Clash of Clans Troop Units Explained

Clash of Clans is a strategy game where players build their own armies (clans) and fight against other armies, requiring an internet connection at every stage of the game. Players grow through resources like gold, elixir, gems, and dark elixir to try to beat other players. Armies can also team up with other armies to fight against other armies. There's also a chat feature so you can talk with other players. So, what are the troop units in Clash of Clans? Let's take a look together.

What Are the Troop Units in Clash of Clans? 2022

Barbarian

Defense Strategy

Attack Strategy

Archer

Archers are the 2nd unit in the barracks. They're depicted as a woman with pink hair and sharp eyes. They wear a short, light green dress and cape, a leather belt, and a small attached pouch. Since their attack range is about 1.5 tiles, they're better than Barbarians, but their damage is half as much.

Defense Strategy

Archers provide excellent defense when kept in the clan castle. Since they can hit both ground and air units, they're quite advantageous for hitting flying units.

Attack Strategy

Archers can hit units up to 1.5 tiles away, even behind walls. With just 50 Archers, you can beat many villages at early levels by destroying 50% or the town hall. Since Archers can hit buildings from a certain distance, it's possible to destroy any building by dropping 2 Archers next to it without entering within its defense range. This method can be used especially against collectors.

Goblin

Goblins are creatures with large pointy ears, red eyes, and a small red-tipped nose. Goblins wear brown pants and shoes. They also appear to carry a large sack for hauling resources stolen from enemies. The Goblin is the fastest ground troop in the game. Goblins attack gold and elixir collectors as well as gold and elixir and dark elixir storages. They ignore other units unless those units are completely destroyed first, since after all, they're thieves. Goblins deal double the listed damage to resources, which means 3 times more damage than Archers and Barbarians.

Defense Strategy

Cannons standing behind walls have a deterrent effect against Wall Breakers. They can one-shot Wall Breakers at many levels. When a few Cannons come together, they hurt Giants badly during mass Giant attacks. If we consider the Wizard Tower, which unlocks at later levels, as part of the strategy, it's possible to kill a multi-Giant group faster with the Wizard Tower while the Giants are busy dealing with the Cannon.

Attack Strategy

Goblins are excellent creatures for stealing resources from collectors and storages. Clear the way for them with a Wall Breaker during the attack, because Goblins that get stuck at walls trying to break them can become defenseless. A Wizard Tower or mortar can wipe out a large group of Goblins in a single hit. If you trust your military strength, first try to destroy all of the village's defenses with your other troops. Once the defense falls, you can deploy all of your Goblins to collect loot quickly.

Giant

Giants are massive troops capable of dealing heavy damage to defenses, but since each Giant takes up 5 housing spaces, production can run into some issues. A group of 5 or 10 Giants is enough for a serious attack, but we recommend not using them alone.

Defense Strategy

Having Giants in your clan castle is a good choice for defense. The only downside is that Giants take up 5 housing spaces each, which means your clan castle can hold at most 6 Giants. When Giants come out of the castle during an attack, they damage the attacking troops. Since they have high hitpoints, they don't die quickly and act as a stalling unit.

Attack Strategy

Giants have significantly higher hitpoints than other troops. Since they attack defensive buildings, they can be used to distract the defense. While the defensive units are busy with the Giants, a serious group of Archers or Barbarians can flatten everything. Giants move quite slowly. They also waste a lot of time at walls, so you need to break down walls and clear a path with Wall Breakers. It makes sense to send Archers and Barbarians in after using Giants to bring down the Wizard Towers. The most popular attack method is sending Healers right behind the Giants. Since Healers constantly heal the Giants as they take damage, the Giants become nearly immortal. If the attacked village hasn't invested properly in air defense in time, it's already 100% defeated.

Wall Breaker

Wall Breakers have a skeleton-like appearance, wear a brown aviator hat, and have a small scar over their right eye. They carry a large bomb. When deployed, Wall Breakers blow up the nearest wall by detonating themselves kamikaze-style. Their favorite target, walls, take 40 times more damage from them. In villages without walls to protect, they head toward the nearest unit and deal damage instead.

Attack Strategy

Wall Breakers deal 40 times the damage to walls but can usually be killed in one hit by an Archer Tower or Cannon. To prevent this and distract the defense, you can first send in a few Giants to occupy it; once the defense starts targeting the Giants, the Wall Breakers can blow up the walls easily. After breaking the first set of walls, Wall Breakers head toward the next enclosed walls. When deployed wisely at intervals, they can easily blow up walls and clear a path for your troops.

Balloon

Inside the flying Balloons are the same skeletons we normally use as Wall Breakers on the ground, except this time they're not there to blow themselves up but to drop bombs . The skeletons inside the Balloons fly over defensive buildings and drop bombs to destroy them.

Defense Strategy

Defending with Balloons in your clan castle is generally a good choice. However, Balloons are easy prey for Archers; troops like Barbarians, Giants, and Goblins get easily wiped out by Balloons, which can turn the tide of the battle in your favor.

Attack Strategy

Before attacking with Balloons, units like the Archer Tower, Wizard Tower, and air defense need to be destroyed. Attacks made directly with Balloons alone aren't very effective and can end in defeat. Dragons are much stronger than Balloons. You can first send a few Dragons to distract the air defenses, and use that window to wipe out the whole defense with your Balloons. The worst part about Balloons is their long production time. When you need to attack frequently, you might need to speed up troops with gems. To avoid falling into flying Balloon traps, you can send a couple of Minions ahead to test whether it's a trap. Using a Rage Spell is also an alternative in villages with strong air defense.

Wizard

The Wizard is a magical troop wearing a hooded cloak, a leather belt with a gold buckle, and matching shoes. Just like Archers, Wizards can hit units behind walls, and they have quite high damage. Their worst trait is having so few hitpoints that they can die in just a few hits. They can be more effective when mixed in among Giants, Archers, and Barbarians.

Defense Strategy

When you keep a Wizard in your clan castle, you don't need to worry too much about attacks on your village. Wizards coming out of your clan castle can instantly wipe out attacking troops with their splash damage spell. If the attacker doesn't have a Lightning Spell, or doesn't use it, the defending village will usually come out on top.

Attack Strategy

When a few Wizards come together, they can wipe out many units in just 2 hits. Wizards deal quite powerful damage, but they have so few hitpoints that they die quickly. Because of this, it's smart to send Wizards in from a bit further away while distracting the defensive units with P.E.K.K.A.s or Giants, so they're not a direct target. If you see Wizards come out of the clan castle during an attack, you need to use your Lightning Spell immediately if you have one. Wizards can instantly kill your troops in just a few hits. To avoid this situation, make sure you always have one Lightning Spell ready. Another attack alternative is supporting your Wizards with a Healer in villages where the air defense has been destroyed. Once your already-powerful Wizards become nearly immortal, there's no battle you can't win.

Healer

The Healer is a flying troop with no ability to damage any unit. Its best ability is keeping your troops alive in battle by healing the wounded. When used correctly, you can easily win many battles with a 100% result.

Defense Strategy

If a Healer is kept in the clan castle for defense and there are other troops in the clan besides the Healer, the Healer will heal the troops that come out of the clan castle with it during an attack. If only a Healer is in the clan castle, the Healer will heal your damaged buildings and defensive troops.

Attack Strategy

The Healer is never the first troop sent into battle, but waiting for your troops to get injured before sending it in is a mistake. It's recommended to send it in right behind a group of Giants. The recommended number for that Giant group is 12. You need to watch out for air defenses. The Healer can be easily destroyed by air defenses. For situations like this, you can produce a backup Healer or send two Healers into battle at the same time. Healers can't heal flying units or another Healer. It's worth keeping this in mind during battle.

Dragon

The Dragon is a flying and intimidating troop. Unlike the Balloon, it can attack both air and ground units, and unlike the Balloon, which only hits a single target, it breathes fire over its entire attack range, draining the hitpoints of multiple units at once.

Defense Strategy

Dragons can be kept in the clan castle and used for defense, instantly disrupting your enemy's entire strategy during a raid on your village. It helps to have the clan castle in the middle of the village for the Dragon to act as an effective defender.

Attack Strategy

Using multiple Dragons, it's possible to completely destroy a village, but this isn't recommended much because of the cost. It's generally a method preferred by people looking to push trophies. Producing 10 Dragons at the first level costs 300,000 elixir. That's a figure almost equal to the loot you could get.

P.E.K.K.A

Since no one in-game ever mentions what P.E.K.K.A. actually is, we think it's a robot — from the sound it makes when it dies to its vulnerability to Teslas and its inability to handle electricity, that's a sign to us that it's a robot. P.E.K.K.A. is the last troop unlocked in the game, and its production cost is quite high.

Defense Strategy

It's recommended to place Teslas, which are built to counter P.E.K.K.A. attacks, behind 3 sets of walls. Teslas, which you're allowed to build at level 7, can be upgraded up to level 3. Once you upgrade your town hall to level 8, you're allowed to upgrade your Teslas up to level 6 and build one more Tesla. Generally, more importance is given to other troops, leaving Teslas as an afterthought. Because of this, village owners hit by P.E.K.K.A. attacks are often left just watching their village get flattened. Reminder: P.E.K.K.A.s aren't affected by spring traps.

Attack Strategy

Attacking with P.E.K.K.A. brings a lot of joy. It can flatten many units in just a few hits, and only 3 sword strikes are enough to break through walls. When attacking, it's recommended to send multiple P.E.K.K.A.s across several spots. If you can take down the air defense first, you can heal your P.E.K.K.A.s with a Healer.

Minion

Minions are a fast, cheap, and relatively weak flying troop. They're depicted as flying creatures with sharp claws, rubber-like gloves, large horns, stubby wings, and large hands. Minions can be trained at the Dark Barracks. They spit dark elixir when attacking. Units like Cannons and mortars can't hit Minions, but they're quite vulnerable to air defense, Archer Towers, and Balloon bombs.

Defense Strategy

When your village is raided by Minions, the precautions you take matter a lot. It's recommended to place air bombs wisely at intervals inside your village. Air bombs placed on the outer part of the village can be destroyed by dropping a few Minions. Remember that air bombs deal splash damage and can kill dozens of Minions in a single hit. Another tip is to upgrade your air defenses as much as your town hall level allows. Minions are quite fragile against air defense. The X-Bow, Wizard Tower, and Archer Towers, which can target flying units, are dangerous enough for Minions.

Attack Strategy

Minions are produced with dark elixir, but they're quite cheap. With the dark elixir loot from a few raids, you can mass-produce Minions in swarms. If you're planning to attack with Minions, we recommend sending a few Balloons or Dragons ahead. This way, Minions that avoid air bomb traps can carry the battle forward with ease. If you're attacking with Minions to farm trophies, you can distract the defense by sending a few Giants or Dragons and wipe out the other units with a swarm of Minions to hit 50% quickly. Another method is to continue your regular attack with ground troops, and after destroying units that can hit flying troops, send in your Minions to finish off the remaining units.

Hog Rider

In clans, many players say the phrase "the Hog Rider showed up, chivalry is dead." The reason is quite clear: the Hog Rider doesn't cost much dark elixir, and its training time is just 2 minutes. Flattening a village with dozens of Hog Riders trained in a short time isn't hard at all. The Hog Rider's biggest trait is being able to jump over walls. This made the Hog Rider a popular troop. Players who used Giants heavily up to a certain level start producing Hog Riders instead of Giants once they upgrade their town halls. The biggest driver behind this is that players who see their village flattened by a swarm of Hog Riders think, "hey, that's actually pretty good."

Attack Strategy

If you're planning a heavy attack with Hog Riders, you don't need Wall Breakers at all. However, unfortunately, the Healer is too slow to keep Hog Riders alive. In this case, there's no alternative but to produce a Healing Spell. Support with a Healing Spell and aim to take down the entire defense first, then easily wipe out the remaining units with 10 Archers and 10 Barbarians or Wizards.

Valkyrie

The Valkyrie is arguably the least produced and least used troop in Clash of Clans history. Aware of this, Supercell has lowered the Valkyrie's production cost and raised its damage in recent updates. Despite this, it unfortunately still isn't chosen very often.

Defense Strategy

Keeping Valkyries in the clan castle for defense is a smart idea, because Valkyries have quite high hitpoints. Even if a Lightning Spell is cast on them as they come out of the clan castle, they don't take much damage and keep on defending.

Attack Strategy

One of the smart sides of using the Valkyrie on attack is that when you lure the Barbarian King or Archer Queen out of the village, you can drop Valkyries and stun the heroes in just a few hits. Another strategic method is sending Valkyries onto troops coming out of the clan castle. With their splash damage, you can easily wipe out the defensive troops that come out of the clan castle.

Golem

The Golem is a troop made of stone that's genuinely hard to kill. If the attacked village has an X-Bow, sending one Golem ahead to distract that unit is enough to occupy the entire defense. The Golem also spawns small Golemites when it dies, and these continue to distract the defense as well.

Defense Strategy

Since the Golem's hitpoints are quite high, it's likely to be among the first troops targeted. Afterward, P.E.K.K.A.s and Giants get targeted. If your village doesn't have an Inferno Tower or an X-Bow at level 3 or 4, there's not much you can do. The outcome of the battle is basically down to luck. To avoid falling to attacks like this, make sure to upgrade your X-Bow to level 3 or 4. Reminder: Golems are very heavy creatures, so they aren't affected by spring traps.

Attack Strategy

If you're planning to flatten a village with a Golem, you should send in the Golem after leaving half of your troops for battle. The Golem is a troop that doesn't die quickly and occupies the defense heavily. Once the defensive units start getting distracted by the Golem, you can send in your remaining Wizards, Archers, and Barbarians to bring down the defensive units.

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