Clash Royale Strategy Guide

Clash Royale Strategy Guide

Clash Royale is an extremely popular game for iOS from Supercell – the same guys who published App Store favourites Clash of Clans and Boom Beach. Clash Royale takes many familiar characters from Clash of Clans (as well as some new faces) but brings an entirely new card-based game mechanic.

Clash Royale has been sitting at the #1 position for good reason, it’s a very addictive game with surprising depth of strategy. Every game is different and you have the opportunity to put your own strategy directly up against that of your opponent. The cards you have matter, but not nearly as much as the way you play them.

Every Clash Royale strategy is based around your deck. A deck has 8 cards and each needs to be carefully chosen to ensure balance. You can have up to 3 pre-made decks at any time, made from any combination of the cards that you have unlocked. As you collect more cards throughout the game you can purchase upgrades to make your deck stronger.

Here are some tips on Clash Royale strategy to help you become a winning player.

Make the Second Move

Taking the first move exposes your strategy and allows for your opponent to play a counter and then push back when your first attack fails. Playing first means that your characters are likely to end up across the river into enemy territory before your opponent – thus you’ll be coming under fire from their towers as well as their defence.

If You Move First, Drop Cards Behind Your Towers

Because of its effectiveness, waiting to move second is a commonly used tactic. Games are often encountered where both players will wait 30 secs or more until someone’s nerve cracks and they decide to attack. Take advantage of this strategy and play slow-moving characters first (Giant, Giant Skeleton) or put down a defensive tower like a Tesla that’s useful against both land and air attacks. By the time your slow-moving character reaches the middle of the map you’ll have regenerated extra elixir and will be able to make a more effective push with an extra card or two.

Only Upgrade Cards You Use

Upgrades are cheap in the beginning and you’ll be tempted to upgrade everything you can. Soon though the costs go up dramatically and you won’t have have the gold to level up all your cards. Be selective and try to save your gold for the cards you actually use in your decks. You may have the cards needed to upgrade that bomb tower – but are you actually going to use it?

Create a Balanced Deck

To pull off a great Clash Royale strategy, your deck needs to be balanced. This means that it should contain a good mix of high and low-cost units, air and land, defense and offense. If all your cards cost 5 or 6 elixir, you may have some heavy hitters but you won’t have any flexibility in defense and you’ll find yourself often overrun without the ability to play a card. Work out which cards will for the basis of your attack, and which cards back them up well. While they’re not exciting or ‘epic’ – cards like minions, goblins and skeletons should feature in your deck as these cards are versatile, cheap and can complement any Clash Royale strategy.

Test New Strategies

Try out new things and take notice of what strategies your opponents are using against you. You may see people try specific combinations like the Hog Rider and Freeze Spell, Goblin Barrel and Mirror or spam Goblin Huts and Barbarian Huts in an effort to overwhelm you with numbers. See what works for you and what fits your playing style. As you move up through the Arenas you’ll see certain strategies and tactics become more prevalent as well as the cards that people use change.

Don’t Drop Trophies

Because Clash Royale is all about winning games and therefore winning chests, there’s no benefit to dropping games or trophies as there was in Clash of Clans. Higher level arenas feature chests with better cards and more gold. You’re better served trying to win as much as possible to move up to the next level Arena. Every arena you move up to unlocks new cards that aren’t available in the lower level games.

Time Your Chest Unlocks

This Clash Royale strategy is more common sense than anything, but you generally get two types of chests – silver chests which take 3 hours to unlock, and gold chests which take 8 hours. Unlock the 3-hour chests during the day and save the 8-hour chests for before bed so you can maximise your non-productive game time.

Make the Most of Crown Chests

Crown Chests are offered up each day, and often feature a large amount of gold, gems and a high number of cards. Crown Chests reward daily play and can only be unlocked by winning 10 crowns in matches. Each tower you destroy is worth one crown, and if you take out the King’s tower that’s worth 3 crowns. Best case scenario, it’s going to take 4 wins to get your 10 crowns but it’s rare to be able to make repeated 3-crown victories once you reach the 5th or 6th Arena.

Understand Counters

Most cards in Clash Royale have a counter. Just about every offensive option that your opponent has can be defended against. You can’t always drop the ideal card (or you may not even have it in your deck), but knowing what works against what is half the battle. For example – any attack that involve en-masse units (goblins, minions etc) are best dispatched using well-timed Arrows or Fireball. Charging units like the Prince or Hog Rider need to be countered with cards that feature multiple units – i.e. Barbarians, Goblins and Skeletons. These units will provide both a physical barrier to reaching your tower and multiple sources of attack to whittle down these powerful units. Slow-moving units like the Giant and Skeleton are best attacked from the air with minions, or taken down with defensive towers and ranged units.

Have you got any more Clash Royale strategies or tips? Let us know in the comments below.