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“The Lava Hound is a majestic flying beast that attacks buildings. The Lava Pups are less majestic angry babies that attack anything.”

The Lava Hound is a Legendary card that is unlocked from the Rascal's Hideout (Arena 13). It spawns a slow, single-target, building-targeting, short-ranged, air troop with very high hitpoints and very low damage. When defeated, it bursts into six spread-out Lava Pups which have slightly higher damage but with much lower hitpoints. The Lava Hound appears to be a flying, burning rock beast with an underbite, short wings, small rocky dog ears, and small limbs. A Lava Hound card costs 7 Elixir to deploy.

Strategy[]

For Battle Decks with this card, click here

  • Since the Lava Hound is a great air tank with high hitpoints, it is best used as a shield for air troops with higher damage and less hitpoints like Minions, Mega Minion, or the Inferno Dragon. It is less effective to use the Lava Hound as a shield for ground troops as the opponent can use troops with ground-only targeting to bypass the Lava Hound.
  • Sending the Lava Hound alone is futile unless your opponent completely ignores it, as the Lava Hound and Lava Pups without support can be countered easily with no damage taken at all.
  • The Lava Hound has a lower sight range compared to other troops that only target buildings. Its sight range matches that of most non-building-targeting troops, like the Knight. This means that it can bypass certain building placements, as opposed to a Golem or a Balloon.
  • The Lava Pups cannot deal much damage without a tank, so a Knight, Miner or Hog Rider could tank for it long enough for it to take a Crown Tower. The Lava Hound can also tank for the said units, allowing them to return the favor subsequently by tanking for its Lava Pups.
  • Defenders should always prepare an area damage card like Arrows or Wizard against Lava Hound players, as the Lava Pups will deal incredible damage if left uncountered.
  • If timed correctly, a Zap can hit and stun all its Lava Pups. You need to use Zap on the Lava Hound just as it dies. Arrows are a much better alternative as they have less room for error with its larger area of effect and it kills all the Lava Pups. Arrows can also be used on a low-health Lava Hound, as the Lava Pups can be defeated in 2 of the 3 waves of the spell's waves.
  • The Inferno Tower is an excellent counter to the Lava Hound, as it deals high damage to the Lava Hound while it does not take much damage from the Lava Hound in return.
    • Back the Inferno Tower up with a Musketeer or use Arrows to finish off the Lava Pups.
    • Despite this, the Lava Hound may not be powerless. Send Minions to distract/destroy the Inferno Tower and the Musketeer. This will allow the Lava Hound to continue its job.
    • Zap may also help with dealing with the Inferno Tower since its stun effect will make it retarget to the Minions, as well as resetting its damage.
    • Using a second tank on the field (such as a Miner) will allow the Lava Pups do more damage. This is because the Lava Pups spawn only a short while after the Lava Hound has been defeated, meaning that any other troops will be targeted instead. This can easily fixed by using any card that has a stun effect, such as Zap and Freeze. However, it is usually better not to stun the troops since the Lava Pups are the main damage dealers in this situation.
    • Pairing the Lava Hound with Lightning is a good option since it will cripple an Inferno Tower and take out glass cannons such as Wizards, Musketeers, and Mega Minions.
  • The Tornado and Executioner combo is very effective in destroying the Lava Hound and its support troops. The Tornado brings all the troops to the same spot so the Executioner can hit all of them at once. If the Executioner defeats the Lava Hound, it can also hit the generated Lava Pups at once. The Tornado can also pull things back, giving your Executioner more time to defeat them. The Magic Archer and Firecracker can work in a similar way.
    • Like the other options, the Hunter is also able to defeat the Lava Hound. He deals great damage to the Lava Hound, while also retaining the ability to hit the Lava Pups right after defeating the Lava Hound. However, he is less reliable against a larger Lava Hound push, so try to protect with with a mini tank while he attacks the Lava Hound.
  • The LavaLoon is a popular strategy where the Lava Hound tanks for a Balloon while it wreaks havoc on Towers.
    • However, this strategy is easily countered if the troops have no support, as the Balloon can be destroyed before the Lava Hound. For example, the Minion Horde can easily destroy the Balloon before it deals damage to the Tower and proceed to destroy the Lava Hound. So a support unit behind them like a Baby Dragon or Skeleton Dragons is crucial to protect the Balloon from swarm units, although this would make the combo very costly.
    • It can also be easily defeated by the Wizard. Place the Wizard correctly so that it targets the Balloon. When the Balloon dies, support the Wizard with other troops to finish off the Lava Hound and its Lava Pups. Thus having a Mega Minion supporting them could also come in handy.
      • Other air-targeting area damage troops like the Executioner can also work if paired with a Tornado. Try to use these combinations when the Balloon has already passed the tile where the Tornado is placed.
    • The Inferno Tower is also able to counter this combo. After defeating the Lava Hound, it will immediately retarget to the next closest unit, which is often the Balloon. The Inferno Tower also has high enough hitpoints to withstand the Balloon's attacks, buying it enough time to defeat it, while the Lava Pups do not deal enough damage to it in return. However, the Inferno Tower will not stop a Lava Hound + Balloon push by itself if the opponent uses Zap or Ice Spirit.
    • When they have both combo tools prepped up on their side, it is important to abuse the Lava Hound's long range by playing a distraction such as a Tombstone on the bridge. The Balloon goes in front of the Lava Hound, and the Crown Tower will target the Balloon first, making it easier for troops such as the Mega Minion to plow the Balloon and some more to the Lava Hound.
  • A high risk, high reward move is to use Clone on the Lava Hound. After the original Lava Hound dies, the Crown Tower will lock onto the cloned Hound for one shot before targeting the original's Lava Pups. This results in twelve Lava Pups dealing massive damage on the map. This is especially effective when the Hound is paired with other swarms like Bats or Skeleton Army that can be used to bait out a spell like a Zap or Giant Snowball that would be more effective against the Clone spell.
  • A Lava Hound can be more versatile than a Golem. The Lava Hound costs less Elixir and cannot be targeted by high-damage ground troops like the P.E.K.K.A. or Prince while the Lava Pups have higher damage overall than the Golemites. The Lava Hound also has a one-second deploy time as opposed to the Golem's three-second deploy time. However, one disadvantage in using the Lava Hound is its difficulty to obtain and upgrade because the Lava Hound is a Legendary card. It also cannot be targeted by troops that cannot target air - such as Barbarians, which means it cannot distract them. It also has less health than the Golem. Its most glaring flaw when compared to the Golem, however, is its extremely low damage output and lack of death damage. Because of this, it should be supported with high-damaging units that can use the Lava Hound as a meat shield such as Baby Dragon or Flying Machine.
  • The Miner is very effective when paired with the Lava Hound. Sending in a Miner after a Tower has locked on to the Lava Hound will allow the Miner to deal a lot of chip damage without being targeted. Alternatively, the Miner can be sent onto grounded anti-air troops like Musketeer to defeat them. After the Lava Hound dies, the Miner will tank for the fragile Lava Pups, allowing for even more damage to the Tower. However, this can be countered by certain spells or swarms that target air troops for a positive Elixir trade, such as Fireball or Rascals.
  • In a Draft Challenge or a Triple Draft Challenge, the player is guaranteed to receive a card that can target air troops (2 in the case of Triple Draft). As such, it might not be a good idea to pick the Lava Hound in those challenges.

Statistics

Lava Hound Attributes

Cost
Elixir
Hit Speed
Damage Speed
First Hit Speed
Damage Speed
Speed
Speed
Deploy Time
Deploy Time
Range
Range
Projectile Speed
Speed
Target
Targets
Count
Troop Count
Transport
Transport
Type
Type
Rarity
Rarity
7 1.3 sec 0.5 sec Slow (45) 1 sec 3.5 400 Buildings x1 Air Troop Legendary

Lava Pup Attributes

Hit Speed
Damage Speed
First Hit Speed
Damage Speed
Speed
Speed
Range
Range
Projectile Speed
Speed
Target
Targets
Count
Troop Count
Transport
Transport
1.7 sec 1 sec Medium (60) Melee: Long (1.6) 500 Air & Ground x6 Air

Card Statistics

Level
Level
Lava Hound Hitpoints
Hitpoint
Lava Hound Damage
Damage
Lava Hound Damage per second
DPS
Lava Pup Hitpoints
Hitpoint
Lava Pup Damage
Damage
Lava Pup Damage per second
DPS
9 2,960 45 34 179 75 44
10 3,256 49 37 196 82 48
11 3,581 54 41 216 90 52
12 3,936 59 45 238 99 58
13 4,321 65 50 261 109 64
14 4,736 72 55 286 120 70
15 5,209 79 60 315 132 77

Card Mastery

Type Level/Tier Objective Reward
Damage Dealer
Damage Dealer
1 Deal a total of 130,000 Damage to enemy Troops or buildings 2 Lava Hound cards
100 XP
2 Deal a total of 385,000 Damage to enemy Troops or buildings 8,000 Gold
100 XP
3 Deal a total of 650,000 Damage to enemy Troops or buildings 150 Gem
100 XP
Pincushion
Pincushion
1 Receive a total of 3,500 hits from enemy Towers 12,000 Gold
150 XP
2 Receive a total of 10,000 hits from enemy Towers 2 Legendary Wild Card
150 XP
3 Receive a total of 18,000 hits from enemy Towers 18,000 Gold
150 XP

History[]

2016

  • The Lava Hound card was added to the game on 3/5/2016, in the May 2016 Update.
  • On 18/5/2016, a Balance Update, increased the Lava Hound's hitpoints by 3% and Lava Pup's hitpoints by 9%.
  • On 21/6/2016, a Balance Update, increased the Lava Hound's damage by 28%.
  • On 30/11/2016, a Balance Update, decreased the Lava Pup's hitpoints by 1%. This was to fix a rounding error where a level 12 Crown Tower should've been able to kill equivalent level Lava Pups in two shots.

2017

  • On 12/6/2017, the June 2017 Update, increased the Lava Hound's collision radius to 0.75 tiles (from 0.5 tiles). This change was not mentioned in any change notes.

2018

2019

2020

  • On 7/1/2020, a Balance Update, increased the Lava Hound's range to 3.5 tiles (from 2 tiles). The damage of the Lava Pups was also increased by 70%, but their attack time interval was increased to 1.7 seconds (from 1 second), their first attack time interval was increased to 1 second (from 0.8 seconds), and their range was decreased to 1.6 tiles (from 2 tiles), now classified as Melee: Long. There was also an unannounced change to Lava Hound's pathing, allowing it to bypass some building placements it was not able to bypass before.

2021

  • On 7/6/2021, the Summer 2021 Update, moved the Arena to unlock the Lava Hound from P.E.K.K.A's Playhouse to Hog Mountain.
  • On 27/10/2021, the Champions Update, increased the Level cap of all cards to 14 (from 13).

2022

  • On 26/10/2022, the 2022 Quarter 3 Update, moved the Arena to unlock the Lava Hound from Hog Mountain to Rascal's Hideout.

2023

Gallery[]

Trivia[]

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