BACKGROUND INFORMATION
This deck was created to center around the sparky. It is a pretty fun deck because of that. This deck is weaker than most decks because the biggest tank you have is an ice golem. You will need good practice with this deck if you wish to climb.
BASICS: AVERAGE ELIXIR AND HOW TO USE EACH TROOP EFFICIENTLY
The average elixir cost for this deck is 3.7 elixir and the following cards used are:
TROOPS: USED FOR DEFENSE AND OFFENSE. IMPORTANT TO USE THE RIGHT COUNTER FOR EACH TROOP
Sparky– The sparky is the main support to your giant. It costs six elixir, just a little more than the giant so you will be making very expensive pushes. The sparky is mainly there to kill any barbarians that your enemy will spawn. However, if it does lock on to the enemy arena or crown tower, you will bring that tower down extremely quick. The sparky also has a defensive capability but I highly recommend you do not use it for defense. The reason be hind this is the zap spell or any disruption spell. If you see an enemy push with a hog rider and barbarians, you may think that a sparky can kill all those troops and give you a huge elixir advantage right? While this can be true, it is very likely that your enemy has a zap in their deck. If they do, they can zap your defending sparky right when it is about to shoot and give them a huge advantage. They will most likely destroy the tower they were aiming for super easily and also kill your sparky . They ill also probably get a lot of your king’s tower health down if not completely destroy it. In these cases, I think the rewards do not outweigh the risks. The sparky is strong against the barbarians and any other troops below 1400 health. It is very weak to any air troops like the minions or the minion horde. It is also weak to spawner buildings like the tombstone, the barbarian hut, the goblin hut, and the furnace-those buildings provide the enemy with big distractions. Additionally a rocket, depending on its level, will either almost destroy a sparky or kill it off completely. If the enemy does have a rocket you should not place your sparky anywhere close to your arena or crown tower. You do not want to have your sparky near your arena or crown tower because if your opponent has a rocket on hand, they can send it and hit both your sparky and tower. This will give your opponent an equal elixir trade but give him a few hundred hit points off of your tower for free. The sparky downs massive damage and can take down a tower in only two shots.
Ice Golem– The ice golem is another card that goes with the ice-keteer theme. The ice golem is basically a a weaker giant that gives an ice wizard’s special effect upon death. You can use this to start a push since it is your main tank. Be careful however since the ice golem is not super tanky like the giant, lava hound, or regular golem. My favorite push is the golem, the ice spirit, and the three musketeers. The ice golem and the ice spirit cc provide so much stalling time that the musketeers can usually get to the tower and shoot a few bullets. The ice golem is not that good on defense since it only targets towers. However if you do use it on defense, it’s death passive will help slow down the enemy’s push. The ice golem can also be used in conjunction with the zap spell to clear away any minions, minion hordes, spear goblins, goblins, goblin hordes, or skeleton armies. The death damage in addition to the sap damage is enough to kill those troops.
Ice Spirits– The ice spirits can be a great card to use in conjunction with the hog. The ice spirits can be compared to the zap spell because both of those cards stun enemy buildings or troops. However, unlike the zap spell, the fire spirit does not cost two elixir. Instead, it is half as expensive and only costs you one elixir to use. In addition to that bonus, the fire spirit’s stun ability lasts twice as long as the zap spell. Because of these two stats on the ice spirit, the ice spirit is worth about four times as much as the zap spell is per elixir. However, there is one downside to using the ice spirit over the zap spell. The ice spirit, unlike the zap spell, can easily be countered. The ice s[irit can be countered by almost anything from direct damage spells like the zap spell, the arrows, the fire ball, and the rocket. The ice spirit is also very fragile against any splash damaging troops because even if they target your own hog rider, the splash damage effect can still kill your ice spirit since the ice spirit has such a low health point stat. Some splash damage troops that can kill your ice spirit is the wizard, the baby dragon, the ice wizard, the princess, the bomber, the witch, and the Valkyrie. Because of this, using the ice spirit is a risk reward type troop. If the ice spirit does get its stuff off before it dies, it is well worth it and you have a four times effectiveness when compared to the zap spell. However, if it dies it has a zero effectiveness when compared to the zap spell. If you find that your opponents are countering your ice spirit more times than not, you make want to switch to the zap spell. Switching to the zap spell will guarantee that you will get a stun on each of your pushes every single time. The zap spell will also get you a little more damage that is also reliable.
Ice Wizard– The ice wizard will help you a lot in this deck. It is great at defense against the hog because if you have the musketeer and ice wizard defending, good placement of both troops will make it impossible for your enemy to get a shot off the tower. The ice wizard’s slowing stat also allows him to counter high damage per second troops by slowing their fire rate. Another example of the ice wizard working his magic is against the royal giant. With only the musketeerdefending against the royal giant, a moderate amount of damage will be done to your tower. If you add the ice wizard onto your defense, the royal giant will get a lot less damage off during his life time.. The ice wizard is also very good on offense as it can help slow defending units or the crown tower. The combination of the ice wizard and musketeer can work extremely well if left uncontested because the ice wizard has a moderate amount of health and does splash damage while slowing the tower down a lot. This makes him act as a very good support troop for the musketeer that causes all the damage. The ice wizard is probably your best card in supporting offensive pushes and supporting your musketeer during a defense.
SPELLS: THEIR MAIN USES AND HOW TO MAXIMIZE THEIR POTENTIAL
Log– The log is here because your opponent would not be expecting you to play this card. The reason why your log is here and not your arrows or your fire ball is for a few reasons. The log does quite a bit more damage when compared to your arrows. In exchange for this damage, though, you cannot target enemy air troops with the log card. In this deck,I think the log is a better choice than the arrows because you already have the furnace and the zap spell. Both of those cards combined should let you kill any swarm air troops like the minion horde or the regular three elixir minions. Also, the log is better than the fire ball in this deck because it is cheaper than the fire ball. The once elixir difference can be the difference in having enough elixir to defend an enemy counter push and to have one of your crown or arena towers completely wiped out. The log also can hit your enemy towers which can help you finish them off if they have low health. Also, just like the fire ball, the log can help support your hog rider in your main push. If you put the log right behind your hog rider, you will be able to use the log to push away and damage any defending barbarians. This push back is similar to the knock back the fire ball does to any defending enemy barbarians. The log will also sort of clear the way for your hog rider to get to the enemy arena or crown tower very easily. The log can also be used fairly well for defensive purposes. If the enemy is bring a strong push to your arena or crown tower, you can send in your log to not only damage the oncoming troops, but to also push them back and away from your arena or crown tower. This push back can help you stall for another second which can really change the tide of the battle. With that one second stall your log provides you, you may be able to reduce the damage done to your tower by hundreds of hit points. I think for three elixir, the log is a pretty good card that can help you in some situations. I see the log more of a utility card than a damage card but it still can easily counter hut spam decks. The log card is great in some decks while lacking in others. The trick is to find the deck that works well with the log and you can have the element of surprise held against your enemy.
Fireball– The fireball is an important card in your deck. In a desperate situation, you can destroy barbarians or a minion horde very quickly. Since the ice wizard can do this job for a better elixir value, you should only use the fireball on those troops if you need them dead in an instant, i.e. they are right next to your tower. Also, if you have level nine arrows and your opponent has a level three or four princess, your arrows won’t take her out. If this situation happens to you, your fireball will always to the job. The fireball is also the best option to take out the triple musketeers. Combined with arrows, this combo can completely destroy high level triple musketeers. Also, because of the May 3rd update, making the elixir collector lose 20% health, and the May 18th update, causing the elixir collector to lose 9% more health, the fireball can now actually counter the elixir collector very well. You can basically may an even trade elixir wise and do a medium amount of chip damage to the tower. A good combo in addition to the elixir collector and tower is that if you hit other troops with that same fireball, you will come out ahead in terms of elixir.
Zap– The zap spell does do a little splash damage and almost happens in an instant. The Zap spell is mainly used to support your sparky and giant. The best way to use the zap is to either severely injure a minion horde and let your spear goblins or your minions finish them off. The other major use for zap in this deck is to stun any inferno towers. With the most recent update,. the zap will now reset the inferno tower’s damage. This will greatly increase the life time of your sparky and giant and make this deck even stronger. Remember, the longer your sparky and giant stays alive, the longer your high damage per second troops stay alive, and the more damage you can put onto enemy building, arena or crown towers, and on their troops. The zap will be your best friend because since it resets the inferno towers damage, it is better than the freeze spell. As a bonus when compared to the freeze spell, the zap spell only costs two elixir while the freeze spell costs four elixir. This lets you put two more elixir into your push that would have been spent on freezing the inferno tower. I recommend you zapping the inferno tower when the inferno tower’s beam is on the second stage. This will allow the sparky and giant to receive little damage and by the time the inferno tower resets, locks back onto the royal giant, and charges back up, the tower should be destroyed by your royal giant and the other supporting troops behind him. With this zap your pushes should be able to hit harder and last longer, a great support spell when trying to take down an enemy arena or crown tower. The zap spell hard counters small troops like the spear goblins, the regular shank goblins, the skeletons, the minions, and the minion horde. The zap also counters the goblin barrel spell quite well. It has a hard time when trying to kill high health point troops like the golem, the pekka, the barbarians, any type of prince, the balloon, and other troops like that. The zap can also stop the princes charges and make them start walking before they charge again . This allows the zap to be used in some tight defenses when a prince is right next to your tower.
TOWERS: HOW TO USE THEM AND WHERE TO PLACE THEM
Furnace-The furnace has some offensive capabilities. The furnace is a card that can help support your pushes. The fire spirits can be a great addition to constant pressure push. Even though you only get 2 fire spirits, they can still do a ton of damage. Two fire spirits can reduce a whole minion horde down to everything but one, single half health minion. This greatly reduces the damage going on your troops and lets you get a lot more damage on to your enemy’s crown or arena tower. The furnace can also be used just as a stead supply of chip damage. With a reasonable level furnace, one fire spirit will always make it to the enemy crown or arena tower. Since each fire spirit can do a decent amount of damage, your opponent has to keep an eye on this furnace. If you opponent just leaves that furnace alone and does not try to counter it at all, you will get a lot of damage off onto his or her tower. The total damage will be around 500 to 1000 damage, quite a lot for only the cost of four elixir. The furnace can also be used in a hut spam strategy. The furnace can provide aerial and ground coverage which only the goblin hut can also provide. It also provides much needed splash damage in the hut spammer deck. Where as before a hut spammer would be completely destroyed by a minion horde, the furnace, along with the goblin hut, lets you easily counter the minion horde very quickly. The furnaces main job, in my opinion, is a defensive one. If you place it behind one of your crown or arena towers, it is very safe and can essentially block off that whole lane. The reason that it can block off a whole lane is because the two fire spirits do a ton of damage. If an an enemy tries to push up the lane where your furnace is located, they will probably receive four to six fire spirits during the whole time of their push. This can be up to eight hundred damage and completely destroy a ton of pushes. Eight hundred damage will kill barbarians, hog riders, balloons, or prince pushes. Because of this, you can sort of influence your opponent to push your other side. A good idea to use the furnace like that is when one of your towers is stronger than the other. If you place the furnace on the side of the weaker crown or arena tower, you make that weaker side a lot stronger. The furnace makes a tough decision for your opponent to make to whether attack the weaker side with the furnace, or attack the stronger side with no furnace. The furnace can also be placed in front of your king’s tower a few squares forward. This, in an addition of being a spawner building, makes the furnace be able to be a big distraction. The furnace can distract the hog rider, the giant, the royal giant, the balloon, the golem, and the lava hound. This can act as a tank for your tower and absorb the damage from troops instead of your own crown or arena tower take the damage. Both of these defensive strategies are very useful but you should use them in their specific situations. If they have a hog rider, place it up front. If one of your towers has 1500 health, place the furnace behind that tower. After you get to know the furnace, you will know what action is the best to take in any given situation.
