تجريبي

Whenever Grandpa Cell came to visit, he always brought Little Chief a present. This time, when Little Chief asked what it was, Grandpa Cell gave him a small (data) package. "Oh boy! A new defense!" said Little Chief as he jumped with joy. Grandpa cell giggled a bit before saying, "Now Little Chief, this is no ordinary defense. It can only shoot things within a 120* angle." Little Chief stares blankly. "You have to figure out the best way to aim it to protect your base! Isn't it ingenious?!" exclaimed Grandpa Cell. "Does it come with instructions?" asked Little Chief as he looked up at Grandpa Cell in confusion. Grandpa Cell smiled and said, "Of course! There is a link to them hidden somewhere in the terms and conditions!"

    Well, as you see in the story, we have been given a great gift with no instruction on how to use it. But fear not! This guide will try to show you all the ways in which the Air Sweeper can be used. So read on and learn the tricky tricks that you can master in this Trikipedia: The Air Sweeper Trikipedia!

    Ok, to start, let's go over some basic information about the Air Sweeper. It has a range of 16 tiles, but only for 120*, or 1/3rd of a circle, in the direction it is facing. The Air Sweeper cannot hit troops directly above it. Additionally, its blast does not hit the entire area at once. When it fires, the blast initially forms a 165* angle and a forms a terminal angle of 35* (I measured this myself). This change in degrees is because the blast does not expant as it travels, instead it stays a constant 5 tiles wide across the entire 15 tile range. However, while the length of the blast stays the same linear length, the blast still takes on the shape of an arc, and pushes troops like an arc would. Troops fan out as they are hit by the blast because of this. For specific information one each level, you can visit the Clash of Clans Wiki here: http://clashofclans.wikia.com/wiki/Air_Sweeper

    Before I continue any further, as a forewarning, TH6's may not find the rest of this post very beneficial to them, simply due to the comparably few defenses (especially when it comes to air defense) that TH6's have. That being said, read on for information, for curiosity, or for some sort of masochistic pleasure that comes from reading longs posts. Also, I am writing this post as if you are building a warbase and the enemy will have time to plan elaborate and powerful attacks. The information and tactics discussed here can certainly be applied outside of war, but for simplicity sake and easy examples, I will be writing it with the idea that it is for war.

    Now, with great power comes great aggression. The Air Sweeper, despite doing no damage definitely has the potential to be very powerful. If you have your Air Sweeper sitting outside your base and aiming away from it, then it will not be a serious target for the enemy to take out. They will likely ignore it's existance and attack from wherever they want to without paying it much attention. This shall not do! You must make your enemy recognize it as the mighty defense that it is! Now the only question is how?

    Because the Air Sweeper pushes troops backwards, you will want to place it so that it can cover other air defenses like Air Defenses and Wizard Towers. Protecting Air Defenses will especially help against dragons and lava hounds, where concentrated high damage can turn the tide of the battle. Protecting Wizard Towers will especially help against balloons and minions, where they are often clumped into hordes that are more susceptible to splash damage. Protecting your Town Hall would obviously be valuable try to prevent the enemy from getting stars. When you are protecting something, you will want the range to extend a bit beyond what you are guarding. There is little the Air Sweeper can do to help a defense if it can't push troops away from it. As the Air Sweeper slows down the enemy air troops, the defenses within the range will get valuable extra time to take them out. A few seconds can mean the battle in Clash of Clans, a fact any experienced player would agree with.

   Ok, you just designed a new war base that makes great use of the Air Sweeper to protect your TH and air defenses. All of a sudden, you check and some guy used mass dragons to 3 star you. What happened?! Well, if this does happen to you, (and I hope it doesn't) then I would be willing to bet that you either made your base vulnerable by trying to over-integrate the Air Sweeper or you didn't protect your Air Sweeper well enough with air defenses. I can hear you now, "Say WHAT?! You just told me to use this thing to protect my air defenses! Now you're telling me the air defenses are supposed to protect it? Make up your mind!"

    Well, let me address each issue before I follow up with an example. If you pile all of your Air Defenses and Wizard Towers into one slice of your base to be guarded by the Air Sweeper, then all the enemy has to do is take out the Air Sweeper and then drop a few rage or heal spells. They will have very quickly taken out all of your air defenses. Don't get me wrong, overlapping your defenses' ranges is good, but smushing them all in one bunch is very risky. If the enemy can get in there, you are in trouble, and if they make it out of there, you're screwed. So remember, a little spread is good.

    To the second issue. You have to defend the Air Sweeper with air defenses and defend air defenses with the Air Sweeper. We have already gone over why defending your air defenses with your Air Sweeper is good, but you have to remember that the Air Sweeper not only has a limited range, but also does no actual damage! You will want to have a few air defenses, preferbly Air Defenses and Wizard Towers, that at least have range over the Air Sweeper itself. If they can shoot a little beyonf the Air Sweeper, that would be even better, so long as you don't make a power zone like was talked about in the previous paragraph.

    Now let me show you a little bit about what I mean and what you need to think about, and counter-think about, when placing the Air Sweeper. So, for my example, I will be refering to my war base design, The Comet. The link to the base is here: http://clashofclansbuilder.com/plan/754696
Also keep in mind that any references to direction will be based on the orientation that the base appears here, on Clash of Clans Builder. In The Comet, the Air Sweeper should be facing North-East, which when implemented will put the left boudary straight throught the center of the Cannon to the North and the right boudary straight through the center of the Cannon to the East. In this position and orientation, it can protect the Town Hall all of the air defenses except for 2 Wizard Towers You will also see how it is in range of the Wizard Towers and Air Defenses. If you were to place it North of the Townbetween the Archer Tower and the Cannon and aim it South, it would be able to cover all of the air defenses except for 1 Wizard Tower. So why isn't that the final design? There are 2 main reasons.

    The first issue involves 'the thought' of the placement. If you place that there, you may be covering more air defenses, but you are covering less of them well. One of the other Wizard Towers and one of the Air Defenses are both barely within it's range. Dragons would be able to attack both of them from just beyond it's range, and balloons would barely be in the range enough to be affected. All of a sudden you are actually protecting less wven thought it initially appears you were protecting more.

    The second issue involves 'the counter-thought' of the placement. Before, when the Air Sweeper was located on in the South-West portion of the base, it would be beneficial to launch an air attack from that side to take it out first. Now, with it placed in the Northern section of the base, it is more beneficial to attack from there to take it out fast. The bad thing about this is that by attacking from the North, they are now also very close to your Town Hall. Despite the Air Sweeper covering about as much of the base as before, and actually having a farther range over the Town Hall, that actually makes it a higher priority target for the enemy, meaning that they are more likely to attack from the side it is not defending.

    What I just said above is the true conundrum. You use the Air Sweeper to protect one part of your base better against air attacks, and you want to have it guarding your air defenses, but that makes it a more important target, so they attack from the side it is not defending! A well placed Air Sweeper will make a thoughtful attacker attack from the side it is not defending. The true irony of this defense when used well, is that wherever this defense is aimed is likely where the enemy will not attack! The more you think about it, the wierder it gets. Defend the air defenses, they attack from behind the Air Sweeper, defend the region behind, they attack the air defenses, you defend the air defenses, etc. You see that a well used air defense creates a loop of how to defend against a thoughtful attacker (if they are not a thoughtful attacker they will attack the air defenses and fall mercy to the Air Sweeper, or they will attack the Air Sweeper when it is not aimed at the air defenses and waste time and resources).

    How do you get around this paradoxical nonsense?! You can't! You just have to go with it and plan for it! In The Comet, I know that the Air Sweeper is well placed, so a thoughtful attacker will want to try to take it out, so I guard it in a careful way. I have air defenses cover it with their ranges so that if and when the enemy attacks from the South-West to try to get it, they will be taking hits from the air defenses. I am careful, however, to keep the air defenses spread out a bit, so that if they do take it out, then they now have the rest of the base to face. A very key strategy I think that will be seen emerging with the Air Sweeper is the idea of having fallback zones. The enemy can either destroy the Air Sweeper first and then have to face the rest of the base, or face the air defenses first and deal with the effects of the Air Sweeper. Either way, the enemy will have to use a lot of it's spells to assist in taking out one or the other, but they may not have enough strength to take out both, thus a fallback. It is hard to destroy one without the interference of the other.

    These are just a few ideas for how to use the Air Sweeper. You now also see just how complex it truely is. Hopefully you are now prepared for the revolution that is to come, both for attacker, and defender.



    Signing off, this is Legojedi. May the Force be with you.

Composition

Backbone
8-14 Valkyrie
10-18 Hog Riders
10-15 Wizards
5+ Wallbreakers

Support
0-4 Witches
0-2 Golems
0-1 PEKKA
0-4 Healer

Spells
Varies but for Th9 players it always consist of at least 1 jump and 1 rage. Th10 players typically also carry a freeze spell or two.

Pros
Extremely effective vs Th9 and premature Th10
Hits hard and fast
Valkyrie and Hogs complement each other well
Offers a variety of troop deployment strategies

Cons
Extremely DE intensive and relies very heavily on one barracks
Timing is huge, miscalculations can result in losses
Troops that make the backbone of this combo are very trap vulnerable

Selecting a Base
Honestly Valkyrie N’ Hogs isn’t so much about base selection per se as it is selecting the right deployment strategy for a particular base. Selecting the right supporting troops for a clan war is also very critical. What I can tell you is that Valkyrie like compacted cores and that is their primary job, usually, in this composition. Still either witches or healers can help you tackle spread out bases. If the base is all spread out (even the core), then this is probably not the best strategy.

In terms of when this strategy is at its peak, I’d say Th9. Valkyrie and Hogs together can demolish a Th9 base pretty easily. If you loved hogs before the giant bomb change, this may be a way to bring your hogs back into the fold. At this level you can use healing spells or even healers to turn either unit into a high DPS fast moving tank. Premature Th10 bases are also very vulnerable to this combo because hogs will chew through neglected defenses pretty fast.

When tackling maxed out bases more thought will be required and planning. Healers are a poor choice against th10 for 2 reasons. The most obvious one is multi-target infernos. But after using this composition for a while a bigger problem really is that healers don’t have a 5th level. They just don’t keep up with the DPS of maxed level defenses. Golems and Witches become the supporting troops of choice. With those units supporting your Valkyrie/Hogs you can tackle most bases with the right strategy and deployment.

Consider the CC carefully. It's placement and layout are critical for troop comp and attack angle.

Examples of Valk n' Hog Comps
[link]http://youtu.be/I0iGxx-O00w?list=PLqrAQwazAOaNUfs6Ork3EJ-Z1StjAH4Sa[/link]

Attacking –
Before I continue this is a difficult strategy to master. Execution can mean the difference between 40% and 90%. It can pack a wallop but requires skill.

Fried Chicken's Th9 Guide - http://www.reddit.com/r/ClashOfClans/comments/2srviy/strategy_th9_valkyriehog_combo_a_3_strategy/

3 Stars on Advanced Th9 Bases - http://www.gadihh.com/valkyrie-attacks

Attacking is different depending on what sort of base you’re looking at and how you choose to deploy these units. So instead of trying to type one section on deployment I will break it into the different techniques you can use depending on your objective.



The V maneuver
This is a technique I favor and is a great one vs th9. It's more tricky vs th10. I start the attack with a lure, either sparing some hogs or bringing along some giants, and draw the CC to an undefended space on the map. I then deploy witches and wizards to take these units out. It’s not a bad idea to have a small handful of barbs and archers for distractions at this point. The Valkyrie trick is also a good option.

I then deploy my tanking unit to distract defensive fire. I usually do this a little left or right of the witches, since they provide good distractions. Vs Th9 and below it’s not 100% necessary to have a tanking unit, as Valkyrie with the heal spell do pretty well.

I will select my location to send the Valkyrie in depending on the base layout. Typically I will send my Valkyrie into the core. In this scenario I will look for the best direct route to the core, somewhere where placing 1 jump spell get me where I want to go. But sometimes I will allow my Hogs to do the work of clearing out the core. I will do this if buildings are tightly packed in larger compartments around the core. Valkyrie do best against tightly packed compartments. I will also try and send my Valkyrie in a location that potentially has many giant bomb traps. Valkyrie aren’t particularly vulnerable to these traps and do much better than hogs against them. The Valkyrie should also deal with the Queen. For high level heros a PEKKA is a good addition.

Once my Valkyrie have the defenses occupied I will send in my Hogs so they crisscross with my Valkyrie. They will destroy a defensive side of the base that has not been touched. I will then try and time one healing or rage spell for when these two groups cross paths. For this particular maneuver I favor 1 jump, 1 rage, 1 freeze and 2 heal. Don't worry at th9 if you need one heal to counter a GB.

If you get the timing right, you essentially get twice the spell for the price of one. The other reason I developed this strategy is that Hogs and Valkyrie have very different strengths. Valkyrie hit hard and fast but quickly petter out as they run into walls. Hogs on the other hand, jump walls but lack the HP to sustain much damage. Valkyrie also have a nasty habit of getting themselves bottled in the core and then getting “stuck” as defenses from all side fire on them. Hogs can easily clear one side of this bottle, and then proceed to easily and effortlessly continue past the core. This also buys Valks enough time to break out of the core.

After this it’s all about spell timing. I typically use rage to get my Hogs past the queen if Valks didn't neutralize her and try my best to have at least 1 heal spell available for when the core is down. Either a rage or a heal will work when the two groups crisscross, but the better the timing with your spells the more damage you can do. Ideally you want to be dropping your healing spell so that units in critical health recover most if not all of their HP. With your hogs, you also want to keep a close eye on possible giant bomb locations and save health for a possible trap.

Please note that this strategy will fall apart if the Valkyrie cannot survive very long. This is why Golems are necessary verses Th10. However, verses Th9 HoVaPe or even He-HoVa will also work well since you can use healing spells and the overall DPS of the defenses is lower.

Verses mid to advanced th10 requires more caution. You can not afford to trigger a GB while the hogs clear a side. It's better to have a second golem and to deploy him as the main force hits the core to attract flanking fire. While defenses are busy hogs can take out point defenses on a walled off side. Note this isn't my primary strategy vs th10.

Cavalry Charge
For th10 this is a blitz. If the base offers a direct path to the core and the big guns are clustered together, then you can use rage/freeze to basically do critical damage in 8 seconds. I use 2 Golems at th10 for this attack and open up like a GoViz but consider defense pathing for hogs as well. I only lure if it's an easy lure.

Centralized heros are better along with heavily centralized important defenses. Also room to set up the attack is necissary, CC triggering too early will mess you up.

I always try and get my Valkyrie into the core with this strategy. I want them occupying defenses and any CC in the way.

If possible I keep a golem near the surge of my attack. I use it to trigger the CC from one point, so I get a straight pull. As long as I can get the CC drawn out in a clump my Valks will eat them alive. If inside the core when they meet so I can add freeze on top, perfect.

When it comes time to unleash the hogs, so to speak, I time it so that the hogs reach the core about the same time as my Valkyrie. Pay careful attention to defenses that make a direct line to the core, they'll help you hit the core hard. I don’t cluster my hogs, but spread them out in a tight line. Or I send a few slightly ahead of the pack. Once they hit the core I will either drop a heal or rage spell. Freeze comes into play for inferno fire. With this maneuver, your royals, Valkyrie, hogs and witches should be colliding with the core roughly the same time. This means as long as you can take down/freeze 1 inferno your heal spell should still be effective due to the number of units in play. Activating your king’s ability at this time is a particularly good way to distract the inferno as well. For higher level th10 bases it is better to drop the heal for another rage. Aim to do as much damage as you can as quickly as you can as a strong th10.

Tine the 1st rage for as you collide with the core and the second as you exit. At th9 you can save a spell to keep momentum going.

The Hog Lure
Inventor: ZenCoC
http://youtu.be/7l2Ip-x-GuE

This is a strategy developed by ZenCoC and is typically used with a heavy witch composition. This strategy uses hogs in the opening of the attack rather than as a 3rd wave. Bases that have point defenses that aren’t covered by the heavy hitters; infernos, x-bows, and well protected wizard towers, are vulnerable to this tactic. In particular if tightly grouped.

In its pure form a rage or heal is dropped in the opening of this attack and a portion or all of the hogs (10-12) are dropped to clear defenses and trigger the CC. Depending on the layout you may or may not spread the hogs out, but the goal is to clear some defenses while luring the CC at the same time. After the CC is eliminated drop a wizard to clean up the weakened area.

Typically a full pull is pretty easy with this strategy but you’ll want to careful consider the location of the pull. Triggering a set of double bombs would leave your hogs nothing but bacon.

The next step is to get the CC troops in the open and clumped up. The Valkyrie trick or witches can kill the CC but you must have fodder. I frequently make the mistake of deploying witches without distracting the enemy CC. If you do this the enemy CC will ignore your skeles and beeline to your witches. For either troop drop a barbarian or 3 to get the attention of the CC. This give witches time to spawn skeletons and valkyrie time to swing. Deploy witches with wizard support to eliminate enemy CC. Note if your losing units other than fodder or a minor loss, you did this wrong.

Next deploy a golem to tank damage from the defenses left or right of where the hogs cleared out defenses. This Golem is to protect wizards as they clear distracting buildings. Get the Golem inside the base. Make sure to get any free buildings left by the hogs with that solo wizards.

Deploy Valkyrie and BK so they make a direct line towards the core. It’s best to choose an attack location that restricts the Valkyrie’s movement this way, having heros in the core will help significantly with this. Drop a jump spell to get your Valkyie to the core quickly.

Once in the core drop freeze spells to lock up the infernos and if possible a hero as well. Drop a rage spell once you’re Valkyrie have breached the core to accelerate the mayhem. Make sure to save a few wizards or train some archers to pick up easy buildings once the core is done. With this strategy it’s easy for your units to become stranded in the core. It’s also sometimes a good idea to save your king for clearing outside buildings if the core will not yield a high enough percentage for the 2 star.

Witches are best in thus combo. With a cleares side and Valks destroying the core, these gals can keep your AQ going.