hound, Golem, Log Bait, Bridge Spam, Hog Cycle, Royal Giant etc. This will allow you to find out your opponent's win condition based on the support cards they play at the beginning, assuming they do not directly play the win condition.
  • Many players use popular decks, or 'meta' decks. This is not the case with this particular deck (which is probably considered off-meta), which can give you a slight advantage in surprising your opponent while you can easily identify all of their cards.
  • The ability to identify a deck archetype based on its supporting troops becomes easier the more cards are put down. Example: If your opponent plays any combination of Princess, Dart Goblin, Goblin Gang, or Skeleton Army, it is highly likely they are also carrying a Goblin Barrel. Save your The Log in order to have a hard counter to their Barrel. Use your other troops to counter their supporting troops instead.
  • Sometimes, the win condition may be ambiguous. Example: Lumberjack is commonly played with Balloon, but is also played in Golem decks. Be prepared for both win conditions (save your air-targeting troops if you suspect a Balloon; save your Inferno Tower if you suspect a tank, Rage, or Freeze spell).
• After you play your first card is when you are most vulnerable to attacks in the early game. This is why playing Inferno Tower, The Log, Valkyrie, or Guards (listed in order of priority – cards that should be saved are listed first) are not recommended as they could be your only reliable counters to certain cards. In the case that playing one of these cards is inevitable, try to wait for your opponent to make a move, or play your lowest priority cards in the back of the King Tower.
  • Guards is the only positive elixir trade-producing counter to Prince and Mini PEKKA.
  • Valkyrie is the only true "tank" card in the deck and reliably counters Elite Barbarians with the help of another card. It also excels at nuking glass cannons (e.g. Wizard, Magic Archer, Musketeer), which means it should be saved to be placed reactively against a push rather than in the back.
  • The Log is a cheap and effective counter to the Goblin Barrel and Skeleton Barrel. These cards are hard to completely counter with any other card otherwise. It should only be cycled at the beginning if there is no other choice (it should also never be cycled afterwards).
• I generally advise against playing the Hog Rider early. Given that the Hog Trifecta is not a commonly played deck these days, it may be much more effective to not reveal your win condition so quickly. Most of your cards are medium-cost, so they are not huge commitments but also not expendable or spammable. Playing the Hog Rider as a first card against a skilled cycle (Hog, X-Bow, Goblin Drill) player may throw the game from the first move. However, it is high-risk, high-reward, so go with it if it fits your playstyle.

Middle Game

• In contrast to the early game, the middle game is much longer and drawn out. Once you know your opponent's cards and card rotation, you have opportunities to develop an attack. Generally, your attack wants to come after a defense – hence the term 'counterattack'.
• Carefully keep track of your advantages over the opponent. Keep track of your elixir, and have a good idea of how much elixir your opponent has in relation to you. The optimal time to send in a Hog Rider is when you have a lot of elixir and your opponent doesn't. Although you can't see your opponent's elixir count, you'll sense this in a variety of situations:
  1. Your opponent just played a high-elixir card behind their King Tower. This signifies they want to build a slow and large push. The most effective tactic against this is to pressure the other lane with the Hog Rider, forcing them to split their troops in separate lanes.
  2. You just defended a large push by your opponent. Beatdown archetype decks rely on large pushes with their main tank card followed by support units. If you are able to successfully take these down, your opponent will generally not have many troops or elixir left to fight with until they can build up their next push. Don't let this happen so soon and pressure them heavily on the opposite lane.
  3. Your opponent just used a high-cost spell. This applies to Rocket, Lightning, and Graveyard. This one is similar to the previous one – if your troops aren't clumped together, a high-cost damaging spell is generally a negative elixir trade, and Graveyard is very punishing to your opponent if it is countered properly (it keeps your troops on your side, allowing larger pushes).
  4. Your opponent used a utility spell (Rage, Clone, Freeze, Tornado) for little value. This is an obvious hallmark of a negative elixir trade and improper usage of these spells can lead to a massive advantage for you.
  5. You just killed a lot of troops that your opponent placed at the bridge. This is more applicable to single-unit, medium-cost troops like Knight, Night Witch, Fisherman, etc. (can also apply to higher-cost troops like Elite Barbarians and Royal Recruits). These troops are generally easy to counter (being support troops) and, because all troops have more value the longer they are not dying, will result in a negative elixir trade when placed at the bridge. The moment after countering these troops is a good time to counterattack. Hog Rider on the opposite lane can catch your opponent off-guard, while Hog Rider on the same lane as you were defending will result in a large push.
• Use Hog Rider during a stalemate to scout your opponent's counter. When both of you have high elixir, it may be smart to force your opponent to reveal a counter to your Hog Rider. This will allow you to follow the next step:
• Play around your opponent's counter to Hog Rider. Common (and effective) counters include Mini PEKKA, Elite Barbarians, Mega Knight, Skeleton Army, Cannon, Tesla, Inferno Tower.
  • If your opponent is smart, they are guaranteed to save their Hog Rider counter just for when you play the Hog Rider. If it consistently lets your Hog Rider connect (e.g. Mini PEKKA), you are able to control your opponent's hand while constantly getting chip damage on their tower. Focus on defending their counterattacks and looking for an opening where they cannot counter your Hog Rider as easily. If it consistently does not let your Hog Rider connect (e.g. Tesla), you are going to have to play around your support cards instead. Focus on building a big push that will overwhelm the defensive troops or buildings. Split pushing on both lanes is an effective strategy for playing around a smart opponent.
  • If your opponent is not as skilled, look for an opening where their counter to Hog Rider is out of rotation. In many cases, playing a Hog Rider in this situation will cause them to panic and place many cards in an attempt to shut it down, after which you can counter the troops with fairly low-cost troops and build an elixir advantage.
• Save your counters to their win condition(s). This tip is obvious, as I've already shown the general strategy your opponent is going to employ against you. Essentially, the deck focuses on what your opponent has, and not your own cards. One important part of playing around your opponent is shutting down their building-targeting troops. The Inferno Tower is very strong against most of these, but certain win conditions (i.e. Skeleton Barrel, Royal Hogs, Battle Ram, Goblin Drill) cannot be countered with a building alone. Try out different card combinations when defending your opponent's pushes, and determine on the spot which one is most effective.
  • Example: You defended your opponent's Giant+Witch+Lightning push with Inferno Tower and Musketeer, but your opponent used Lightning which almost overwhelmed your defense. In this case, Inferno Tower paired with Valkyrie or Guards, which can survive a Lightning, may be more effective than a Musketeer.
  • You will find that some particular win conditions will be much harder to shut down than others. In this case, it is better to sacrifice tower health than to overcommit elixir on defending. Damage/tower advantages are temporary. Most opponents will reveal a weakness at one point or another in the match.
• Avoid letting your opponent build a large push. Similar to cycle decks, you will get destroyed if your opponent is able to constantly overwhelm your defending troops in one attack. Even if you are close to taking one tower down, it is always beneficial to pressure the other lane to force your opponent to split their troops.
• Use Freeze sparingly. Freeze is not that strong of a card. It does damage only enough to kill Skeletons and Bats, and provides a stun only long enough for your Hog Rider to get about 2-3 extra swings. In single elixir, only use Freeze if:
  1. It allows you to take down a tower that you can't destroy without Freeze. This provides extremely valuable lane control, allowing you to place cards on your opponent's side of the arena.
  2. You are able to shut down a large push. Lava Hound and Golem pushes come to mind, where Valkyrie, Musketeer, and Inferno Tower are very strong paired with Freeze. The 4 elixir is worth its cost if you can take down the tank and prevent its support troops from damaging your towers too heavily, keeping your defending troops alive in the process.
  3. It shuts down your opponent's counter to your Hog Rider. This is really only applicable to very fragile troops like Skeleton Army, Bats, Goblin Gang. Freeze is an instant spell unlike the Log, which allows your Hog Rider to survive with more hitpoints and potentially get more swings without the threat of a counterattack.
• If everything goes wrong, slow down. The deck is designed for controlling your opponents, but it will fail hard when you are unable to take control of the game. Sometimes you have to sacrifice damage on your tower to regain an advantage, especially with chip/cycle decks like Miner and Hog Cycle that rotate cards faster than you. Have a good idea of how your tower can deal with each unit. Spear Goblins on your tower deals negligible damage – Mini PEKKA does not.
• The single elixir middlegame is the most important time when playing this deck. It is designed to defend everything, but you can easily lose if you go into double elixir at a disadvantage. The overall strategy for the middlegame is to play defensively and avoid overcommitting on a single push. Look for your opponent's weaknesses and exploit them – do they spam cards at the bridge? Do they commit too much on a single lane? Do they always use Rocket on your Ice Wizard? If you can successfully gain a significant damage or tower advantage in single elixir, it will be very easy to maintain your advantage in double elixir.

Late Game

• Late game begins when double elixir starts. Essentially, this is just two minutes of single elixir compressed into one minute, but cards move at the same speed. It's common knowledge that high-elixir cost decks are stronger in double elixir, since they can build much larger pushes. The most important tip when playing this deck is don't panic. You have the cards and the elixir to defend any push, so the worst thing you can do is waste them.
• Focus on maintaining your advantage (if you have one). Continue defending as you did in single elixir. The goal when playing ahead is to stall your opponent as you slowly build a bigger lead over them. Remember to save your card counters for their win condition. Your playstyle should shift depending on the type of advantage:
  • If you are up two towers (and one or both of your towers are at high health), your deck is perfectly equipped to hold this advantage for a minute. It's very intuitive to play defensively and counterattack your opponent's weak King Tower when they overcommit on attacking. However, beware of your opponent spamming everything down a single lane. It's fine to lose one tower, but don't lose your King Tower in the process.
  • If you are up one tower, play defensively as if you were up two towers. You want to defend your tower that is lower health, because your opponent will likely try to destroy it in the next minute. Their push will likely be more concentrated on that single tower, making it less optimal to split-lane push as that makes your defense weaker overall. Make sure to take advantage of your ability to place cards on their side. If they attempt to push on the side that you've taken a tower, a Valkyrie on top of their glass cannon troops can wreck their assault.
  • If you are up one or two towers but both of your towers are at low hitpoints, your main priority is to take down their remaining towers, not to defend. Your opponent will likely have high-damage spells to deal guaranteed damage on your towers, so there is little to no advantage you can gain by overzealously defending.
  • If you are up damage (with 0 towers taken on either side), think of the tactics you employed to gain that damage advantage, and continue to use that tactic. Your opponent will try to defend, but the amount of elixir you can put on the playing field is much higher, so you can afford to overcommit a little on attacks. Freeze spell is your friend here – if you haven't played it yet, it is a powerful weapon when paired with any high-damage card. Use it primarily when your Hog Rider, Valkyrie, or Musketeer have connected to your opponent's tower. For a higher-risk play, use it to freeze a large group of defending troops along with a supported Hog Rider push.
• If you are at a tower/damage disadvantage, you must play more offensively. If your opponent is more skilled than you, you will likely not be able to recover from behind. However, even skilled players can show weaknesses. The following should be indicators of when to play hyper-offensively:
  1. Your opponent plays cards on the lane opposite to their weak tower.
  2. Your opponent spams cards at the bridge or on your side in an attempt to take down a tower.
  3. Your opponent plays a heavy tank (Giant, PEKKA, Golem, etc.) card with no support.
  4. Your opponent plays spells that hit nothing except your towers.
• You absolutely should not play aggressively if your opponent has an elixir advantage. This can lead to swift counterattacks that will demolish anything on sight. You have to wait for the opportune moment to send in your Hog Rider. It is completely fine to hold back on playing the Hog Rider if you think a push will not be successful.

Overtime

• If you have managed to slowly built an advantage up until now, this is no time to make a mistake. It may be frustrating playing this deck as your options for attacking are extremely limited, but don't give up. Surviving this long with the same number of towers as your opponent is fairly rare, as you will often win or lose before that.
• Forget about split-lane pushing if one of your opponent's towers is fairly healthy. It's not going to be effective if you lose a tower in return. The exception to this rule is when you (for some reason) have a Valkyrie, Ice Wizard, an Inferno Tower and two Musketeers on one side and your opponent thinks they can defend (spoiler: they probably can't).
• Focus all of your lane control on one side. Generally, if you stop placing cards, you'll leak elixir, so don't stop putting down cards. However, don't spam them together either.
• Hopefully, you're good working under pressure. If the game state resets (no cards left on the field, both players are waiting to reach 10 elixir), you are letting your opponent build a large push. To avoid this, continue countering your opponent's single troops with your own troops. Use these troops to counterattack. Repeat the process.
• If you play fast enough to cycle to a card again, and your opponent doesn't have Fireball, Tornado, or Rocket, they may start panicking when they see a huge deathball approaching their tower. Use this to your advantage and rush them with the Hog Rider.
• If one of your opponent's towers are down, generally you want to attack their other Princess Tower and not their King Tower. This is because troops planted to defend the King Tower are further back and can be placed in the opposite lane, forcing your opponent to build up a large push (which is obviously bad for you).
• Try to get value out of your Freeze. It is an extremely situational card, but can consistently turn individual pushes and defenses in your favor. Whether you are attacking or defending, try to target as many enemy troops as possible to maximize the value of Freeze.

Tactics

"Strategy is the overarching set of goals you are hoping to achieve, and tactics are the specific actions you undertake to accomplish that strategy."

This section will cover the techniques that are commonly used to maximize the effectiveness of each card. More specifically, whereas in the strategy section I covered when to attack and defend, in this section I will cover how to attack and defend.

Attacking

The goal of attacking is to deal damage to your opponent's towers. It's very simple. The only offense-oriented card in this deck is the:

Hog Rider

• The Hog Rider only targets buildings, which means it will ignore any defending troops. Generally, it is best to play a Hog Rider when your opponent does not have a defensive building on the playing field, because it will path straight to the Crown Towers.
• If your opponent puts down a building card that is closer in the Hog Rider's sight range than the Crown Tower, it will path to the building instead.
• The Hog Rider has the same movement speed as Spear Goblins and Lumberjack. It is unique in that it can jump over the river, so it doesn't need to cross the bridge to get to the opponent's side.

• To ensure that your opponent has the least time to react to your Hog Rider, it must be placed as close to your opponent's side as possible. This means that it should be crossing a bridge or jumping over the river.

Right side

• The single most effective placement for a Hog Rider is directly behind the leftmost or rightmost river tile. This is right next to the chain in Legendary Arena. If there are no buildings that will aggro the Hog Rider, it will jump over the river and path straight to the Princess Tower.
  • This placement will always bypass a building placed in the exact position shown in the pictures to the right (3 tiles away from the tower that is being targeted, 4 tiles away from the river).

Left side

• If the Hog Rider instead targets another building, it will not jump over the river and path directly towards that building.

• There are almost no situations in which you should place the Hog Rider anywhere away from the river. Doing so gives your opponent more time to react and use the appropriate counter.
• If you are not sure whether a Hog Rider will bypass a building, it is better to wait for the building to expire than to take your chances. Remember, one error can be fatal.

Notice how the Hog Rider paths toward the Goblin Cage instead of the tower. Compare this placement with the ones above.

• There is a building placement that will only pull the Hog Rider placed in the optimal position if it is a passive building (all spawners, Goblin Cage and Elixir Collector). This position is one tile closer to the river than the buildings shown in the previous examples.
  • The Hog Rider will bypass the building if it is an attacking building like Inferno Tower or Cannon, because these 'active buildings' have a slightly smaller hitbox compared to passive buildings. For more information on this complex interaction, watch The Ultimate Building Placement Guide by Orange Juice.
  • Basic building placement is discussed later in the Inferno Tower section.

Synergy

• The deck is built around the Hog Trifecta, an old concept that is based upon the synergy between the Hog Rider, Valkyrie, and Musketeer. When given the chance to have all three cards down at the same time, the resulting attack will be very strong.
  • The Hog Rider targets buildings. Its goal is to damage the towers.
  • The Valkyrie has similar health to the Hog Rider and deals area damage in a radius around her. She can protect the Hog Rider from swarm troops (Skeleton Army, Goblin Gang, Barbarians, etc), or deny your opponent from placing them down.
  • The Musketeer is a long-range damage dealer. She deals high single-target damage, allowing her to destroy higher-health troops that the Valkyrie struggles to deal with (such as Ice Wizard, Fisherman, Mega Minion).
  • Allowing any of these cards to connect to the tower is lethal. All three cards deal exceptional damage and can never be ignored.
• Hog+Freeze is a classic combination that is highly effective when your opponent does not expect it. Refer to the Strategy section to understand when to use it. Freeze as a card itself will be covered in the Utility section.

Deploy the Hog Rider one tile behind the Valkyrie. Valkyrie should be placed before the Hog Rider.

• Split pushing is one of the options for attacking. A simple split-lane push is sending a Valkyrie and Musketeer in one lane (applying a basic tank-and-support strategy) and Hog Rider in the other lane. Other viable options include:

• Guards (1) + Hog Rider, Guards (2) + Musketeer
• Valkyrie + Ice Wizard, Hog Rider
• Valkyrie + Guards (behind Valkyrie), Hog Rider
• Evidently, you can be creative with your pushes. Instead of sticking with one type of push, you should be adapting to the cards you have left on the playing field and using those to counterattack. This makes you more unpredictable.

• When you focus a single lane (usually when you have support troops for the Hog Rider), a highly useful technique is placing a Hog Rider directly behind the Valkyrie. This will cause the Hog Rider to push the Valkyrie to the tower, allowing it to act as a shield for the Hog Rider and potentially deal a little extra damage. This is much better than sending a Valkyrie behind the Hog.
  • When executing this technique, the Hog Rider should not jump over the bridge.
  • This will not work most of the time if there is a building that pulls the Valkyrie/Hog Rider.
  • The technique displayed on the right is just a demonstration. If your Valkyrie just defended an attack and walks down the bridge slightly to the right, adjust your Hog Rider so it runs directly behind the Valkyrie.
• The rare occasion where the Hog Rider should not be placed so that it jumps over the river is when your opponent has defending troops and you have low-health support troops behind the Hog Rider. The Hog becomes untargetable mid-air, which causes the defending troops to retarget onto your weak troops behind it.
• The Hog Rider is useful when sent alone or with support troops. It is one of the most consistent win conditions in the game. Learning all of the tactics with the Hog Rider is essential for victory, and will also help you when playing against it.

Defending

The goal of defending is to spend as little elixir as possible to minimize damage to your own Crown Towers. An ideal defense mitigates damage to your towers, costs less elixir than what your opponent spent on attacking, and has troops left over for you to start a counterattack. This deck is loaded with defensive powerhouses.

Hog Rider

• Don't pretend Hog Rider can't also be used on defense, albeit only filling a small niche. Because it only targets buildings, the Hog Rider can be used to kite troops – after units have crossed the bridge and walked some distance toward your tower, place the Hog Rider above the troops so that it runs straight to the enemy tower. The troops will follow the Hog Rider and be unable to attack it until they run all the way back, buying you some extra time on defense.
  • This does not work on ranged troops, so don't even try.
  • This tactic is easier to perform on fast-moving troops like Mini PEKKA and Elite Barbarians, because the Hog Rider is in their sight range for longer. Slower troops like Valkyrie will often target the Hog Rider for a few seconds and then proceed to turn around after it has lost sight of the Hog Rider, which may actually be a wanted effect.
  • Make sure the Hog Rider does not jump the bridge. This makes him untargetable and essentially invisible to enemy units and will cause them to ignore the Hog Rider for the time he is in the air.

Valkyrie

An ideal placement against swarms. Time your placement so that units do not lock onto the tower.

• Having similar health to a Knight, similar damage to a Musketeer, and a 360 degree splash radius makes the Valkyrie a highly effective defensive card. She is very valuable for 4 elixir. The reason she isn't used more often on offense is because of her slow movement speed, which is only negated when a Hog Rider is pushing her.
• Take advantage of the Valkyrie's 360° splash radius by placing her on top of a group of incoming troops. Unlike the Mini PEKKA and Knight who struggle against large swarm troops, the Valkyrie excels at destroying them.
  • The best troops to place the Valkyrie on top of are low-cost swarm troops like Skeleton Army, or medium-health glass cannons like Musketeer and Magic Archer.
  • Avoid placing Valkyrie on top of tank killers like Mini PEKKA and Hunter. They can kill the Valkyrie faster than she can kill them.
• Against melee troops, you want to pull them to the center instead of placing the Valkyrie on top. This is because the 1-second deploy time allows the enemy unit to get extra hits on the Valkyrie. Placing the Valkyrie in the center also allows the tower to get extra hits on the unit before the Valkyrie gets attacked.
  • This technique is more important when using ranged troops, but applies to the Valkyrie as well. Remember that you are never limited to one technique.

Place the Valkyrie in the center of your side so that the troop walks for as long as possible.

• Against stronger units like Prince and Elite Barbarians (especially if they are overleveled), using a second card to defend along with the Valkyrie ensures your towers stay healthy and might preserve your Valkyrie.
• The Valkyrie can tank for flying troops as well. With the exception of the Flying Machine, most flying troops have a short range, so apply the principles of dealing with melee troops as well. The main goal when defending flying units with ground-targeting troops is to keep your troops on your own side as long as possible.

Musketeer

• The Musketeer is a long-range card that deals a considerable amount of DPS. She seems to be used the most in cycle decks because of her high value as a 4-elixir card, making her a cheap and effective tank killer. In this deck, she serves as a secondary tank killer (supporting the Inferno Tower) and as a defensive support card against almost every card in the game.
• The Musketeer's favorite part of the arena is the center. Because of her long range, placing her in the center will allow her to hit incoming troops likely before they can hit her back. As opposed to the Valkyrie who likes to be up close, the Musketeer is most effective when she is being protected by other cards around her.
• The Musketeer's range allows her to hit troops from the other lane when placed correctly, allowing you to set up a counterattack on the other side of the arena, where your opponent likely has not played any cards. To do this properly, pull incoming troops to the center using a card like Valkyrie, then place the Musketeer in the other lane. She will be able to shoot at the enemy units while remaining relatively safe.
  • The middle of your side of the playing field where both towers can shoot a unit is called the "kill zone". Melee troops that actively target the Musketeer in the center will likely step into this kill zone, adding damage to your defense and potentially preserving health on your defending troops.
• One of the important guidelines for playing 2.6 Hog Cycle is to protect the Musketeer, because she is the main damage dealer. This tip applies to this deck as well. Before an enemy troop reaches your Musketeer and starts attacking her, you can interpose a tank or throwaway card like Valkyrie or Guards to protect her for longer.
• Lightning, Rocket, and a full-duration Poison will take the Musketeer out. Fireball and a little bit of damage will also take her out. If your opponent consistently uses these spells to take out your Musketeer and hit your tower, consider spacing her away from your tower, or waiting for your opponent to play these spells before putting her down.
• During single elixir, try to keep the Musketeer on your side of the arena as long as possible. This is often achieved by placing her behind or around the King Tower. The more units she defends, the more valuable she is, and the more Positive Elixir Trades™ you will get.
  • The Musketeer at low health is still extremely valuable. Try to exploit her for as long as your opponent doesn't use Zap or Skeletons to finally eliminate her. This commonly involves placing a unit in front of her to tank, such as Hog Rider when counterattacking.

Ice Wizard

• Ice Wizard is a low-cost, low-damage ranged card that has an AoE slow effect. This is the exact same slow as the Ice Golem's death nova effect or the Giant Snowball's slow effect.
• The Ice Wizard plays very similarly to the Musketeer, but his value lies in his slow ability rather than his ability to do damage (which is pitifully weak). He constantly decreases the movement speed and attack speed of troops he hits by 35%, making him an excellent defensive and stall card.
• The Ice Wizard also functions as the deck's ranged swarm-killer. He can one-shot Skeletons/Bats, two-shot Spear Goblins and three-shot stab Goblins and Minions, making him effective at controlling these cards. However, he struggles to deal with tankier swarms without the help of the tower. Barbarians and Royal Recruits can easily overwhelm him.
• The Ice Wizard is fairly weak on his own, so pair him with any other card to help them defend. He greatly enhances the defensive capabilities of every card he is paired with because he reduces both the movement speed and damage output of the units he hits.
• While the Ice Wizard functions best in conjunction with other cards, he is still very good at individually minimizing the damage taken from win conditions.
  • If ignored, the Hog Rider will get a total of seven hits on a Princess Tower (King Tower not activated). Using an Ice Wizard to defend reduces this to just three hits.
  • A Royal Giant will take the tower in about 10 hits if it is left alone. Using a lone Ice Wizard will reduce the number of hits it gets on your tower by half. Pair this with any damage-dealing card and most of the Royal Giant's damage can be negated easily.
• Ice Wizard is a great opening card because he is low-cost (meaning low commitment to put down), slow-moving, and he discourages your opponent from playing any win condition on the same lane as him. Musketeer fulfills the same role, but for one more elixir; hence, Ice Wizard should always be played as a starting card if he is in your hand.

Guards

• Guards are a low-cost swarm card with a special ability that allows each Guard to never be one-shot. They are essentially slower but tankier stab Goblins. Whereas Goblins typically fill an offensive role in chip/cycle decks, the Guards' lower movement speed make them more well-suited for defense.

The Wizard's splash attack is large, but it only knocks out the shield of two Guards when he is surrounded.

• The best troops to play Guards against are single-target troops like Prince or Musketeer. It takes a total of six shots (minimum) to take all the Guards out, which means they buy plenty of time to put down additional cards if you need them.

• When using Guards to defend against single units, follow similar principles to the Valkyrie – pull the enemy unit to the center if it is melee, and place them on top if it is ranged.
  • Against splash damage troops (with the exception of Dark Prince and Valkyrie), you want to surround enemy units so that their splash attack does not hit all three Guards at the same time (see right). This causes the splash troop to only take out one or two Guards with a single hit, effectively doubling the time it takes to kill all three Guards.
  • This technique does not work with a charging Dark Prince, because his charged hit has a 360° radius splash around his body. You can place a unit to diffuse his charge, then surround him with Guards.
• Common uses for the Guards include:
  1. Tanking a Sparky hit. It doesn't matter how much damage a shield takes – as long as it is up, a Guard itself cannot die.
  2. Semi-reliable counter to Graveyard. Unlike Skeleton Army, Goblin Gang, and Goblins, the Guards are not weak to Zap, Snowball, or Fireball. Unfortunately, Arrows will kill Guards (see below).
  3. Reliable counter to any single-target unit sent in alone. They are the original Royal Recruits and can be used to distract a single-target troop for a long time, giving your towers/other troops plenty of time to kill the distracted unit.
  4. Decent distraction for swarms. Because there are 3 of them, they aren't bad at defending a Skeleton Army or Goblin Gang (with the help of a tower). They have the same movement speed as Minions, so you can use Guards to kite Bats or Minion Horde.
  5. Sacrifice. Sometimes a push is too large and placing down one unit in the middle of everything will get it obliterated. You can quickly drop down Guards as a minor distraction to allow a Valkyrie to take out a large cluster of troops, or to protect a Musketeer from certain death (think charging Prince certain death).
  6. Cycle card. Guards are slow-moving and do not usually provoke a defense, so they are a safe option to play at the back if you know you won't need it for a defense. They are individually better than a single Skeleton or Goblin because of their higher effective health and resistance to spells.
• The Guards' shields can be taken out with a single The Log – without their shields, they are essentially just Skeletons with a slightly longer range. Try not to play Guards into a spell.
• If your opponent has Poison, do not rely on Guards to defend a Graveyard. It will take some time for the Guards to die, but they do not have high hitpoints. The damage over time effect takes out the shields and kills the Guards right after.
• Arrows are designed to kill Guards. Because they hit three times, they will always take out the Guards' shields and the naked Guards immediately after. However, other instant-damage spells like Rocket can never take out Guards in just one shot.

Inferno Tower

• The Inferno Tower is a medium-health defensive building with a mechanic that increases its damage over time the longer it continuously attacks a single target. Hence, it is best used to kill high-hitpoint units such as PEKKA or Golem. It also distracts all building-targeting units like Hog Rider, preventing damage to your towers.
• This building is particularly weak to stuns from the Electro Wizard, Zappies, Electro Dragon, Electro Giant, Freeze, Zap and Lightning cards. Stunning the Inferno Tower resets its damage, making it take about 3 seconds to reach full damage again. It is basically useless against cards that can constantly stun it.
• Inferno Tower is weak against cards with a shield (Dark Prince, Guards, Royal Recruits) and swarms, because every time it takes out a single shield or unit, its damage resets. Hence, the utmost importance must be put onto protecting the Inferno Tower and ensuring it locks on the right unit.
• Building placement in general is difficult to explain without pictures. The following is a list of basic placements that are effective 99% of the time you use a building.

The 4-3 placement (4 tiles from the river, 3 tiles away from the tower being attacked). This is the single best placement against any ground building-targeting unit that crosses the bridge. However, this does not distract any support units behind the Giant, nor does it pull a Hog Rider placed in the optimal position.

This is the 4-2 placement. Unlike the 4-3 placement, this will both pull a building-targeting unit and any support units behind it, like Archers or Musketeer. Hog Rider cannot bypass this placement in the same lane.

The 4-1 placement will always pull a Lava Hound or Balloon placed on the outer edge of the arena. Always use this if you are not sure if a regular 4-3 or 4-2 placement will pull an air unit.

Place the Inferno Tower on the edge if your opponent plays swarm cards in the middle of the river. This ensures the Inferno Tower isn't distracted by the Minions, and you can take care of the Minions separately with support cards.

This is the 3-3 placement. This placement will pull a tank as well as protect against a Fireball hitting both your tower and your Inferno Tower at the same time.

This is a situational placement that protects against a Lightning Spell hitting both your tower and the Inferno Tower. Only use the 0-3 placement if you know your opponent can't place Electro Wizard or a similar card at the bridge, because the Inferno Tower is highly vulnerable.

This 3-4 placement is an interesting, highly situational placement that only works against a Giant placed at the back of the arena or on the inside edge of the bridge. It does not work against Golem.

Synergy

If you haven't noticed already, this deck is based upon the synergy that the cards have on defense. A combination of these cards put in the right position will guarantee minimal tower damage. This section will focus mostly on the ideal combinations and how to use them.

• Inferno Tower + Valkyrie: Strong against the classic tank+support combo. Inferno Tower distracts and kills the tank, while Valkyrie is placed on top of the support unit. If no spells or air units are played, your remaining units should be fairly healthy and ready to counterattack/defend a second wave.
• Inferno Tower + Musketeer/Ice Wizard: More effective than Valkyrie if your opponent has air units. The Musketeer/Ice Wizard should be protected – placed behind or beside the Princess Tower, with additional Guards/Log if they need more protection.
• Valkyrie + Musketeer/Ice Wizard: Saves your Inferno Tower for a more dangerous push. This defense is generally enough to stop most pushes that do not have a building-targeting or heavy-hitting unit. The Valkyrie should be protected – don't play her in the middle of troops and sacrifice her, unless the enemy troops cannot kill her. Excellent counterattack potential.
• Musketeer + Ice Wizard: Destroys all air units bar Lava Hound. Useful for when you can't or don't want to play Inferno Tower. One Ice Wizard hit + a Musketeer bullet can take out Minions quickly while protecting the Musketeer. Counterattack by placing a Valkyrie or Hog Rider in front of the troops, but you can opt to hold off on the attack if your opponent has Valkyrie or Mini PEKKA (they easily deal with both Musketeer and Ice Wizard simultaneously).
• Musketeer + Guards: Play against any non-splash damage troop to guarantee that your Musketeer takes it out. Guards in front of Musketeer will help it easily win bridge duels, especially against Inferno Dragon, Baby Dragon, Electro Wizard, and other Musketeers. Guards are also a substitute Valkyrie for when she is out of hand – they don't splash, but they can distract Barbarians/Elite Barbarians for a long time.

  

  The Musketeer and Inferno Tower are far enough apart that the Fireball cannot hit both units. Space out your troops when possible to avoid high-value spells hitting your towers.

• Valkyrie + Guards: This is useful if you want to take out a Sparky. You can also place Guards behind a Valkyrie left over from defense to push her faster, making her slightly more threatening.
• Valkyrie + Freeze: The Freeze spell eliminates the need to protect your Valkyrie and can help you stall for time to build up elixir. Massive pushes can be stopped with a single Valkyrie and a Freeze put down quickly after (or vice versa). Make sure to deploy the Valkyrie on top of support units, not the tank. It is typically the support units that cause more problems than the tank itself.
• Literally everything: This is what you can do to defend in double elixir. Make sure to position your troops properly – Valkyrie should be tanking for everything, Inferno Tower should be locked on a single powerful unit, Musketeer and Ice Wizard should be protected, Guards should be distracting single-targeting troops. Use The Log to buy time for your troops to deal damage, and Freeze when you have a lot of troops on the field. Do not stack cards if your opponent has Tornado or a heavy spell – wait for them to use it first.

Utility

Spells are utility cards because they are useful in many situations. They can be used for both attacking and defending.

The Log

• Everyone knows what The Log does because everyone uses it in their deck. It is a cheap card that rolls slowly on the ground, hitting every ground unit it touches and pushing them back a small amount. Unlike Fireball or Snowball, The Log pushes back everything, not just small units. It is the only card in the game that can knock back a Dark Prince, Golem, Sparky, anything. It is an incredibly useful and versatile card.
• The Log is best known for killing the Princess, Goblins, Dart Goblin, and Goblin Barrel in one shot. It can either take out or effectively stall any ground swarm. It is best used against any of these units, or to finish off a low-health troop.
  • In the case that you play against Goblin Barrel (mostly in log bait decks), The Log should be saved only for the Goblin Barrel and nothing else. This ensures you have a hard counter to the Barrel and take 0 damage every time it is played, provided you aren't tricked by the Barrel's placement. You should utilize your other units to take out their Princess and other units that are typically taken out with The Log.
• Because The Log hits everything in its path, if it does enough damage to destroy a 'shield' unit (e.g. Battle Ram, Cannon Cart in their first stages) or spawner building (e.g. Tombstone, Goblin Drill), it will also damage the troops that emerge from the resulting damage. This means placing The Log to kill a Tombstone will instantly kill all the Skeletons that spawn from it. You can use this to clear a Tombstone/Goblin Hut and prevent extra damage on your attacking Hog Rider.
  • Curiously, the only multi-stage troop this does not work on is the Goblin Giant.
• The Log stops the charge of the Princes, Ram Rider, and Battle Ram, forcing them to walk another 3.5 tiles to initiate a second charge. You can use this to decrease the damage a unit will deal to your troops or towers the second before they connect. The Log will not stop the Bandit's dash or the Mega Knight's jump.
• The Log can prevent a stunning unit from reaching your Inferno Tower, giving it enough time to ramp up to max damage to take out a tank, such as the Electro Giant.
• An interesting mechanic involving pushback is that it completely resets the attack animations of units that are pushed back. Correctly timing The Log can fully stop a slow-hitting unit from attacking for about one second.
• If your opponent always uses a counter to the Hog Rider that can be countered by The Log (like Skeleton Army), you can put down a prediction The Log after deploying your Hog Rider for a high-risk, high-reward play.
• If a unit is locked onto your tower, you can play The Log to knock them back and quickly drop a unit between the enemy troop and the tower, making them retarget. For larger enemy units like Elite Barbarians, you do not need a The Log to push them back; you can just place a unit in between.

Freeze

• The Freeze spell is a highly situational but powerful utility card that stuns all units in its area for 4 seconds (doesn't depend on level). It also does minor damage to towers and units, enough to kill Skeletons.
• This spell stops all units from spawning troops (but not death spawns); Tombstone stops spawning Skeletons, Night Witch stops spawning Bats, etc.
• Freeze is similar to the Clone and Rage spell in that it is best utilized when you are winning to win even harder. For example, Hog Rider will get a few extra shots on the tower if a Freeze is deployed to stun the tower and the troops attacking it. This works in the same way a Rage spell will cause the Hog Rider to attack faster and get more hits.
  • However, Freeze is slightly more versatile than Clone and Rage despite costing 4 elixir. It has more uses in general, and can be used more often even when you are not winning completely (defending comes to mind).
• Hog+Freeze is a classic combo that ensures a high amount of damage on your opponent's tower if the Hog is able to connect. A Hog Rider + Freeze left alone will leave a full-health tower in 1-shot range from any of your troops.
• On offense, surprise your opponent by using Freeze at the very last second before your troops are going to die. If timed correctly, it will catch them off-guard and possibly make them panic when placing down a card in desperation.
• Freeze is not just reserved for Hog Rider. If a Valkyrie or Musketeer locks on to your opponent's tower, they can easily decimate it single-handedly with a Freeze spell. Valkyrie, Musketeer, and Hog Rider all have very similar DPS (~150 at level 9), so they are equally deadly when paired with a Freeze to keep them alive.
• If Freeze is used on your opponent's side, they will most likely play a cheap card on top of your troops to take them out while the rest of their troops are frozen. Most of these cards can be easily taken out with a single The Log, in addition to damaging the tower and the frozen units. This is known as a Positive Elixir Trade™.
• On defense, Freeze is used to shut down cards or combinations of cards that you cannot deal with with your regular troops.
  • Example: A Balloon is heading towards your tower, but you just played your Inferno Tower in the other lane (which means the Balloon will head straight to the tower). You can use Freeze on the Balloon to let the Inferno Tower ramp up in damage, and also give you time to build elixir if your opponent decides to Zap or Lightning the Inferno Tower.
• Valkyrie+Freeze is a dangerous anti-ground defense that is very strong at taking out a large group of enemy troops in a small area. Because Valkyrie has a 360 degree attack radius, the concept is simple: the Valkyrie and Freeze should be put down in quick succession, one after the other. The Valkyrie's high damage output takes out all of the supporting troops that are frozen, allowing you to deal with the surviving units much more easily.
  • Make sure to save 8 elixir before using this combo, or the Valkyrie will be taken out very quickly. This is a game-losing mistake that might happen when you are under pressure.
• It's not usually worth it to use Freeze on a single building in conjunction with your Hog Rider. The Hog Rider is distracted long enough by a single building to only get one or a few shots on the tower. However, it is worth it to Freeze a single unit if the Hog Rider is already locked on the tower. If your opponent constantly pulls your Hog Rider with a building, save the Freeze until the Hog is able to connect for a big surprise.
• Freeze does absolutely nothing if you do not have units on the arena, or towers attacking enemy units. It just allows your opponent to build a bigger push that is harder to stop. Therefore, be cautious about where the Freeze is placed. On defense, Freeze to protect your units and towers. This should be done mostly on your side of the arena. On offense, Freeze to disable enemy units from killing your attacking troops.
• Freeze is an instant spell, meaning there is no delay between your cast and the spell effect (ignoring the universal 1-second card delay). This means Freeze is better than The Log for taking out a Skeleton Army attacking your Hog Rider, because it ensures that the Skeleton Army doesn't do too much damage to the Hog.

Synergy

Utility cards are useful in combination with any card. I wish to avoid redundancy in this particular section, so refer to the guides on the individual cards or the other Synergy sections for guides on how to use spell combinations effectively.

Card Substitutes

If your goal is to win as much as possible, it is highly advised to change your deck in response to certain cards that in the metagame (the game outside of the game – namely, deck building).

Strong Substitutes

These are card substitutions that are almost seamless and just as effective as the original deck. You may have to change your playstyle with the particular card slightly, but they mainly keep the overall style of the original deck.

• Valkyrie → Dark Prince: Dark Prince exchanges the slow and defensive playstyle of Valkyrie for a strong attacking potential. He is undoubtedly one of the best card substitutions because he fills a similar role to the Valkyrie and is a very well-rounded card.
• Inferno Tower → Tesla: This card can easily fill the role of Inferno Tower because of its high damage, air-targeting capability, and low cost. It is arguably a stronger counter to most building-targeting troops because it is not as easily distracted, has a smaller hitbox (harder to hit with spells), and costs 1 elixir less. You are able to take more risks when playing Tesla, but you'll have a harder time dealing with PEKKA and Royal Giant.
• Inferno Tower → Goblin Cage: Because you already have two cards that target air, Goblin Cage is able to be substituted just as well as Tesla. It is more versatile in that the unit it spawns on destruction can be used to fill multiple roles (tank killer, Valkyrie pusher, protection for glass cannons) besides just defense.
• Ice Wizard → Electro Wizard: The Electro Wizard is a hard counter to cards that might be problematic for this deck, like Inferno Dragon, Inferno Tower, and Sparky. Because both cards are very similar, it makes sense that Electro Wizard is able to be swapped in. Be careful of full health Minions (no more air splash).
• Guards → Skeleton Army/Goblin Gang: Skeleton Army and Goblin Gang offer much higher DPS at the cost of being more vulnerable to spells. They counter cards such as Prince and Sparky just as effectively, but be aware that the opponent's Zap and The Log will be much more deadly.
• Guards → Spear Goblins: Instead of a large swarm, you may want a cheaper ranged swarm instead to assist your Valkyrie and Hog Rider. Keep in mind that Spear Goblins and Goblin Gang are played more aggressively than Guards.
• The Log → Zap/Arrows/Barbarian Barrel: Your 'light spell' is easily swapped for any of the other consistent light spells. I especially like Barbarian Barrel because the unit it spawns can potentially have very high value on defense.
• Freeze → Fireball/Poison: You can sacrifice your surprise tactic card for a more consistent damage dealer. Fireball and Poison can be used on their own unlike Freeze, which needs to be paired with a unit.
• Freeze → Tornado: Tornado is a very strong and versatile card, unlike Freeze which is strong but situational. Swapping out Freeze for Tornado gives you more robust defensive options. Learn important techniques with Tornado such as activating the King Tower or completely denying a Hog Rider.

Situational Substitutes

These card substitutions will work in some deck matchups, but sacrifice some aspect of an original card in order to be effective in another way.

• Hog Rider → Ram Rider: Before you swap out your win condition, consider the 'ram'ifications. The Ram Rider has higher health and a unique attack which can be utilized on defense. However, it has worse rushing potential because of its starting speed and costs 1 more elixir. You will have to be more strategic with how you play your Ram Rider. Proper positioning is key with the Ram Rider, while with Hog Rider it's pretty straightforward.
• Hog Rider → Goblin Drill: Goblin Drill isn't the best win condition for this deck because of the prevalence of splash damage cards. You don't have a big spell or strong troops to eliminate them (bar Valkyrie), so you will need to focus on building stronger and larger pushes to gain the most out of Goblin Drill. It is very punishing (albeit slow to deploy), however, if your opponent is caught without its counters.
• Hog Rider → Royal Hogs: Similar to the Goblin Drill, Royal Hogs aren't the best because of the popularity of splash cards like Bomber, Valkyrie, and Dark Prince. However, they encourage a split-pushing playstyle, which is best compared to the strategy with Three Musketeers. Given that your opponent doesn't have hard counters like Fireball, Royal Hogs can fill a similar role to Hog Rider for one more elixir.
• Valkyrie → Knight/Ice Golem: Concentrated splash damage and support-troop killing ability is important. Sacrificing those for a cheaper mini-tank may be worth it, but will leave you without options in some situations because of the Ice Golem and Knight's weakness of being overwhelmed/ignored.
• Valkyrie → Baby Dragon: Baby Dragon and Valkyrie are very similar cards, but the Valkyrie is objectively stronger in this deck because distracts ground cards like Goblins (especially from the Goblin Drill), Cannon Cart, and Elite Barbarians while dealing substantially more damage. If you absolutely want a solid, high-health, air-targeting, splash-damage flying unit in this deck, use Baby Dragon.
• Valkyrie → Night Witch: Night Witch fills the role of tank-killer rather than game-ender like in Golem decks. She is less versatile than the Valkyrie because of her lack of splash damage, but that is negated slightly due to her bat-spawning ability. You could definitely make her work with a little bit more skill.
• Valkyrie → Elite Barbarians: Use these if you want to be really annoying.
• Valkyrie → Fisherman: Fisherman is better for 3 elixir at countering single units, but he struggles against anything more (e.g. Elite Barbarians, Witch). Much more strategic finesse is required to utilize Fisherman effectively (he's not a tank, he has less health than a Bandit).
• Musketeer → Flying Machine: Flying Machine is faster, which will play in your favor at some points in the game, but definitely not when you are trying to play passively. It is much easier to protect because it's flying, but it has slightly lower health and less damage than the Musketeer. It is more situational and less of an 'all-rounder' card.
• Musketeer → Cannon Cart: The Cannon Cart is a super buff Musketeer that lost its ability to hit air. It is super reliable for all ground-based defenses, and is deadly on offense. However, using it will make you struggle against Balloon and Lava Hound decks (the Ice Wizard sucks at killing things). Consider using Cannon Cart if Lava Hound and Balloon are weak cards (unlikely).
• Musketeer → Archers: Surprisingly, the Archers have similar DPS to a Musketeer. However, they are much more fragile and overall don't seem like a damage powerhouse like the Musketeer is. Still, if you want a cheaper option for damage, go with Archers. They are amazing for a first play because you can split them.
• Musketeer → Mega Minion: A DPS-focused card just like the Musketeer. The Mega Minion is highly valuable for its cost, and does a good amount of damage. However, you will have some problems protecting it, because it is essentially a melee attacker. This means it is hard to get counterattacking potential out of a Mega Minion. Still, a versatile defensive card comparable to Musketeer.
• Inferno Tower → Cannon: Inferno Tower is your biggest air troop counter – Musketeer and Ice Wizard are simply not enough to deal with Lava Hound. Swapping Inferno Tower for a relatively low hitpoint building that does moderate DPS and can't hit air is not exactly the best choice for this kind of defense-oriented deck. However, if you really want a positive elixir trade for defending a Hog Rider or Giant, absolutely use Cannon. Just beware when they Zap or Fireball it.
• Inferno Tower → Bomb Tower: Similar situation to the Cannon, but at least Bomb Tower is actually a decent defensive building. It is much better than Inferno Tower at dealing with cards like Royal Hogs and Elite Barbarians, but still leaves you with a huge air weakness.
• Inferno Tower → Furnace: Furnace is here just because it is a very strong card. The single Fire Spirit that it spawns will always connect if it is the same level as the enemy tower, giving you a Fireball's worth of damage every time. The defensive and offensive utility this building provides is insane, but you may have problems dealing with large tanks with Furnace.
• Ice Wizard → Ice Golem: It is definitely better to swap Ice Golem for Ice Wizard instead of Valkyrie, but this time it removes an air-targeting splash card that might be useful in many defensive situations. Play more offensively when using Ice Golem, because it offers a cheap tank that can be very valuable on defending a counterattack.
• Ice Wizard → Ice Spirit/Electro Spirit/Fire Spirit: If you want to play cycle instead of control, adding a Spirit reduces your average elixir cost for many benefits. Just don't use Heal Spirit, because it sucks.
• Ice Wizard → Bowler: The Bowler is like a substitute Valkyrie, but works better as an Ice Wizard replacement because he is ranged. Bowler helps you control ground troops better than the Ice Wizard because of his resistance to almost every spell in the game. However, it makes the average elixir cost quite high, and you'll have to defend air attacks more meticulously.
• Ice Wizard → Bomber: Bomber is an extremely high-value card for 2 elixir. He fills a similar role to Ice Wizard. However, he isn't very strong outside of tank decks. I would still prefer the Ice Wizard's durability and utility over the Bomber's value.
• Ice Wizard → Archers/Dart Goblin/Firecracker/Princess: I find that all four of these cards play similarly. Opt to play more defensively with these cards instead of bait-style at the bridge. They are solid options, but all of these cards are very frail, so beware of Arrows.
• Guards → Royal Delivery: Royal Delivery is a strong defensive spell that is comparable to Guards, though it offers slightly less versatility (because the single Royal Recruit is even worse than Guards on offense). I recommend swapping out Freeze if you want to play triple spell.
• Guards → Skeletons: Similar to the Spirits replacing the Ice Wizard, Skeletons are a pretty good substitute against Guards for a cycle playstyle. However, they are (obviously) much weaker and more vulnerable than Guards. Against Graveyard or any support troop like Musketeer or Electro Wizard, I would still prefer Guards for a solid defense.
• Guards → Goblins: Goblins are the faster, less bulky counterparts to Guards. They are better paired with cards that are meant for attacking; unfortunately, this deck doesn't have many offense-oriented cards. Goblins have higher damage per second than Guards for 1 less elixir, so it's a shame that most swarms outclass them due to their frailty.
• The Log → Giant Snowball: Snowball is a fine substitution. It doesn't have the best synergy with the other cards in this deck – it's not an instant spell like Zap, nor does it cover a wide area like Arrows. Against a Goblin Barrel, the Log and Barbarian Barrel are still better. Nothing is stopping you from using the Snowball – it's still a great low-cost spell that doesn't change your deck's playstyle much – but there are better options.
• Freeze → Rocket/Lightning: Heavy spells are great because you can delete huge pushes with two taps. They can easily be used to chip the tower (in the case that Hog Rider doesn't connect), or as a surprise tactic like with Freeze. The only reason I am cautious to use these cards is because they make the deck's average cost pretty expensive. Just make sure not to miss your Rockets.
• Freeze → Earthquake: Do you hate buildings? Of course, all Hog players do. Now you can delete them for 3 elixir. Unfortunately, Earthquake is pretty useless if your opponent doesn't have a building, so it's situational. If you see a lot of X-Bow, Tesla, or Furnace, Earthquake will assist you in beating those cards more than Freeze.

Keep in mind that this is not a comprehensive list – I may have missed some important card substitutes, and there could be justifications for moving a card from one category to another. Use this guide as a suggestion for how the deck could be improved to adapt to the meta.

Card Matchups

I don't play the game enough to give you a full list of deck matchups, because I am simply not experienced at dealing with different kinds of deck archetypes. Additionally, this is an off-meta deck that doesn't see much (if any) real competitive use. However, I am able to give advice on matchups against particular cards, and common combinations involving those cards. I will say, however, that this deck can be used to counter almost everything in single elixir. Play it right and you'll do well against any card. For the sake of simplicity, the 'rating' given to each card is based on an opponent of a similar skill level (compared to you) playing this deck.

Beatdown

Beatdown is definitely the simplest archetype to play against, because its core strategy revolves around 'play tank and put cards behind it and maybe throw down some spells'. Therefore, the best way to counter it is to treat each part of a beatdown attack as a separate 'unit' that needs to be dealt with your own defensive components.

Giant

Rating: 8/10

• Giant is generally easy to play against because he's a melee tank with no special features about him. This means a simple Inferno Tower should be enough to stop him alone.
• Troops coming from behind the Giant can be distracted or killed with a Valkyrie. Flying troops can be singled out from the Giant due to their faster speeds and different pathing. Spell cards cannot be avoided, but it is necessary to deny any spell value that your opponent might get.
• Common support troops with Giant include Balloon and Graveyard, which can be dealt with easily by first pulling the Giant with an Inferno Tower, then placing troops so they target the support card. Units should be placed sparingly and far apart from each other, because Lightning, Fireball, and Tornado spell value can be devastating to a good defense setup.

Golem

Rating: 6/10

• Golem can be a problematic card if too many units are behind him, because the push is generally unstoppable if you are at an elixir disadvantage. Hence, not playing too aggressively at the beginning is the key to beating a Golem deck (in case they play Golem as a first card).
• Once you understand the Golem player's deck a little more (whether it contains Lightning, Tornado, Dark Prince, a building, etc.), you can afford to be more aggressive to deny your opponent from playing a Golem at the back.
• Sometimes, a Golem player will sacrifice large amounts of damage to their tower in order to gain a massive elixir advantage. In this case, make sure you have the defensive tools to stop a large push right after you attack. This normally involves having an Inferno Tower and Freeze ready to be played.

Royal Giant

Rating: 6/10

• Royal Giant alone can easily be countered by an Inferno Tower. If he is paired with a lighter win condition like Hog Rider, the Inferno Tower should be saved for the Royal Giant.
• Beware of large pushes. Royal Giant decks are typically not very well-equipped on defense, so use this to your advantage by applying constant pressure with your high-damage troops. This also lets you cycle Inferno Towers.
• A common card that is paired with the Royal Giant is the Fisherman, which reels in your troops and allows other troops to beat them up. You can protect a unit from being reeled by placing Guards in front of it (before Fisherman starts his hook animation), or hitting the Fisherman with The Log and Freeze.

Electro Giant

Rating: 6/10

• Electro Giant's ability to do well depends on one factor, which is its ability to get to your Inferno Tower and stun it. He is no more threatening than a Giant if the Inferno locks on to him and it cannot be stunned in time.
• Electro Giant decks almost always carry Tornado, so staggered timing of your cards is very important when playing against him.
• Keep in mind that The Log and Freeze are excellent cards for keeping the Electro Giant away from the Inferno Tower (and other troops). An added bonus is that he cannot stun troops while he is frozen.

Lava Hound

Rating: 7/10

• Lava Hound is not problematic because you have three main cards to deal with the Hound and any support units behind it. The problematic part is if your opponent has Tornado or Lightning to destroy these cards.
• When playing against a Lava Hound with support units, never target the Hound first. Unlike the other beatdown cards, the Lava Hound does almost nothing if it hasn't popped into Lava Pups. Focus on taking down the support units. For example, a Musketeer can be placed right next to a Balloon behind a Lava Hound, so it targets the Balloon first.
• Lava Hound decks typically have mobile cards that can get to your tower fairly quickly (because they are air-based). Freeze is very useful on defense when playing against Hound.
• As with all decks that may carry heavy spells or Tornado, separate your cards and stagger their placement timings so that a single spell can't wipe out your entire defense.

Elixir Golem

Rating: 8/10

• Elixir Golem is only used in one viable deck, combining it with Battle Healer. The best thing to be done when facing this deck is to separate the Battle Healer from the Elixir Golemites and blobs, while using the Musketeer to snipe the air troops. An Inferno Tower is best paired with another card to defeat the Elixir Golem, because it can become easily overwhelmed. The Elixir Golem is never sent in alone.
• If your opponent uses Elixir Golem to soak damage, they are truly desperate to defend. Take advantage of this by pushing the lane with the Elixir Golem hard, because you will gain back 4 elixir quickly if you can defeat it as soon as possible.

Goblin Giant

Rating: 9/10

• Goblin Giant is played similarly to a Giant, but is almost exclusively used with Sparky (and sometimes Rage). An Inferno Tower counters him as well as a regular Giant, so a Goblin Giant+Sparky push is not very threatening if the Sparky can be distracted and separated from the Goblin Giant.
• Apply similar tactics relating to the Giant when dealing with the Goblin Giant. Keep in mind that the Goblin Giant is slightly more expensive, meaning your opponent will have a bigger deficiency of elixir right after playing the Goblin Giant.

Siege

This archetype is annoying to play against for any deck. Fortunately, once you learn to counter a siege deck, you learn to counter all of them (for the most part).

X-Bow

Rating: 5/10

• This is a very commonly played card for some reason. X-Bow decks typically outcycle this particular deck, so you need to play around some of your X-Bow counters.
• Valkyrie is the best unit for absorbing X-Bow hits. If she is used only for tanking, she should be placed in range of the X-Bow such that she will walk in the opposite lane and not engage it. This decreases the chance that your opponent tries to kill it.
• Inferno Tower can easily beat X-Bow one-on-one, but it isn't reliable because troops will be placed in front of the X-Bow. If you manage to get a lock on the X-Bow with the Inferno, place any unit in front of the Inferno Tower so that an Ice Spirit or Electro Wizard won't force it to retarget. Guards or Valkyrie are the best for this.
• Musketeer can deal a good amount of damage to the X-Bow on her own. With a unit to tank for her, she can shred the X-Bow easily.
• Ice Wizard will substantially decrease the damage output of the X-Bow. If it is already locked onto your tower, an Ice Wizard helps to negate a lot of damage. Make sure to protect him.
• Use a The Log proactively if you know that your opponent will deploy troops such as Skeletons or Ice Spirit to block your troops from touching the X-Bow. Siege decks normally overcommit on their defenses, so a good positive elixir trade gives you the opportunity to exert pressure.
• A Hog Rider will tank just as well as the Valkyrie, although he is better suited at rushing the X-Bow itself and dealing damage to it. Make sure that the X-Bow won't lock on to your tower after the Hog jumps over a river.
• Against a fast cycle X-Bow deck, the best option is to build a large push. Utilize Freeze effectively to throw down very heavy pressure on your opponent. Slower X-Bow decks can be countered similarly to beatdown decks.
• Avoid losing your Musketeer and Ice Wizard to a Rocket on your tower. If your opponent has Rocket as a secondary win condition, force them to use it away from your towers. Build big pushes to overwhelm their defensive X-Bows.
• Tesla + X-Bow is a large 10 elixir commitment. Rushing in against this setup (from either side) can catch your opponent off-guard.

Mortar

Rating: 7/10

• The less common and less annoying cousin of the X-Bow. Apply everything I talked about in the X-Bow section, but be wary that a Mortar can lock on your tower if a troop enters its blind spot.
• Mortar decks typically carry a secondary win condition, because the Mortar itself is not a strong tower damage dealer. Be prepared for spell cycle, Miner, Skeleton Barrel, etc.
• In general, Mortar forces you to play differently less than the X-Bow does. Apply basic strategies of countering beatdown to effectively destroy Mortar 'pushes'.
• A Mortar on defense is ineffective against your Hog Rider. If your sole purpose is to take a Mortar down, Hog Rider does the job very nicely.

Cycle

Cycle is the hardest archetype for control to play against (at least in my experience), because continuous pressure and a constantly rotating hand makes it hard to build up units for a strong counterattack. Hence, the key component of playing against cycle decks is knowing when to soak damage and when to defend.

Hog Rider (2.6 + others)

Rating: 4/10

• Against a Hog cycle deck, your individual units are not going to be effective. In fact, they are just opportunities for your opponent to build up positive elixir trades. Therefore, you need a large attack in order to do any actual damage to a Hog cycle player's tower.
• Your opponent will out-cycle your Inferno Tower. Therefore, it is best to protect your Inferno Tower after you defend against one, to deny any Hog Riders that might catch you off-guard without a defense.
• Overcommitting on a defense is fine, but you have to be sure that your opponent does not have the units to defend your counterattack. A 'weak' counterattack can be destroyed with spells or outcycled with defensive cards such as Cannon.
• Cycle cards are very weak in damage and/or health. If you notice that your opponent makes a mistake, such as sacrificing a Musketeer, capitalize on the few seconds where they cannot play another Musketeer on the field until they cycle back to it.
• Do not give any spell value with your Musketeer or Ice Wizard. Space out troops from your tower and other troops so that a single Fireball or Poison will not seriously damage a potential counterattack.
• If your opponent has a Musketeer, don't let them play it in reaction to your own Musketeer (this applies to all decks with Musketeer, but especially 2.6). They will essentially get free value out of their Musketeer while yours walks over the bridge and dies to an Ice Golem and Skeletons.
• Cannon is a 2.6 staple building, but it is very weak compared to the other defensive buildings (except Tombstone). Take advantage of this by pairing your Hog pushes with any card. A Hog Rider that needs one less hit to kill a Cannon will likely get to the tower, even with an optimal Cannon placement.
• Hog Rider + Ice Golem by itself cannot outdamage an Inferno Tower. Use this to your advantage to build positive elixir trades (given that your opponent doesn't damage the Inferno Tower in another way).
• When playing a solo Hog Rider, he must always jump the bridge; otherwise, you make it too easy to give your opponent a positive elixir trade by letting them pull your Hog Rider into the range of both towers.
• If you consistently have trouble dealing with the Hog Rider, consider switching the Inferno Tower for a cheaper building such as Tesla, Goblin Cage, Bomb Tower, or Cannon.

Hog Rider (EQ)

Rating: 4/10

• A special variant of Hog cycle that can be very threatening in the right hands. A Hog + Earthquake is enough to counter your Inferno Tower and get the Hog to your tower. Hog EQ generally has multiple ways to deal damage to your towers, so caution must be taken even when your opponent's Hog Rider is out of hand.
• Similar to 2.6 Hog cycle, don't let your opponent cycle and play Hog Rider and Earthquake quickly by building robust defenses centered around the Inferno Tower.
• Bats are typically carried in Hog EQ decks rather than Skeletons. They are harder to deal with, so make sure you have an Ice Wizard on hand or troops that can kite the Bats away. A Freeze works in a pinch, which can be used to disable a Hog Rider push.
• Firecracker is a staple of Hog EQ decks as well. Make sure that she is the first to go down when attacking or defending, because she is easily protected by other units due to her long range and pushback mechanic.

Bait (Log/Arrows)

Rating: 7/10

• Decks with Goblin Barrel and/or Skeleton Barrel aren't very threatening because of your ability to build large pushes and utilize the Freeze spell. Unless your opponent plays Bomb Tower or Tesla, the Hog Rider is almost always guaranteed to get to your opponent's tower (unless they overcommit which is even worse for them), at which point you can Freeze to get a lot of extra damage.
• Save your The Log for your opponent's win condition. This is likely Goblin Barrel or Skeleton Barrel (or both). Use your troop cards to eliminate other troops that are not Goblin Barrels or Skeleton Barrels. Generally, if your opponent has both of these win conditions, The Log should be saved for the Goblin Barrel and Skeleton Barrel should be countered with something like Valkyrie.
• Almost all the cards in your deck are able to counter classic Log bait support cards (Skeleton Army, Princess, Dart Goblin, Goblin Gang) on your side of the arena. This means that the moment your opponent makes a mistake on offense, you can easily counter it with whatever cards you have on hand and punish them heavily.
• A more experienced bait player will try to engage your cards on their side of the arena once they learn about your deck. Utilize your splash damage cards well on offense to deny as many enemy cards as possible from being turned into a counterattack.
• Temporarily protect your valuable troops from swarm cards by surrounding them with Guards. This distraction may give a Musketeer or Hog Rider enough time to evade or kill the swarm troops.
• Knight is very common in classic Log bait decks. Do not attack with Valkyrie if you know your opponent will use a Knight, because the Valkyrie does very bad against it on your opponent's side of the arena. This also applies to Musketeer and Ice Wizard.
• One tip for countering Princess is that a Musketeer can hit a Princess from the opposite lane if the Musketeer is played at the bridge and one tile from the middle on the opposite side of the arena. This allows you to defend a Princess, then quickly counterattack.

Goblin Drill

Rating: 8/10

• Treat Goblin Drill like a Goblin Barrel, only with different counters and a more lenient period of time to react.
• You must save your Valkyrie to deal heavy area splash to the Drill. However, if you notice that your opponent plays the Drill on defense, you can rush in using your Valkyrie to overwhelm it.
• If you have no other counters in hand, wait until the Goblin Drill reaches around 1/4 health, then use The Log to kill the building as well as the Goblins that it spawns on death.

Control

Unlike cycle, control decks can't randomly spam cards when playing on defense. They generally rely on taking advantage of good defenses to counterattack, then easily taking care of the opponent's remaining defending cards. The weakness of control decks is that they can play out very slowly and cannot take a lot of damage on their own towers. Therefore, the strategy to beat an opposing control deck is to take the initiative when attacking and trying to shift the 'control' of the game into your hands.

Miner

Rating: 5/10

• Miner control decks used to be very strong. Nowadays, they rely too much on other win conditions like Wall Breakers or Mega Knight to damage towers. If the Miner did more damage to towers, Miner control decks would basically be the hard counter to this deck because of their faster cycle and more reliable tower damage.
• A Miner does not do a lot of damage to the tower when sent in alone. Therefore, you should be more worried about the cards that come along with the Miner. Common 'rushing' cards include Minions/Minion Horde, Goblin Gang, Dark Prince, Wall Breakers, and Skeleton Barrel. You need to find a way to take care of these cards even when the tower is distracted by the Miner. The Miner himself can generally be ignored.
• Do not overcommit when you see a Miner coming towards your tower. This leaves you vulnerable to cheap attacks in the other lane. It may be wise to wait a second before you place cards to defend a Miner, because your opponent might be planning to rush you when you're not expecting it.
• Miner + Wall Breakers is a common combination in Miner decks. Wall Breakers are a huge threat if your tower is distracted, but sometimes it is better to soak their damage rather than overcommit on defense and prepare an attack with your saved elixir which will potentially deal more damage than you took.

Graveyard

Rating: 7/10

• Valkyrie and Guards are very strong against the Graveyard card itself. The hard part about playing against a Graveyard control deck (such as Splashyard) is dealing with the support troops that come with a Graveyard.
• Slow control Graveyard decks rarely ever get damage on your tower without a Graveyard. Take advantage of this by continuously applying pressure when your opponent is low on elixir, forcing them to repeatedly defend.
• While applying pressure, be wary of the cards that your opponent is building on their side of the arena. A Baby Dragon or Bowler makes an excellent tank for a Graveyard, so force them to play it on the opposite lane or take them down using a Musketeer before they cross the bridge.
• Make sure you have a Graveyard counter in hand when your opponent attacks. Hard counters include Valkyrie and Guards, and soft counters are Ice Wizard and The Log. These cards, especially in combination with each other will make short work of the Graveyard and set you up for a counterattack.
• Against a Freeze spell, try not to stack all of your troops together so that one Freeze will catch them all. Bait the Freeze by placing down one card, then defend with other cards after they Freeze.
• Against slow cards like Bowler or Ice Golem, block them from ever crossing into your side of the arena if you know that your opponent will play Graveyard. This basically renders the Graveyard useless, because your tower can easily pick off Skeletons.

Other

These decks are commonly played, but don't fit into the archetypes listed above.

Bridge Spam

Lumberjack + Balloon

Elite Barbarians

Double Prince

Thanks for reading!

Mass Spawners