Hi all, Blackbeard here, and now I’m going to show you all a deck that I recently made, combining some of the most popular decks and win conditions in the game, creating a lovely 3.0 easy-to-use deck for all level players. Now since in the new update coming 6/20 they are rearranging the cards in arenas (Hunter going to arena 1, elite barbarians going to arena 10, that sort of thing), I don’t really know which arena you can start using this deck in, so just for now to be safe, this is probably a deck from legendary arena through all of the challenges, and maybe even higher.

Battle Deck: Mega Minion, Poison, Miner, Hog Rider, Ice Wizard, The Log, Ice Golem, Arrows

Introduction: The Idea of the Deck

This deck has one of the main win conditions in the current meta; miner poison. This combo is in many decks, and some decks are based solely around that combo. So I made one of my miner poison decks, except I switched it up a bit. I took this combo and pared it with one of the most popular decks right now; the 2.6 hog cycle. I took the gist of this hog cycle, taking the quick cycle and of course hog from that deck, and putting it with a miner, poison. But also one of the ideas I had to make this deck was the hog and poison. This isn’t a very well known combo, in fact, I hadn’t heard of it until of my friends introduced me to it. It immediately became of my favorite combos and is also great it 2v2. So while we have miner and poison, we also have the hog with poison. Both of these combos work so well; I am very happy to have been able to put them both in this deck. One of the biggest keys to working this deck is being able to execute a clean and efficient cycle, much like the hog cycle deck. Something you can do to help keep this efficient cycle going is sometimes playing ice golem even when you don’t have to. This will help you cycle cards faster than your opponents and create more opportunities for your attacking cards to get damage in.

Countering and Defence

Countering certain decks can be explained in length in this guide, but if you match up against a very off meta deck, I’m afraid to say you’re on your own. But one tip of advise I can give you when your facing an opponent with an off meta deck: every time they play a card you should try and remember it, and keep track of when they will have it in their hand again. You should do this with every deck, but more so with an off met deck because that way you can kind of build what kind of deck you’re facing. With that being, unfortunately, all the advise I can give you against facing an off meta deck, let’s focus on facing some of the popular decks.

Defence Against a Golem Deck

Golem is one of the top win conditions in the game, very popular. This can be a problem sometimes to people with a very light deck, with no heavy troops like Pekka or Mega Knight or something of the like. Especially if the deck you have against a golem deck is light and has no buildings. That being the case with this deck, and a quick cycle, you might think it would have difficulty defending a golem. But I am pleased to tell you there is quite an easy way to counter this if all the cards are positioned correctly to the oncoming golem push. Now first step when you see a golem placed behind your opponents’ king tower: place hog on the opposite side of the golem they have just played. If you don’t have it in your hand then cycle around to be able to get to it. If that won’t work then jump straight to the next step that we will get to in a minute. Don’t play anything with the hog, not even the ice golem or anything like that. This will cause them to have to defend the hog on that side and be unable to put support troops behind their golem. Then don’t really bother about the troops they have played to defend the hog, unless its a swarm troop such as Skeleton Army, then you can log it. But by this time the golem will be nearing the bridge. So play ice wizard behind your princess tower, the one the golem is approaching.  Then play mega minion just over the top of the princess tower. This way when the golem reaches the bridge, the ice wizard is beside the princess tower, and the mega minion is near the bridge, but not quite at the bridge. This is the positions they should be in when they can start targeting the golem. By this time the opponent will have probably enough elixir to play another card. (Night Witch, Mega Minion, Lumberjack, Baby Dragon.) But since they had to defend the hog push they will only have enough for one support troop. Now with the mega minion and ice wizard locked onto the golem, this new arrival can do any amount of damage to either of these troops without receiving any damage in return. Therefore you will play ice golem so this troop, whatever it be (no more than 4 elixirs), locks onto the ice golem instead of any of your troops targeting the golem. By the time the ice golem dies, you should have split the golem into two Golemites with the golem just getting a few hits in on tower. But now the ice wizard and mega minion will focus on the golemites. Now you should have enough elixir for miner. Here you have a choice; you can play miner on the two golemites to help the mega minion and ice wizard deal them faster or you can play the miner so that the support troop, whatever it is, locks onto the miner instead of the other two. This is the smarter play if your planning to play a hog with the support of the ice wizard and mega minion. But if your just going for defence then play the miner on the golemites. There you have it on how to defend a golem push.

How to Defend Against Hog

Now how to defend the hog is quite easy. When the hog is just solo then all you have to do is play ice wizard and mega minion, or miner instead of one of these. But if you want to conserve elixir and don’t mind taking a bit more damage to your tower, just play ONE of them. But how to defend a hog with support is a bit more tricky. Now if its an ice golem in front of it, then your tower will lock onto the ice golem which isn’t great. Here try and predict which way the hog is going to pass the ice golem, and play your cards on that side. Sometimes you can log it if you want, to try and get the hog to pass the ice golem, making it easier for your troops to target. But if it’s a wizard that’s backing up the hog then play miner on the wizard, and ice wizard and mega minion on the hog. Or again if you don’t mind taking more damage and want to save elixir, then just play one of these on the hog. The wizard will win against the miner, but its hit points will be well down, and it will have bought you some time. By the time the wizard is done with the miner I expect you to have finished of the hog with your ice wizard and mega minion, or just ice wizard or mega minion. Therefore, even if its just the mega minion, and it won’t reach the wizard in time to do any damage on it, the tower will be targeting it, and so it will deal with the wizard before it can get any damage on the tower. But if its fire spirits that backed up the hog then just log it, and then play ice wizard and mega minion or just one, on the hog. If log is not available then play your defensive troops far enough away from the tower that when the fire spirits land on the troop, they won’t do any damage to the tower. That is how you defend the hog.

How to Defend Against Giant

Defending against the giant is quite a brief explanation. Here it is pretty much the same as defending against the hog or golem. As you have probably noticed, your main defence troops are ice wizard, mega minion, and sometimes miner. A log can be used on defense as well. Sometimes poison can too if you are in the right scenario to play it on defence. But is mainly used for offence with hog or miner like we talked about at the beginning of this guide. So here we use the same cards to defend against giant as to defend against pretty much anything else. Here we will, once again, want ice wizard to be beside the tower, and mega minion almost at the bridge. If a witch is supporting the giant you can play poison on it, and log it as well if it is too high level to die from the poison only. If they play something else as well, after the witch, then play ice golem (similar to defending the golem) to distract it until you have the giant taken care of. That’s the simple and brief way to defend giant.

How to Defend Graveyard

Now how to defend graveyard will be even quicker of an explanation, as really, as I’m sure you have noticed, there is one main really good counter for the graveyard in this deck; poison. If you don’t have poison the first time they play graveyard in the game, then play ice wizard on the graveyard. Play it at the edge of the graveyard, so it doesn’t get too much damage done against itself. But from then on, you know they have a graveyard, so don’t over commit and play a poison on something else, not even a witch or Electro Wizard. So there you have it. How to defend the top win conditions in the game. And some of the most popular cards in the game. But now that we have talked about defence, its time to talk offence, and what each card is good for.

Now we are going to talk about how to use each and every card in this deck. We’ll also talk substitutions and game plans.

How to Use Each Card

• Mega Minion: Mega Minion is a very good defensive troop, and is even better on defence when paired with another card. Ice wizard is the best card to pare it with on defence, but it can also solely back up hog on a hog, poison push, or miner, poison. It is also really good at backing up big pushes, and so is ice wizard. A popular push in this deck would be ice wizard, mega minion, hog and ice golem. And if it’s in 2x maybe even throwing in a poison there.
• Ice Wizard: Ice wizard, as said above, is good for being a follow up/support troop in a push. But it is also the center of defence. It is one card that is almost solely for defence in this deck, used for slowing down troops for another card, namely mega minion, to easily pick off.
• Poison: This card is, unlike the ice wizard, used almost only for offence. The rare time that you would use it on defence is when they play a support troop that will easily die from the poison. But on offence it is great pared with miner and hog, which is one of the big ideas for attack in this deck.
• Miner: The Miner is used for both offence and defence equally. On offence pared with poison is one of the main attack strategies, and on defence, against support troops, or drawing off a prince. It is really a very good all around card, that is quite useful.
• Hog Rider: This is the only card in this deck (I think) that is used only for offence. Pared with poison or miner or both, or just on its own, it is deadly. A lethal weapon, and very good at chipping away at towers. It can also be supported by all varieties of troops.
• The Log: The log is used for offence and defence equally. It can be used to push back troops, or kill small swarm troops; skeleton army, Goblin Gang, or anything like that.
• Ice Golem: Ice golem is used for placing in front of a hog (offence), or kiting troops over into the other lane. Or used for distracting troops that are making a push for one of your towers.
• Arrows: Used solely for taking out Minions or Minion Horde. If the opponent has neither it can sometimes be used on Bats, goblin gang or skeleton army.

Card Substitutions:

• Ice Wizard – Electro Wizard, Witch, Wizard, Hunter
• The Log – Zap
• Ice Golem – Archers, Ice Spirt, Giant Snowball

Game Plan: Early Stages: Elixir x1

At the beginning of the game you’ll just try and use miner and poison to chip away at their tower, but making sure you don’t over expend and focus mostly on defence. You don’t want to play hog too early in the game. In fact I try not to play it until 1 minute left. Because this way you can surprise your opponent. But at the beginning mega minion and ice wizard are saved solely for defence, and sometimes you can play ice golem as a tank for when you play miner. But when you do this don’t play poison because that would be too expensive. And don’t forget! Don’t be afraid to use miner on defence!

Later stages: Elixir x2

In the later stages, in 1 minute left, in double elixir is now when you can play hog. Come up with a hog poison, and surprise your opponent into over-committing. Then defend with your ice wizard and mega minion, then when your done defending, play ice golem in front of them, hog behind ice golem, then when they cross the bridge you will have enough elixir for miner, and the poison. This is the biggest push you can do with this deck, and it works like a charm.

Latest stages: Elixir x2: Overtime

If the game happens to go to overtime, then it will probably be zero, or maybe its one one, but either way, you probably both have each others remaining tower down to low hit points. Here you just defend defend, and chip with your miner poison. Pretty much the only time you can play the hog and have a surprise advantage over your opponent is with the one minute mark. But the chip with miner poison in overtime, and defending like crazy usually works. But if it’s one one (you have a tower), and if you have their tower down to 300 hit points or under then you can play hog in between the king tower and the princess tower. But only do this if they have no buildings.

There you are! The conclusion to the guide of this new miner/hog, poison chip deck. I hope you all do well with this deck, and if not that you at least try it out. Happy clashing!

ggillespiehewitt@gmail.com is my email. Don’t show this to the public though. Thanks